Russia is not running out of new soldiers to send to the meat grinders in Ukraine:

The main sources of data on new recruits signing up are federal and regional budget spending reports, which include a separate section on bonuses paid for signing military contracts. The sizes of the bonuses paid at both the federal and most regional levels are a matter of record, which makes it possible to estimate the numbers of new military recruits on at least a quarterly basis. Based on these data, over the past two years, the Russian armed forces and associated private military companies have recruited 30,000–40,000 contract soldiers every month, or 1,000–1,300 people per day.

Meanwhile, recruitment is becoming increasingly expensive. The federal authorities doubled their payments back in 2024, while the regions, which are set recruitment targets by Moscow, drastically increase signing-up bonuses during periods of candidate shortages and reduce them again once quotas have been met. While the federal budget can still afford to do this, these expenses are becoming a significant burden for the regions.

Regional budgets are increasingly in debt, but their collapse is not imminent. The regions are cutting spending on other, “lower priority” items. The central government is providing top-ups from the federal budget to offset some of these costs.