Article
Нужен ли российской экономике человеческий капитал? Десять сомнений
Positive impact of human capital on economic growth seems to be undisputable but its magnitude depends on to what extent high quality education and skills are demanded and valued by the labour market. This essay argues that lack of demand for human capital cannot be cured by growing supply if other things remain intact. The author formulates 10 doubts concerning human capital absorption in the Russian economy. The doubts, supported by statistical and anecdotal evidence, relate to low quality of the Russian institutional environment which limits demand for labour and distorts its structure.
This paper puts forth a comprehensive set of measures to address the current economic crisis, prevent its further aggravation and ensure sustained and ongoing development of the Russian economy. In this study we seek to adopt the viewpoint of common sense and keep free from political and ideological bias. This is why we believe the proposed solutions should be implemented by any reasonable government irrespective of its political coloration. This text presents our vision of the Russian economy and its problems.
The modern concept of modernizing Russia somehow reproduce the history of the theory of innovation. The theory of innovation in its development has gone through a least 3 stages. In the first phase (1910 - first half of the 40s) to the forefront issues of understanding the nature of innovation and their role in the development of society over time (long, medium and short periods), the relationship of innovation and long cycles conditions. This period is associated with the names of J.A.Schumpeter, M.I.Tugan-Baranovsky and N.D. Kondratieff. The second stage in the development of innovation theory (second half 1940 - first half of the 1970s) is characterized by the increased role of macroeconomic analysis, in turn, he has at least two substages: the first of which was dominated by the ideas of neo-Keynesians, on the second-neoclassical. The third stage of development of the theory of innovation began in the mid-1970s and proldolzhaetsya to the present. It is characterized by an offensive alternative approach to macroeconomic theory. With a certain degree of conditionality is also possible to distinguish two substages. The first (second half of the 1970s - early 1990s) is characterized by the emergence of new ideas drawn from evolutionary theory, institutionalism (the theory of the firm) and management (innovation management). In the second substage (mid 90s) innovations studied by the methods of systems analysis. The authors are increasingly focused on issues of comparative studies: a comparative analysis of innovation policy in different countries, study the ways and means of forming an effective innovation systems. In the report it is critically considered not only the official point of view, but also M. Porter, K. Ketels work “Competitiveness at the Crossroads: Choosing the Future Direction of the Russian Economy”. Also «The forecast of innovative, technological and structural dynamics of Russian economy till 2030» and RAND Corporation report “The Global Technology Revolution 2020: Trends, Drivers, Barriers, and Social Implications” are analyzed. In this paper institutional preconditions and possibilities of application of the concept of social market economy in the 21st century Russia were analyzed. Basic elements of social market economy are personal liberty, social justice, and economic efficiency.
The Working Paper examines the peculiarities of the Russian model of corporate governance and control in the banking sector. The study relies upon theoretical as well as applied research of corporate governance in Russian commercial banks featuring different forms of ownership. We focus on real interests of all stakeholders, namely bank and stock market regulators, bank owners, investors, top managers and other insiders. The Anglo-American concept of corporate governance, based on agency theory and implying outside investors’ control over banks through stock market, is found to bear limited relevance. We suggest some ways of overcoming the gap between formal institutions of governance and the real life.
The general aim of this thesis is to explore the gendered and classed nature of social work and social welfare in Russia to show how social policy can be a part of and reinforce marginalisation. The overall research question is in what ways class and gender are constructed in Russian social work practice and welfare rhetoric through Soviet legacies and contemporary challenges? In addition, which actors contribute to the constitution of social work values and how this value system affects the agency of the clients? This study focuses on contradictory ideologies that are shaped in discursive formations of social policy, social work training and practice. It is a qualitative study, containing fi ve papers looking at this issue from three different perspectives: policy and institutions, culture and discourse, actors and identity. The data collection was arranged as a purposive–iterative process. The empirical material consists of qualitative interviews with social work practitioners, administrators and clients, participant observations in social services and analysis of documents of various kinds.
Economic crisis started in 2008 forced companies in Russia to move from growth and expansion to reduction and restructuring. The article presents the main changes at top managers’ labor market from the beginning of crisis in Russia. The original data on top managers’ mobility in Russia from late 1999 till 2009 was used. The main result of the research is that there were no big changes in Russian top managers’ labor market during the crisis years (2008–2009). The most significant change was the increase of firm’s demand for specific human capital of top managers and the decrease of demand for general human capital.
The article considers the processes of progress in production and service sectors and answers the question how and thanks to what service sector of Russian economy left the productive one behind (concerning contribution in GDP of our country). The rates of development of service sector turned out to be so high firstly - as a reason of peculiarities of new Russian economy, which historically was built on the market principles and was developing in conditions of investment resources deficit, secondly - as a reason of system differences between «physical» goods and services as an object of sale. Nowadays Russia faces an unusual symbiosis: effective service companies, operating in hard competitive sphere with average profitability and non-affective from the point of management industrial companies, which thanks to monopolistic pricing have great profitability, providing profits of Russian budget and determining a macroeconomic situation.
Institutions affect investment decisions, including investments in human capital. Hence institutions are relevant for the allocation of talent. Good market-supporting institutions attract talent to productive value-creating activities, whereas poor ones raise the appeal of rent-seeking. We propose a theoretical model that predicts that more talented individuals are particularly sensitive in their career choices to the quality of institutions, and test these predictions on a sample of around 95 countries of the world. We find a strong positive association between the quality of institutions and graduation of college and university students in science, and an even stronger negative correlation with graduation in law. Our findings are robust to various specifications of empirical models, including smaller samples of former colonies and transition countries. The quality of human capital makes the distinction between educational choices under strong and weak institutions particularly sharp. We show that the allocation of talent is an important link between institutions and growth.
This chapter is an output of a research project implemented as part of the Basic Research
Program at the National Research University Higher School of Economics (HSE).
2 . With the exception of medical facilities belonging to privatized enterprises.
3 . Fundholding of a primary care unit is a scheme of public health care funding that provides a virtual budget to a primary care unit (general practitioner, outpatient clinic, etc.) for purchasing selected clinical and diagnosis services, such as minor surgery, physiotherapy, and common endoscopic procedures (Langenbrunner et al. 2005). Th is scheme creates incentives for increasing effi ciency of primary care and for containing excessive supply of diagnostic and inpatient services. Fundholding is used in the United Kingdom and Estonia, as well as in some Russian regions (Kaliningrad, Samara, and Perm).
Smoking is a problem, bringing signifi cant social and economic costs to Russiansociety. However, ratifi cation of the World health organization Framework conventionon tobacco control makes it possible to improve Russian legislation accordingto the international standards. So, I describe some measures that should be taken bythe Russian authorities in the nearest future, and I examine their effi ciency. By studyingthe international evidence I analyze the impact of the smoke-free areas, advertisementand sponsorship bans, tax increases, etc. on the prevalence of smoking, cigaretteconsumption and some other indicators. I also investigate the obstacles confrontingthe Russian authorities when they introduce new policy measures and the public attitudetowards these measures. I conclude that there is a number of easy-to-implementanti-smoking activities that need no fi nancial resources but only a political will.
One of the most important indicators of company's success is the increase of its value. The article investigates traditional methods of company's value assessment and the evidence that the application of these methods is incorrect in the new stage of economy. So it is necessary to create a new method of valuation based on the new main sources of company's success that is its intellectual capital.