The policy of the city public administration of Yekaterinburg in the sphere of searching for new sources of funding (1905-1914)

The aim of this work is to analyze the financial policy of the Yekaterinburg city self-government in the area of searching for new sources of income from 1905 to the first half of 1914. The choice of Yekaterinburg is due to the fact that it was the largest district town of the Perm Governorate, whose capabilities were quite comparable to the provincial capital Perm in the sphere of municipal budget formation. The article examines the ways in which the Yekaterinburg city self-government sought to replenish municipal finances. A number of such methods are identified that were characteristic of the city from 1905 until the beginning of the First World War, their correspondence to the all-Russian course of development of local self-government. The policy of the Yekaterinburg city authorities in raising funds is compared with the policy of the Perm city authorities, which allows us to demonstrate the difference in the capabilities of a provincial and a district, albeit the largest, city. The state of the municipal budget is analyzed. The public administration of the city, in order to improve the financial situation, tried to introduce new taxes and levies, maximize the exploitation of municipal property and enterprises, and use the concession method of attracting funds. The main source of attracting additional funds was municipal loans. Yekaterinburg, as a large, high-budget city, despite its district status, could make them, which brought it closer to the provincial capital. The scientific novelty of the research lies in the fact that individual facts about the activities of the Yekaterinburg city self-government are published for the first time, and the history of the city's finances is considered for the first time in the focus of finding new sources of income. As a result of the research, the author concludes that the financial policy of the Yekaterinburg city authorities, on the one hand, corresponded to all-Russian trends, and on the other hand, had its own specifics.