CROWDFUNDING SYSTEMS: evaluation and government regulation in the conditions of reengineering

Foreign researchers often focus not on annual income, but on the number of savings and investments. This approach works, for example, to analyze the wealth of older people who live only on their savings. American and European researchers call this indicator «wealth». Another method of identifying the middle class is to analyze their consumption expenditures. Some scientists believe that this method is more effective and more accurately reflects the well-being of the population. In many states, the government or local authorities assist in the form of food stamps, utility discounts, etc. As a result, these non-training benefits are not counted as income or wealth. In the literature, consumption expenditures include food, transpor- tation, entertainment, housing, and other items. Interestingly, some scien- tists do not include expenditures on health and education, suggesting that these expenditures can be considered investments (Luhby et al., 2016). Researchers at the Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis (USA) decided to use a more complex approach. To define the middle class, they combine sociology with economics. Scientists use three demographic character- ristics: age, education, and origin. The middle class usually consists of people who fit some combination of these three characteristics. So, researchers divided people into 3 groups according to their age: ڰ 0–39 years old; ڰ 40–61 years old; ڰ more than 62 years old. Regarding education, the research contains the following criteria: ڰ did you graduate from school? Yes / No; ڰ did you get a higher education? Yes / No; The third criterion was an origin: representatives of the Caucasian race, representatives of the Negroid race, representatives of the Hispanic culture, representatives of the Mongoloid race (Luhby et al., 2016). So, researchers at the Federal Reserve Bank divide people into three classes according to the combination of these three characteristics: ڰ low class; ڰ middle class; ڰ upper class. According to this approach, middle-class Americans include a person of any race under the age of 40 who has received secondary and higher education, a representative of a Caucasian or Mongoloid race with only secondary education, a representative of Hispanic culture, or a represen- 28