The traditionally high level of both fundamental science and education of the population is taken into account.

It is no coincidence that therefore the main components of the national innovation system are the reproduction of knowledge, primarily the conduct of fundamental research, and the training of scientific personnel and specialists in the organization and management in the innovation field. Joint efforts of science and education, various forms, including organizational and legal,

fruitful cooperation between universities and academic institutions, good personal ties - all this and much more can make an important contribution to solving the problem of increasing the welfare and power of our country and each of its citizens.

It is easy to see that the plans mentioned above, the tasks that life objectively sets before our society, are designed mainly for young people and for their future.

N. M. Rimashevskaya

SOCIAL VECTOR OF DEVELOPMENT IN RUSSIA

The radical social transformations taking place in Russia, which are undoubtedly of a civilizational nature, have so far affected mainly the economic aspects of the life of the country (privatization of property, marketization of production relations, the formation of labor markets, housing, and services). If any actions were taken in the social sphere, they were either wrong or ineffective in terms of solving social problems. This could not but lead to an aggravation of the disproportions in the economic and social aspects of the transformation processes. The policy of the federal authorities strictly followed the requirements of the Washington Consensus, based to a greater extent on the economic paradigm, within which the

Rimashevskaya Natalya Mikhailovna -

corresponding member RAS, director

ISEPN RAS.

the solution of problems in the social sphere was postponed “until later”, when a steady growth in social production, GDP and national income would be obvious. Such an attitude of the Russian young reformers, professing the purest liberalism, based on the already outdated concepts of the processes of globalization, turned out to be not only extremely harmful to Russian society, but also pulls it “backward”, hindering, among other things, economic development. Both Russian and foreign experts have long formulated the framework of the “post-Washington” consensus, reflecting a new stage in the dynamics of globalization processes, allocating a fundamentally different place to social policy and social infrastructure designed to ensure social security and social protection of the population (“social safety nets”) one. Market reforms were actually carried out "from above", without using the necessary

1 Nekipelov A. D. Influence of globalization on the re-location of resources in transitional economies // Problems of the theory of management practice. - 2003. - No. 2; Stiglitz J. Diverse tools, broader goals: moving towards a post-Washington consensus. Voprosy ekonomiki. - 1998. - No. 8.

social shock absorbers. Having "shock therapy" as a starting point, the authorities did not take care of taking into account and preventing negative social consequences. Crisis phenomena flourished in the social sphere, dangerous not only in practical terms, activating the protest potential of almost all groups of the population. They block economic development, actually slowing down the pace of its dynamics, increasing the negative factors affecting the market economy. This primarily concerns the formation of a high-quality workforce capable of adapting to the tasks of post-industrial development in the context of the information society. A ten-year discussion about what is "primary" and priority - economic dynamics or the solution of social problems, has finally lost all meaning. There were negative changes in the living conditions of the population in all spheres of its activity, which could not but affect the condition of people, their behavior and the quality of human potential. The population has entered such a phase of depopulation that, provided that trends in the field of demographic reproduction continue, the onset of irreversible consequences regarding the decline in the number and deterioration in the quality of the Russian people becomes dangerous. The current situation is such that the economy, with all its components, must, first of all and without delay, guarantee to each citizen a certain minimum of well-being, measured by a set of social standards, and not at the level of rhetoric that has tired everyone, but in real provision. Otherwise, it is doomed to stagnate or roll back.

The activation of the social functions of the state, in addition, requires the “social contract” fixed in the current Constitution (Article 7) of the country, according to which the Russian Federation is a social

a state whose policy is aimed at creating conditions that ensure a decent life and free development of every citizen of the country. Thus, the mechanism for consolidating the state, business and society around the goal - the growth of well-being is determined. The social market state, contributing to the development of entrepreneurship and, thereby, activating economic development in conditions of democracy and liberal relations, provides minimum social guarantees, a policy of economic justice, support for vulnerable groups of the population and social protection of citizens. Obviously, all this is not only alien and incompatible with state paternalism, but, on the contrary, is aimed at creating conditions for each family to choose an individual strategy of behavior, as well as the most effective forms of life.

Russian neo-liberals carried out reforms, and their epigones continue to do so today, guided by the principles of the Washington Consensus, which demanded: a) absolute freedom of the domestic market and the prevailing prices on it; b) the speedy integration of the country into international structures in all areas; c) macroeconomic balancing (regardless of the situation in the country) as the main priority in financial policy; d) privatization of all types of property and withdrawal of the state from the sphere of regulation of economic relations. At the same time, the authorities sought to implement reforms as soon as possible, without considering and assessing the consequences of a social nature. For those who were so blindly and meekly guided by Western models far from Russia, it would be more useful to use the country's historical experience and recall the words of Alexander II, which he said in connection with the preparation of measures to free the peasants from serfdom. He unequivocally stressed "that the nobility in the name of society, Russia must sacrifice part of their benefits."

And further - "the abolition of serfdom in no case, even at the first stage, should not worsen the life of the peasants, but, on the contrary, even improve it." This is how the Russian tsar raised the issues of reform, in contrast to the Russian liberals, who left the population without heat and light.

The economic and social vectors of the country's development came into sharp conflict with each other. And no matter what positive indicators the state statistics on the economic and social development of the country record, it is clear that this “growth” is determined by an extremely low initial level, when GDP production and real incomes of the population fell by 2-2.5 times against what was in pre-reform Russia 2. The average indicators of real income growth should not be misleading either, since today they make up only half of what the population had in 1991. In addition, average indicators in the conditions of the existing polarization of living standards are capable of creating illusions of well-being, in contrast to reality.

Let's try to consider and analyze the current situation by answering the following questions: how have the living conditions and characteristics of the population changed as a result of the reforms? Who won and who lost among the citizens of the country? How and why do “formal institutions and real practices” diverge and oppose? What should have been and what have not been done by the authorities? What urgently and urgently should be done in the social sphere, including to neutralize wrong and harmful decisions?

Two preliminary remarks that are necessary for a correct assessment of the factual material used below.

2 Russia: 10 years of reforms. Socio-demographic situation / Ed. N.M. Rimashevskaya. - M.,

First note. All provisions and conclusions presented below are based on the data of the State Statistics Committee of the Russian Federation and are commented on by them. This does not mean that they are "blameless". On the contrary, many claims can be made against them related to clarifications of a methodological nature; but this is largely a different matter of thought. When using the indicators obtained by the State Statistics Committee of the Russian Federation, one should constantly keep in mind that the existing assessments of social phenomena and trends proposed by individual experts are very different, and each percentage point related to the total population today amounts to almost 1.5 million people. Thus, the Goskomstat of the Russian Federation defines the proportion of poor citizens as 25% of the total population3, the World Bank - 27%, and ISEPN - 33%4. If the State Statistics Committee does not have relevant information, then we use our own estimates.

The second remark concerns significant differences in socio-demographic indicators across the regions of the country, their deviation from the average Russian data and trends. The territorial aspect will be fully considered in a special section.

According to the estimates of ISEPN RAS, and not only, as a result of the implementation of economic reforms, about one fifth of the Russian population has benefited to date, and the remaining four fifths

The popular majority-mostly lost. But to varying degrees: some more, others less. Conventionally, we consider those who have managed to adapt, integrate into market structures and find themselves in a stream of upward mobility as "winners". Since all social relations have changed radically - from top to bottom and

3 Socio-economic situation in Russia. VII, 2003 - M.: Goskomstat. - S. 233.

4 Rimashevskaya N. Man and reforms. Secrets of Survival. - M., 2003. - S. 29.

from left to right, then no one was left without changes.

Changes in the conditions, level and quality of life of the country's citizens were transformed into socio-economic problems, and the people of Russia found themselves in captivity of five acute problems that caused three equally acute demographic consequences. Among them should be highlighted:

A high share of the poor group of the population, including the “social bottom”, with an extremely “meager” poverty line;

Unprecedented social polarization, determined by the differentiation of wages and incomes, cash savings, differences in property and housing provision;

Significant unemployment and to this day existing non-payment of wages;

The degradation of social security, including the pension system, and the actual destruction of the social sphere, which is rolling along the old rails, but has lost the nature of free and generally accessible.

The exacerbation of socio-economic problems affecting the main aspects of human life have led to violations of the dynamic stereotype of higher nervous activity, which, in turn, causes a weakening of the immune defense, the development of pathological processes, depression and other mental disorders. The state of "wear and tear" of the population leads to the fact that the generation of children does not reproduce the generation of parents, not only quantitatively, but also qualitatively. This reduces the population, destroys human capital, posing a threat to national security. Ultimately, the current situation caused a natural decline and depopulation, a decline in the quality of each next generation, and inefficient external and internal migration.

1. Social consequences of economic reforms

“Shock therapy” led to the fact that the population with their monetary incomes ended up in a deep “pit” and with weak hopes to get out of there in the coming years. Indeed, in 2002, real incomes only reached the level of 1997, while the level of 1991 is still far ahead of 5.

1.1. Falling wages. The main factor behind the two-fold decline in living standards is inadequate wages. Contrary to the current Constitution and the provision of the Labor Code, the minimum wage today is just over a quarter of the subsistence minimum (PM), while one-third of workers (20 million people) and two-thirds (about 40 million people) earn less than the minimum wage. receive wages that do not provide a living wage for the worker and his child. In addition, the ratio of the average wages of the 10% of the least and most paid is 30 (!) times 6.

Due to the fall in wages to the level "below the lowest" limit, she ceased to perform:

Reproductive function, tk. does not provide even a simple reproduction of the labor force of the worker himself;

Economic function, because does not stimulate the motivation of quality and high labor productivity;

Social function, because causes the disintegration of society due to the existing differentiation in wages.

At the same time, one cannot ignore the widespread use of hidden forms of wages, which in 2000, according to the State Statistics Committee of the Russian Federation, amounted to 27.7% of the total fund7.

5 Russia: 10 years of reforms. Socio-demographic situation. - M., 2003. - S. 139.

6 Statistical Bulletin No. 9 (93). - M., 2003. - S. 35-36.

7 Russian Statistical Yearbook. - M.: Goskomstat, 2003.

1.2. Poverty and misery. The second, no less acute socio-economic problem is the impoverishment and poverty of the Russian population. At the UN session devoted to the problems of "Copenhagen + 5", which was held in Geneva in 2000, it was determined that a standard of living below $ 1 per day per person is defined as poverty, and in the range of $ 1-2 - as poverty . Of course, these are only rough estimates, because. the poverty line significantly depends not only on living conditions (for example, north-south), but to a greater extent - on the economic situation of the country. And in Russia it is still different in the territorial context.

In 2002, the poverty line in the country was one and a half times lower than what existed in 1991, and amounted to 1,800 rubles. or $60 per month, or $2 per day, which, according to the UN recommendation, applies to developing countries. The income distribution shows that:

the proportion of the poor fell to a quarter of the total population (36 million people);

half of the country's citizens have incomes of less than $4 a day, or $120 a month per capita;

a tenth of the population is not provided with income, even at the level of the food basket, which takes up half of the subsistence minimum budget.

Several specific features of poverty in Russia should be noted, namely:

About half of the children are in poor families;

A layer of the so-called “new poor” has formed, representing those groups of the population who, in terms of education, profession, and social status, have never been low-income before; in a significant part, these are the working poor, when their earnings do not provide not only a decent lifestyle, but even biological survival;

Two forms of poverty have emerged - "sustainable" and "floating": the first, as a rule, perpetuates poverty, because those who are born as permanently poor remain so throughout their lives; the second form is much rarer and refers to those poor people who make incredible efforts and "jump" out of the social circle in which they have fallen.

There is a process of feminization of poverty, determined by a complex of socio-demographic factors:

a) 97% of incomplete families are a mother with children; b) low wages most often affect women; c) the level of pensions for women is significantly lower than for men.

The structure of poverty in Russia is significantly determined by its factors, namely: one third (approximately) is associated with low wages, which are below the LMW for a third of workers; another third - with an inadequate level of pensions, which is still below the minimum wage for a third of pensioners, and the rest are the so-called traditional poor, i.e. single mothers with children, families with many children, the disabled and families of the disabled, families with the unemployed.

Poverty, unemployment, economic and social instability intensify the process of marginalization of the population. As a result, a social layer of paupers appears, as a result of downward social mobility, which forms the so-called "social bottom", including beggars, "homeless", homeless and neglected children, street prostitutes.

1.3. social polarization. The most severe consequences of economic reforms are associated with social polarization in society, which is based on differentiation in wages, incomes, material security, savings, property of citizens, and, above all, housing. On one territory, in fact, “two Russias” arose, opposing and moving away from each other, if

judge by their behavior, orientations, preferences. Representatives of the "two Russias", without intersecting in everyday life, speak different languages ​​and do not understand each other well. Two living standards have emerged with their own incomes and monetary units, two consumer markets that differ in prices and a set of consumer goods. Two layers of citizens are formed from childhood on the basis of alternative forms of upbringing and education. This is all the more dangerous because the "country" of the rich and the very rich, as well as the well-to-do, actually includes the political elite.

In order to correctly assess the problems of economic stratification of the population and the existing inequality, it is necessary to emphasize the specifics of their formation in Russia.

First, the state of polarization of the population arose, one might say, overnight, unnaturally quickly, as evidenced by the dynamics of income differentiation indicators. For 5 years (1989

1994) the decile coefficient increased by 2.5 times with a 2-fold decrease in income 8. This is an unprecedented change that could not remain without consequences.

Secondly, the monstrous polarization arose as a result of the “shock therapy” of 1992 and was marked by its growth throughout the 1990s; since 2000, the dynamics of income differentiation has only slowed down in pace, but not reduced.

Thirdly, social polarization in Russia is a consequence of multifaceted and heterogeneous adaptation, which, by definition, cannot proceed at a rapid pace, and most importantly, various sections of the country's citizens have specific resources for this. According to our estimates, today only one fifth of the population has integrated into the new market relations, one quarter, due to their personal characteristics, does not

8 Russia: 10 years of reforms. Socio-demographic situation. - M., 2002. - S. 143.

will be able to adapt, and the rest (more than half) are still hesitant.

Fourthly, Russian society has transformed in an extremely short period of time from an egalitarian one with an ideology of equalization in all directions into a highly polarized one, approaching in this respect the countries of Latin America.

The mechanisms of formation of social polarization of the Russian population include the following components.

First of all, it is an unprecedented differentiation of wages. From the pre-reform period to the present, it has grown 5 times 9; as well as unprecedented gaps in actual size: the ratio of average incomes in the 10 percent extreme groups is 30-40 times.

But wages are the foundation upon which the market components of inequality are formed. And here the income distribution becomes the main one, which shows that in 2003 the decile coefficient of funds is 14.2 times, the Gini coefficient exceeds 0.4, the decimal differentiation coefficient reaches 8.2 times, the ratio of incomes of the "top" and "lower" 5 % of groups reaches at least 50 times. At the same time, the “top” 20% group of the population owns 46% of the total income fund, while the “bottom” group owns only about 6%10.

No less important in the formation of social polarization is the distribution of savings (cash savings), which, according to our research, is significantly higher: half of the population has no more than 2% of savings, and 2% of the “very rich” own half of the accumulation fund; while 40% of households do not have any savings at all p.

9 Russia: 10 years of reforms. Socio-demographic situation. - M., 2002. - S. 116.

10 Socio-economic situation in Russia, VII, 2002 - p. 230.

11 Savings of the population of the Russian Federation. Analytical report. - M., 1997. - S. 34-35.

However, the most significant differences are in the area of ​​housing provision. A thin layer of apartment-owners has luxury housing of huge size and luxurious amenities, including cottage buildings. At the same time, one third of the housing stock is deprived of basic communal amenities, and a quarter of families have a living area of ​​less than 9 square meters. m per person. According to the State Construction Committee of the Russian Federation, 77% of the Russian population needs to improve their living conditions.

The structure of incomes of various groups of the population indicates that economic inequality has developed primarily as a result of the redistribution of property. In 1990, 76.4% of the total income of the population was wages, and 6.2% - income from property; in 2000, the share of earnings decreased to 61.4%, while the share of income from property increased to 23.0%, i.e. almost 4 times. In fact, the share of wages decreased by 15 percentage points, while the share of income from property increased by 16.8 percentage points. How many “departed” from some, so many “arrived” from others 12.

The gap between the rich and the poor, which has arisen as a result of social polarization, embitters people, excites aggressive moods in the family and in society, destroys Orthodox values, disorients young people, disintegrates the population as a whole and negatively affects health.

1.4. All types of unemployment. The fourth socio-economic problem

This is unemployment in all its forms and non-payment of wages, which can be considered as "quasi-unemployment". Its sharpness in Russia is associated to a large extent with some "novelty", perhaps not so much in form as in scale. involuntary unemployment

12 Social status and standard of living on-

villages of Russia. - M: Goskomstat, 2001. - S. 103.

existed in the era of the planned economy, but it was a structural imbalance in the distribution and use of predominantly labor resources, and for the sake of ideologically consistent rhetoric, the principles of economic efficiency were violated.

The Employment Act of 1994 legally formalized the status of the unemployed, while in order to avoid monstrous numbers, different estimates of the number of unemployed were used:

number determined according to ILO methodology;

the number of registered unemployed;

* the number of those receiving unemployment benefits;

* number of partial unemployment;

* number of hidden unemployment.

And all this - different people and different

indicators.

The economically active population in 2001 was 70.9 million people, i.е. 49% of the total population of the country. Of these, 64.66 million were employed in the economy (91.1%) and 6.3 million (8.9%) did not have a job, but were actively looking for it (unemployed according to the ILO methodology). 1.1 million people were registered with the state employment service. or 17% of the unemployed; an even smaller proportion of them received unemployment benefits

1.0 million people or 15.9% 13. With regard to partial and hidden unemployment, here, in the absence of statistics, only expert estimates can be used, according to which its size ranges from 5 to 10 million people.

An analysis of the phenomenon of unemployment in Russia allows us to draw a number of conclusions regarding the nature of employment:

> The risk group includes: young people, men and women of pre-retirement age, demobilized from military units; employees of military enterprises

13 Ibid. - S. 71.

industrial complex; migrants and forced migrants (excluding labor migrants); women with young children.

> There is a steady trend of expanding "stagnant" unemployment, when able-bodied citizens are deprived of a stable job for more than a year.

> Unemployment is one of the factors in the formation of poverty; one fifth of the poor is determined by it.

> The state of employment and unemployment differs significantly in the regional aspect and depending on the specifics of settlements.

> Unemployment in Russia is accompanied by an increase in vacancies, one part of which is occupied by labor migrants from the CIS, and the other part remains unclaimed due to the lack of necessary professional training among those who want to take jobs.

The development of a real labor market is possible only with a real, not a virtual housing market, which in Russia is still in its infancy. Our population mainly looks for work where they live, while in a developed market a person lives where he works.

1.5. Social Security. And, finally, the fifth socio-demographic problem is related to the deformation of social security and social infrastructure. We are talking about the pension system, health care, education and housing and communal services.

Since 1990, the pension sector has been constantly reformed. However, despite the steps taken, including the transition to the so-called funded system, the principles of organizing pensions remain the same to this day and represent the worst version of distributive relations that crossed out the insurance bases that are most acceptable for Russian conditions. This is evidenced by the main characteristics of pension provision:

The catastrophically low level of pensions, which in 2001 amounted to 1024 rubles. per month (or 34 dollars, or 1 dollar per day), which in relation to the average wage reached only 32%, and with the subsistence minimum - only 90%; the minimum pension was 474 rubles, i.e. 41% of PM; meanwhile, the law originally provided for the size of the minimum pension at the level of the subsistence level of a pensioner,4;

The size of the pension is weakly or not at all linked to the level of remuneration of the worker and his length of service; differences in the level of pensions15 today are 1:1.6 for the extreme 10% groups of pensioners against 1:32 for the same wage indicator; the pension has actually turned into a social benefit paid to almost everyone equally, without taking into account the length of service and insurance payments;

Until recently, an extremely high difference in the amount of pensions was established for working and non-working pensioners, in favor of the latter; meanwhile, working people actually compensate for their pensions with payments to the pension fund and, as a rule, take unattractive jobs;

~ use of a part of payments to the pension fund for transformation into a funded pension model and payment of pensions only after at least 10 years; in addition, a significant part also goes to the pensioner who did not earn it, but to the payment of the basic pension, which can be received by a citizen who either did not work at all or has a very short work experience; only half of the payments in

14 Social status and standard of living of the population of Russia. - M.: Goskomstat, 2002. - S. 174.

15 Rimashevskaya N. Man and reforms: secrets

survival. - M., 2003. - S. 32.

Pension Fund. In 2001, the level of pensions compared to 1992 was 23% lower16.

1.6. Deformation of healthcare and education. The practice of strictly state organization of health care in the Soviet era had a number of significant shortcomings, the main of which is the low efficiency of the industry in terms of the health of the nation as the goal of its functioning; however, every citizen and at any time could receive the necessary medical care free of charge. Today, the old system turned out to be virtually destroyed, and the new one has not yet acquired any definite features, while efficiency has not increased, and the free provision of services is being reduced more and more. This is evidenced by the following facts:

> The existing system of medical services has largely lost free of charge for consumers. According to 1997 data, state funding of total health care expenditures was 45%, 39% was covered by households, including payments to private health insurance and shadow payments, 16% fell to the compulsory health insurance fund, contributions to which are made by the employer and Essentially, there are deductions from the employee's earnings.

> There is a high differentiation of the conditions, quality, scale and nature of medical services provided to the population by various institutions, regardless of the sources of their funding. According to 1999 data, the first decile group (the poor) spent 1% of the total amount of the population's expenditures on medical services, and the last (the rich) - 35.0%17. Thus

16 Statistical Bulletin, No. 8(82). - M.: Goskomstat, 2001. - S. 120.

17 Social status and standard of living of the population of Russia. - M., 2000. - S. 142.

Therefore, differences in spending on health services are higher than the overall differentiation in final consumption.

> With formally free medical care, citizens often refuse hospitalization due to the inability to pay for the relevant services. The high and ever-increasing cost of medicines and care is causing about a quarter of the population to deprive themselves of medicines and medical services.

> The prevailing prices have led to the fact that only 1.0% of total expenses for medical services and 0.4% for health-improving measures fall on the poorest 10%, while on 10% of the richest - 35 and 63%, respectively eighteen.

During the period from 1990 to 2001, the number of preschool institutions decreased by almost 2 times19, mainly due to the inability of enterprises to support them, if they were departmental organizations, and parents' refusal to provide this type of service due to high fees, which hurts hit primarily low-income, large families and single mothers. At the same time, private pre-school institutions with a high cost of services (up to $100 and more per month) have emerged. They are used by about 5% of children from the most affluent families. The proclamation of free school education does not prevent the fact that about 2 million 20 children of school age do not attend school; 3% of children study in private educational institutions; parents pay extra for textbooks and teaching aids, for maintenance, school security, for children's food and extra classes. In the field of higher and secondary specialized education, there are two strategies for paying for the services provided: the first one is

19 Social status and standard of living of the population of Russia. - M.: Goskomstat, 2002. - S. 333.

20 On the situation of children in the Russian Federation.

2000. State report. - M., 2000. - S. 44.

in principle paid education, the second

Payment for certain types of services in the system of free education (it covers 40% of students). Constant dis-

The expansion of paid education is perceived pessimistically by citizens, whose incomes still tend to decrease. 60% of families with school-age children believe that they will not be able to pay for their children's education in universities 21.

1.7. Depopulation. The results of a decade of reforms influenced and could not but affect the processes of demographic reproduction.

According to preliminary data from the 2002 All-Russian Population Census, 145.2 million people live in Russia. The natural decline between the two censuses amounted to 7.4 million people, of which 5.6 million were offset by a positive migration balance, i.e. the real decline in numbers is only 1.8 million people.22 The all-Russian natural decline originates in 1992, the year of the intersection of the birth and death curves, and it is not yet clear when they would change their direction during the current century. Currently, migration compensation has decreased to 4%, and the dynamics of the Russian population depends entirely on the ratio of births and deaths.

And the situation here is not as rosy as we would like, as evidenced by the following data:

e" the absolute number of births over the past 15 years has decreased by almost 2 times

From 2.5 million in 1987 to 1.4 million in 200223

the total fertility rate today is 1.25, while to ensure simple reproduction, 2.15 is needed - this is largely determined by the effect of depopulation 24;

21 On the situation of children in the Russian Federation.

2000. State. report._ M., 2000.

22 Statistical Bulletin No. 1(94). - M.: Goskomstat, 2003. - S. 222-223.

23 Demographic Yearbook of Russia. - M.: Goskomstat, 2002. - S. 55.

24 Ibid. - S. 94.

o for various reasons, society is steadily oriented towards a one-child family;

o there is a decrease in the absolute number of women of the reproductive contingents;

c” had a certain impact on the timing shifts in fertility, as a result of which women fulfilled their reproductive plans in the 1980s;

about there is a postponement and refusal of births due to a systemic crisis and political instability;

at the same time, unfortunately, up to 20% of married couples, according to expert estimates, are infertile;

h> and about 30% of births are illegitimate, which negatively affects the health of those born 25.

These factors are superimposed on global trends in the decline in fertility. In Russia, there is not only a natural population decline (in recent years, 900-950 thousand people per year), but also the comparative level of depopulation turned out to be higher than in other European countries with a declining population, with the exception of Ukraine. In terms of the total fertility rate, Russia is among the third of the countries with the lowest values ​​of this indicator 26.

The situation is even more dramatic in the area of ​​mortality:

The overall mortality rate in Russia is steadily rising, in contrast to aging European countries;

The number of deaths during the year is 1.7 times higher than the number of births27;

Russia differs from all developed and developing countries in the supermortality of men, especially in working age, as a result of which it has the lowest life expectancy in Europe - 58 years 28.

25 Ibid. - S. 149.

26 Ibid. - S. 389.

27 Ibid. - S. 55.

28 Ibid. - S. 391-392.

For the period from 1992 to 1999. the dynamics of mortality was determined by the interaction of economic and social factors that were typical for Russia at that time. The increase in mortality from 1992 to 1994 inclusive was influenced by the "shock" of the beginning of reforms, the events of late 1991 and 1993, which brought with them extraordinary shocks. Decrease in mortality in 1995 - 1998 did not have any economic basis, but is consistent with the assumption that the psychological adaptation of society to new social realities is problematic. The limit of the adaptation period was set by the economic crisis of 1998, after which the increase in mortality began again. The change in social status and the associated increase in psychological stress were the most important factors that determined the dynamics of mortality in Russia in the 1990s.

If the current level of mortality remains unchanged, among Russians who reached the age of 16 in 2000, less than half of the men will live to be 60 years old. The life expectancy of today's men aged 25 and over is equal to or less than the 29 they had at the end of the 19th century, despite the fact that the life expectancy of those born at that time was 29 years, and today is twice as high.

The increase in mortality is based on factors that were caused by the systemic crisis, namely: the “breakdown” of the dynamic stereotype of higher nervous activity, which caused a weakening of the immune defense, the development of pathological processes, depression, and hence the increase in suicides and alcoholism, the spread of drug addiction; inaccessibility of effective medicines for the main part of the population; deterioration in balance and diet; disregard for norms

29 Population of Russia for 100 years (1987-1997): Stat. collection. - M., 1998. - S. 167.

30 Ibid. - S. 164.

occupational health and safety; the “liberalization” of road traffic, which caused an intensive increase in deaths from road traffic accidents31; falsification of food and alcohol imported into the country.

Infant mortality, despite its decline in 2002, amounted to about 13.3%o, i.e. 3-4 times higher than in developed countries32.

At present, in terms of life expectancy, Russia firmly occupies a place among the underdeveloped countries. The situation does not look so gloomy (among Asian countries 16th out of 50) only when compared with African states. It can be said that in Russia at the end of the 20th century a unique mode of population reproduction developed: European fertility and Afro-Asiatic mortality33.

Forecasts of the total population of Russia by various organizations indicate that in 2025 there will be only 125 million people in our country, and about 100 million people in the middle of this century, i.e. the number will decrease by 45 million people.

1.8. Decline in the quality of the population. The second significant consequence of the transformation processes, which affected the state of the population, is the decline in its qualitative characteristics in three main groups of indicators: 1) health (physical, mental, social); 2) intellectual potential and professional readiness; 3) spiritual and moral values ​​and orientations.

There is an increase in the incidence, especially for diseases of social etiology (tuberculosis, syphilis, AIDS/HIV, hepatitis). Forecasts show that

31 Health care in Russia. - M.: Goskomstat,

32 Russia in numbers. - M.: Goskomstat, 2003. -S. 70.

33 Rybakovsky L. Applied demography. - M.,

2003. - S. 153-154.

2010 8-11% of the population will be infected, and this is about 13 million people. - Predominantly among young people. In the first half of 2003 alone, 16,307 HIV-infected patients were identified34. According to international experts, Russia is at the stage of a concentrated HIV epidemic. A quarter of HIV-infected women are women of the most active reproductive ages. This means that HIV infections can lead to direct demographic losses. Drug addiction is growing exponentially, especially among children aged 11 to 17. The number of drug addicts is estimated at 4 million people; 70,000 people die every year from drugs.

Especially dangerous is the decline in reproductive health. The proportion of pregnant women suffering from anemia has increased by 3.6 times over the decade. As a result, the birth of already sick children increased by 2.6 times, in which the health potential only decreases with age. The main concern is the fact that the generation of children has less health potential than their parents, and their children (grandchildren of parents) have even less potential. Already at birth, 40% of children are sick. Thus, a “social funnel” arises, where the younger generation is increasingly drawn in: health problems move from older population groups to groups of children and youth. In order to get out of the "funnel", if it is still possible, more than one generation is needed.

In terms of healthy life expectancy, Russia is in 107th place. Its expected duration in men is 51.5 years, and in women - 61.9 years. Since 1999, there has been an intensive increase in the number of people with disabilities (by about

1 million people in year). The total number of in-

34 Socio-economic situation in Russia. VII. - M.: Goskomstat, 2003. - S. 261.

Valids was about 11 million in 2001, and according to forecasts, it will increase to 20 million in 2015, with a population of 134 million, i.e. will be 15% against 7.5% today35.

The decline in intellectual potential, as a result of a direct "brain drain" and the transition of professionals to other sectors of the economy, as well as admission to foreign companies, continues, although with less intensity. It, unfortunately, is supplemented by a decline in the quality of school and vocational education, which is typical for educational institutions in rural areas and small towns.

No less acute are the problems of the crisis of social values ​​and orientations, the decline of morals and moral principles based on the lack of law and order and violation of the law. In the mass consciousness, there is a process of "erosion" of the norms of morality characteristic of Russian culture. Pragmatism, a focus on personal gain, reflecting the American model of interpersonal communication, is becoming more widespread.

2. The need for a "sharp" turn towards social reforms

By the end of the 1990s, especially after the 1998 default, it became obvious that it was no longer possible to continue the formation of the market in Russia without paying attention to the position and condition of the country's citizens. However, the neoliberal ideology professed by the ruling structures did not allow an adequate response to social challenges. The main focus of the social actions of the Government from the very beginning ("shock therapy") and to this day was focused on reducing the level of social obligations of the state, which actually contradicts the Constitution, which defines the Russian state

35 Social status and standard of living of the population of Russia. - M.: Goskomstat, 2002. - S. 304.

social.

What should be commented on from the decisions made in the field of social reform?

Firstly, the introduction of a flat tax scale on income from individuals, directly directed against the poor and low-income groups of the population, since for them:

The tax rate increased from 12 to 13% and

The tax pressure has increased, which previously was twice as high for the low-paid.

In addition, the flat scale exacerbated social polarization and destabilization in society, widening the income gaps between the bottom and top 10% from 14 to 17 times.

Taking into account the unified social tax for those who earn up to 30 thousand rubles. per year, the fee was 48.6% (i.e., almost half), but those who receive more than 600 thousand per year pay only 15% (13 + 2%) in general 36.

Secondly, the introduction of a unified social tax (ESS) actually crossed out the emerging insurance system with off-budget funds. As a result of this “transformation”, the contributions of entrepreneurs, actually paid from the payroll fund, were transformed into a regular state tax that goes to the federal budget, which forced to freeze wages.The UST becomes the property of the state and therefore actually loses its target orientation, directly helping the state budget, if necessary, to the detriment of the interests of the population.

Thirdly, the introduction of the funded principle into the pension system by slowing down the growth of pensions for existing pensioners. In fact, the cumulative model has a dual purpose: a) the final

36 On the way to a welfare state. The concept of the welfare state AT and SO. - M., 2003. -S. 31.

justification for the reduction of existing pensions, the allocation of a "basic" pension in the labor structure, paying it to a large extent at the expense of "insurance" contributions made by entrepreneurs; b) the accumulation of "long" rubles under the auspices of the state to use them as an investment resource.

Fourthly, the housing reform conceived by the authorities is aimed not so much at correcting the deplorable state of this sector, but at its disposal a housing subsidy fund, which is close to the pension fund in size, and its use will be even less transparent.

Fifth, the reform in the field of education, led by the unified state exam. In the conditions of today's Russia, where a third of schools not only do not have a set of teachers, but they lack running water, sewerage, and heat and electricity in winter, students in such schools do not receive a standard of knowledge, and the quality of their education is an order of magnitude lower than that required by the Unified State Examination. The unified state exam turns out to be a guarantee of privileges for children studying closer to the “center”, with all modern amenities and computer classes.

Sixth, the introduction of targeted social assistance, the effectiveness of which is close to zero. And there are two reasons for this when it comes to cash transfers: 1) benefits in the income of the population today are only 2%; 2) administrative costs in determining the right to social assistance will significantly cover their amount, opening up a new source for corruption of officials.

Pursuing a purely liberal policy, the state is concerned only with the economic situation of big business, actually neglecting the conditions for the survival of the main part of the population, which cannot but destroy the national potential of the country and increase the pro-test resource. At the same time the state

"wear and tear" of the population leads to the fact that the generation of children does not reproduce the generation of parents, not only quantitatively, but also qualitatively. This reduces the number of citizens in the country, destroys human capital, posing a threat to national security. There is a disintegration of social ties and a weakening of social potential, which is comparable to the process of depletion of nature in the absence of activities to restore it.

2.1. To the establishment of social justice. All that has been said about the social consequences of economic reforms leads to the urgent need for a decisive and radical turn towards the implementation of social reforms in order to implement the dual task of ensuring the social protection of the population and transferring the social sphere to market "rails". Moreover, the real marketization of social relations and social sectors, to everyone's pleasure, will reduce government social spending without worsening the material situation of the population.

The situation in the social sphere requires an immediate deep maneuver in the direction of a particular person, a positive change in the conditions and standard of his life, opportunities for social and professional development. Social reform involves resolving the most acute problems in order to prevent a threat to social security and "saving" the Russian people, expanding the adaptive capacity of the population and forming a middle class as a guarantor of social and political stability, comprehensive support for the family as the main social institution that contributes to the expansion of demographic reproduction and acts as a support for the formation of "private" person. The main task of social reform

A response to social challenges that have led to a deterioration in the condition of the population.

The social sphere includes citizens of the country, on the one hand, as a subject of social activity in the main spheres of society, and on the other hand, as an object of the state's social policy at all levels of its implementation. The population interacts with industries that produce social services and shape the social ecology, i.e. ensuring the quality of social life itself in the context of reproduction and the state of the population. Among the sectors of the social sphere, the main place is occupied by health care, education, social and housing and communal services. An organic characteristic of the social sphere is social relations determined by the system of social insurance, pension provision and social protection of the population.

The ultimate goal of the socio-economic transformations taking place in the country is to improve the quality of life not only on average, but also for all strata and groups of the population, for every citizen, and above all for those who are beyond worthy living conditions. The basis for achieving this goal is intensive economic growth within the framework of structural reforms. Social restructuring will activate economic development primarily by improving the quality of the labor force, including improving its physical, mental and social health, as well as high intellectual and educational potential, spirituality and morality. Sociocultural factors of maintaining the prestige of a high level of education and participation in creative activity that have developed in the country are becoming essential. Intellectuality and spirituality are still quite significant for the majority of the country's population. Equally important from the standpoint of economic growth is the expansion of the domestic consumer market for goods and services associated with the growth of household incomes.

2.2. To increase the value of labor and labor motivation. One of the main factors in the increase in GDP is a system of radical increase in labor motivation, focused on all groups and strata of the population: youth and the elderly, highly and poorly educated, engaged in physical and mental labor, entrepreneurs and employees, social elite and bureaucracy. Without the activation of the activity of every able-bodied person, there can be no economic development and growth of well-being. It is necessary to overcome the polarization of incomes and wages that have arisen as a result of Russian methods of economic liberalization. Hyper-differentiation of income becomes an active stimulus for trade and intermediary and financial activities, promising quick and ultra-high profits, but reduces the interest in participating in the real economy, science, education, undermining public morality, asserting purely mercantilist values, intensifying criminalization and social isolation in society. There are two main conditions for the activation of labor: the provision of opportunities for vertical mobility for everyone and the growth of the prestige of education, professionalism, and creativity. Both conditions can only be met on the basis of a reduction in social polarization. The main factor in the growth of human capital as a factor in GDP growth remains the effective development of education and healthcare.

The goals of social policy today and for the coming years are determined by the current situation in society as a result of a decade of economic reforms. Analysis of what is happening allows us to identify two main directions.

The first direction is focused on amortization of the negative social consequences caused by economic transformations. Ignoring the social component from the very beginning of economic

transformation has become the main brake on effective change and the crisis in general. Economic and social processes have entered into a sharp confrontation with each other; the social component began to impede and block economic transformations. The active dissatisfaction of a significant part of the country's citizens endangered the social security of the state. The way out of this situation required, on the one hand, a broad and multifaceted adaptation of all groups of the population to market conditions, and on the other hand, social protection for those who have not yet integrated themselves or are not capable of this at all.

The transformations taking place in Russia affect the deepest, civilizational foundations of society in the sense of changing models and regulators of social activity. The functioning of economic entities is moving to market rails, the main feature of which is private entrepreneurship and private ownership of the means of production. The usual norms of social relations are being destroyed, the system of values ​​is changing, when old stereotypes are discarded (but not by all), and new ones are just being formed. Thus, the egalitarian principle of "equality in poverty" is not accepted by the majority, but the emerging polarization of incomes (due to its irrational scale) cannot be perceived as a social norm. Rather, on the contrary. The rich (“new Russians”) are assessed by the population in a predominantly negative way; and more and more imperative is not just regulation, but the redistribution of income in favor of the poor and the very poor (poor), which, among other things, should be directed by social policy.

Significant changes also concern the official attitude to the value of labor. If in the Soviet society labor was considered as the first value (“a matter of valor and heroism”) with an orientation

population - to live in order to work, then today the positive principles of labor

Quality, qualifications, professionalism are losing public recognition to a large extent, especially if we consider its payment as a public assessment. After all, incentives to work have weakened primarily due to low wages.

The expansion of adaptive opportunities is a serious basis for supporting and forming the middle class of Russian society as the foundation of market relations and guarantees of social and political stability. The socio-economic stratification of Russian society today can be represented in the form of a classical pyramid, in which the higher the economic status, the thinner the layer. In fact, it should get a "pear-shaped" form, where the proportion of the rich will reach 10%, the poor - no more than 20%, and the middle class, with its upper stratum, - 70%.

The second target area is focused on overcoming the newly emerged and exacerbated socio-demographic problems, described in detail in the first part of the article. Seven problems (challenges) and seven answers to them.

First, the problem of increasing the real incomes of the population, the main source of which is the growth of the minimum and average wages; following the increase in wages, the level of pensions will inevitably increase. The minimum wage must not be below the working-age living wage, and pay gaps must not exceed the corresponding income-related indicators. The gaps in income and wages are in a one-to-one correspondence. Only under such conditions will wages fulfill their reproductive function, ensuring the restoration of the labor force, its economic function, stimulating motivation to achieve high quality.

labor and the introduction of innovative technologies, its social function, realizing fair distribution conditions, and finally, the “reformist” function, contributing to the implementation of reforms and restructuring of wages, including in the social sphere.

Secondly, overcoming poverty and poverty of the population from the position of the minimum consumer budget, which implies not only the physical survival of a person, but also the satisfaction of the necessary set of social needs of the country's citizens, providing them with a decent life. The state must fight the processes of marginalization of the population, the formation of a "social bottom" in society, as well as the feminization of poverty, which is expressed in the growth of the proportion of women below the poverty line.

Thirdly, the problem of the monstrous polarization of the living standards of the population, which led, on the basis of hyper-differentiation of incomes, to the formation of a deep social divide. The decrease in differentiation in wages, incomes, property security will take place on the basis of the intensive formation of the middle strata of the population, which form the main subject of solvent demand, which underlies economic growth. The absence of these layers blocks the development of the domestic market and segments it: at one end, an elite demand is formed for predominantly expensive high-quality imported goods, and at the other, low-grade cheap goods, which are again satisfied mainly by imports, which negatively affects domestic production. The stagnation of the economy leads to a crisis in investment activity, and the capital accumulated by the elite strata of society goes abroad; domestic production is falling, the number of jobs is being reduced, the incomes of the bulk of the population are declining, the process is becoming self-regenerating.

produced character. The main effect of the decrease in polarization is the consolidation of society, the urgent need for which is increasingly felt.

Fourth, it is the problem of unemployment and non-payment of wages. The fight against unemployment should also concern its registered part, as well as regulatory, hidden and partial. Risk groups deserve special attention. The main task is not only to increase the effectiveness of state assistance to the unemployed at the level of social benefits, but mainly by integrating them into new relationships. A decrease in unemployment guarantees against the disqualification of professionals, the aging of labor potential, the constant stress of the population and the destabilization of social relations.

2.3. To the effective development of health care and education. Fifth, the need to reform social infrastructure sectors, including pensions. In the latter case, the task is to make the transformation of existing pension payments strictly dependent not only on the level of wages, but also on the length of service.

Health care activities should be brought into line with the requirements of the Constitution on free medical care, providing it with state guarantees, broad social insurance, and accessibility for the entire population of assistance from qualified doctors. The motivation of medical personnel to provide quality treatment should be significantly increased, the allocated budget funds should be expanded to maintain the network of state medical institutions and unique specialized centers.

In the field of education, it is necessary to fully implement the constitutional rights of citizens, taking into account

power transfer and this industry on the market rails.

There are extremely serious tasks in the field of housing and communal services, where the housing stock and basic utilities are worn out by more than half. Reforming this extremely important area of ​​people's lives requires not only serious state resources, but also a wide time frame.

Sixth, the problem of natural population decline and depopulation, which most acutely manifested itself after 1992, requires special attention and its immediate solution, not only (and not so much) in the context of an increase in the birth rate, but on the basis of a decrease in mortality, which since the early 2000s gg. again tends to increase, especially since at the same time the replacement of natural population decline by migration growth is seriously decreasing.

And, finally, the seventh problem is focused on stopping the decline in the quality of human potential, which today is characterized by a decline in the health of each next generation. This is all the more important as innovative technologies require a higher quality workforce today than yesterday.

2.4. To overcome social polarization. The implementation of social reforms in Russia is based on the following principles, without which they cannot be successful.

> The main condition is a systematic implementation format, parallel and interconnected restructuring in the main segments of the social sphere. It is impossible to reform the pension system, leaving wages unchanged, because. the first organically depends on the second. Employees with inadequate wages (below the subsistence minimum and below the minimum pension), going on a well-deserved rest, will receive a pension at the expense of insurance payments of other insured people;

it is impossible to raise wages in the field of education, freezing it in the field of health care, because it will only increase the already unjustified differentiation.

> In conditions of monstrous polarization, the ideology of social reforms cannot but have a redistributive character. The mechanisms for redistribution are taxes and the social insurance system; its goal is to reduce differences in material security and to establish a social structure adequate to market relations, which should include not only the poor and the rich, but also the active "middle" - the middle class.

> Activation of local governments, charitable communities, social initiatives as important components of civil society, where a special role belongs to the municipal level of government, which is closest to a particular person. Social policy, including social protection, is implemented “on the ground”, while the state policy is designed to create a reserve for the future, support the restoration and renewal of specialized social institutions based on the values ​​of freedom, justice, human solidarity and mutual assistance. Part of the work on the implementation of social programs should be assigned to self-organizing social institutions, including their formation in the business environment, for the participation of business in humanitarian actions.

> Optimal interaction between federal and regional authorities is of paramount importance, and the cardinal problem of social policy is the definition of the boundaries of their mutual responsibility. The presence of a significant number of regions that use federal subsidies exacerbates this problem. It is necessary to abandon the extremely centralized system associated with decision-making exclusively in the Center. On the other hand,

rony, unjustified differentiation in social security should not be allowed; population density in different territories of the country, because the development of this trend leads to the undermining of the fundamental foundations) of social justice, affecting the main rights of Russian citizens. It is necessary to constantly take into account the regional specifics in such a vast territory.

» With regard to the technology of building a social program of action, as well as to the development of strategies and tactics within the framework of social policy, it is necessary to establish a segregation of activities over time, bearing in mind that: a) reforming the social sphere requires a long period (at least 10 years); b) the whole set of measures focused on various segments of this area is being implemented “in parallel”; c) it is necessary to distinguish between strategic and tactical measures, which should not only not contradict, but support each other.

Finally, gender and national-ethnic aspects of the state of the population should be strictly taken into account. This refers primarily to the elimination of all forms of discrimination against women, the provision of equal opportunities for their social activities, as well as the socio-cultural development of all ethnic groups. As for the gender aspect of social transformations, strategic and tactical steps should overcome all types of vertical and horizontal segregation (breaking through the "glass ceiling" and "glass walls"), have a clear focus on reducing gender asymmetry in Russian society.

2.5. To reform social protection. The main instruments for implementing the social protection of the population and reforming the social sphere are reduced to three: a) minimum social guarantees provided by the state; b) an expanded and expanding system of social insurance;

c) taxes as a way to reduce the differentiation of wages and incomes.

Minimum living standards are not a matter of debate. This is a social imperative. They must be given the highest priority, they must be brought to the attention of every person. The functioning of the social protection system is based on a social consensus regarding fundamental values ​​that determine acceptable levels and security of access to the means of meeting basic needs and realizing fundamental rights. Minimum social guarantees include at least the following standards: living wage, minimum wage, minimum social benefits (pensions, allowances, scholarships), minimum free education, primary health care program, the right to basic housing.

An integral part of the social protection of the population is a comprehensive mandatory system of state insurance against social risks (loss of work, illness, old age, loss of a breadwinner), the set of which is determined by the legislator. In modern conditions of extremely high differentiation of incomes of the population, the decisive role belongs to the implementation of the principle of solidarity, which contributes to the redistribution of income from certain "financing" subgroups of society in favor of "receiving" subgroups, i.e. the sick, the elderly, the disabled, the unemployed. The main source of financing in this segment is the mandatory social insurance funds formed on the basis of employer and employee insurance payments. The funds operate exclusively as state-owned insurance companies, adapting to changes in the social sphere. A new role is being played by trade unions, which in all sectors of social security become the representatives of insured workers to protect their rights.

The main tool for reducing the polarization of wages and incomes is the tax system, which

on the basis of differentiated tax scales provides a ban on ultra-high earnings and incomes.

3. Social program of action.

Concrete steps

3.1. Raising the minimum social guarantees. The initial component of social reforms is to increase the minimum social guarantees. The main social norm today is the living wage (PM), or the minimum consumer budget (MPB). In fact, it determines all other standards. The modern PM is a rigid structure that essentially includes only physiological needs and forms an extremely low poverty line; all families whose incomes are below the PM are considered to be in poverty. Such a budget cannot support any additional family expenses, including an increase in housing and communal services, not to mention paid medicine, education, or the expansion of social insurance.

The transfer of social sectors to a market economy requires the “saturation” of PM due to higher payments for compulsory insurance than today, as well as full payment for housing and utilities. In this case, the PM receives the structure of the “full subsistence minimum budget” (FBPM), its size should increase by 2.4 times.

PM (PBPM) determines the minimum wage, minimum pension, minimum benefits. If we use PBPM, then we get the minimum “market model of wages”. Only under such conditions, the employee has an adequate salary, entering the labor market, and is fully included in the system of compulsory state insurance as a basis for social security of the population. At the same time, branches of the social sphere begin to function in accordance with market principles.

3.2. Reforming the wage system. The foundation of social reforms is the reform of the wage system. The basis of social transformations of this kind are the restructuring of the labor market and its payment. Only under conditions of consistent wage growth can the employee's interest in more efficient work be ensured and a constant increase in his productivity be realized. An increase in wages ensures the fulfillment of its functions.

The positive dynamics of wages is in fact the basis for improving the quality potential of the labor force and solving the problem of social protection for one third of Russian families living below the poverty line due to low wages. Without rising wages, it is impossible to solve the problem of poverty. Moreover, the increase in wages is the main factor in the expansion of consumer demand and the domestic market, and, following it, in the development of production. Ford at one time discovered what later became the universally recognized law of the growth of the national economy. If we want to develop the automotive industry intensively, cars must be available as consumer goods, and potential buyers must earn enough money to be able to buy them. So he paid the workers the equivalent of the price of one of the Ford models for three months.

Social wage reforms include three interrelated components:

> dynamics of the subsistence minimum to include not only the traditional consumer package, but higher taxes, social contributions, full payment for housing and utilities;

> a radical increase in the guaranteed minimum wage and its average value, taking into account changes in

“structures” of wage costs, including the composition of mandatory payments;

> significant reduction in wage polarization.

Thus, the reform of wages is a one-time implementation of three interrelated actions: raising wages, reducing its differentiation and increasing mandatory payments. Shifts should be such that, on the one hand, the reform achieves its goals in the context of raising living standards, and on the other hand, important macro- and micro-level relationships between wage growth, an increase in labor productivity, income and the efficiency of economic activity of enterprises are not violated. .

The first component of the reform concerns radical changes in wages on the basis of a significant increase in its level and, above all, a guaranteed minimum. The minimum wage cannot be lower than the subsistence minimum or the minimum consumer budget, which must include a significant social component. Moreover, the "wage minimum" is the living wage, taken with a coefficient of 1.2 -

1.5, because even the minimum wage should contain the amount of resources necessary not only for the reproduction of the worker, but also for his child (at least partially).

The second component of the restructuring of wages is to balance the interests of the employee and the employer. An increase in the level of wages, along with an increase in taxes and mandatory social insurance payments that the employee makes, is combined with a decrease in taxes and social payments and the employer. Today, an entrepreneur (employer) pays more than one third of the wage fund in the form of social tax. This makes it difficult for him to

his economic position, and he seeks to divert part of his wages into the “shadow”. But the employee also loses in such a situation, because. his pension provision is determined by the level of open wages. At the same time, it is obvious that payments to insurance funds made by the employer are nothing but part of the wages. Therefore, it is advisable to divide the accruals to her fund in such a way that one third of their employer will pay, as before, to social funds, and two thirds

Worker, increasing earnings. Of this "increase" for the employee, a part will go to taxes and mandatory insurance premiums for social and professional risks; the main thing is that the level of these deductions from earnings will be different for low-, medium- and high-paid people. Such an approach will help to reduce the differentiation in wages, because. the lower the wage, the higher the increase, and vice versa.

Thus, there is a certain “exchange” between the entrepreneur and the employee, as a result of which not only nominal, but also actual earnings will increase, as well as income tax from it; the amount of social tax will generally remain unchanged, but the employee will be interested in withdrawing his earnings from the “shadow”, because. the value of his insurance for all types of risk depends on this. Another equally important source of increasing average earnings is the state budget, especially when it comes to those employed in the public sector.

The third component of wage reform requires that the personal income tax in an environment of unjustified polarization should not be based on a flat scale.

It is advisable to establish a four-stage income tax scale for individuals: employees with earnings below and at the subsistence level are unconditionally exempt from income tax, employees with

wages below 2RM pay a minimum tax of 10%, workers with earnings below the wages are subject to an average tax of 15%, the rest

20% tax. Exemption from income tax on wages below the subsistence level will help increase the incomes of those families who are in distress. In addition, such a step corresponds to the solution of the general task - to increase the minimum wage to the subsistence level.

At the same time, as mentioned above, social payments for compulsory insurance are divided between the entrepreneur (employer) and the employee in a ratio of 1:2. One part is covered by the employer and two parts by the employee. Of course, such a restructuring of taxes is possible only with a corresponding increase in wages. Higher taxes are envisaged not only in the structure of the subsistence minimum, and, consequently, in the structure of the minimum wage, but also, accordingly, in the composition of any earnings. Ultimately, the share of taxes in obligatory payments from the manufacturer (entrepreneur) will also be significantly reduced. In this direction, there will be changes in the ratio of insurance payments of the employer and the employee in the direction of increasing the share of the latter. The scale and nature of redistributions are carried out taking into account the interests of all participants in this process: policyholders, insurers and insured persons.

The release of the state budget from subsidies of housing and communal services will not only reduce taxes on entrepreneurs, but also open up reserves for investment in the production sector. In addition, tax cuts from enterprises will increase incentives for their self-development, provide their own source of investment, payment of loans, replenishment of working capital. The wage increase will

encourage enterprises to reduce the number of employees, lay off excess staff, reduce inefficient production. The incentives for enterprises to create new jobs through the development of small and medium-sized businesses should also become more active. The increase in wages is partially offset by a threefold reduction in the social payments of entrepreneurs.

Thus, the third component of the reform assumes a decrease in the polarization of wages and incomes so that the ratio of earnings of the extreme 10% of workers (decile coefficient of differentiation) should not exceed 4-5 times against 8-10 times today. This is convincingly evidenced not only by world experience, but also by real correlations in the efficiency of labor of different quality. To do this, it is necessary to: a) introduce certain restrictions on the growth of maximum earnings, primarily at state-owned enterprises; b) establish "prohibitive" taxes for high earnings and incomes; c) introduce highly differentiated tax scales;

d) establish differentiated scales for tariffs for compulsory social insurance; e) in collective agreements to provide restrictions on high wages for employees of the enterprise.

The reduction of differences in wages will ultimately allow to increase its level with a smaller fund as a component of the cost. The change in tax payments and mandatory insurance contributions, increasing the share of employees, will be a certain balancer for increasing wages.

Without an increase in wages, it is impossible not only to transform the labor market, but also to transfer the social security system to a market footing.

Projections for 2010, under the above assumptions, show that the minimum wage should increase compared to 2003.

(in uniform prices) almost 7 times, and the average - 2.5 times; at the same time, differences in wages, measured by the decile coefficient of differentiation, will decrease to 5.7 times, i.e. will decrease by 40%, and the share of workers with wages below the minimum will fall to one tenth37.

3.3. Restoration of the solidarity component of pension provision. The most acute social problem turned out to be pension provision, which has been reformed since 1990 and continues to exist in a state of restructuring, already along a funded path, essentially directed against the elderly population living today. It is necessary to turn the pension system absolutely into an insurance channel, using the system of personalization of employees for the purpose of organically linking the level of pensions with the accumulated amount of wages received by the employee for his working life and the length of service. The pension system should be based on the principle of solidarity and distribution, which is the most fair for Russian society, taking into account the religious and moral basis that determines the attitude in society to the family, to parents and grandparents. The demographic aspect of the problem cannot be ignored either. After all, about one fifth of pensioners live alone, among the elderly there are 2 times more women than men (that is, these are our mothers); half of the elderly population was away from their loved ones and relatives. In connection with the intensive involvement (in Soviet times) of the population and especially women in social production, new intra-family relations (between spouses) were formed, based on the economic independence of individual family members. There is also a certain psychological moment in relation to pensions,

37 Social protection of the population / Ed. N.M. Rimashevskaya. - M.: ISEPN RAN, Carleton University, 2002. - S. 143-145.

when the second part of the employee's work path, as a rule, is associated with concern for obtaining its maximum value. In addition, our population has lost its savings three times over the past 10 years, which is especially painful for the elderly, who today find it difficult to balance their family budget.

Given the current situation, as well as the practice of pensions, founded more than forty years ago and has already undergone certain adjustments, when reforming the pension system, it is necessary to be guided by a number of principles, the main of which requires the transfer of the use of the funded component at least a decade ahead, during which the life expectancy should increase significantly. population level along with overcoming poverty among all sectors of society.

The system should include three pension pillars: a) social pensions; b) labor state pensions; c) non-state (private) pensions.

Social pensions are received by all the elderly who are not entitled to labor payments: they must be financed entirely from the national budget through general taxes and payments received by the budget network. The social type includes all additional payments to labor pensions that are not directly related to labor insurance. Civil servants who are on the material and financial support of the state also receive pensions at the expense of the state budget. Thus, the basic pension that exists today is fundamentally changing its content and, as a result, the source of funding.

The right to a labor pension applies exclusively to insured employees, and its amount depends on the length of the insurance period and the amount of the contribution. A certain type of labor pension is Professional, which is assigned

employees of a limited range of professions; additional contributions to occupational pensions are made by the state and the entrepreneur. Territorial pensions, paid to persons who worked in difficult and extreme natural and climatic conditions, are becoming another type of special labor pensions.

Non-state pensions make it possible to realize the personal initiative of the employee and the employer. They are aimed at providing an opportunity for every citizen of the country to voluntarily provide themselves with additional protection in old age by choosing any of the existing programs. Unlike state systems, these pensions can be more flexible in terms of the amount and conditions of their receipt within the framework of non-state pension programs implemented on the basis of special legislation. In essence, they are an alternative to the funded pension without the obligation to use it.

The main "level" principle of the pension system is the fact of establishing a minimum pension not lower than the subsistence level of a disabled citizen of the country, determined and legally fixed once every four years. The retirement age for the general labor pension is proposed to remain the same - 55 years for women and 60 years for men. It is possible to revise this provision only in the event of a steady increase in the life expectancy of the country's population by 5 to 10 years against the current one. A disability pension is paid in case of permanent disability upon the expiration of the period for payment of temporary disability benefits, if the medical commission determines the state of health as incurable. The labor pension is calculated at a level of at least 40% of the salary for the entire period of service, updated by the time of retirement. This principle can be implemented

only if there is a personalized account of insurance premiums.

Taking into account the above principles and wage growth, the 2010 pension projections (in uniform prices) show that:

a) social pension will increase by 2.3 times;

b) the average labor pension will increase by 3.6 times; c) the ratio of the labor pension to the average wage will reach 54% 38.

3.4. Reforming the healthcare system. The health care system requires serious reform, not only in terms of a clearer definition of funding sources that meet the requirements for free medical care, but also in terms of updating technologies in the production of health care services and the organization of appropriate care.

In doing so, the following principles must be observed.

First, the existence of three sources of health financing, each of which has a strictly designated purpose:

^ the state budget, which provides minimum social guarantees in the field of health protection, the necessary reorganization of the healthcare system and the development of science in order to obtain new medical technologies;

o compulsory health insurance, which provides the bulk of medical services;

^direct costs of the population (paid services), including various exclusives.

In healthcare, budget funding is directed to a certain range of diseases or other medical services that are of acute social importance. Such diseases include tuberculosis, HIV/AIDS, occupational diseases, etc. Same

38 Social protection of the population / Ed. N.M. Rimashevskaya. - M.: ISEPN RAS, Carleton University, 2002. - S. 151-152.

also applies to some categories of patients whose ill health is associated with economic, environmental and man-made disasters. Budget expenditures in this case are determined in the context of the minimum social guarantees implemented by the state.

Secondly, insurance in case of receiving medical care applies to the entire population of the country and should be organized according to a single scheme. Employees are insured against temporary disability, work injury and occupational disease, maternity, death of the insured person or disabled family members who are dependent on him.

Thirdly, it is advisable to concentrate the risk insurance of the Social Insurance Fund (FSS) and the Compulsory Medical Insurance Fund (FOMS) in one fund, creating special insurance funds, which will eliminate the dependence of the employee's insurance protection on the employer.

Fourth, for medical care insurance, the rate is set differentially by district, because the possibilities of the regions and the need for medical care are different. Payment for medical services is carried out at prices determined by the tariff agreement between professional medical associations, the insurer and trade unions as representatives of the insured. The insured person becomes the buyer of medical services. For each disease included in the compulsory health insurance program, a standard of care is required that provides a list of means of prevention, diagnosis and treatment. Information on standards and prices for each type of service should be publicly available. All services in excess of those guaranteed by the compulsory medical insurance program provided by state health facilities are paid by the patient independently, also according to payment documents and at approved prices.

The scheme of "purchase" of medical services solves a number of pressing problems in the organization of health care:

♦ an excessive intermediary - CMO is eliminated; the Medical and Social Insurance Fund becomes a full-fledged insurer;

♦ the employer's accounting department is liquidated as an intermediary; the employee receives temporary disability pay, regardless of the desire of the employer;

♦ the insured get a real opportunity to choose a doctor, to be treated in a private clinic, paying the difference in the cost of services on their own;

♦ there is an opportunity to change the payment system for a doctor: in addition to the minimum wage under the unified tariff system (UTS), he receives an additional percentage of payment for the services provided from insurance funds and funds received for paid services - the more patients the doctor treats, the more will be his earnings;

♦ a competitive environment is being created in the field of medical services, which is an incentive for restructuring the healthcare system; gradually eliminated in medical organizations (clinics, hospitals) unclaimed jobs.

Administrative expenses for the formation of insurance funds will be partially compensated by the release of the staff of the two funds due to a reduction in the amount of work to collect insurance funds, conduct business under the credit scheme with each insured, and conduct business in HMOs.

Forecasts of financial resources for medico-social insurance for 2010 are made subject to wage growth; they provide insurance benefits, a basic health care program, and administrative expenses. Per capita consumption will increase by more than

3 times, and the tariff rate will not exceed 5.2% 39.

Russian health care needs serious innovations related to its organization, including the use of hospital-replacing technologies - day hospitals, hospitals at home, hospitals "one day surgery", diagnostics, nursing and rehabilitation either on an outpatient basis or in cheaper rehabilitation beds; expanding the team of general practitioners and family doctors to provide primary care.

3.5. Employment insurance. The risk of job loss (unemployment) persists in market conditions, regardless of the success of economic development. For hired workers who have no other source of income other than pay for work, insurance of this social risk is vital. It is based on the following principles:

> Insurance is compulsory and applies only to those who are of working age.

> Insurance premiums are deducted from the employee's salary. As long as the minimum wage does not reach the living wage, which includes the relevant insurance premiums, the employer pays for workers with wages below the living wage.

> Only those who are insured are eligible for unemployment benefits, so the contribution and benefit accounting system should be based on individual insurance and personalized accounting.

> The right to receive benefits arises from the employee with the continuous payment of contributions to the preceding unemployment of 12 months of work, in case of dismissal not of his own free will.

39 Social protection of the population / Ed. N.M. Rimashevskaya. - M.: ISEPN RAS, Carleton University, 2002. - S. 155-157.

> Benefit amount: in the first 3 months

65%, next 3 months - 50%, next 6 months - 45% of insured wages.

> The maximum duration of benefit payments is no more than 1 year.

> The maximum amount of benefits is determined by limiting the maximum amount of insured wages. It is advisable to set the "ceiling" in the same way as pension insurance.

The tariff rate ranges from 2 to 1.1%.

Instead of a conclusion

Raising wages and pensions, expanding social risk insurance, as well as the state guarantee of a minimum level of satisfaction of needs will actually make it possible to overcome in Russia not only the problem of poverty, but an even more terrible problem of the social field.

’ Rization that destroys human ’ capital and hinders the adaptation of the population to new living conditions.

"Average money income in 2010 rises 3.5 times, the decile differentiation coefficient will decrease by 30% 3 and amount to 5.7 times; the share of the population with per capita money income will decrease to 10.5%, t i.e. 2.5 times in relation to the current state.40 Among the poor group of the population, there will be mainly large families with a non-working mother, pensioners living alone who receive a social pension, as well as families with disabled children. allowances (subsidies) A ​​possible doubling of GDP will make it possible to move further along the path of improving the living standards of the population, and the nationalization of natural resource rent will act in the same direction.

V. A. Ilyin

DEVELOP SCIENTIFIC AND TECHNICAL POTENTIAL OF THE REGION

Doubling the gross domestic product by 2010 is the first priority of Russia's contemporary development. The essence of the process of doubling GDP is not just to increase the quantity of products, but to provide a new quality of economic growth. World experience convincingly shows that all countries where success in social and economic development has been achieved have followed the path

Vladimir Alexandrovich

Doctor of Economics, Prof., Director

VSCC CEMI RAS.

gaining leading positions in the scientific and technical field. Moreover, studies by leading domestic scientists allow us to assert that there is no other option for accelerating the development of Russia than strengthening and building up its scientific and technical potential.

Unfortunately, the current state of this potential can be defined as critical in a number of ways. The number of personnel involved in scientific research and development has significantly decreased compared to the pre-reform level. The innovative activity of enterprises has sharply weakened. At present, the share of Russia in the world market of civil science-intensive products is less than 0.3%,

SOCIO-ECONOMIC AND DEMOGRAPHIC PROBLEMS OF MODERN RUSSIA

N. M. Rimashevskaya

BULLETIN OF THE RUSSIAN ACADEMY OF SCIENCES vol. 74, no. 3, p. 209-218 (2004)

The article brought to the attention of readers is based on a scientific report, which was heard at a meeting of the Presidium of the Russian Academy of Sciences in July last year. The materials of the discussion are published in the presentation.

Original

Rimashevskaya Natalya Mikhailovna- Corresponding Member of the Russian Academy of Sciences,
Director of the Institute of Socio-Economic Problems of the Population of the Russian Academy of Sciences (ISEPN).

The market reforms and transformational transformations carried out in recent years have strictly followed the requirements Washington Consensus, were carried out from above and without the necessary social shock absorbers. As we all remember, they had "shock therapy" as their beginning, negative social consequences were not taken into account. As a result, there have been radical changes in the living conditions of the Russian population, and this could not but affect the physical and psychological state of people, their behavior and the quality of human potential.

Adhering to overseas recommendations, our reformers did not pay due attention to the historical experience of Russia. And it would be useful to recall, for example, what Alexander II said in connection with the preparation of measures to free the peasants from serfdom. The autocrat emphasized that the nobility should, in the name of society, in the name of Russia, sacrifice part of their benefits and that the abolition of serfdom in no case, even at the first stage, should worsen the life of the peasants, but, on the contrary, improve it. This is how the Russian tsar put the question, in contrast to the Russian liberals.

I will try to analyze how the living conditions and characteristics of the population have changed in the course of another breakdown of the socio-economic foundations of our society. Who won and who lost as a result of the reforms? What should have been done and what have not been done? What steps should be taken immediately in the social sphere?

I will preface what follows with two remarks.

First. All presented provisions and conclusions will be commented on by the data of the State Statistics Committee of Russia, which has never allowed and does not allow itself to give a worse picture than it actually is. This does not mean that I agree with all the assessments of a respected institution. But it is necessary to take into account its data, otherwise the discussion of a methodological nature cannot be bypassed. The remark about Goskomstat is very important: the indicators used in the social sphere vary greatly, and yet 1%, when it comes to the total population of the country, is 1.5 million people. Thus, the Goskomstat defines the number of poor at 25%, the World Bank - 27%, and the Institute of Socio-Economic Problems of the Population of the Russian Academy of Sciences, which I head - 33%. Even greater deviations in estimates are typical, for example, for the Gini coefficient, which reveals the inequality of income distribution.

Second. We will also have to abstract from territorial features; they are large and significant, but this is the topic of a special report, which involves regional monitoring of living standards.

According to our (and not only our) estimates, as a result of the reforms, one-fifth of the population turned out to be winners, while the majority mostly lost. For some, the living conditions have not changed. We consider "winners" those who have managed to adapt and integrate into market structures.

Changes in the level and quality of life of the population were transformed into the most acute socio-economic problems, which had no less acute demographic consequences. Among them:

A catastrophic decline in income and material security of the main part of the population;

A high proportion of the poor with an extremely poor definition of the level of poverty;

Unprecedented polarization of living conditions;

Significant unemployment and non-payment of wages;

Degradation of social security and the actual destruction of the social sphere, including housing and communal services.

All this could not but affect the state of the population, its natural decline and depopulation began, the quality of the population decreased, and an inefficient model of external and internal migration developed.

The "shock therapy" led to a sharp drop in the monetary incomes of the population (Fig. 1), and there are little hopes for their recovery in the coming years. In 2002, real incomes only reached the level of 1997.

Rice. one. Main indicators of monetary income of the population
in real terms (1990 = 100%)

1 - real cash income,

2 - real accrued wages,

3 - the real size of the assigned pensions
(including compensation)

The main factor behind the two-fold decline in the living standards of Russians (compared to 1991) is inadequate wages. So far, the situation is as follows:

The minimum wage today is 600 rubles. per month, that is, 26% of the subsistence minimum (PM) of the able-bodied population (2328 rubles);

The average monthly accrued salary in 2002 was 4,414 rubles, or $141, that is, $4.7 a day;

One third of workers (20 million people) have earnings below the minimum wage;

60% of workers (40 million people) do not provide income even for their minimum needs and the needs of one child;

The difference in wages between 10% of high- and 10% of low-paid workers is 30 times. The growth of the average wage in 2002 by 18% with a change in its minimum level even from 300 to 450 rubles. does not mean anything other than a significant increase in it in highly paid groups of the population.

As a result of its decline, wages have ceased to fulfill their basic functions: reproduction, since it does not even provide a simple reproduction of the labor force of the worker himself; economic, because it does not stimulate to improve the quality and productivity of labor; social, as it enhances the disintegration of society, due to the growing property differentiation.

Today, the poverty line turned out to be 1.5 times lower than the level adopted in 1991 and amounts to 1800 rubles. (2002), or $60 per month ($2 per day), which, in terms of UN standards, corresponds only to the level of developing countries. The distribution of incomes of the population shows that the proportion of the poor in our country reaches 25% (36 million people); half of the country's citizens have incomes of less than $4 a day; one tenth is not even provided with a food basket; half of Russian children live in poverty.

The extremely low level of consumption is evidenced primarily by the fact that, on average, food costs reach half of the total expenses of families, while in developed countries this figure does not exceed 20-30%. The foregoing does not mean that Russia is a poor country. On the contrary, it is very rich, especially in resources. Only the main part of its population lives in poverty and very poor.

The most severe consequences of the reforms are related to the extraordinary growth of social polarization. This is evidenced by the distribution of incomes of the population. Thus, the ratio of average incomes of 10% of the most and 10% of the least secured (the decile coefficient of funds) is 14.2; Gini coefficient - about 0.4; decile coefficient of income differentiation - 8.2 times; the gap in income between the 5% extreme groups with the highest and lowest incomes reaches at least 50 times; The "top" 20% group of the population owns 46% of the total income fund, while the "bottom" group owns only about 6% (Table 1).

Table 1. Distribution of monetary incomes of the population, %

Cash income by 20% groups

first (lowest income)
second
third
fourth
fifth (with the highest income)

Coeff. Gini (income concentration index)

6.0
11.6
17.6
26.5
38.3

6.1
10.7
15.2
21.7
46.3

5.8
10.5
15.2
22.3
46.2

6.0
10.5
15.0
21.5
47.0

6.0
10.4
14.8
21.1
47.7

5.8
10.4
15.1
21.9
46.8

5.6
10.4
15.4
22.8
45.8

5.6
10.4
15.4
22.8
45.8

It can be said that today there are two Russias that live in different dimensions, do not understand each other well, have different orientations and preferences, their own demand and a market for goods and services. The polarization of incomes entails the disintegration of society, causes aggression on the part of certain groups of the population, especially young people, leads to instability and mass deviant behavior. This is the main factor in the criminalization of society, the growth of drug and alcohol consumption.

Based on the composition of statistical data from different sources and using special methods, a socio-economic pyramid of Russian society was built, which reflects the economic stratification of the population (Fig. 2).

Rice. 2. Economic stratification of the Russian population

It is necessary to emphasize one methodologically important fact: with the existing polarization of wages and incomes, their average indicators do not reflect the dynamics of ongoing processes. The growth in real incomes of the population, which amounted to 30% in three years, according to the State Statistics Committee, actually means an increase in the incomes of only the rich and well-to-do strata, while the real incomes of the poor are actually frozen. As an average characteristic, a modal value should be used, which characterizes the most common level of income and is significantly lower than the statistical average. The fact that one quarter of families (data from the State Statistics Committee) have vehicles should not be misleading: the history of the acquisition (15-20 years ago) and the use of a car when self-employed are at play here.

It would be possible to continue the description of the situation, touching also on the problems of unemployment, the deformation of social security and infrastructure. But what has been said is enough to show further how the decade of reforms affected the processes of demographic reproduction.

According to preliminary data from the 2002 All-Russian Population Census, 145.2 million people live in Russia. The natural loss between the two censuses was 7.4 million, of which 5.6 million was offset by the influx of migrants, so the real decline was only 1.8 million.

Rice. 3. Russian cross - dynamics of general birth and death rates (per 1000 population)

1 - birth rate, 2 - death rate

The natural population decline in Russia began in 1992, when the birth and death curves intersected (Fig. 3), and so far there are no signs that their direction may change. To date, migration compensation for population loss has decreased to 4%, and the dynamics of the number of Russians depends entirely on the ratio of births and deaths. And the situation here is not at all rosy.

As for the birth rate, it is characterized by the following trends:

The absolute number of births over the past 15 years has decreased by almost 2 times - from 2.5 million in 1987 to 1.4 million in 2002;

The total fertility rate (the average number of children born to one woman in her entire life) today is 1.25, while to ensure simple reproduction (children replacing parents) it must reach 2.15, hence the depopulation;

For various reasons, society is steadily oriented towards a one-child family: 54% of families have one child, 37% have two children, 9% have three or more; according to expert estimates, 15-17% of married couples are infertile;

Now about 30% of children are born out of wedlock, which entails all sorts of negative consequences.

It should be borne in mind that the decline in the birth rate is a global trend. However, in modern Russia, in addition to this trend, the process of population reproduction is influenced by some negative social factors (Table 2), which aggravate the situation. Temporary shifts in the birth rate had a certain impact: births are being postponed and abandoned due to a systemic crisis and political instability in society.

Table 2. General fertility, mortality and natural increase rates (per 1000 population

Number of births

Number of deaths

Natural increase, decrease (-)

Russia
Austria
United Kingdom
Germany
Denmark
Italy
Netherlands
Finland
France
Sweden
USA
Japan

13.4
11.6
13.9
11.4
12.4
9.8
13.3
13.2
13.5
14.5
16.7
9.9

8.7
9.6
11.4
9.2
12.6
9.4
13.0
11.0
13.2
10.2
14.0
9.4

11.2
10.6
11.2
11.5
11.9
9.4
8.6
10.0
9.3
11.1
8.7
6.7

15.4
9.3
10.3
10.1
10.9
9.7
8.8
9.5
9.1
10.5
8.5
7.6

2.2
1.0
2.7
-0.1
0.5
0.4
4.7
3.2
4.2
3.4
8.0
3.2

-6.7
0.3
1.1
-0.9
1.7
-0.3
4.2
1.5
4.1
-0.3
5.5
1.8

The situation with mortality in Russia is even more dramatic:

The crude death rate (number of deaths per 1,000 population) is steadily rising, in contrast to aging European countries;

The number of deaths is 1.7 times higher than the number of births over the same period of time;

Supermortality of men, especially of working age, is noted, the indicator of the future life expectancy of Russian men is very low, even in comparison with many developing countries - 58 years.

If the current level of mortality remains unchanged, among Russians who reached the age of 16 in 2000, less than half of the men will live to 60. The life expectancy of men who are now 25 or more years old is equal to or even less than life expectancy at the end of the 19th century, although at that time the life expectancy of those born was only 29 years (due to high infant mortality).

According to modern concepts, infant mortality remains high in the country, despite its decline in recent years: now this figure reaches 13 per 1,000 children under the age of 1, which is 3-4 times more than in developed countries. In terms of infant mortality, Russia has one of the highest rates in Europe (only Romania is higher) and not only in Europe: in Japan, the USA, and Australia, the situation is also better than ours.

The forecasts of the total population of Russia offered by various organizations are disappointing: by 2025 there will be 125 million Russians, and by the middle of this century - only about 100 million people, that is, we will be less by 45 million.

The second significant consequence of the great transformations is the decline in the qualitative characteristics of the population in three main groups of indicators: health (physical, mental, social), intellectual potential and professional readiness, spiritual and moral values ​​and orientations.

Assessing the health of the population through the characteristics of ill health, one has to note an increase in the incidence, especially for diseases of social etiology (tuberculosis, syphilis, AIDS/HIV, infectious hepatitis). Forecasts show that by 2010 8-11% of the population will be infected with HIV, which is about 13 million people, mostly young people. According to international experts, Russia is at the stage of a concentrated HIV epidemic. A quarter of HIV-infected women are women of active reproductive age. This means that HIV infection can lead to direct demographic losses. Drug addiction is growing exponentially, especially among children aged 11 to 17. According to estimates, the number of drug addicts reaches 4 million people; 70,000 people die each year as a result of drug use.

Especially dangerous is the decline in reproductive health. The proportion of pregnant women suffering from anemia has increased by 3.6 times over the decade. As a result, the number of children sick already at birth increased by 2.6 times. The main concern is the fact that the generation of children has less health potential than their parents, and their children (grandchildren of parents) have even less potential. Already at the time of birth, 40% of children are sick, and during the life cycle their health only worsens. Thus, a "social funnel" arises, where young cohorts are increasingly drawn in: health problems move from older population groups to groups of children and youth. In order to get out of the "funnel" (if at all possible), more than one generation of healthy people is needed.

According to such an indicator as healthy life expectancy, Russia ranks 107th in the world. Its expected duration in men is 51.5 years, in women - 61.9 years. Since 1999, there has been an intensive growth in the number of disabled people (by about 1 million people a year). Their total number in 2002 was more than 11 million people (7.5% of the population); it is projected to rise to 20 million in 2015 (15% of the population).

The fall in the intellectual potential - both as a result of a direct "brain drain" and the departure of professionals to non-core sectors of the economy - continues, albeit with less intensity. The decline in the quality of school and vocational education, which is especially characteristic of educational institutions in rural areas and small towns, is also important.

No less acute is the problem of the crisis of social values ​​and orientations, the decline of morals and moral principles against the backdrop of the lack of proper law and order and widespread violation of the law. In the mass consciousness, there is a process of erosion of the moral norms characteristic of Russian culture. Pragmatism and orientation towards personal gain, typical of the American model of interpersonal relationships and life orientations, are becoming more and more widespread.

By the end of the 1990s, especially after the 1998 default, it became obvious that it was no longer possible to continue to shape the market in Russia without paying attention to the physical and psychological state of the country's citizens. However, the neoliberal ideology did not allow adequate response to social challenges. The main focus of the social program of the Government of Russia from the very beginning (from "shock therapy") to this day is the reduction of state obligations in the social sphere, which actually contradicts the Constitution of the Russian Federation (Article 7), in which the Russian state is defined as social.

In this regard, a number of social measures taken by the government should be commented on.

First of all, the introduction of a flat scale of taxes on personal income turned out to be directly directed against the poor and low-income groups of the population. For them, the tax rate increased from 12 to 13%; the tax pressure has increased, which before was 2 times more burdensome than that of highly paid groups. As a result, the polarization of the population increased, the income gap increased from 14 to 17 times. For those whose earnings do not exceed 30 thousand rubles. per year, the tax burden (taking into account the unified social tax) amounted to 48.6% (almost half), while those who receive more than 600 thousand per year pay in general only 15% (13 + 2%) of their income.

Secondly, the introduction of the unified social tax (UST) crossed out the emerging insurance system with non-budgetary funds. As a result of this "transformation", the contributions of entrepreneurs, actually carried out at the expense of the wage fund, were transformed into a regular state tax, and this forced employers to freeze wages. The UST becomes the property of the state, losing its target orientation, and, if necessary, is used by the state for other than expected needs, supporting the budget.

Thirdly, The introduction of a funded pension system by slowing down the growth of pensions for today's pensioners actually has a twofold goal:

a) the final justification for reducing the current pension rates, including the allocation of a basic pension in the labor structure, and

b) the accumulation of "long" rubles in the hands of the state in order to use them as an investment resource.

Fourth, the reform of housing and communal services planned by the authorities is focused not so much on bringing this sector out of a deplorable state, but on getting at its disposal a housing subsidy fund, which is close to the size of a pension fund; its use will be even less transparent, given the depreciation of funds at the level of 70-80%.

Fifth, reform of the education sector, the introduction of the unified state exam (USE) is a guarantee of privileges for those who study closer to the center in schools equipped at the modern level and staffed with teachers. Today in Russia, a third of schools do not only have a full set of teachers, but often do not have running water, sewerage, heating and electricity, the quality of education in such schools is an order of magnitude lower than that required by the Unified State Examination.

At sixth, One cannot fail to mention the introduction of the so-called targeted social assistance, the effectiveness of which is close to zero. In fact, the share of cash transfers in the income of the population today is less than 2%, at the same time, the administrative costs associated with establishing the right to receive social assistance will cover the amount of benefits, opening a new source for corruption among officials.

So, all of the above allows us to formulate a number of conclusions.

Unfavorable living conditions resulted in a violation of the dynamic stereotype of higher nervous activity in a significant part of the Russian population. This, in turn, caused a weakening of the immune defense, the development of pathological processes, depression and other mental disorders.

The state of "wear and tear" of the population leads to the fact that the generation of children does not reproduce the generation of parents, not only quantitatively, but also qualitatively; the population is declining, human capital is being destroyed, and this is a threat to national security.

There is a process of disintegration of social ties and weakening of social potential, which is comparable to the depletion of nature in the absence of its restoration.

The liberal policy of the state is aimed at maintaining the economic well-being of big business; the survival of the main part of the population of the country is not actually taken into account; as a result, the people's potential of Russia is being destroyed and the protest resource is growing.

In order to reverse the trends that are disastrous for the country, it is necessary to immediately and radically change the policy of the state, turn it towards the social sphere, guided by the ideology of the welfare state. This implies the implementation of a comprehensive doctrine aimed at a systematic solution of the aggravated problems, providing the population with at least minimal state guarantees, and the widespread development of social insurance. Economic growth and the use of redistributive mechanisms will make it possible not only to revise the subsistence minimum on a modern basis, but also to ensure decent wages for all workers.

Director of the Institute of Socio-Economic Problems of Population of the Russian Academy of Sciences since 1988; was born on March 29, 1932 in Moscow; graduated from Moscow State University in 1955, Moscow Financial Institute in 1957, doctor of economic sciences, professor; Academician of the Russian Academy of Natural Sciences, Academician of the International Academy of Informatization; 1958-1967 - employee of the Research Institute of the Ministry of Labor; 1967-1988 - employee of the Central Economics and Mathematics Institute of the USSR Academy of Sciences; member of the European Association for Demographic Research; member of the governing national committee of the Rockefeller Foundation regional program - "Leaders of the 21st century and the environment"; editor-in-chief of the journal "Demography and Sociology"; member of the editorial boards of the journals "Economics and Mathematical Methods", "Economic and Social Changes: Monitoring Public Opinion", "Economic Issues" and "Rabotnitsa".

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SOCIO-ECONOMIC
AND DEMOGRAPHIC PROBLEMS
MODERN RUSSIA

N. M. Rimashevskaya

Rimashevskaya Natalya Mikhailovna- Corresponding Member of the Russian Academy of Sciences,
Director of the Institute of Socio-Economic Problems of the Population of the Russian Academy of Sciences (ISEPN).

The market reforms and transformational transformations carried out in recent years strictly followed the requirements of the Washington Consensus, were carried out from above and without the necessary social shock absorbers. As we all remember, they had "shock therapy" as their beginning, negative social consequences were not taken into account. As a result, there have been radical changes in the living conditions of the Russian population, and this could not but affect the physical and psychological state of people, their behavior and the quality of human potential.

Adhering to overseas recommendations, our reformers did not pay due attention to the historical experience of Russia. And it would be useful to recall, for example, what Alexander II said in connection with the preparation of measures to free the peasants from serfdom. The autocrat emphasized that the nobility should, in the name of society, in the name of Russia, sacrifice part of their benefits and that the abolition of serfdom in no case, even at the first stage, should worsen the life of the peasants, but, on the contrary, improve it. This is how the Russian tsar put the question, in contrast to the Russian liberals.

I will try to analyze how the living conditions and characteristics of the population have changed in the course of another breakdown of the socio-economic foundations of our society. Who won and who lost as a result of the reforms? What should have been done and what have not been done? What steps should be taken immediately in the social sphere?

I will preface what follows with two remarks.

First. All presented provisions and conclusions will be commented on by the data of the State Statistics Committee of Russia, which has never allowed and does not allow itself to give a worse picture than it actually is. This does not mean that I agree with all the assessments of a respected institution. But it is necessary to take into account its data, otherwise the discussion of a methodological nature cannot be bypassed. The remark about Goskomstat is very important: the indicators used in the social sphere vary greatly, and yet 1%, when it comes to the total population of the country, is 1.5 million people. Thus, the Goskomstat defines the number of poor at 25%, the World Bank - 27%, and the Institute of Socio-Economic Problems of the Population of the Russian Academy of Sciences, which I head - 33%. Even greater deviations in estimates are typical, for example, for the Gini coefficient, which reveals the inequality of income distribution.

Second. We will also have to abstract from territorial features; they are large and significant, but this is the topic of a special report, which involves regional monitoring of living standards.

According to our (and not only our) estimates, as a result of the reforms, one-fifth of the population turned out to be winners, while the majority mostly lost. For some, the living conditions have not changed. We consider "winners" those who have managed to adapt and integrate into market structures.

Changes in the level and quality of life of the population were transformed into the most acute socio-economic problems, which had no less acute demographic consequences. Among them:

catastrophic decline in income and material security of the main part of the population;

A high proportion of the poor with an extremely poor definition of the level of poverty;

Unprecedented polarization of living conditions;

Significant unemployment and non-payment of wages;

Degradation of social security and the actual destruction of the social sphere, including housing and communal services.

All this could not but affect the state of the population, its natural decline and depopulation began, the quality of the population decreased, and an inefficient model of external and internal migration developed.

The "shock therapy" led to a sharp drop in the monetary incomes of the population (Fig. 1), and there are little hopes for their recovery in the coming years. In 2002, real incomes only reached the level of 1997.

The main factor behind the two-fold decline in the living standards of Russians (compared to 1991) is inadequate wages. So far, the situation is as follows:

The minimum wage today is 600 rubles. per month, that is, 26% of the subsistence minimum (PM) of the able-bodied population (2328 rubles);

The average monthly accrued salary in 2002 was 4,414 rubles, or $141, that is, $4.7 a day;

One third of workers (20 million people) have earnings below the minimum wage;

60% of workers (40 million people) do not provide income even for their minimum needs and the needs of one child;

The difference in wages between 10% of high- and 10% of low-paid workers is 30 times. The growth of the average wage in 2002 by 18% with a change in its minimum level even from 300 to 450 rubles. does not mean anything other than a significant increase in it in highly paid groups of the population.

As a result of its decline, wages have ceased to fulfill their basic functions: reproduction, since it does not even provide a simple reproduction of the labor force of the worker himself; economic, because it does not stimulate to improve the quality and productivity of labor; social, as it enhances the disintegration of society, due to the growing property differentiation.

Today, the poverty line turned out to be 1.5 times lower than the level adopted in 1991 and amounts to 1800 rubles. (2002), or $60 per month ($2 per day), which, in terms of UN standards, corresponds only to the level of developing countries. The distribution of incomes of the population shows that the proportion of the poor in our country reaches 25% (36 million people); half of the country's citizens have incomes of less than $4 a day; one tenth is not even provided with a food basket; half of Russian children live in poverty.

The extremely low level of consumption is evidenced primarily by the fact that, on average, food costs reach half of the total expenses of families, while in developed countries this figure does not exceed 20-30%. The foregoing does not mean that Russia is a poor country. On the contrary, it is very rich, especially in resources. Only the main part of its population lives in poverty and very poor.

The most severe consequences of the reforms are related to the extraordinary growth of social polarization. This is evidenced by the distribution of incomes of the population. Thus, the ratio of average incomes of 10% of the most and 10% of the least secured (the decile coefficient of funds) is 14.2; Gini coefficient - about 0.4; decile coefficient of income differentiation - 8.2 times; the gap in income between the 5% extreme groups with the highest and lowest incomes reaches at least 50 times; The "top" 20% group of the population owns 46% of the total income fund, while the "bottom" group owns only about 6% (Table 1).

Table 1. Distribution of monetary incomes of the population, %

Cash income by 20% groups	1992	1995	1997	1998	1999	2000	2001	2002
first (lowest income) second third fourth fifth (with the highest income) Coeff. Gini (income concentration index)	6.0 11.6 17.6 26.5 38.3 0.289	6.1 10.7 15.2 21.7 46.3 0.387	5.8 10.5 15.2 22.3 46.2 0.390	6.0 10.5 15.0 21.5 47.0 0.394	6.0 10.4 14.8 21.1 47.7 0.400	5.8 10.4 15.1 21.9 46.8 0.395	5.6 10.4 15.4 22.8 45.8 0.398	5.6 10.4 15.4 22.8 45.8 0.398

It can be said that today there are two Russias that live in different dimensions, do not understand each other well, have different orientations and preferences, their own demand and a market for goods and services. The polarization of incomes entails the disintegration of society, causes aggression on the part of certain groups of the population, especially young people, leads to instability and mass deviant behavior. This is the main factor in the criminalization of society, the growth of drug and alcohol consumption.

Based on the composition of statistical data from different sources and using special methods, a socio-economic pyramid of Russian society was built, which reflects the economic stratification of the population (Fig. 2).

Rice. 2. Economic stratification of the Russian population

It is necessary to emphasize one methodologically important fact: with the existing polarization of wages and incomes, their average indicators do not reflect the dynamics of ongoing processes. The growth in real incomes of the population, which amounted to 30% in three years, according to the State Statistics Committee, actually means an increase in the incomes of only the rich and well-to-do strata, while the real incomes of the poor are actually frozen. As an average characteristic, a modal value should be used, which characterizes the most common level of income and is significantly lower than the statistical average. The fact that one quarter of families (data from the State Statistics Committee) have vehicles should not be misleading: the history of the acquisition (15-20 years ago) and the use of a car when self-employed are at play here.

* * *

It would be possible to continue the description of the situation, touching also on the problems of unemployment, the deformation of social security and infrastructure. But what has been said is enough to show further how the decade of reforms affected the processes of demographic reproduction.

According to preliminary data from the 2002 All-Russian Population Census, 145.2 million people live in Russia. The natural loss between the two censuses was 7.4 million, of which 5.6 million was offset by the influx of migrants, so the real decline was only 1.8 million.

Rice. 3. Russian cross - dynamics of general birth and death rates (per 1000 population)

1 - birth rate, 2 - death rate

The natural population decline in Russia began in 1992, when the birth and death curves intersected (Fig. 3), and so far there are no signs that their direction may change. To date, migration compensation for population loss has decreased to 4%, and the dynamics of the number of Russians depends entirely on the ratio of births and deaths. And the situation here is not at all rosy.

As for the birth rate, it is characterized by the following trends:

the absolute number of births over the past 15 years has decreased by almost 2 times - from 2.5 million in 1987 to 1.4 million in 2002;

The total fertility rate (the average number of children born to one woman in her entire life) today is 1.25, while to ensure simple reproduction (children replacing parents) it must reach 2.15, hence the depopulation;

For various reasons, society is steadily oriented towards a one-child family: 54% of families have one child, 37% have two children, 9% have three or more; according to expert estimates, 15-17% of married couples are infertile;

Now about 30% of children are born out of wedlock, which entails all sorts of negative consequences.

It should be borne in mind that the decline in the birth rate is a global trend. However, in modern Russia, in addition to this trend, the process of population reproduction is influenced by some negative social factors (Table 2), which aggravate the situation. Temporary shifts in the birth rate had a certain impact: births are being postponed and abandoned due to a systemic crisis and political instability in society.

Table 2. General fertility, mortality and natural increase rates (per 1000 population

Countries	Number of births		Number of deaths		Natural increase, decrease (-)
	1990	2000	1990	2000	1990	2000
Russia Austria United Kingdom Germany Denmark Italy Netherlands Finland France Sweden USA Japan	13.4 11.6 13.9 11.4 12.4 9.8 13.3 13.2 13.5 14.5 16.7 9.9	8.7 9.6 11.4 9.2 12.6 9.4 13.0 11.0 13.2 10.2 14.0 9.4	11.2 10.6 11.2 11.5 11.9 9.4 8.6 10.0 9.3 11.1 8.7 6.7	15.4 9.3 10.3 10.1 10.9 9.7 8.8 9.5 9.1 10.5 8.5 7.6	2.2 1.0 2.7 -0.1 0.5 0.4 4.7 3.2 4.2 3.4 8.0 3.2	-6.7 0.3 1.1 -0.9 1.7 -0.3 4.2 1.5 4.1 -0.3 5.5 1.8

The situation with mortality in Russia is even more dramatic:

the overall mortality rate (number of deaths per 1,000 population) is steadily rising, in contrast to aging European countries;

The number of deaths is 1.7 times higher than the number of births over the same period of time;

Supermortality of men, especially of working age, is noted, the indicator of the future life expectancy of Russian men is very low, even in comparison with many developing countries - 58 years.

If the current level of mortality remains unchanged, among Russians who reached the age of 16 in 2000, less than half of the men will live to 60. The life expectancy of men who are now 25 or more years old is equal to or even less than life expectancy at the end of the 19th century, although at that time the life expectancy of those born was only 29 years (due to high infant mortality).

According to modern concepts, infant mortality remains high in the country, despite its decline in recent years: now this figure reaches 13 per 1,000 children under the age of 1, which is 3-4 times more than in developed countries. In terms of infant mortality, Russia has one of the highest rates in Europe (only Romania is higher) and not only in Europe: in Japan, the USA, and Australia, the situation is also better than ours.

The forecasts of the total population of Russia offered by various organizations are disappointing: by 2025 there will be 125 million Russians, and by the middle of this century - only about 100 million people, that is, we will be less by 45 million.

The second significant consequence of the great transformations is the decline in the qualitative characteristics of the population in three main groups of indicators: health (physical, mental, social), intellectual potential and professional readiness, spiritual and moral values ​​and orientations.

Assessing the health of the population through the characteristics of ill health, one has to note an increase in the incidence, especially for diseases of social etiology (tuberculosis, syphilis, AIDS/HIV, infectious hepatitis). Forecasts show that by 2010 8-11% of the population will be infected with HIV, which is about 13 million people, mostly young people. According to international experts, Russia is at the stage of a concentrated HIV epidemic. A quarter of HIV-infected women are women of active reproductive age. This means that HIV infection can lead to direct demographic losses. Drug addiction is growing exponentially, especially among children aged 11 to 17. According to estimates, the number of drug addicts reaches 4 million people; 70,000 people die each year as a result of drug use.

Especially dangerous is the decline in reproductive health. The proportion of pregnant women suffering from anemia has increased by 3.6 times over the decade. As a result, the number of children sick already at birth increased by 2.6 times. The main concern is the fact that the generation of children has less health potential than their parents, and their children (grandchildren of parents) have even less potential. Already at the time of birth, 40% of children are sick, and during the life cycle their health only worsens. Thus, a "social funnel" arises, where young cohorts are increasingly drawn in: health problems move from older population groups to groups of children and youth. In order to get out of the "funnel" (if at all possible), more than one generation of healthy people is needed.

According to such an indicator as healthy life expectancy, Russia ranks 107th in the world. Its expected duration in men is 51.5 years, in women - 61.9 years. Since 1999, there has been an intensive growth in the number of disabled people (by about 1 million people a year). Their total number in 2002 was more than 11 million people (7.5% of the population); it is projected to rise to 20 million in 2015 (15% of the population).

The fall in the intellectual potential - both as a result of a direct "brain drain" and the departure of professionals to non-core sectors of the economy - continues, albeit with less intensity. The decline in the quality of school and vocational education, which is especially characteristic of educational institutions in rural areas and small towns, is also important.

No less acute is the problem of the crisis of social values ​​and orientations, the decline of morals and moral principles against the backdrop of the lack of proper law and order and widespread violation of the law. In the mass consciousness, there is a process of erosion of the moral norms characteristic of Russian culture. Pragmatism and orientation towards personal gain, typical of the American model of interpersonal relationships and life orientations, are becoming more and more widespread.

* * * By the end of the 1990s, especially after the default of 1998, it became obvious that it was no longer possible to continue to shape the market in Russia without paying attention to the physical and psychological state of the country's citizens. However, the neoliberal ideology did not allow adequate response to social challenges. The main focus of the social program of the Government of Russia from the very beginning (from "shock therapy") to this day is the reduction of state obligations in the social sphere, which actually contradicts the Constitution of the Russian Federation (Article 7), in which the Russian state is defined as social.

In this regard, a number of social measures taken by the government should be commented on.

First of all, the introduction of a flat scale of taxes on personal income turned out to be directly directed against the poor and low-income groups of the population. For them, the tax rate increased from 12 to 13%; the tax pressure has increased, which before was 2 times more burdensome than that of highly paid groups. As a result, the polarization of the population increased, the income gap increased from 14 to 17 times. For those whose earnings do not exceed 30 thousand rubles. per year, the tax burden (taking into account the unified social tax) amounted to 48.6% (almost half), while those who receive more than 600 thousand per year pay in general only 15% (13 + 2%) of their income.

Secondly, the introduction of the unified social tax (UST) crossed out the emerging insurance system with non-budgetary funds. As a result of this "transformation", the contributions of entrepreneurs, actually carried out at the expense of the wage fund, were transformed into a regular state tax, and this forced employers to freeze wages. The UST becomes the property of the state, losing its target orientation, and, if necessary, is used by the state for other than expected needs, supporting the budget.

Thirdly, The introduction of a funded pension system by slowing down the growth of pensions for today's pensioners actually has a twofold goal:

a) the final justification for reducing the current pension rates, including the allocation of a basic pension in the labor structure, and

b) the accumulation of "long" rubles in the hands of the state in order to use them as an investment resource.

Fourth, the reform of housing and communal services planned by the authorities is focused not so much on bringing this sector out of a deplorable state, but on getting at its disposal a housing subsidy fund, which is close to the size of a pension fund; its use will be even less transparent, given the depreciation of funds at the level of 70-80%.

Fifth, reform of the education sector, the introduction of the unified state exam (USE) is a guarantee of privileges for those who study closer to the center in schools equipped at the modern level and staffed with teachers. Today in Russia, a third of schools do not only have a full set of teachers, but often do not have running water, sewerage, heating and electricity, the quality of education in such schools is an order of magnitude lower than that required by the Unified State Examination.

At sixth, One cannot fail to mention the introduction of the so-called targeted social assistance, the effectiveness of which is close to zero. In fact, the share of cash transfers in the income of the population today is less than 2%, at the same time, the administrative costs associated with establishing the right to receive social assistance will cover the amount of benefits, opening a new source for corruption among officials.

* * * So, all that has been said allows us to formulate a number of conclusions.

Unfavorable living conditions resulted in a violation of the dynamic stereotype of higher nervous activity in a significant part of the Russian population. This, in turn, caused a weakening of the immune defense, the development of pathological processes, depression and other mental disorders.

The state of "wear and tear" of the population leads to the fact that the generation of children does not reproduce the generation of parents, not only quantitatively, but also qualitatively; the population is declining, human capital is being destroyed, and this is a threat to national security.

There is a process of disintegration of social ties and weakening of social potential, which is comparable to the depletion of nature in the absence of its restoration.

The liberal policy of the state is aimed at maintaining the economic well-being of big business; the survival of the main part of the population of the country is not actually taken into account; as a result, the people's potential of Russia is being destroyed and the protest resource is growing.

In order to reverse the trends that are disastrous for the country, it is necessary to immediately and radically change the policy of the state, turn it towards the social sphere, guided by the ideology of the welfare state. This implies the implementation of a comprehensive doctrine aimed at a systematic solution of the aggravated problems, providing the population with at least minimal state guarantees, and the widespread development of social insurance. Economic growth and the use of redistributive mechanisms will make it possible not only to revise the subsistence minimum on a modern basis, but also to ensure decent wages for all workers.

At the end of the report, Corresponding Member of the Russian Academy of Sciences N.M. Rimashevskaya answered questions.

Academician G.A. Month:

Could you please tell us if there have been any changes since the arrival in 2000 of the new leadership of the country?

N.M. Rimashevskaya:

You can say no. Statistics show positive trends only on average. Meanwhile, with the polarization and differentiation that are now characteristic of our society, the average indicators do not actually reflect anything, except, perhaps, for the fact that the situation of the highly wealthy, rich and very rich strata continues to improve.

Academician V.E. Forts:

The report gives a description of the general situation. I would like to hear what is the position of people of science with an average salary in the academy of 3 thousand rubles. per month?

N.M. Rimashevskaya:

Today, the subsistence minimum for the population as a whole is 2140 rubles, for the able-bodied population - 2330 rubles. Scientific personnel cannot ensure the reproduction of themselves and their child with their earnings, that is, they are included in those 60% of workers who live in poverty. Science in our country belongs to the branches of the non-production sphere, where the average wage in relation to individual branches of industry is from 50 to 80%. In mid-2003, the ratio of the average salary in science and scientific services to the national level was 127%.

Academician V.N. Kudryavtsev:

The data on security that you cite do not quite coincide with the estimates of other authors, for example, Gorshkov, Drobizheva, Levada. According to their research, 35% of the population have an income below the subsistence level. What data is more consistent with reality?

N.M. Rimashevskaya:

I immediately said that I use official sources. According to the State Statistics Committee, today 25% - a quarter of our population, are below the subsistence level, that is, in a state of extreme poverty, of which 10% have incomes below the food basket. 50% are below the four-dollar border - the poverty line for developed countries, as defined by the UN. According to the World Bank, 27% of the population lives below the poverty level in Russia. As for the assessments of our institute, we believe that a lot depends on where to draw the line. In our opinion, 33% are below the poverty line. The serious studies of Gorshkov and Drobizheva mentioned here provide very rich information about who the Russian poor are. But these data, obtained on the basis of local observations, do not concern the population of the country as a whole, but only individual regions.

V.N. Kudryavtsev:

In continuation of the question, please explain what is the reason for the depressing situation in which many of our fellow citizens find themselves. Is the income of this part of the population really lower than it was 10-15 years ago, or has the subsistence minimum "grown up", and a significant proportion of the population can no longer achieve it?

N.M. Rimashevskaya:

I have already said that as a result of shock therapy, current incomes (wages, pensions - the main sources of income) decreased by 2-2.5 times. This means that in 1991 all current incomes were 2-2.5 times higher than after 1992. As for the subsistence minimum and the poverty line, in 1992 it was determined to be 2 times lower than the pre-reform level. In the structure of the subsistence minimum, 70% began to be occupied by food expenses, 30% were allocated for all other needs. This budget was expected to be used for only 1.5-2 years, and it was valid for 7 years. In 2000, the poverty line was shifted, and a law was passed according to which the subsistence minimum must be reviewed every four years (it is assumed that upwards). This is absolutely natural, because living conditions are changing: what the family used to receive for free, now they have to pay. Thus, vast masses of the population fell into poverty and even poverty, not because a high standard of living was set, but because of a sharp decline in the level of real incomes.

Academician E.P. Velikhov:

I would like to hear about the income contribution of the gray economy on the one hand and the household on the other.

N.M. Rimashevskaya:

Since the "gray" economy is the "shadow" economy, there are no exact estimates of it. Presenting the distribution of income, the State Statistics Committee adds 25% to everyone equally, which is actually not true. Still, it's good that this phenomenon is somehow taken into account.

As for the in-kind contribution to the income of citizens, it is also taken into account, including when determining the cost of a food basket. In-kind consumption takes place not only in the countryside or in small towns; even in such megalopolises as Moscow, a certain proportion of families partly subsist at the expense of household plots. Residents of small towns make up approximately 19% of the population of Russia. According to our estimates, the contribution of household plots to family income averages 7-8%. I must say that after 1992 the population abandoned paid services, which became very expensive, and people switched to self-service. In fact, it is both production and consumption.

Academician E.M. Galimov:

Are there specific and feasible recommendations on how the authorities should act in order to drastically change unfavorable trends?

N.M. Rimashevskaya:

We sent our proposals to all decision-making levels. Briefly, they boil down to the following. First of all, it is necessary to change social mechanisms, to use redistributive instruments. In our country today, as I have already said, the income differentiation between the extreme ten percent groups reaches 14 times (in European countries - 3-4 times). We need to reduce this catastrophic stratification. The corresponding mechanisms have long been developed by mankind, nothing new needs to be discovered. It should be about changing the tax system. The introduction of a flat income tax scale is a direct strengthening of differentiation, as is the introduction of a unified social tax. You have to put the situation on its head. This is the first direction. The second direction is solving the problem of unprecedentedly high wages, and not only in private enterprises, but also in the public sector. It is necessary to introduce "prohibitive" taxes. After all, the flat scale has by no means reduced the size of shadow incomes.

DISCUSSION IN THE PRESIDIUM OF THE RAS

Awareness of the real situation
- THE BASIS OF A SMART POLICY

Opened the discussion Academician V.N. Kudryavtsev, supporting the conclusions of N.M. Rimashevskaya, confirmed their objectivity by the data of criminal statistics. He pointed to a change in the structure of crime, 70-75% of which are now acquisitive crimes. Moreover, the overwhelming majority of them is "poor crime", when people commit theft, in the literal sense, for the sake of their daily bread, which indicates the impoverishment of the population. Much more damage to the state is caused by "rich crime", thanks to which about 20 billion dollars are stolen and exported abroad every year. This is incomparably more than the damage from the rest of the mass of violations of the law, but it is with "rich crime" that practically no fight is carried out.

What to do? The answer to this question, considers V.N. Kudryavtsev, is contained in numerous speeches and publications of Academician D.S. Lvov. We need not just a social program, but a restructuring of the social structure.

The next speaker Academician D.S. Lviv pointed to a specific mechanism for the redistribution of property, primarily mineral resources, in favor of the state - without revolutions, expropriations, etc. After all, now 92% of property income is controlled by 7% of the population, and if you carefully analyze the differentiation within these 7%, it turns out that the main share of the country's wealth is in the hands of 12 families. D.S. Lvov offers a completely market mechanism for changing this ratio in favor of the state and the population. We are talking about re-evaluation of subsoil reserves - this is an elementary technological issue. If such an additional assessment is made, then instead of 5%, the state will own 98% of the extracted resources - without nationalization, within the framework of the market. On this basis, an equitable distribution is possible. Under the conditions of private ownership, the production of oil wells fell 1.5 times compared to 1990, when it was 2 times higher than the corresponding figure in the United States. In 1990, the output reached 500-520 million tons with 148 thousand employees. Today, the number of employed has almost doubled (380 thousand people) against the backdrop of reduced output. That is, the efficiency of the industry has decreased during the transition to private hands.

Academician Lvov approved the fundamental research that the Institute of Social and Economic Problems of Population of the Russian Academy of Sciences has been conducting for many years with great scientific depth, agreeing on the need to strengthen the recommendatory side of documents sent to the authorities, to place more emphasis on the mechanism for implementing proposals.

As an opponent N.M. Rimashevskaya spoke at the meeting Corresponding Member of the Russian Academy of Sciences V.A. Tishkov. First of all, he expressed doubts about the possibility of developing a consolidated position of the academy, since different points of view are presented in its institutions, in particular the Department of Social Sciences and Humanities, and the assessment of both the transformations of the last decade and, especially, demographic processes does not coincide with that presented in the report. . In particular, the groups of social demographers from the Institute of Economic Forecasting and geographers from the Institute of Geography of the Russian Academy of Sciences, studies of sociologists and ethnographers were mentioned. V.A. Tishkov also drew attention to a fundamental question: how much can one trust the data of the State Statistics Committee, which, in his opinion, largely do not reflect what is happening. As for the population, the observed trends are a complex and long cycle of demographic decline. Estimates of the early 90s - that there will be less than 50 million of us - turned out to be inaccurate, V.A. Tishkov. Already the last census showed that the population was decreasing not by 700 thousand or 1 million a year, but at a much lower rate and was largely compensated. As a result, the number of Russians has decreased in recent years by 3 million. If we add to this the 7% underestimation of the population, we will get approximately the same number as in 1989. Based on these figures, the population decline by the middle of the century will be much less than 50 million. , says V.A. Tishkov. True, it remains unclear whether the aforementioned underestimation of the population is only a defect of the current census. Perhaps it also took place in the previous census (1989)?

V.A. did not agree. Tishkov and with conclusions about the impoverishment of the population. Thus, according to official data from the State Statistics Committee, the lowest incomes are in the North Caucasus, primarily in Dagestan and Ingushetia. However, more sensitive studies - ethnographic, sociological - give a different picture: according to a number of important indicators (state of health, number of cars, size of housing, currency exchange), these republics are among the most prosperous.

As for the qualification of our country as poor, V.A. Tishkov recalled that there are criteria developed by the UN for referring a country to this category. For example, in terms of infant mortality, which in 2003 was 15 per 1,000 children under the age of one, we are among the top twenty prosperous countries in the world. Such a country cannot be considered poor. If you have more than 90% of the population literate, then the country cannot be poor either. If over the past 10 years the number of students has doubled, it means that the country could not become as radically impoverished during this period as we imagine.

The next thesis of the director of the Institute of Ethnology and Anthropology of the Russian Academy of Sciences concerned the initiative of our population in obtaining income not taken into account by statistics, even such rather exotic activities as poaching and hunting were mentioned. But the main thing is how to solve the problem of Russian poverty, especially the elderly, as follows from the words of V.A. Tishkov, is the redistribution of housing.

First of all, he considers dachas and dacha plots as a second home, living on which (apparently, year-round), people have the opportunity to rent out city apartments and receive unaccounted income.

Secondly, it was literally said that "half of pensioners in Moscow live in apartments whose cost reaches 200-500 thousand dollars." And further: "The problem of our society is to help these people move to apartments much cheaper (they do not have to live within the Garden Ring) and immediately get out of poverty." These people are not poor, says V.A. Tishkov. It's just society and they themselves don't know how to use the available opportunities and resources. *

In conclusion, V.A. Tishkov called for a much more serious discussion on the topic raised, involving a wider range of specialists, including social demographers.

* Highlighted by us... - V.V.

Then spoke doctor of economic sciences A.Yu. Shevyakov, head of the Central Laboratory of Socio-Economic Measurements of the Russian Academy of Sciences and the State Statistics Committee of Russia, created to combine the work of an official statistical body with scientific research. He supplemented the drawn by N.M. Rimashevskaya picture, touching upon regional differences in the standard of living, which are an order of magnitude higher than the national ones. This is not only bad in itself, but also from the point of view of developing social and economic policies that should eliminate such disproportions. A.Yu. Shevyakov cited the following data characterizing the deformation of distribution mechanisms: for 1 rub. GDP growth in the regions accounts for 2 rubles. income growth for the rich and 6 kopecks. the poorest part of the population. This allows us to draw conclusions about the directions for improving state policy in the socio-economic sphere.

Speaking about the information collected by the State Statistics Committee, A.Yu. Shevyakov noted that the whole question was how to work with her. The sample of the State Statistics Committee (and this is a unique survey of 50,000 families over many decades, perhaps unparalleled in the world) is somewhat biased towards the poor. If we work with this data directly, then we really turn out to be very poor. If, however, some adjustments are made, "re-weighted" the proportion of strata, the picture turns out to be somewhat different, although polarization remains, and it is very pronounced and formed at the expense of the poor part of the population. The existing inequality, noted A.Yu. Shevyakov, is a brake on the development of the national economy.

Agreeing with V.A. Tishkov in that, on average, it is possible to estimate the income and expenses of the population by no more than 30%, A.Yu. Shevyakov drew attention to the structure of income sources. For many years, the State Statistics Committee has estimated the share of ownership among such sources at 10%. In fact, it reaches 350%. On the one hand, this indicates a monstrous differentiation, and on the other hand, it indicates how much taxes are not being collected. Even without redistributing property, remaining within the framework of the existing system and taxation norms, it would be possible (and should) receive approximately 150 billion rubles. more per year. Here is the source of funding for the public sector. And if you switch to rent payments, which Academician Lvov advocates, the budget revenues will be much higher. This is to the question of the mechanisms for correcting the situation.

As for overcoming poverty, 20% of this is possible through the so-called social transfers; another 40% - by improving wages. The remaining 40% can be overcome by providing an enabling environment for private business, which is currently facing bureaucratic obstacles, corruption, and so on.

A specific proposal was put forward Academician E.M. Galimov. In his opinion, the Academy of Sciences comes up with an unnecessarily loose, multidimensional program in the socio-economic field. We should focus on some very clear one or two recommendations and insist on their implementation. EM. Galimov singled out two important, from his point of view, components. One of them is an efficient tax system. The second is the elimination of corruption in law enforcement agencies, which would ensure the effectiveness of the tax system. If there is a specific, sharply defined program, then the academy will be listened to, E.M. Galimov.

Academician A.D. Nekipelov, emphasizing the significance of the scientific results of N.M. Rimashevskaya, focused on controversial issues that do not find an unambiguous interpretation among specialists. To what extent is the demographic situation related to a trend that clearly manifested itself back in the Soviet period, and to what extent - to the peculiarities of reforming our economy? From the point of view of A.D. Nekipelov, the general trend does exist, but the peculiarities of the transformations in the country have seriously aggravated it. In fact, the wealth differentiation of the population has increased incredibly, poverty has grown incredibly, a large number of children have stopped going to school, are engaged in begging, regional differences are very large.

Further A.D. Nekipelov turned to the question of "what to do?", however, rejecting the proposal by E.M. Galimov's approach, since it is impossible to single out two or three problems and limit ourselves solely to their solution. It is more important to show how it would be correct to approach this or that problem. After all, often the attempts of scientists to prove the existence of crisis phenomena and offer a program to overcome them irritate the authorities, who usually refer to the lack of funds. In fact, the real fact is exploited, connected with the fact that at any given moment society has limited resources, and various spheres compete for their attraction. But what is important is the basis on which they compete, what kind and how decisions are made on the allocation of resources. In society, emphasized A.D. Nekipelov, a mechanism for identifying social preferences should be formed, and this is a function of the political system. The task of scientists is to identify the current situation, because it is impossible to develop a position on what to do if there is no clear idea of ​​the real state of affairs.

The last thing A.D. Nekipelov, is the task put forward by the President of the Russian Federation to double the GDP. The very formulation of the question is incorrect, since GDP can be increased in different ways. What is better - to achieve rapid and significant GDP growth, which will be accompanied by a deepening of the polarization of household incomes, a further slide of the economy into the fuel and raw materials sector, or to increase GDP at a rate of 5% per year, modernizing the economy and ensuring a more or less even distribution of income that corresponds to preferences majority? The answer seems obvious.

Closing remarks were made by the chairman of the meeting Academician G.A. Month. First of all, he drew attention to the following figures. In 2003, Russia's budget amounted to 80 billion dollars, the population, according to the latest census, was 150 million people. That is, a little more than $ 500 of budget money falls on a person per year. A poor country cannot provide for its poor, the unemployed, the destitute. It is impossible to live and develop in the conditions of such a budget. But the authorities are proud that anyone - from an oligarch to a student - pays 13% of the tax.

G.A. Month noted that N.M. Rimashevskaya, the facts and conclusions are extremely important for understanding the situation, and the authorities, be it the Security Council, should be regularly informed about them. Federation Council, Government or President of the country. Despite the differences in assessments, if current trends continue, the question will be only one thing - the timing of complete degradation: will it occur in the 10s or 50s of the current century.

The materials of the discussion were prepared for publication by G.A. Zaikin