Finding sources of growth is a favorite pastime of domestic economists. But they all agree on one thing: our country has everything necessary for this. And almost inexhaustible reserves of natural non-renewable resources, and access to financial resources (there are temporary difficulties here due to sanctions, but they will not last forever), and the ability to attract labor resources with a competitive price/quality ratio.

However, the mere presence of these resources, as it turned out, does not provide any guarantees of prosperity for the country and its population. The question, obviously, is how effectively these resources are used, and most importantly, what the earned wealth is invested in: what is the priority in investment. A hint regarding the optimal choice of priorities is contained in modern trends, which already make it possible to answer the question of what are the main sources of future economic growth in the world.

The world is entering the digital era, in a few more decades - and the era of extended reality will come, when technologies for combining real and virtual space will provide a qualitatively different level of informatization of human activity. Already today, obtaining instant and free access to any open information and using effective methods for processing large volumes of data are qualitatively changing the nature of human activity and becoming an integral factor in business success. The creation in the virtual space of fundamentally new tools for attracting financing for projects of an innovative nature, in other words, the informatization of new financial and investment activities independent of the state, regardless of geographic and territorial reference, is another important factor in entering the digital economy. Loading human consciousness into a computer, integrating virtual systems with human physical strength - these achievements have not yet been implemented in business, but this is not far off. Most futurologists argue that in the future, thanks to the intervention of scientific achievements in the field of genetics and biotechnology in the practical activities of people and their synergy with the progress of digital technologies, it will be possible to replace with machines not only almost all types of physical labor, but also, partially, human intellectual activity.

It may seem that all this is a matter of the distant future. But we are now witnessing an unprecedented acceleration of transformations in these areas - the qualitative leaps taking place in them are already within the life of one generation of people. All this is created by people working in the new knowledge economy. Therefore, the one who manages to create a favorable environment for the activities of these advanced detachments of knowledge bearers will succeed. This is where real competition between economic systems and their economic success will lie. The role of non-renewable natural resources in this competition, although it will remain as one of the sources of energy and the creation of materials, will, however, undergo a significant reduction.

Concern for the preservation and reproduction of human capital becomes the cornerstone of competition. Human capital today is educated, motivated, creative people who become creators and bearers of the knowledge economy. Such people are very mobile and prefer to work where there is an environment that allows them to get the most out of their skills and knowledge. Therefore, the environment becomes a determining factor in economic progress.

Socio-economic systems that are unable to retain human capital become its free exporters (suffer from brain drain) and, on the contrary, spend huge resources on importing technological advances, which, as a rule, have already been widely adopted, thereby dooming themselves to the position of always catching up. Businesses in such systems mainly import the fruits of technological, managerial, and information innovations and are not particularly interested in serious investments in human capital on their territory.

Households remain investors in the development of human capital in any environment. Given sufficient resources, they invest in education, personal and their children's, and in health, seeking to obtain these services in the most efficient manner. Families and entrepreneurs who have the necessary material resources receive education and improve their health in those places where they find the best price/quality ratio. In the absence of such supply within the country, they encourage the development of these services abroad.

This description corresponds one to one with the situation in our country and the behavior of citizens who have managed to achieve a certain level of income that allows them to invest in their own education and health, as well as their children. Russia has, so to speak, a certain supply of human capital thanks to old educational traditions and state support for several large institutions of higher education. However, in reality, incentives at the government level to invest seriously in the education and health of the nation, as well as incentives at the level of private companies, are extremely weak. The quality of human capital in the country is declining, despite the growing share of individual spending on education and medicine.

Why does our society put up with this state of affairs? One of the reasons lying on the surface is the low value for our society of creative creative activity as such, in the utilitarian material assessment of the personality and value of a person. The motivation of the world's creators of innovative technologies and builders of the foundations of the new economy is in the search and pursuit of results. Such people work successfully in those countries that, through their institutions and regulatory practices, support their activities, which have an intellectual and political elite that supports the values of creation in society. In such communities, horizontal financial and economic mechanisms independent of the state for attracting resources necessary for the implementation of exploration projects have been developed. To briefly characterize such ecosystems, these are systems in which layers of creative economic and scientific activity are open, existing intellectually and materially absolutely independently of the state, and, moreover, in its policy the state tries to support this activity of forward-looking people.

The new Russian elite seems to be indifferent, if not wary, towards these people. Politicians rely on large companies, on state participation in innovative projects, i.e. on macro-projects. While innovative breakthroughs and the modern economy are increasingly created within the framework of micro-projects by small mobile groups of people and companies that operate in hierarchies under the patronage of large companies interested in the subsequent mass introduction of new products. In our country, this approach does not take root, perhaps because leadership in all more or less technological industries belongs to state-owned companies that are not very interested in innovative breakthroughs. And the general legislative and enforcement climate is not conducive to the active development of small companies. As a result, there is no spirit of creative competition necessary for innovation.

The Soviet intelligentsia, which successfully represented domestic fundamental science, art and culture, then recognized in the world, and in the 1990s was also largely the ideological inspirer of democratic reforms in Russia, has today left the stage. The Russian elite (those who direct society and influence the formation of people’s values and interests) today are also represented by those who began their careers in the USSR, but are not from the intelligentsia. The new generation born in the new Russia, who has received a high-quality education and is involved in innovative activities in different parts of the world, is small in number and has not yet formed the agenda in their homeland. For this reason, in our society the values of creation and creativity have not developed. And what are the values of a society, so are its human capital, so are its economic prospects for growth.

The author is a professor at the National Research University Higher School of Economics

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