RESERVES TO PREVENT WAGE DELAYS: A MONTE CARLO SIMULATION

Wage as a source of covering the basic needs of many households largely determines employee productivity, work enthusiasm, and creative activity. If an employee is dissat-isfied with the remuneration or there are wage delays, then distrust in the employer increases, strikes are more likely, there is the risk of losing experienced and highly qualified employees, and the employer’s reputation suffers, which can lead to significant economic losses for the enterprise. The article uses the Monte Carlo simulation method to determine the amount of reserves that should be formed by business entities repre-senting different areas of economic activity to prevent possible accumulation of wage delays. Simulation modeling was performed for the following areas of economic activity: information and communication; financial and insurance activities; real estate activities; professional, scientific and technical activities; scientific research and development; and human health and social work activities. The modelling process considers simulated cases when wage delays are 10%, 20%, 25%, 50%, 75%, 100% of the total amount. The study was conducted on the example of Ukraine based on the statistical data of the National Bank of Ukraine. Since the war on the territory of Ukraine has significantly affected the functioning of all sectors of the Ukrainian economy, the research horizon is limited to before the full-scale invasion period: from February 2013 to February 2022. The analysis showed that in Ukraine, the largest delays in the payment of wages occur in the sectors financed from the state budget: professional, scientific and technical ac-tivities, scientific research and development, and human health and social work activi-ties. This problem is particularly exacerbated by the total budget deficit during the war. Therefore, the results of simulation modelling for different scenarios presented in this paper can be used in planning the state budget and building state reserves.