REGIONAL ECONOMIC PROBLEMS: LABOR POTENTIAL OF THE FAR EAST DEVELOPMENT

Abstract

The article deals with the problem of reducing the total population and reducing labor potential in the Far Eastern Federal District of the Russian Federation. Among the reasons that influence this process, a relatively low standard of living of the population is identified (lagging behind the average Russian population shares with incomes below the subsistence level, unemployment and access to social benefits), which contributes to an increase in migration outflows. Against the backdrop of a negative coefficient of natural profit, the migration of the able-bodied strata of the population poses a threat to the implementation of the state plan for the long-term social and economic development of the Far East. It has been suggested that the implementation of the “Far Eastern Capital” program is one of the ways to attract highly educated labor resources to the territory of the subjects of the Far-Eastern macroregion. The program envisages the allocation of financial resources that are applied by the population exclusively in the given territory in order to improve their living standards (housing and the opportunity to open their own business), as well as the quality of the educational (and hence labor) potential. The increase in population due to the solution of issues of material and social well-being will contribute to the expansion of domestic effective demand in the Far East. This, in turn, will lead to the successful functioning of the territories of advanced development and special zones of investment attractiveness.