Importance Cities have been playing a greater role in economic and social processes for recent decades, thus necessitating a research into urban inequality, i.e. processes of active growth and dissolution of cities throughout the economic milieu of the country. The research is relevant since the Russian cities are very different in terms of some indicators. Objectives The research pursues determining indicators of urban economic inequality in the Russian Federation, forming the system of evaluation methods. I verified the hypothesis stating that a percentage of subsistence rate within the average monthly pay depends on the volume of domestic production of goods and services per capita in the Russian cities. Methods To evaluate urban inequality in the Russian Federation, I used the Zipf's Law, Gini coefficient, Theil index. The hypothesis was tested with the least-squares method. Results As the analysis of the population trends for 2003–2013 shows, smaller towns mainly demonstrate a decline in population, within the federal district, while larger cities of the Central, Northwestern, Southern, North Caucasian and Siberian Federal Districts see a population influx. The Central Federal District demonstrates the maximum Gini coefficient in terms of internal production of goods and services, and high differentiation of salaries in the cities. Conclusions and Relevance Large cities of the Central, Northwestern, Southern, North Caucasian and Siberian Federal Districts attract the regions' population. High inequality of internal production of goods and services in the district results from a gap between Moscow and the other cities. Low Theil index says that the index per capita is evenly dispersed within the Federal District. If internal production of goods and services increases per capita by 1%, it will decrease a percentage of subsistence rate within the average monthly pay by 0.1%.
Keywords: urban inequality
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