Small and medium-sized enterprises are a much broader concept than just enterprises, and additionally include individual entrepreneurs and the self-employed. SMEs in a broad sense are precisely the sector that is seen in the EU and around the world as a key component of national security and a key element of employment. SMEs is a guarantee social stability and are an important element of innovative development and, accordingly, significantly affect the success of Ukraine's integration into the EU. The current state of SME development in Ukraine is generally proportional to the state of SME development in the EU, but the regulatory conditions for domestic small and medium-sized enterprises still do not fully meet the requirements and standards that should ensure economic growth. Therefore, in Ukraine the process of accumulation and understanding of the world experience of developed countries in the field of procedures for the formation of state policy on SMEs is becoming increasingly important. And the first stage of this process is the proper definition of the object of regulation - that is, the development of unambiguous terminology and criteries - which economic subjects belong to the group of micro, small and medium. The article considers the stages of development of a modern classification of SMEs in Ukraine, presents the positive and negative components of this process. The process of bringing the classification of SMEs in Ukraine in line with European practice is analyzed. Peculiarities of SME classification in the context of formation of state support programs are considered. The expediency of adopting the classifier of economic activities (KVED:2010) in the form of the law of Ukraine has been studied (at this time - as normative act of the State Statistics Service of Ukraine). The article shows that in most developed countries the classification of SMEs is not completely universal for different policies (fiscal, support policy, export, etc.) - and even within one country, different classifiers of SMEs can be used. Therefore, the emphasis is not on the formal compliance of SMEs with certain criteria, but on a meaningful understanding of the qualitative and fundamental differences between micro and small and medium-sized businesses. And the definition that public policy towards micro, small and medium-sized businesses has qualitatively different goals and should use different public policy instruments.
COMPARATIVE CHARACTERISTICS OF PUBLIC POLICY INSTRUMENTS IN THE EU AND UKRAINE
