Specifics of interaction between the factors of economic growth in the Murmansk Oblast and the Russian Federation as a whole

Aim. To establish the specifics of interaction between the factors of economic growth of the Murmansk Oblast and Russia as a whole using the methodological potential of production functions. Objectives. To evaluate the possibilities of building production function models for the Murmansk Oblast and Russia as a whole; to build and study adequate models of the production function type for the Murmansk Oblast and Russia as a whole. Methods. The constructed methodology is based on the verification of the initial hypothesis about the possibility of building an adequate model of the production function type for the subjects of the Russian Federation (RF) and Russia as a whole. At the first stage, the dynamics of gross regional product (GRP) and economic growth factors (investment in fixed capital, the value of fixed assets and the number of employees) were analyzed, which reflects significant differences in the behavior of these indicators for the Murmansk Oblast and Russia as a whole. Aiming to test the hypothesis about the possibility of constructing production functions for the Murmansk Oblast and Russia as a whole, Pearson correlation coefficients between GRP and production factors for 2000-2022 were calculated. Further it was supposed to construct a series of models of the production function type. The indicative production function and the Cobb-Douglas production function were considered. The best model was selected using Akaike’s information criterion adjusted for small samples. Results. It was found that for Russia as a whole the mutual behavior of the main factors of economic growth (labor and capital) fits into the generally accepted ideas: there is a significant positive relationship between GRP and factors of production. Accordingly, for Russia it becomes possible to construct classical models of GRP production in the form of production functions. The hypothesis about the possibility of building production functions for the Murmansk Oblast was not confirmed; the models were created only for Russia as a whole. Conclusions. Based on the study of a series of models in the form of the indicative production function and the Cobb-Douglas function, the growing nature of the Russian economy, elasticity parameters for the number of employed and investment in fixed capital are established. The fact of unbalanced interaction of the main factors of production in the Murmansk Oblast did not confirm the hypothesis for this region. The reasons for the imbalance should be sought in the specifics of regional production processes.