The understanding of space and time will always play an extremely important role for functioning of society, which is largely determined by the set of concepts supported by the dominant paradigm in science. Defining the concepts of "space" and "time" is one of the basic tasks of science and philosophy. The subsequent construction of many social life foundations and further both long-term and short-term planning of their development depends on the solution of this problem. The article considers the evolution of these concepts in historical retrospect, analyzes their metamorphosis at the current stage of digitalization of the world economy. The economy, which has undergone significant changes in the last few decades, is transforming the ontological status of the studied concepts, rapidly transferring space and time from physical reality to virtual reality, while creating new social institutions and revising relations in the existing social formations.

The article analyzes the dynamics of wages of teachers in the sphere of professional education of the Russian Federation, which was applied to the regions of the far North and equated localities as of 01.01.2018. Analyzed regional features of changes in wages of the teaching staff in 20132018 on two levels of education: elementary and secondary professional education and higher professional education, due to the necessity of execution of the decree of the President of the Russian Federation of May 7, 2012 No. 597 «On measures to implement the state social policy» (hereinafter referred to as the Decree of the President of the Russian Federation 2012). The factors that determined the degree of achievement by 2018 of target indicators on the level of remuneration of teachers of vocational education in the regions of the country are highlighted.

Digital technologies will both create new jobs and replace existing ones. To cope with increasing labor market dynamics in the digital age, workers will have to become more mobile across jobs, occupations, and industries. The relative importance of their job-specific skills will decrease while that of their general skills applicable to various occupations will increase. The G20 should establish national adult training programs that focus on improving workers’ general skills, specifically their theoretical, non-cognitive, and digital skills. These general skills will enable workers to work with technology instead of competing with it, thereby increasing their job mobility and employability.

(Published as Global Solutions Paper)

Recent decades have seen accelerating interest in key factors of happiness driven by patterns of modern life. While more and more often global communities appeal to wider audiences, highlighting the need to commit to achievement of major goals of sustainable development, elimination of negative footprint and raising the bar of living standards, people are paying more attention to the living conditions they find themselves in. The government is focused on life satisfaction to identify major areas for improvement and to develop effective policy measures. This paper aims to estimate how and to which extent unfavorable ecological situation, primarily low air quality, impact population well-being and happiness. Recent studies point out that environmental conditions considerably influence subjective life satisfaction of an individual. On these pages, we test the relation between air pollution and people’s happiness at country level. Our findings show significantly negative impact, which signals the need to reduce emissions and propose solutions to lower the level of air pollution.

In the review of the book of the Novosibirsk scientist Yu.P. Voronov`s “Nobel Laureates in Economics (1997–2018)” discusses a general criterion for dividing the world's leading economists into mathematicians and theoreticians. The author’s position on the current state of world economic thought is also examined. A generally high level of analysis and the dignity of the literary design of the book are noted.

The article is devoted to a review of the Third Annual Conference of Journals consortium at MSU Faculty of Economics, which took place on October 23, 2019. The purpose of this conference was to discuss a wide range of issues relevant to economic science, including issues of state scientific policy, methodology of economics, digital and sectoral economics, macroeconomic modeling and sustainable development, demography and labor economics. The article provides brief information about the previous conferences, considers key ideas of the plenary session and gives an overview of thematic sections.