Working paper
Велики ли глаза у страха? Страх безработицы и гибкость заработной платы в России
The modernization of Russian society and the transition to a market economy has changed the nature of the problems of social development and employment in different regions of Russia. Regional differences are generated by various factors. Some of these are the result of economic activity, including the free market and free competition. Others are tied in with a series of cultural and ethnic problems, such as some groups being drawn more towards a European culture, while others are drawn to the Asiatic culture. This may help or hinder the regions ability to cope with the modernization of Russia. This is a presentation of the results of a study on work and welfare in Russia, that began in December 1994. The study covers many topics such as poverty, employment or lack of, education, gender, and food consumption, in three areas of Russia: Moscow, St Petersburg and Voronezh.
The article examines differences between two Russian regions – Moscow and Bashkortostan – through the following socio-psychological indicators: perceived social capital, trust, civil identity, life satisfaction, and economic attitudes.
In this paper the public-private wage gap is estimated by means both of the OLS and the quantile regression, which will provide a more complex picture of the distribution of the public-private sector wage gap. The author finds the existence of significant public-private wage gap (about 30%) considering both observable and unobservable characteristics of workers and jobs. Using the decomposition based on quantile regression helps to answer the question about the nature of the wage differences. The author comes to the conclusion that the main reason for the gap is the institutional mechanisms of public sector wages in Russia. The analysis is based on the data from Russian Longitudinal Monitoring Survey (RLMS-HSE) 2000-2010.
The paper examines the structure, governance, and balance sheets of state-controlled banks in Russia, which accounted for over 55 percent of the total assets in the country's banking system in early 2012. The author offers a credible estimate of the size of the country's state banking sector by including banks that are indirectly owned by public organizations. Contrary to some predictions based on the theoretical literature on economic transition, he explains the relatively high profitability and efficiency of Russian state-controlled banks by pointing to their competitive position in such functions as acquisition and disposal of assets on behalf of the government. Also suggested in the paper is a different way of looking at market concentration in Russia (by consolidating the market shares of core state-controlled banks), which produces a picture of a more concentrated market than officially reported. Lastly, one of the author's interesting conclusions is that China provides a better benchmark than the formerly centrally planned economies of Central and Eastern Europe by which to assess the viability of state ownership of banks in Russia and to evaluate the country's banking sector.
The results of cross-cultural research of implicit theories of innovativeness among students and teachers, representatives of three ethnocultural groups: Russians, the people of the North Caucasus (Chechens and Ingushs) and Tuvinians (N=804) are presented. Intergroup differences in implicit theories of innovativeness are revealed: the ‘individual’ theories of innovativeness prevail among Russians and among the students, the ‘social’ theories of innovativeness are more expressed among respondents from the North Caucasus, Tuva and among the teachers. Using the structural equations modeling the universal model of values impact on implicit theories of innovativeness and attitudes towards innovations is constructed. Values of the Openness to changes and individual theories of innovativeness promote the positive relation to innovations. Results of research have shown that implicit theories of innovativeness differ in different cultures, and values make different impact on the attitudes towards innovations and innovative experience in different cultures.
The paper examines the principles for the supervision of financial conglomerates proposed by BCBS in the consultative document published in December 2011. Moreover, the article proposes a number of suggestions worked out by the authors within the HSE research team.