Historical Evolution of Economic Category “State Financial Reserves”

Abstract

1. Introduction Under the conditions of instability and crisis in the global economy, national governments strive for search and use of various means of preservation of stability of their national economic systems. One of the most popular tools for this is formation of state financial reserves in the period of economic growth, when there is excess of assets of state budget, which could be put into reserve without any damage to realization of planned state programs and under the condition of fulfillment of all state social responsibilities. During the period of recession, accumulated financial resources are directed for supporting the top-priority spheres of economy for preservation of national production and prevention of massive bankruptcy and unemployment. Despite the large interest to state financial reserves, this economic category is not properly studies from evolutional point of view, which hinders effective use of instrumentarium of state financial reserves. This causes the necessity for conduct of additional research in this sphere and determines actuality of this article. 2. Method Up to this time, the modern financial theory viewed the problems of financial reserves primarily at micro-level, in regard to activities of separate economic subjects. This explained small number of domestic publications and studies, devoted to financial reserved at macro-level, i.e., reserves which are usually defined as state reserves. Only over the recent period, the number of scientific research grew substantially--in our opinion, it was caused by the fact that traditional structure of state reserves was supplemented by the Stabilization Reserve, which four years after its creation was divided into the Reserve Fund and the Russian National Wealth Fund (Fund of Future Generations). This gave reasons for more detailed study of theories, tendencies, and conditions which influence formation of diverse state reserves, classification of their types, ways of investment and formation, modeling, and forecasting of their required reserves. Among the researchers that studies the above problems are the following scientists: (Demirmen, 2013), (Zhou, 2009), (Rockoff, 2015), (Morelli et al., 2015), (Vortelinos, 2014), (Hayo et al., 2014), (Carpenter et al., 2014), (Kohn, 2013), (Bassetto & Messer, 2013), etc. At the same time, the task of description of economists' opinions on the nature of reserving from the point of view of their evolution remains topical. It is known that works of A. Smith, K. Marx, F. Engels, T. Hobbs, J. Locke, Antoine de Montchrestien, J. Lauderdale, E. Hansen, R. Maltus, J. Hobson. J. Ackerlof, S.Y. Vitte, etc. contain various approaches to determination of main attributes of reserves and conditions which led to their formation at micro-and macro-levels. 3. Results Our studies show that evolutional environment for generalization of various opinions as to reserving can be conventionally divided into several periods (Fig. 1). Back in III century B.C. in Rome, first bankers were chosen to receive free assets from state treasury as loans, and to borrow from them for social needs--which was the prototype of modern state financial reserves. (Rockoff, 2015). However, first attempts of theoretical realization of economic phenomena and economic structure of society were made by classical Greek thinkers (Xenophon, Plato, Aristotle). Aristotle was the first to analyze regularities of development of society and became the first economist in the history of science. He opposed economy (from [TEXT NOT REPRODUCIBLE IN ASCII]-household and [TEXT NOT REPRODUCIBLE IN ASCII]--manage) and chrematistics (from Greek: [TEXT NOT REPRODUCIBLE IN ASCII]--property). He treated economy as natural husbandry activities related to manufacture of commodities necessary for living, and chrematistics--as an art of accumulating wealth, activities aimed at receiving profit, accumulation of wealth, especially, in the form of money (Morelli et al. …