Economic and Social Changes: Facts, Trends, Forecast @volnc-esc-en
Статьи журнала - Economic and Social Changes: Facts, Trends, Forecast
Все статьи: 1745
Статья научная
The economic significance of the problem of preserving and strengthening the health of shrinking child population as an important component of reproductive, labor and human potential requires the search for and development of mechanisms to manage risk factors. We present sample results of a multi-year monitoring study of child health in the Vologda Oblast for 25 years of research (1998- 2022). The purpose of our research is to evaluate the degree of risk to the health of preschool children caused by certain factors on the part of parents. The research methodology is the intracohort method of data analysis on 1,454 children from five cohorts (1998, 2001, 2004, 2014 and 2020 years of birth) by calculating the relative risk index. The scientific novelty is a comparative analysis of the influence of age, health and hazardous working conditions of future parents on the child health in the pre- and postnatal period. We have found that young maternal age is often a risk factor for child health, while mature maternal age increases the risk of cesarean section and delayed neuropsychological development in children by the age of 7. In contrast, father’s young age acts as a protective factor during intrauterine child development, but increases the risk of disease development in the future. Mature father’s age creates risks of congenital abnormalities of the cardiovascular system, but its negative effect is mitigated later on. We assume that the reason for this lies in the higher level of material wealth, medical literacy, and responsibility of aging parents. Parents’ hazardous working conditions have a deleterious effect on the child health after birth, and on the maternal health in the prenatal period as well. A complicated obstetric history of previous and current pregnancies is the most significant risk factor on the maternal part. Her chronic diseases showed no association with abnormalities in the child health, the exceptions are obesity and thyroid dysfunction. In contrast, father’s complicated obstetric history demonstrates a strong association with intrauterine fetal development disorders, the use of surgical childbirth, congenital abnormalities, the low Apgar score for the newborn, and child’s disease in the future. Practical significance of the work lies in emphasizing father’s role in the formation of child health and preparing recommendations for the prevention of child health disorders taking into account the data on the risk factors of both parents.
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Статья научная
The article presents the results of the study on the performance of the region’s schoolchildren of the final stage of the All-Russian Olympiad over the past 10 years, based on the open data of the Ministry of Education and Science of the Russian Federation and the Vologda Oblast Department of Education. The article reveals the Oblast to be the country’s leader in the Olympiads training efficiency. The groups of disciplines are distinguished by the results achieved (high, average, low). The article provides information on educational institutions that trained the largest number of winners. The article outlines key problems on the Olympiads training and proposals for improving the region’s performance results in the All-Russian Olympiad.
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Статья научная
The article considers the processes and results of privatization of enterprises taking place in the Arctic regions of the Russian Federation in the period of 1991-2010. The authors study the aspect concerning the redistribution of influence (financial, political, etc.) between companies and the state, and between different levels of power. A conclusion has been made that the 2000-2010 period faced the intensification of transition from the direct intervention model, when the government acts as a regulator and entrepreneur, to the principles of indirect management.
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Passive behavior of the government. Budget problems are aggravating in the regions
Статья научная
Despite a number of reforms, the current multi-level budgetary system does not fully correspond to the development strategy of the country and its regions. Still the Russian Government has not taken effective measures to address the main structural contradiction of the budgetary system, based on the non-adequate distribution of revenue and expenditure responsibilities, manifested in the sharp decline in the revenue base of territorial budgets during the 2009 global financial crisis. However, the crisis effects have not been analyzed and the conclusions have not been made. The Ministry of Finance of the Russian Federation tried to solve the problem of territorial budgets imbalance not by enhancing existing mechanisms of revenue distribution at the regional level, but by granting large-scale loans to be repaid after 2012. Despite it, due to the sharp rise in the social burden1, the deficit and the debt load enlarged and resulted in the budget crisis in the regions. The experts of the Higher School of Economics state that 20 RF subjects, having the level of public debt above 80%, had been actually in default2 by the end of 2014...
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Patterns of birth rate and reproductive behavior of Russian female population: current trends
Статья научная
The article analyzes changes in the patterns of birth rate and female reproductive behavior in the period from 2000 to 2018. The object of the research is reproductive behavior, which is a system of actions and relationships aimed at giving birth to a certain number of children or refusing to give birth. The subject of the research is demographic and socio-economic aspects of the relationship between the need for children and the conditions of realization. The purpose of this paper is to consider current trends of birth rate and reproductive behavior, taking into account demographic, economic, and social factors that affect birth rate. The novelty of the study is the usage of an interdisciplinary approach based on the synthesis of demographic and economic theories that explain changes in reproductive behavior. The article analyzes the dynamics of demographic and socio-economic indicators, highlights the characteristic features inherent in certain patterns of Russian female population reproductive behavior for the period from 2000 to 2018. The results obtained in the course of the study demonstrate fundamental restructuring of the system of values associated with the birth and upbringing of a child. The decline of crude and total birth rates, shifts in the age structure of birth rate, the focus on one- or two-child family pattern, the increase of an average maternal age at birth indicate a prevalence of economic and social benefits over the birth of more children. In practical terms, the results presented in the article can serve as a basis for future interdisciplinary research in birth rate area and be used as a methodological and informational base for developing demographic policy measures aimed at stimulating birth rate.
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Patterns of population's self-preservation behavior: research approaches and building experience
Статья научная
As countries make their epidemiological transition, the contribution of behavioral risk factors to population’s health is increased; they include challenges of low physical and medical activity, diet and sleep violations, imbalance of work and rest, tobacco and alcohol consumption, and high stress loads. In Russia, the situation is complicated by incomplete epidemiological transition, as well as increased morbidity and mortality from endogenous and quasi-endogenous causes. The purpose for the article is to analyze methodological approaches to studying the self-preservation behavior and build models describing it for the population of the Vologda Oblast. Russian scholars A.I. Antonov, V.A. Borisov, I.V. Zhuravleva, L.S. Shilova, G.I., Ivakhnenko, T.V. Shushunova, and A.E. Lugovoy attempt to highlight the patterns of self-preservation behavior taking into account all or some of its elements (needs, attitudes, motives and actions), but not considering them in a single system...
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Pension reform and exacerbating issues of the legitimacy of the government
Статья научная
In the first months of the new political season, which began after the March 2018 Presidential Election, the Government adopted and is currently discussing measures that received a very negative response from Russian society and many experts, especially against the background of election campaign promises and long-term goals of internal development that Vladimir Putin set out in his Address to the Federal Assembly on March 1, 2018. The greatest public response was caused by a draft law on raising the retirement age, although it should be noted that it is not the only one in the list of controversial administration decisions that bring to the fore the issue of compliance of state policy with the national interests or, in other words, the legitimacy of the government. The paper discusses scientific, theoretical and historical foundations of the legitimacy of the government. We present data on Russian national and regional studies of public opinion, indicating Russians’ growing discontent with the first steps of the Government in the new political season coinciding with Putin’s last (according to the Constitution of the Russian Federation) presidential term...
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Статья научная
The article presents an experience of a structured study of a special socio-economic phenomenon-corruption - in the aspect of its perception by different groups of population of a region. The study was conducted by Kostroma regional branch of the Russian Society of Sociologists in several stages: civil servants of the Kostroma Oblast Administration were interviewed in 2015, an online survey of university graduates of the city of Kostroma was conducted in November 2016, and finally, surveys of representatives of the business community1 of the Kostroma Oblast were conducted in 2017. The goal of the survey was to assess the perception of corruption as a socio-economic phenomenon; the assessment was carried out through analyzing and interpreting the data obtained in the course of the surveys on the following topics: assessment of the level of corruption in general, perception of the level and dynamics of corruption, and possible ways to overcome corruption, according to respondents. Having interpreted the results of the survey we reveal the attitude of different target audiences toward the understanding of the phenomenon of corruption, its causes, and ways to combat it. In the context of the decree of Russian President Vladimir Putin “On the national anti-corruption plan for 2018-2020” signed June 29, 2018, the data we have obtained become particularly relevant for the development of sociological research techniques to assess the level of corruption in constituent entities of the Russian Federation (Section I, Paragraph 1, Letter “a”) and to conduct scientific interdisciplinary studies, the results of which can be used to prepare proposals aimed to enhance anti-corruption measures and increase the efficiency of such measures in the business sector (Section V, Paragraph 21, Letter “b”).
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Perception of higher education: a public or private good?
Статья научная
The social benefit of higher education is one of the most important reasons for its being funded by the state. However, within the context of liberal economic policies, the perception of education as a private good and, therefore, the necessity of supplying it by the market has brought about a decrease in the state participation in higher education in many countries. Therefore, this study aims to determine whether students studying at public and foundation universities, differentiated according to financing, perceive their university education as a public or private good. In a sense, this study aims to examine whether different financing methods in higher education affect students’ perception of higher education as a public good. In this study, the data collected from the students were tested within the scope of structural equation modelling, and the hypotheses put forward were confirmed. This study demonstrated that higher education is perceived as a public good by all university students whose financing method differs. According to the results obtained, students who are direct buyers of higher education services in universities that differ according to the financing method do not differentiate in terms of perceiving higher education as a public good.
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Статья научная
In recent years, the ecological capital becomes the factor that has important influence on the economic development. To establish the ecological capital operation performance evaluation model and to make comprehensive measurement of regional ecological capital operation, we can effectively measure the regional ecological and economic coordination degree and provide relevant basis for formulating the regional economic development and environmental protection policy. In general, there are few scholars making research on ecological capital operation; and also there are some disputes on the connotation and mode of ecological capital operation. Therefore, on the basis of domestic and foreign scholars’ research, and taking Poyang Lake Eco-economic Zone in China as an example, the regional ecological capital operation performance evaluation index system was established from three dimensions including economic value, ecological value and social value in this paper. The paper combines the expert evaluation with objective weighting method and entropy evaluation method to jointly confirm the index weighting, then to construct the regional comprehensive capital operation index, therefore to perform empirical analysis of regional ecological capital operation...
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Performance-based pay - a new (mixed) payment scheme for Russian civil servants
Статья научная
We have developed a fundamentally new approach to the provision of financial incentives (bonuses) to civil servants, which does not contradict the concept of new public management (NPM) and has a certain similarity with the corporate (Asian) performance-based type of remuneration system. In the context of our study, “performance” means socio-economic development of Russian regions. We develop and test our methodology in two successive stages: first, we carry out a retrospective assessment of the level of development of Russia's constituent entities (according to regional statistics), and then we calculate the amount of bonuses paid to civil servants according to their performance. Based on the level of socio-economic development, we solve the problem of clustering of Russian regions with the use of neuromodeling. The prognostic function is implemented on the basis of neural network technologies (through the development of appropriate Bayesian ensemble of dynamic neuromodules)...
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Platform employment specifics in Russia: what the data of workers’ online profiles indicate
Статья научная
The article discusses platform employment issues and aims to systematize and provide an overview of current knowledge about the state and structure of platform employment in Russia. It also aims to assess the position and status of platform workers based on previously published research, new official statistical data, and the results of our own empirical research using data from the digital platform Profi.ru for Moscow and the Moscow region as of 2023. To achieve this goal, the following tasks were addressed: systematizing available estimates of the platform labor market in Russia, analyzing the primary statistical data from Rosstat on platform employment, and creating a profile of a typical Russian employed person in this segment. Approaches to studying employment on digital platforms were also tested by downloading open data on platform workers directly from the platforms' websites in order to enrich statistical data and gain a better understanding of platform employment specifics. We conclude that the platform employment structure is institutionalized within social practices and is gradually approaching the general employment structure in terms of basic socio-demographic characteristics. However, it still has its own unique features. For example, the average age of platform workers is lower than that of the overall employed population. Platform workers are predominantly male and urban residents. At the same time, platforms, particularly those providing physical services on a local level, are characterized by a predominance of traditionally vulnerable groups in the labor market, such as women aged 20-29 and 3039 with young children, students, and young people without work experience. Migrants and individuals without professional qualifications are also overrepresented among platform workers. Data from the Profi. ru website indicates that these workers are mainly employed in the informal economy. More than 10% of the profiles on the platform in question are "false", that is, they belong to organizations, teams, or groups of performers (formal or informal) rather than individuals.
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Policy priorities in the health protection sector of a northern region
Статья научная
The article is devoted to the modernization of the health of a northern region (the example of the Murmansk Oblast) and the promising directions of implementing its own policies in the health protection sector at a regional level. The article gives the analysis of the medical and demographic situation in the Murmansk Oblast, as well as the main priorities of the modern regional policy in the health protection sector. It identifies the priority directions of the policy in this sector, requiring implementation at federal, regional and local levels.
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Political blackmail - the eve of the global catastrophe
Статья научная
The article by the leading Russian sociologist and political scientist, who has been studying Russia-U.S. relations for decades, raises an acute issue concerning the necessity of immediate cessation of confrontation between the U.S. and Russia and transition to joint control over the processes going on in the world, and establishment of the multipolar model of the global community. The author provides numerous examples of interaction between the superpowers and the newly emerged countries, former Soviet republics; he shows that particular threat comes from the quasi-states of the former USSR, who seek to fuel the U.S.-Russian confrontation for their own selfish purposes. This policy was manifested especially clearly in the actions of the “Maidan” authorities in Ukraine, who launched the armed terror against its own people in the East of the country to accommodate the U.S. interests and the NATO alliance controlled by this country. The author believes that the response of Russia to such hostile actions of the USA and their Ukrainian proteges should be adequate; it should be composed and peacekeeping, but when the “red” line is crossed - hard and adamant...
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Статья научная
The paper discusses some features of the source of social entrepreneurship as a new form of business organization, aimed at implementing social objectives in the context of strengthening neoliberal trends in economic policy and economic theory, rather than at maximizing the owners’ profit. It is demonstrated that, remaining within the framework of the neoliberal ideology which retains its influence in the economic science, it is impossible to create an adequate theory explaining the importance of social entrepreneurship in the context of the process of changing paradigms of economic relations, since under the influence of this ideology false stereotypes are established, which is accompanied by falsification of historical facts. In this context it seems that the methodology of political economy, taking into account the current trends in the transformation of socio-economic relations and the deviation of the trend of social development from the framework of the formally preserved, but declining neoliberal paradigm, is very popular, especially since its problem areas include issues such as the distinction between individual and social forms of production, the relations between the necessary and surplus product, the distribution of surplus value (in case of its occurrence), the issues of individualization and socialization of economic phenomena, the correlation between market and non-market production areas and distribution of the final product, the issue of recognizing the social significance of the result of individual labor...
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Polycausal concept of social evolution
Статья научная
The article puts forward a polycausal concept of social evolution (PCSE) based on taking into consideration the structure of the competition mechanism. The novelty of the PCSE lies in the simultaneous consideration of a set of interrelated variables of the competition mechanism that exclude the establishment of simple cause-and-effect relationships typical of monocausal theoretical constructions. A structural scheme of the PCSE includes the subject, object, environment and the process of competition; all of them are directly associated with such civilizational phenomena as technology, institutions, culture and ecosystem; together, these variables determine the nature of economic growth and the type of capitalist (market) relations. This approach can be called a method of structural (organizational) competition. To illustrate the PCSE and test its explanatory capabilities, we look for answers to the following classic questions: Why has human civilization matured in Eurasia rather than in other continents? How did humanity manage to break out of the Malthusian trap? How can we explain the Needham Puzzle? Why are some countries and peoples rich, while others are poor? Why do some poor countries and peoples manage to catch up with rich ones, while others do not? How can we explain the “case of the USSR”? The proposed PCSE is used to reconstruct key events in the history of human civilization. For this purpose, we put forward a structural outline of social evolution, which includes basic principles and mechanisms that determine certain results of the development of human societies. In conclusion, we make an attempt to use the PCSE to designate reference points of a modern civilizational crisis.
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Population health of large cities: trends and risks
Статья научная
The article considers the problem of forming and maintaining the health of the population living in the big city by giving an example of the cities of Vologda and Cherepovets. Based on the correlation analysis the factors having both positive and negative effects on the health of the population of large cities have been identified. With an allowance for intensive development of urban areas at the present stage the author has outlined the main priorities of the activities on maintaining the health of urban populations.
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Population inequality and its impact on the region's socio-economic development
Статья научная
The article is written on the basis of the study of the population's inequality effect on economic and demographic indexes of the Vologda region in the period of 1997 - 2007. The authors carried out a statistical evaluation of the effect of normal and excessive inequality in gross domestic product and indicators of mortality and fertility. The economic and social losses from the population's inequality in the region are identified.
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Population migration as a factor in Belarus demographic security
Статья научная
The article presents a brief description of the demographic situation in the Republic of Belarus in the beginning of 21st century. It indicates the special role of migration in reducing negative demographic processes. The curb on natural loss of population, the impact on its gender and age structure and the rate of aging, as well as the formation of the total population increase in the administrative units of the Republic are regarded as important social aspects of the external migration of the population of Belarus.
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