Economy of a large city: structural transformations in the era of global changes

Abstract

The paper outlines the features of structural transformations in the economy of large cities in conditions of globalization. Special attention is paid to finding priority directions and mechanisms of impact of global economic changes on evolutionary advances in economic structure of large cities. The decisive role of large cities in economic development of contemporary states is emphasized. The processes are accompanied by constant growth of the share of urban population and concentration of growing economic capacity in cities. Moreover, more and more metropolises and global cities emerge. Their major advantage is a high concentration level of production capacities and capital as well as significant human capacity, which promotes innovative development of various sectors of urban economy, mostly energy, information technologies, transport, household services, leisure and banking sector, etc. The following problems are defined as the most essential of those faced by large cities in the era of globalization: deteriorating quality of social capital, growing security challenges, growing risks of technological disasters, deteriorating quality of environment and environmental situation in general, growing load on engineering and social infrastructure, need to secure constant supply of sufficient volumes of drinking water and food. The paper proves that the priority directions of economy development in large cities in the era of globalization is to improve the mobility of population, improve living conditions and meet high standards of citizens’ household comfort, form innovative information-communication networks, establish qualitative planning of urban space, solve ecological problems, namely through renewable energy and prioritization of environmental protection. Recommendations regarding top priority measures of adaptation of large Ukrainian cities to modern requirements of globalization based on the experience of the most developed countries in the world are suggested. In particular, the authors emphasize the need to increase the volumes of investment in the development of information technologies and activation of digitalization of urban space due to releasing the share of budget resources currently inefficiently used and directing them on meeting social needs of citizens.