Estimation Of Factors For Social And Economic Inequality Of Russia'S Towns

At the present-day stage of economics development the issue of productive power arrangement over the Russia’s territory is being intensively researched due to ever growing differentiation of social and economic state of towns. The goal is to identify factors and estimate their impact on the social and economic inequality of Russia’s towns. The key factors under consideration include the size of engaged population, investment in a town budget, population density, density of hard-surface roads, distance along motor roads to the town center. The factor model is constructed by a least-square method. The authors made use of the data from the Federal State Statistics Service as of 2003, 2009, 2014, the research covered the populated areas having a town status with the population size over 100 thous. people. It has been proven empirically that positive impact on the social and economic inequality of Russia’s towns is the most significant from volume of investments in a town budget and level of transport infrastructure development. Such factor as geographic arrangement of the towns has a noticeable negative influence on the social and economic inequality of towns. However, in the Siberian Federal district, a factor of distance along motor roads to the nearest major town correlates with the industrial output, thus demonstrating that trade in the towns of this Federal District is aimed at the foreign market. In Southern, North Caucasian, Ural, Siberian and Far Eastern Federal Districts the inflow of labor resources to a town exceeds demand thereof, thus confirming migration of engaged population to big towns. Research outcomes may be utilized in creation of procedural aids for development of mechanisms to level out interregional inequalities, social and economic development programs of a town.