Russian Rates Research Articles

Increasing the VAT Rate in Russia from the Position of the Laffer Curve

Increasing the VAT Rate in Russia from the Position of the Laffer Curve

History and prospects of perinatal mortality rate in Russia

Population reproduction is a priority task of social policy and a factor of Russias national security. The review presents the stages of recording the perinatal mortality indicator, which is closely related to the frequency of preterm birth. In the first stage, the criteria for registering preterm birth were 28 weeks of pregnancy, and in the second, since 2012, 22 weeks. At both stages, due to underreporting of low birth weight babies (their transfer to the miscarriage group), stillbirths, including full-term babies, prevailed in the preterm birth indicator structure. The authors of the article stressed that the main cause of preterm birth (including iatrogenic) is the formation of endotoxemia syndrome, or systemic effects of aggressive metabolites in the mother placenta fetus system. In this etiopathogenetic therapeutic means are methods of efferent therapy in the form of plasmapheresis, etc. These technologies in many obstetric pathologies (thrombophilia, preeclampsia, Rh-conflict, isthmic-cesmic and chronic placental insufficiency, etc.) sanitize the mother placenta fetus system and allow to prolong pregnancy with a reduction of perinatal mortality index. The authors cite their own data on the use of efferent therapy methods in 102 women presenting at 2228 weeks of pregnancy to the Perinatal Center of Saint Petersburg State Medical University from other institutions after unsuccessful treatment according to the Protocols for various obstetric complications. Pregnancies were prolonged by 215 weeks; all 123 children (20 twins, 1 triplet) were born alive, did not require long-term intensive care, survived and were not disabled. Six newborns died and the perinatal mortality rate was 48 : 1000, which is an order of magnitude lower than that quoted in the literature for similar pathologies and gestational ages. In conclusion of the article, it is suggested that in order to reduce perinatal mortality in Russia, all large institutions should arrange efferent therapy rooms to treat sick pregnant women using the safe, low-cost technologies developed by the authors, using domestic equipment.

Comparative Characteristics of the Factors Affecting Inflation in Russia and China

Success of the state economic policy depends on a number of external and internal factors, condition of national economy as well as on external economic relations. Implementation of state macroeconomic policy is directly linked to approaches of the state to regulation of its inflation constituent, which became especially relevant during the pandemic. The article examines the experience of Russia and China in .their conduct of the anti-inflation policy as the countries which were initially oriented to planning economy with intensive industrialization. However after the 90-s of the 20th century the economies diverged in terms of goals and instruments used for implementation of their macroeconomic policy. By analyzing the existing theoretical and factual materials, the article demonstrates the link between inflation rate in the country and some factors. These factors include: instruments of national monetary policy; level of industrialization in the country and competitiveness of national industrial sector; dependence of national economy developments on world oil prices (commodity dependent production and export); participation of the country in the sanction policy. The authors expect that the inflation rate in Russia will further exceed the corresponding figure in China.

COMPARATIVE ANALYSIS OF THE DIFFERENTIATION OF WAGE RATES IN RUSSIA AND IN THE UNITED STATES

The purpose of this study is a comparative analysis of the factors affecting the differentiation of wage rates in Russia and the United States. The information base for the study was statistical and analytical materials given on the official websites of the Russian Federation and the United States. The article presents an extensive analysis of the wage levels depending on the professional training of employees. Based on statistical data, the authors substantiate why in Russia and the United States the wages of employees with higher professional education are significantly higher than the wages of employees with secondary education, not to mention employees without secondary education. Much attention is paid to the consideration of the differentiation of wage levels with respect to the type of the economic activity. It is shown that in Russia and the United States, despite significant differences in the structure of the economy and economic potentials, the highest earnings prevail in the extractive industries, primarily in the fuel and energy complex. On the other hand, wages in the light and food industries, as well as in agriculture in Russia and the United States are about 20 and 33% of the above-mentioned industries, respectively. The article also examines the differentiation of wages in relation to racial characteristics and gender differences. Citing a number of factual data from Russia and the United States, the authors show that such differentiation in the 21st century should be qualified in terms of labor market imperfections from both scientific and social points of view. The regional aspect of the wage difference in both countries is also analyzed in detail. It is explained why the regional factor has almost no effect on the size of the average wage in the United States contrary to Russia. It is concluded that the most effective mechanism for regulating wage levels is competition in the labor market, which puts the qualifications, skills and experience of employees, as well as working conditions, as the basis for wage differentiation.

Public Policy Measures to Increase Anti-SARS-CoV-2 Vaccination Rate in Russia.

The total vaccination rate remains relatively low in Russia as of March 2022 (around 55%, with around 20% in some regions). In the paper, we study the reasons for it. We communicate the results of our survey aimed at detecting reasons for the relatively low anti-SARS-CoV-2 vaccination rate in Russia (47.1% as of mid-January 2022) and suggest potential measures to increase the level of confidence in the Russian vaccination campaign. A total of 14,310 users exhibited interest to participate in the research (16.84% of the total number of invitations sent in the Russian social network VKontakte). After the sample set repair, only 5822 (40.68% of those who agreed to participate) responses were suitable for the research, and they composed the final set. The age range of the respondents was 16–51 years old (y.o.) with a mean of 29.1 ± 10.6 y.o. The proportion of the female gender in responses was 44.23%. A total of 2454 persons (42.15%) expressed their hesitant, cautious, or negative attitude towards vaccine uptake. Of the 2454 persons with cautious attitude towards vaccination, only 928 (37.82%) were concerned about the quality of the Russian vaccines. A total of 1323 individuals (53.91%) supported one or more conspiracy beliefs. A total of 5064 (86.98% of the whole set) showed cautious or negative attitude towards the planned introduction of a nationwide system of vaccination certification/verification based on QR codes. The main social factors that hinder the Russian vaccination campaign are: vexation over the lack of desire of officials to receive feedback from the general population regarding vaccination, wide support for conspiracy beliefs, and controversy over the QR code-based digital system. To elevate the vaccination rate in Russia, the following steps may be taken: social encouragement of those who support vaccination, increase in transparency of the vaccination campaign, acceptance of both digital and paper vaccination certificates, increase in participation of society in vaccination-related discussions, public disclosure of vaccine composition, and avoidance of excessive digitalization of data in the vaccination campaign.

Structure of GDP growth rates in Russia up to 2024

By the fall of 2021, the Russian economy had practically overcome the crisis caused by coronavirus pandemic and sharp drop in oil prices in the first half of 2020, having returned in terms of GDP, industrial production and investment in fixed assets to pre-crisis levels. At the same time, the prospects for further growth of the Russian economy remain uncertain, since both in the short and long term, the balance of factors affecting the growth rate of Russia’s GDP is shifted to a negative area. These external factors include the growing risks of a new financial and/or economic crisis in the world’s leading economies (including China), imposing large-scale sanctions against Russia in connection with a special operation in Ukraine, the instability of world commodity markets, as well as the processes of decarbonization and restructuring of the world economy. Internal factors of growth comprise increased investment activity of private and state-owned companies (and in the field of national projects), expansion of non-resource non-energy exports, while internal growth constraints comprise possible decline in the working-age population in Russia and slow growth of the real personal income. According to the official forecast by the RF Ministry of Economic Development, after the recovery acceleration of the economy by 4.2% in 2021 (the first estimate by Rosstat — 4.7%), GDP growth will stabilize at about 3% per year in subsequent years. However, it is lower than expected growth rates of the world economy, but it is significantly higher than the average growth rates of the Russian economy over the past decade (about 0.7% per year).To reveal the growth rates structure, which corresponds to anticipated economic dynamics in Russia, we have used an approach based on identifying three components of GDP growth rates — structural, foreign trade, and business cycle ones. In this article a new decomposition method was applied, which assumes the neutrality of the foreign trade component if the oil price is at the average long-term values.In case of achievement of the RF Ministry of Economic Development forecast, actual and structural unemployment indicators convergence may lead to a shortage of labor in certain sectors of the Russian economy in 2022—2023. The solution to this problem lies in the sphere of external and internal migration policy intensification and measures for promoting inter-sectoral labor mobility. Estimates of the output gap show that it is advisable to pursue a stimulating fiscal policy in 2022 with a transition to neutrality in 2023—2024. Supporting the global spread of vaccines against coronavirus infection and the recovery of the global economy will contribute to an increase in oil prices and in the foreign trade component of economic growth in Russia.

Risk of Increasing Income Inequality and Poverty: Analysis by Income Source

The high and persistent level of income inequality limits the opportunities for economic growth and contributes to the persistence of a high poverty rate in Russia. Reducing inequality is integral to achieving the Sustainable Development Goals (SDG-10); thus, greater focus is needed to reduce income inequality. We assess income inequality based on a representative income and expenditure data collected at the micro level to determine the risk of increasing inequality and poverty in the context of specific socio-demographic groups and income sources. We look at the contribution of various household income sources to total income inequality, taking into account the differences in the weighting of income components, the unevenness of their distribution, and their correlation with the total distribution of income. The main data source is the project “The Russia Longitudinal Monitoring Survey-Higher School of Economics” (RLMS-HSE) for 2000–2018. Calculation of the elasticity of the Gini index by sources of total income for poor and non-poor households revealed their multidirectional impact on overall inequality. We show that social transfers in poor households do not help to reduce inequality. This indicates the need for closer attention to this phenomenon when making policy decisions connected with social policy. Moreover, the “hidden incomes” appear to be a factor reducing inequality for poor households within the framework of the accepted definitions and the formed sample of households.

Существует ли в России естественный уровень преступности?

According to the concept of the natural rate of crime the number of crimes committed in the long term depends not on the direct costs of society to combat them, but on the quality of the work of socio-economic institutions. Empirical verification of the presence of this phenomenon in some countries is reflected in foreign studies, while in Russia such works are more descriptive than applied. At the same time, determining the natural rate of crime is important for the strategic planning in the economy, as it allows minimizing the costs of combating crime and increasing the efficiency of budget expenditures. The purpose of this article is to check whether there is a natural crime rate in Russia. For this purpose the indicators of the crime rate in Russia from 1992 to 2020 are analyzed using unit root tests. We apply both conventional unit root tests and tests that take into account structural breaks and spatial correlation between the subjects of panel data, which are the federal districts. The results of the study allow to conclude that there is a natural crime rate in Russia for rapes, hijackings and traffic violations. In the context of the deterrence hypothesis, counteracting these types of crimes will lead to a temporary decrease in their level, which will inevitably return to its previous values. The author attributes the absence of a natural level for most types of Russian crime to the state of public institutions and the mobility of the institutional structure, as well as to the limitations of official criminal statistics.

РЕФОРМИРОВАНИЕ ПОДОХОДНОГО НАЛОГА В РОССИИ

The social orientation and economic significance of income tax gives it a special place in the tax system of the state. Throughout its existence, income taxation has been in constant reform, including in terms of the tax rate. The article provides a periodization of the application of progressive and proportional tax rates in Russia from 1812 to 2021. The modern stage, which is marked by a gradual transition to a progressive tax rate on personal income, is covered in detail. Changes in the direction of raising the tax rate, undertaken in Russia from 2021, will affect only a small share of the country's population so far. However, the initiated reform may lead to a more significant and tangible transformation of the tax rate for taxpayers in the future.

Оценка влияния новостных шоков условий торговли на российскую экономику

This paper examines the impact of terms of trade news shocks on the dynamics of output, consumption, investment, trade balance and exchange rate in Russia. News in recent work are understood as the emergence of information about future changes in the economy. To identify expected shocks, we maximize the forecast error variance share of terms of trade time series over a finite horizon of several quarters. The results indicate that news shocks have a significant effect on the Russian economy and explain almost 60% of the variance of the main indicators.

ПРОИЗВОДСТВЕННЫЙ ТРАВМАТИЗМ В РФ: АНАЛИЗ СОСТОЯНИЯ В РЕГИОНАХ И ПО ВИДАМ ЭКОНОМИЧЕСКОЙ ДЕЯТЕЛЬНОСТИ

The subject of the study was the indicators of occupational injuries in the context of Russian regions. The aim of the study is to analyze the state of occupational injuries in the regions of the Russian Federation. The study presents an analysis based on Rosstat data in 2019-2020, considering the contribution of certain types of economic activity to injury rates. The relevance of the study is due to the fact that in the last 5 years the rate of decline in occupational injury rates in Russia has slowed down significantly and is no longer so clearly dependent on employment rates in the economy. The scientific novelty is the grouping of the regions of the Russian Federation according to the types of economic activity prevailing in them in order to analyze their impact on the indicators of occupational injuries. The research methods are analysis, synthesis, induction and deduction, grouping and modeling. The authors developed a methodology for analyzing the state of occupational injuries in the context of the regions of the Russian Federation. In the process of developing the methodology, the types of economic activity were identified, the contribution of which to occupational injuries is at least 10%. For the country as a whole, these are manufacturing, transportation and storage, and health care activities (the share of affected people employed in them exceeds 60%). The authors compiled a list of regions of the Russian Federation, in which the rates of occupational injuries exceed national figures in all types of economic activity that dominate in terms of injuries. A comparative analysis of data on occupational injuries in 2019-2020 made it possible to assess the impact of the pandemic both on the distribution of victims by types of economic activity and on the composition of the types of economic activities that dominate in occupational injuries. The study concludes that it is necessary to consider the types of economic activity prevailing in the regions when developing state programs for Russian regions to improve working conditions and labor protection.

Тенденции развития занятости в современной экономике

In the modern economy, an unprecedented rapid change in the sphere of work is taking place. The transformation of forms of employment and its impact on the labor market and social and labor relations have manifested themselves almost on a global scale. The article raises questions and poses problems related to trends in the development of new forms of employment, in particular, under the influence of the development of information and communications and digital technologies. The authors’ interpretation of the signs of modern forms of employment is proposed: the degree of documenting the employer-employee relationship; compliance with the classical requirements imposed by employers for working hours and contract terms; remoteness from the company’s head office of the employee’s workplace; conditions for the use of information and communications and digital technologies. This made it possible to distinguish such classification groups of employment as formal and informal, standard and non-standard, remote and stationary. To analyze the current state of issues related to the development of new forms of employment, data from the Federal State Statistics Service and the All-Russian Center for the Study of Public Opinion were used. The authors used the classical method of statistical analysis, which allows answering the questions posed. The article shows the influence of new non-standard forms of employment on the dynamics of the unemployment rate in Russia and on the dynamics of the number of vacancies over the past 20 years reported by Russian enterprises and organizations to the state employment service. The development of the platform economy is changing the nature of work, creating new forms of employment, and increasing the number of jobs. However, within the framework of platform employment, new problems arise, generated by the inability to meet the challenges of modern legislation, the uncertainty of the location of the employer and the employee, the lack of control over the provision of minimum wages, the health and safety of employees. The authors also analyzed the distribution of federal districts and regions of the Russian Federation by the number of part-time employees on the initiative of the employer for 2017. The largest number of employees who worked part-time at the initiative of the employer was revealed in the Volga Federal District. An overview of the gender and age characteristics of a sociological survey of 1,600 Russians aged 18 and over, conducted by the All-Russian Center for the Study of Public Opinion, on the advantages and disadvantages of remote work is presented. The new form of employment that has arisen is ambiguously evaluated and accepted by working Russians, but a positive beginning prevails. The relevant conclusions are drawn. The problems and further directions of labor market research, ensuring employment and decent wages, observance of workers’ rights and guarantees are outlined. Contribution of the authors: the authors contributed equally to this article. The authors declare no conflicts of interests.

Дискуссионные аспекты налоговых отношений: авторский взгляд

TInterpretation of the tax as a «gratuitous payment» impoverishes (narrows) the role and place of tax relations in the economic system, causes a variety of negative processes at the stage of its formation and payment. This issue is one of the debatable in the field of tax relations and is important for the formation of an adequate perception of the tax system by business and the population. The source of all taxes is the value added. The latter contains factors that formally belong to a legal entity, but in fact are the merit of the labor collective. This is where the complexity of the unambiguous division of taxes between different categories of taxpayers arises. In the phase of final consumption of goods and services, the division of the tax burden between legal entities and individuals loses its meaning, because it completely falls on the well-being of the population. The essence of the value added tax is not obvious not only to the public, but also to practitioners. The explanation of profit in terms of «entrepreneurial ability» as a factor of production is far-fetched. Three classical factors: labor, land and capital fully explain the origin of profit. Also, the unique role of the businessman in the formation of profits is undeniable. A businessman (owner) and employees combine their efforts to conduct business more efficiently and improve the well-being of all participants in the production process. Progressive income tax embodies the principle of fair taxation and mitigates social inequality in the society. The introduction of an additional rate in Russia from 2021 is considered as the introduction of a progressive scale, but does this fully implement the principle of social justice? The author critically examines all these issues in the article, gives his interpretation and argumentation of processes and phenomena.

Ռուս-ուկրաինական հակամարտություն. տրանսֆերտներ/Russian-Ukrainian Conflict: Remittances

The paper examines the impact of sanctions imposed on Russia following the Russian-Ukrainian conflict on remittances to Armenia. Traditionally, remittances have had a significant impact on the Armenian economy, and even though the remittances / GDP ratio has been declining in recent years, it still remains high. The main source of remittances for the Armenian economy is Russia, the share of which is decreasing, but it still retains its predominant role. As a result of the sanctions, the Russian ruble depreciates which leads to a reduction in remittances in dram or dollar terms. In addition, the sanctions will also lead to an increase in the unemployment rate in Russia, which in quantitative terms will again lead to a reduction in remittances. The latter will have a chain effect first on the consumption of households, and then on the state tax revenues.

Репродуктивное здоровье и репродуктивная культура студентов: тактика профилактических мероприятий

BACKGROUND: Statistics shows a decrease in the birth rate in Russia. This is alarming fact that obliges to take some measures, including preventive ones. Since the reproductive health of students will determine demographic indicators for many years to come, it is very important to choose methods of prevention in one direction or another, taking into account modern technical trends and hobbies of young people. AIM: To explore the knowledge of students of different specialties in matters of reproductive health, reproductive culture. To suggest the way of preventive measures based on the data obtained. MATERIALS AND METHODS: The study involved students from the Ural, Moscow and St. Petersburg universities. 537 questionnaires were processed. The questionnaire indicated the social status of the participants (gender, age, university profile). According to the latter criterion, the sample was divided into four groups: natural sciences, medical sciences, technical sciences, and humanities. An anonymous survey was conducted in the “Google form”. The respondents answered questions about the most pressing problems of reproductive health and reproductive culture. RESULTS: 64% of the respondents assess their reproductive health as good; the most popular source of information on contraception for university youth is the Internet. According to the analysis of the data obtained, in the event of an unwanted pregnancy, only 24% of the women surveyed would have the pregnancy kept, which may indicate a low reproductive culture of students. CONCLUSION: To take attention to reproductive health and prevention issues among students in accessible terms, blogging on social networks by specialists in the field of obstetrics and gynecology, urology and andrology, senior medical students or clinical residents can be proposed.

Formation a Мathematical Modeling of Unemployment Rate in Russian Federation

The research analyzed the unemployment rate in the Russian Fe­deration using economic and mathematical modeling. The оbject of the research is the dynamics of the unemployment rate in the Russian Federation in the period from 2005 to 2020, depending on some factors that make an impact on the factor under consideration. As a result of this investigation, carried out using the multiple regression method, a linear regression model was obtained, which can be employed for further analysis and forecasting of the unemployment rate in Russia.

Results of the study of demographic problems in Russia in the 21st century

Demographic problems are among the most acute in modern Russia. This is evidenced by the great attention paid to them by the authorities, the media, and public organizations. Demographic science uses its own methods to find the ways to solve the existing problems. And in Russia the coverage of demographic problems in scientific publications has a special perspective, since on the one hand, specialists are professionally versed in the topic and see nuances incomprehensible "from the outside". On the other hand, many researchers in the field of social sciences are characterized by a critical approach to any actions of the authorities, and the existing achievements may be downplayed, as they do not reach the final goal. In particular, firstly, the mortality rate in Russia has been decreasing for almost all the years of the 21st century, but it is still very high as compared to most European countries. Secondly, the birth rate in the country is low by world standards, but it is higher than in most European countries. As a result, these facts are interpreted in different ways both in a positive and in a negative way. At the same time, all demographic projections indicate that in the coming decades the natural decline of the Russian population will continue. And to solve this problem, it is necessary to search for new approaches, measures of demographic policy that is impossible without combined efforts of all domestic demographers, despite theoretical, practical and other differences. The national project "Demography" and related programs ("Health Care" and others) can solve problems only subject to necessary scientific development of the proposed measures and their adaptation to the real Russian conditions.

Regional differences in cardiac mortality rates in Russia: the role of statistical features

Aim. To analyze the contribution of cardiac causes to all-cause mortality, to characterize the differences in standardized mortality rates (SMRs) in Russian regions, as well as to identify promising directions for improving establishment of cardiovascular death and its coding.Material and methods. We used the Federal State Statistics Service (Rosstat) data on the mortality rate and the average annual population in one-year age groups for 2019. To calculate the SMR, the European Standard Population was used. For each cardiac death, the SMR from 23 causes was calculated, which were combined into 4 groups, and for each of these groups, the regional mean and standard deviation of SMR in Russian regions were estimated.Results. In 2019, the cardiac SMR in Russian regions was 301,02±77,67, which corresponded to 30,5±5,8% of all death causes. At the same time, the coefficient of variation of regional cardiac SMR was 25,8%. In general, in 60,9±13,8% of cases, the cause of cardiac death was chronic diseases, mainly related to atherosclerosis. The proportion of deaths from acute types of coronary artery disease was 17,3±9,7%, deaths not associated with atherosclerosis (heart defects, myocardial diseases, etc.) — 17,5±8,2%, deaths associated with hypertension — 4,2±5,2%. The coefficient of variation of regional SMR was 34,66, 64,47, 50,99 and 122,7, respectively.Conclusion. Significant regional differences in SMR from certain cardiac causes and groups of causes, as well as their contribution to mortality pattern, were revealed. It is necessary to continue the research on the methodology of statistical recording of certain cardiovascular diseases.

Theory and Practice of Quantitative Assessment of System Harmonicity: Case of Road Safety in Russia before and during the COVID-19 Epidemic

People have had an interest in harmony issues for thousands of years; however, there is still no elaborated system of views on these questions. Ancient Greeks understood harmony as an agreement of opposites. A surge of interest in the study of the harmonic aspects of being occurred in the twentieth century due to the development of systems science, particularly regarding synergetic system effects. At the same time, there are still relatively few applications of synergetics because of the absence of an accurate methodology for the identification of system harmonicity. The aim of this research is to develop the methodology for the quantitative assessment of system harmonicity by considering a practical example: the quantitative assessment of the harmonicity of the road safety provision system (RSS) and its dynamics during the last 15 years (2006–2020). In addition, the impact of the COVID restrictions on population mobility in Russia in 2020, on the change in the harmonicity of the road safety provision system, is considered. During the research it was established that the quality factor g of the Russian road safety provision system changed from g2006 = 1.9565 to g2020 = 2.4646, which promoted the decline of the relative entropy of the Russian road safety provision system from Hn RSS2006 = 0.8623 to Hn RSS2020 = 0.7553. The deep reason for that change was the modification of relation between “weights” or the significance of the contribution of different elements of the cause-and-effect chain in the formation of the factual level of the road accident rate in Russia in the last 15 years. The main conclusion of this research is that the harmonicity of the Russian road safety provision system, assessed by the normalized functional general utility GUn, has been increased, and it has already exceeded the level of harmonious reference systems GUn = 0.618. In fact, the normalized functional general utility GUn of the Russian road safety provision system increased from GUnRSS2006 = 0.615 to GUnRSS2020 = 0.652 (by 6.0%), from 2006 to 2020. Simultaneously, the share of the normalized used resource Xn declined, allowing a conclusion to be drawn about a significant improvement in the balance “efficiency-quality” of the Russian road safety provision system. The COVID lockdown played a positive role in this process. Harmonicity of the Russian road safety provision system, assessed by the normalized general utility GUnRSS, increased by 0.46% from 2019 to 2020.

Characteristics of the reproductive behaviour of the population in Iran and Russia during the Pandemic period COVID-19

Introduction. The urgent issue of the challenges of the COVID-19 pandemic, which negatively affected the demographic development of the world’s countries, is the search for new effective mechanisms for the development of demographic potential, which is not possible without appropriate justification monitoring data. The aim of the study is to analyze trends in demographic processes and assess the reproductive behavior of the population of Russia and Iran, as well as develop recommendations in the field of monitoring demographic processes, taking into account the need to study their changes as a result of the spread of COVID-19, which seems significant for determining effective directions and measures of demographic policy in terms of increasing the birth rate in Russia and Iran in the post-pandemic period. Materials and methods. The article is based on the data of the official national statistics of the countries (the Federal State Statistics Service of the Russian Federation and the Statistical Center of the Islamic Republic of Iran), the international database of the UN Population Division, and sociological information. The general research period is determined by the boundaries from 2000 to 2019. To assess the determination of reproductive behaviour in Russia and Iran, general statistical methods of data analysis were used (for example, indicators of structure, dynamics, implementation of the plan), unique methods of demographic statistics (construction of age and sex pyramids of the population, total fertility rate, and others), methods of sociological research (results are presented as All-Russian sociological research “Demographic well-being of Russians”, conducted with the participation of the authors in 2019-2020 on the territory of 10 constituent entities of Russia). Results. An assessment of fertility trends in Russia and Iran is given, general and specific traits of the character and mechanisms of reproductive behaviour are identified. The substantiation of the improvement of directions and measures of demographic policy is given, taking into account the assessment of its effectiveness. In Russia, it was aimed at increasing the birth rate. In Iran, on the contrary, at decreasing it. In both countries, the policy was very effective - in Russia in 2007-2016. the birth rate for second and subsequent births increased significantly in Iran in the late 1980s-1990s. The decline in fertility was one of the largest in the world. If in Iran the birth rate is now close to the level of simple reproduction of the population (in 2017, the total fertility rate was 2.12), then in Russia, especially after the decline since 2017. In this case, it is far from this level. Conclusion. The article substantiates the need to improve scientific monitoring of the demographic consequences of the COVID-19 pandemic.