Lietuvos regionų netolygaus ekonominio augimo statistinis vertinimas ir galima jo mažinimo politika

This master’s final paper analyses divergent economic development in Lithuanian regions and its causes. Given that objective I reviewed works where the main interest is in economic convergence – divergence process in regions. It also presents β and σ convergence and classical methods of inequality measurement. The paper presents a detailed analysis of differences in spatial economic activity described by territorial disparity of active economic subjects, investment in tangible fixed assets and foreign direct investment in regions. Estimation of the rate and speed of uneven growth is grounded on spatial disparity measurement of GDP per capita and GDP per worker. This paper assesses relationship between regional specialization, comparative advantage in main economic sectors and divergence process. The hypothesis is formulated as follows: “the source of increasing spatial differences in Lithuanian regions is cumulative causation process” is confirmed. Political intervention in promoting workplace training programs and accumulation of human capital stock is necessary to defeat this causation process.