The regional ranking of human capital development in Russia

Abstract

This article examines the rationale for the importance and effectiveness of preparing the rankings of territories as a tool of regional socio-economic policy aimed at leveling the conditions for the socio-economic development of regions. It provides a methodological approach to determining the level of human capital development in the regions of the Russian Federation focused on identifying the quality of the human capital in each subject of the Russian Federation and the causes underlying the existing situation. The author presents a methodological apparatus based on the qualimetric method of indicative analysis, which allows to convert the diverse indicative gures expressed in different units of measure into a comparable type, obtain and differentiate the integrated assessments of human capital level in each subject of the Russian Federation based on the proposed classification of its conditions. The article provides the structure of indicators’ system that models the human capital level by its descriptive components, including its demographic, educational, labor, research, and socio-cultural components. It was found that, in the vast majority of the subjects of the Russian Federation, a human capital is characterized by a predominantly low level of development. The author examines the positions of Russian regions ranked by their human capital level in 2013, presents the dynamics of changes in the human capital level across the Russian Federal Districts, as well as leaders and laggards in the ranking of the subjects of the Russian Federation in 2000–2013. The article provides the structure of integrated assessment of human capital level by presenting the assessments of its components. It establishes the classification of the subjects of the Russian Federation by taking into account the changes in their ranking, which allowed to identify four groups of territories: 1) Regions with consistently successful human capital level; 2) Regions with fairly high assessments in 2013 and, at the same time, significant advancement in the ranking during 2000–2013; 3) Regions with low assessments in 2013 and, at the same time, a significant decline in the ranking over 2000–2013; 4) Consistently unsuccessful regions.