Scientific and technological potential and the quality of life of the population: the search for interrelationships

The scientific and technical potential of the regions is the most important socio-economic category, without the development of which the prosperous existence of the country in conditions of high international competition is impossible. The article provides a brief overview of the main methods for measuring scientific and technical potential at the regional level. Based on the analysis results, 8 indicators were identified that characterize the resource and productive components of the scientific and technical potential of the regions. Further, a correlation study was carried out in order to find out the closeness of the relationship between the indicators of the quality of life and the scientific and technical potential of the regions. As factors of the quality of life, 6 indicators were selected that characterize the welfare of the population, the degree of socio-economic inequality, the level of employment and the number of students. The research results revealed some functional relationships between the studied categories. The strongest was the negative correlation between unemployment and the resource factors of scientific and technical potential, in particular, the monetary costs of research and technological innovation, as well as the number of researchers. The greatest correlation dependence on the quality of life indicators, as expected, was shown by such factors of the scientific and technical potential of the regions as the cost of research and the cost of innovation.