Household Capital, Sources of Income and Stratification in Rural Russian Villages

Survey data from households, gathered at different intervals from 1995 to 2006, show important shifts in sources of income and the effects of different types of household capital on income stratification in rural Russia. Income from household enterprises continues to play an important role in the rural economy but improvements in the macro-level Russian economy have produced significant gains in income from salary and wages. Another important shift has occurred in the role of different types of household capital on the economic well being of households. Household labour continues to play a critical role in household enterprises, but amount of land held by the household has both direct and indirect effects on total income that are independent of household labour. Education plays a minor role in differentiating income between households ill the survey samples. The implications of these findings for neo-institutional economic and sociological theories of stratification are discussed.