Analysis of the Vologda oblast population's income dynamics

Population’s incomes are one of the structural elements of the economy affecting the region’s socio-economic development. Managing it contributes to the transformation of household financial resources into an investment source aimed at ensuring economic growth. In the Russian Federation, there is currently a great potential for using the population’s incomes for the implementation of structural policies. This task is of special relevance at the regional level, since there is a spatial disparity in this indicator. The Vologda Oblast is among the Russian regions where the problem of increasing incomes of the population is acute. The aim of the article is to study the dynamics of the Vologda Oblast incomes, considered as one of the ways for achieving the region’s economic growth. The study is based on general scientific methods of comparison, generalization, analysis, synthesis. The information base was composed by the works of domestic and foreign economists in the field of methodological and practical issues of generating and using incomes of the population, as well as statistical data from state statistics bodies, and materials from expert studies. The article analyzes the dynamics and structure of the population’s income in the region, its expenditures and consumption, identifies the areas of savings and defines the ways of formation and use of population incomes contributing to economic growth. It is established that the existing society’s differentiation by income is one of the constraints to achieving economic growth and development. A shift in the priorities of the population’s expenditures in favor of paying for services is determined, and it is also revealed that the absence of changes in expenditures on the purchase of non-food goods at the same time indicates that people have to economize. In conclusion, the article formulates measures aimed at increasing the income of the region’s population. The practical significance of the study is that the results of the analysis of the dynamics of per capita cash income and expenses of the Vologda Oblast, the specifics of their use will be valuable to the regional authorities in developing priority areas and adjusting the economic policy in the field of the population’s living standards.