3.2.1 Human Capital and Russian Labor Market

Research Area 3. Employment and Development of Skills and Competencies  → Research Program 3.2 Labor Market: Changes in Demand in Professional Structure and System of Skills and Wages

Project period

2020-2025

Context of Research Project within a Subject of Human Capital

The labor market undergoes a continuous transformation: some sectors and occupations are disappearing, others are emerging or expanding. Skills employers require from employees are also changing: professional skills are insufficient, one needs to have a wide range of social skills as well. All this is manifested in the fact that the structure of jobs, which reflects interplay of demand for labor and its supply, is subject to continuous and profound shifts. As a result, the demand for human capital changes as well and the change has multiple social, economic, political and socio-psychological consequences.

The research project Human Capital and Russian Labour Market examines the Russian economy through the prism of changing jobs

Project Aim

Analyzing supply and demand for human capital in the Russian economy

Project Objectives:

1. Exploring changes in the occupational structure of employment in the Russian economy
2. Examining changes in the demand for skills necessary for the economy
3. Studying the evolution of wages, wages and its determinants

Key Findings

2020

A methodology has been developed for analyzing the digitalization of professions in relation to the Russian labor market, a statistical base has been formed for analyzing the digitalization of professions based on the Russian monitoring of the economic situation and public health of the HSE and the analytical project The Occupational Information Network (O*NET) for 2003-2018

2021

Obtained new estimates for the return to education in the Russian economy (the return remains high and does not tend to decrease), presented the analysis of the demand for skills using job ads from the website of one of the leading online job search platforms during 2019-2020

2022

The evolution of the workplaces structure has been analyzed. It has been revealed that during 2000-2019 the structure of jobs in the Russian economy evolved according to the improvement scenario: the share of ‘bad’ jobs decreased, and the share of ‘good’ ones, on the contrary, increased. The contribution of various socio-demographic groups to the process of changing the structure of jobs has been analyzed, sectoral shifts have been studied. It turned out that a significant reduction in ‘bad’ jobs occurred due to a sharp decrease in agricultural employment, and the main generators of ‘good’ jobs were business services, trade and service sector, as well as construction.

Studies of institutional changes in the regulation of the minimum wage (minimum wage) have shown that the actual centralization of the minimum wage has increased significantly in recent years. This was a consequence of the increase in the minimum wage to the subsistence minimum and the accrual of district coefficients in excess of the minimum wage. The consequences of increased centralization of minimum wage standards are ambiguous: on the one hand, for economically weak regions, strict centralized regulation with inflated standards can cause a reduction in employment and outflow of labor, and on the other hand, in recent years, the discussed institutional changes in the establishment of minimum wage could help reduce interregional differences in its real purchasing power.

Absolute average annual increases in quintiles of job quality, 2000–2019, all employed, thousand people (ranking – by annual earnings in 2016)

2023

The relationship of non-cognitive skills with self-assessments of job satisfaction

It is revealed that the Russian labor market presents a "universal" demand for employees with a pronounced tendency to discipline, organization, sociability and emotional stability, which is rewarded by more comfortable (from the point of view of employees' perception) characteristics of workplaces.

The Russian labor market, all other things being equal, also rewards a willingness to defend one's interests – expressed goodwill, or an orientation towards considering the opinions of other people, is not a significant positive factor in job satisfaction. 

Orientation towards cognition and creativity also does not bring significant positive returns in the workplace, which can be considered as a signal of inconsistency with the parameters of workplaces (or a set of tasks performed), in which the tendency to openness either does not find expression or is not rewarded, in the opinion of employees, with a sufficient level of remuneration and career opportunities.

Publications

1. Kapelyushnikov R. Returns to education in Russia: Nowhere below? (RU) // Voprosy Ekonomiki Volume 2021, Issue 8, pp. 37-68
2. Lukyanova A. Digitalization of Professions and Its Impact on the Gender Pay Gap (RU) // Economic policy. 2021. Vol. 16. No. 2. pp. 88-117
3. Report Labor Productivity and Russian Human Capital: Paradoxes of Interrelation?. (RU) Authors: Daria Avdeeva, Natalia Akindinova, Ilya Voskoboynikov, Vladimir Gimpelson, Mikhail Denisenko, Yuri Simachev, Pavel Travkin and Anna Fedyunina.
4. Report Wage Inequality: Dynamics, Major Factors, Regional Differences, Impact of Labor Market Institutions (RU) Authors: N. Vishnevskaya, A. Zudina, R. Kapelyushnikov, A. Lukyanova, A. Oshchepkov, A. Sharunina. National Research University Higher School of Economics, Moscow: HSE, 2022.
5. Lukyanova A. Self-employment, Secondary Employment and Inequality of Labor Income in Russia (2000-2014) (RU) // Economic Sociology. Vol. 23. No. 1. January 2022, pp.101-124

6. Gimpelson V. E., Kapelyushnikov R. I. The evolution of the structure of jobs in Russia: polarization, improvement, stagnation //Economic issues. – 2023. – Vol. 1. – pp. 59-85. doi

   7.Lukyanova A. L. Centralization and regionalization of minimum wages: Russian experience //Economic issues. – 2023. – No. 1. – pp. 86-104. doi

   8.Zudina, A. A. (2024). The subjective return on non-cognitive skills in the Russian labor market: an example of job satisfaction. Public Opinion Monitoring: Economic and Social Changes, (1), 3-25. doi

Conferences

XXII April International Scientific Conference on Economic and Social Development (Moscow, Russia, April 4-22, 2021):
- Special round table Labor Productivity and Russian Human Capital: Paradoxes of Interrelation (04/14/2021)

5th International Russia Longitudinal Monitoring Survey of HSE User Conference (RU) (Moscow, Russia, May 27-28, 2021)

Joint online conference of HSE and RANEPA Labor Market: Demographic Challenges and Human Capital (Moscow, Russia, June 8-9, 2021)

Joint International IOS – IZA – HSE Seminar Adopting Telework: The Causal Impact of Working from Home on Subjective Wellbeing during the Covid-19 Lockdown (RU) (Moscow, Russia, November 30, 2011)

Conference "Social and Non-cognitive Skills and the Labor Market" (Online, September 22, 2022)

Scientific and Practical Conference "Labor Market: Demographic Challenges and Human Capital" RANEPA and HSE (Online, October 25-26, 2022)

The Sixth International Conference of data users "Russian Monitoring of the Economic Situation and Public Health of the HSE (RLMS-HSE)" (Moscow, Russia, May 26-27, 2023):

Zudina A.A. Informal employment of Russian workers before and after COVID-19 (26/05/2023)

Seminar "The Russian labor market under sanctions pressure" (online, October 24, 2023)