The article is devoted to the study of unsolved problems of the human capital theory, as follows the determination of the mechanism of human capital formation, methods of economic analysis of its effectiveness and accounting costs for its formation. The authors rely on the approach to the definition of “human capital” generally accepted in the economic theory, in terms of which it is a complex of knowledge and the most important resource for sustainable development of the economy, as well as on the structural and systematic approaches, according to which the components of human contribute to the sustainable development of the economy capital acting in concert with each other. In this setting, the main unit of human capital is the member of the creative class. The authors consider a cost approach as the methodological basis for accounting and evaluating human capital in practice. As the main research methods, the authors use the model-building technique for the formation and accumulation of human capital, special methods of economic analysis and statistics. The theoretical and practical significance of the study lies in identifying the management mechanism of human capital formation and validation of the integrated assessment methods and the methods of accounting the effectiveness of the costs of developing human capital in the enterprise management system, which were tested when measuring the effectiveness of the particular enterprise’s investments in human capital.