Trends of social development of old industrial regions
This paper studies the features of the social component of the functioning of old industrial regions in the context of trends in steel and coal industries, which define the conditions of life for most areas of the Donbas. The absence of a systematic approach to structural change and industrial upgrading of old industrial regions of Ukraine directly provokes reduced quality of life, reflected in deteriorating demographics, state of environment and employment. There is a high level of differentiation of unemployed per vacancy between the large industrial cities and peripheral areas. A discrepancy exists between the demand for labor and its proposal in the context of professional qualification. In the region there is social pressure due to significant differentiation of salaries and wages by economic activity and territory. Significant source of stress on the working-age population in the region is the presence of pensioners and disabled people in the population of old industrial regions associated with favorable pensionterms for workers of coal mines and a high level of injuries in heavy industry. The main areas of social problems are as follows: to update the strategy for socio-economic development of regions;to monitorcontinuously the demand and supply of labor in region labor markets in order to provide recommendations to the Ministry of Education and Science of Ukraine for the adjustment of the list of occupations for which training is conducted in regions at the expense of the state budget resources;to introduceinnovative technologies into the production process that reduce the level of environmental loading is the development of services, including recreation and tourism industry development due to providing the programs for soft loans to small and medium-sized businesses in service sector, tourism area, and agricultural sector; to develop the entrepreneurship in the region and to attract young people to the small business.