Monetary income of the Russian population in 2013-2018: results of the changes in the Rosstat methodology

The Object of the Study: population monetary incomeThe Subject of the Study: standards, differentiation and structure of the population monetary incomeThe Purpose of the Study is assessing the dynamics in the main characteristics of the Russian population monetary income as a result of the changes in the Rosstat methodologyThe Main Provisions of the Article. In 2018 Rosstat changed the methods of calculating the macro-economic indicator of population monetary income by separate income sources and published new data on per capita monetary income of population for Russia and RF subjects, as well as distribution series for RF population by per capita monetary income in 2013-2017. Alongside this, they began to estimate inequality in household income using the data from the Sample Survey of Population Income (SSPI) instead of the Household Budget Survey (HBS) used before. The article provides a comparative analysis of the level, composition and differentiation of the monetary income of the Russian population calculated by both old and new methods. It has been found out that significant changes took place only in the structure of population monetary income, and mainly in such income items as work remuneration of employees and other cash receipts. Average per capita income of the RF population changed slightly (±1%), while in separate regions the difference makes (± 5-10%). There is no significant disparity in the level of income differentiation of the RF population. The author presents calculations of the differentiation of the RF population monetary income based on the data from the Sample Survey of Population Income for 2016. It shows how the distribution of population by per capita monetary income changes with different estimation of the population within the range of the minimum per capita monetary income.