2001. vol. 5. No. 2

A year ago, at the first international conference of the HSE, the author and his colleagues presented a report reflecting their view of Russia 's economic strategy. Since then, the development of the Gref program has been completed, and a government program for 1.5 years has been adopted. Then, on behalf of the state Council, V. Ishaev 's program was developed. Long-term and medium-term programs are being developed. Comparison of these and other similar documents shows the similarity of their ideas, proposals, and alternatives. At present, it is interesting to consider what ideas and how they are being implemented, in what direction the Russian economy is turning, and what new (or previously missed), threats and opportunities are emerging. This is what this report is about.

This paper attempts to estimate the impact of wage arrears on subjective well being, as measured by the RLMS (Russian Longitudinal Monitoring Survey). This latter is a comprehensive survey, conducted from 1992 up to 1998, on a representative sample of Russian households and individuals. The results are unambiguous: working with wage ar­rears implies a clear fall in satisfaction. We are able to calculate the shadow price of wage arrears, that is the increase in wages which would place an individual with wage arrears on the same indifference curve as an individual without such arrears. Another result, on the face of it more puzzling, is that the level of satisfaction provided by a job with ar­rears is lower than that provided by inactivity (although higher than that provided by unemployment). We suggest some explanations which we will test in further work. Sub-regressions show that the psychologi­cal impact of wage arrears is greater for men and less well-educated workers, and smaller for women and better-educated workers.

The main purpose of the work is to draw public attention to the causes of the increase in crime and to offer alternative ways to combat it. The dynamic model of crime proposal estimated by econometric methods is considered. The impact of various factors (law enforcement, socio-economic, demographic and other indicators) on the crime rate in Russia during the transition period is assessed. The study studied violent and mercenary crime, represented by the levels of murder and theft per 100 thousand population, respectively (criminologists have a so-called index or crime rate). Using data from 1990 to 1998 for 70 Russian regions, the author comes to the following conclusions. First of all, the effect of deterrence of crime by the activities of law enforcement agencies, but this effect is severely limited. Another limiting factor is the high level of education: an additional year of education of the population leads to a drop in the crime rate by 10%. The increased consumption of alcohol and drugs was one of the reasons for the increase in violent crimes. Contrary to belief in the West, the majority of murders in Russia are not connected with criminal groups, and is result of the flash of aggression caused by alcoholic intoxication within a family and the immediate environment. Family instability has also had a significant impact on the growth of crime. On the contrary, the fall in the birth rate will have a positive impact on the level of crimes against the person in 10-15 years. Other socio-economic indicators have the opposite effect on violent and self-serving crime. With declining income inequality, rising real incomes and unemployment, violent crime is being replaced by self-serving crimes. Consequently, we can expect a further increase in crimes against property during the steady economic growth in Russia. However, the overall crime rate in Russia is still several times lower than in other European countries, even if we take into account the higher share of latent crime in Russia.

The article is devoted to the forecasting of prospective order volumes for the domestic civil aviation industry. The specific conditions of functioning of the Russian aviation complex and related problems of applicability of traditional methods of forecasting are discussed. In the article the scenario method of forecasting is offered and calculation of the expected volume and the nomenclature of the order for the Russian aircraft industry on new planes from civil aviation for the period till 2015 under favorable and adverse conditions of development of the domestic aircraft market is carried out. Based on the results of the calculations, a list of priority measures of state regulation aimed at both expanding demand and improving the parameters of supply of Russian aircraft in the domestic market is proposed.

The two previous issues of the journal published the initial chapters of A. Ponomarenko's work "Historical national accounts of Russia: 1961-1990.». These chapters set out the main approaches to the implementation of retrospective calculations, as well as the results of the reconstruction of indicators in current prices.  Continuing this publication, we offer readers to get acquainted with the results of the reconstruction of the gross domestic product (GDP) of Russia for 1961-1990 in comparable prices.