When the card system was abolished. Abolition of the card system in the USSR - features, history and interesting facts
Ancient world
For the first time, cards for receiving food (“tesserae”) were noted in Ancient Rome. In France, during the Jacobin dictatorship, bread cards were introduced (1793-1797).
The card system was widely used in Soviet Russia since its creation in 1917, due to the policy of "war communism". The first abolition of the card system occurred in 1921 in connection with the transition to the NEP policy. In January 1931, by decision of the Politburo of the Central Committee of the All-Union Communist Party of Bolsheviks, the People's Commissariat of Supply of the USSR introduced an all-Union card system for the distribution of basic food products and non-food products. Cards were issued only to those who worked in the public sector of the economy (industrial enterprises, government, military organizations and institutions, state farms), as well as their dependents. Outside the state supply system were peasants and those deprived of political rights (disenfranchised), who together made up more than 80% of the country's population. . On January 1, 1935, cards for bread were abolished, on October 1 for other products, and after them for manufactured goods.
Simultaneously with the beginning of the free sale of products, a restriction was introduced on the sale of goods to one person. Moreover, over time it decreased. If in 1936 a buyer could buy 2 kg of meat, then from April 1940 - 1 kg, and instead of 2 kg of sausage, only 0.5 kg was allowed per person. The quantity of fish sold, if it, like everything else, appeared on sale at all, was reduced from 3 kg to 1 kg. And instead of 500 g of butter, the lucky ones received only 200 g. But locally, based on the actual availability of products, they often set distribution standards that differed from the all-Union ones. Thus, in the Ryazan region, the distribution of bread per person varied in different regions and collective farms from the all-Union 2 kg to 700 g.
Soon, however, new supply crises inevitably followed (1936-1937, 1939-1941), local famine and a spontaneous revival of rationing in the regions. The country entered the world war in a state of acute commodity crisis, with queues of many thousands.
The Second World War
German ration cards, 1940s
Shortage in the USSR
Map of tobacco coupons for Moscow in the early 1990s.
From the beginning of the 70s of the 20th century, a shortage of products began to appear, in particular sausages, meat, and buckwheat. In small towns (for example, Yaroslavl region) they also have oils. But coupons were not introduced at that time. Some enterprises were able to provide their employees with these products. It was practiced to purchase products in the capital and big cities during business trips, vacations, etc., as well as through acquaintances. On the eve of the holidays, enterprises organized special trips to Moscow for food by buses and so-called “sausage trains” from the cities closest to the capital. At the same time, cooperative stores from agricultural enterprises began to appear, where these products were sold at approximately twice the price. But there was still no abundance observed. The shortage of meat products was relatively unnoticeable in Moscow, Leningrad, northern cities, areas of nuclear power plant construction, etc. But there were huge queues because of visitors.
The first food stamps appeared during the period of so-called “glasnost”, that is, in the period preceding the era of private capital. The coupon system became most widespread in the 90s, when inflation became noticeable to the population in the form of empty grocery shelves appearing, and products began to disappear, both meat and ordinary ones, which had not previously been in short supply: sugar, cereals, vegetable oil, etc. . The coupons were issued from 1990 to 1993. Non-food products also began to be sold using coupons, but citizens purchased mainly food. The essence of the coupon system is that in order to purchase a scarce product, it is necessary not only to pay money, but also to hand over a special coupon authorizing the purchase of this product. Coupons for food and some consumer goods were received at the place of registration in the housing office (or dormitory - for university students). At the place of work (usually in the trade union committee) the distribution of certain products and manufactured goods received through in-kind exchange between enterprises was organized. The reason for the emergence of the coupon system was the shortage of certain consumer goods. Initially, coupons were introduced as an element of the motivation system. The distinguished employee was given a coupon for the purchase of a scarce product (for example, a television or women's boots). It was difficult to buy this product without a coupon, since it rarely appeared in stores (sales using a coupon were, as a rule, carried out from a specialized warehouse). However, subsequently coupons were introduced everywhere for many food products and some other goods (tobacco, vodka, sausage, soap, tea, cereals, salt, sugar, in some extremely rare cases, in remote areas, bread, mayonnaise, laundry powder, lingerie, etc.). The purpose of introducing coupons was to provide the population with a minimum guaranteed set of goods. Demand should have decreased, since the corresponding goods were not sold in the state trading network without a coupon. In practice, it was sometimes impossible to use coupons if the corresponding goods were not available in stores. Some goods, if they were in abundance, were sold without coupons, although coupons were issued, for example, salt.
A hidden form of the card (coupon) system can be considered the existence of so-called “order tables”, where residents with appropriate registration and assigned to a given order table could, with a certain frequency and in limited quantities, purchase certain goods that had disappeared from free sale.
The coupon system came to naught from the beginning of 1992, due to the “release” of prices, which reduced effective demand, and the spread of free trade. For a number of goods in some regions, coupons were kept longer (in Ulyanovsk they were finally abolished only in 1996).
Grocery cards in the USA
see also
Links
- Half a stack... for entry to the exhibition (exhibition “Card distribution system in Russia: four waves”) / URAL COLLECTOR No. 2 (02) September 2003
Notes
Wikimedia Foundation. 2010.
See what a “Card System” is in other dictionaries:
card system- a method of recording any data or registering any information by entering each specific fact, figure or information on cards pre-graphed in a certain form; The convenience of this system is that by... Reference commercial dictionary
Card system- CARD SYSTEM, see Rated supply... Great Patriotic War 1941-1945: encyclopedia
FOOD STAMPS IN THE LAST YEARS OF THE USSR
Coupons were issued at different times and by different countries. And the first coupons appeared in Ancient Rome. Warrants were issued for the city plebs to receive a certain amount of grain, oil or wine. Grain distributions were introduced by Gaius Gracchus (153-121 BC), for this they used tesserae-numaria, which were bronze coin-shaped tokens. Among the ancient Romans, tessera was the name for a die, mark, and token.
Rates, first for bread and then for soap, meat and sugar, were introduced during the Jacobin dictatorship in France (1793-1797). Coupons and cards were used in different countries, especially during the war. During World War I, food distribution was introduced in a number of belligerent European states, and even in the United States. In Russia, food cards were also introduced under Nicholas II in 1916. After the revolutionary events of 1917 and during the civil war, the coupon system covered the entire country (ill. 1).
Il. 1. “Labor ration” coupon, 1920. Presumably from Petrograd.
Later there were tesserae (coupons, checks) for kerosene, firewood, water, etc. On our website you can read the article about the water voucher.
Il. 2. USSR. Moscow. Cards for cereals, pasta, sugar, confectionery and bread, 1947
During During the Second World War, food cards were available in all European countries, as well as in the USA, Canada, New Zealand, Australia, Japan, India, Turkey, Algeria, Tunisia, etc. And of course, during the Second World War, a card system was introduced for food and industrial goods in the USSR (ill. 2,3).
Il. 3. USSR. Leningrad. Bread cards and school breakfast passes.
Only on December 13, 1947, the Izvestia newspaper (USSR) published Resolution of the Council of Ministers of the USSR and the Central Committee of the All-Union Communist Party of Bolsheviks No. 3866 of December 14, 1947, “On carrying out monetary reform and the abolition of cards for food and industrial goods.” Many people left them as a keepsake, so they have survived to this day.You can see that these coupons have remained unused since this date (Fig. 2,3).
I was born in 1964, the year when Leonid Ilyich Brezhnev became the leader of the country. And there have been no coupons in the country for 19 years. So I grew and developed with this General Secretary of the Communist Party. In 1980, the Summer Olympic Games were held in Moscow, the capital of the USSR. There was a national upsurge, the population greeted these games with great enthusiasm. And no one then could have imagined that in a little more than 10 years the Soviet Union would collapse. L. I. Brezhnev died in 1982. I will not discuss the economic situation in the country and in the world at that time. During the period of Brezhnev's leadership, there was no particular abundance of food and industrial goods in the country. However, in the mid-1980s the situation began to deteriorate. At that time, miniatures by Mikhail Zhvanetsky, as before and songs by V. Vysotsky, were listened to on tape recordings (he was not shown on television, and he did not perform on All-Union Radio). So, in one of his miniatures of that period, Zhvanetsky once said that there is a minister of the meat and dairy industry, and he looks good, but there are no meat and dairy products... I don’t know how it was in your city, but then we had the so-called “Sandwich Butter” on sale. It’s hard to say what it was made of, but it didn’t freeze in the refrigerator, and when it was spread on a piece of bread, some kind of liquid came out.
Il. 4. Leningrad. Tea voucher, 1989
Il. 5. Kurgan. Coupon for 500 gr. Meat products, 1988
The main version then was that margarine was mixed with regular butter, and this is how such a product appeared. It tasted...like margarine mixed with butter. So, in our city, the first coupons appeared specifically for butter and meat in 1985. This year I already studied at the institute. And I remember very well how a major spoke at one of the lectures at the military department. He was transferred from the army to our institute. They said that they wrote him off because of epilepsy, and that he even had one seizure while giving a lecture right at the pulpit. And in the army he served as a political worker. So, at one of his lectures, he told us that the American imperialists and their hirelings are angry, that a coupon system has been introduced in the country of the Soviets, that there is famine in the country. This is not so, the teacher continued, American hawks are silent about the fact that with coupons you can now buy good butter, and not “Sandwich” butter, as it was before the introduction of coupons! There really was no famine, but there was a shortage of goods. There was no meat in the stores, but the population's refrigerators were not empty.
Il. 6. Leningrad. Coupons for sugar, laundry soap, washing powder, 1989
So, from the mid-80s of the twentieth century, food coupons were again introduced in the USSR, and then for a number of other essential goods (soap, washing powder, etc.). The coupons were different in different cities. There were coupons for butter, meat and meat products, sugar, tea, pasta and confectionery, laundry and toilet soap, washing powder, tobacco and alcohol (ill. 4,5,6,7,8). Coupons were introduced even in cities such as Leningrad and Moscow, which were always on special support at that time. At the beginning, coupons were issued on plain paper or thin cardboard, without any special means of protection. At best they had a serial number. And already in the late 80s and early 90s of the twentieth century, they were printed on higher quality paper and even with watermarks (ill. 6,7,8). Such coupons for a number of cities were printed on Goznak (ill. 7, 8).
And it is no coincidence that a type of collecting has emerged - tesseristics - collecting coupons (cards, coupons) for specific or limited food, industrial goods or services. 
Il. 7. Moscow. Coupons for tobacco products and vodka. Late 80s - early 90s of the twentieth century.
Il. 8. Food stamps. Late 80s - early 90s of the twentieth century.
We are contemporaries of history that is happening now and that happened during our lifetime. And I am always interested in learning history from people who lived in one period or another. To see historical events through the subjective prism of a person who was an eyewitness to those events, and not to read dry phrases in historical reference books. I hope that I have made a small contribution to this historical process.
All tesserae are from a private collection. Images posted with permission of the owner.
Sources of information used:
1. Makurin A.V. Half a stack for entry to the exhibition // Ural Collector. Ekaterinburg. 2003, no. 2. P.24-26.
2. Makurin A.V. Ural heirs of Napoleon...: essays on modern Ural bonistics. Ekaterinburg, USGU Publishing House, 2008, 67 p.
3. Makurin A.V. Eh, coupons... // Collector's shop. Samara.2002, No. 3 (29). S.3.
4. Rudenko V. Coupon for the tesserist // Ural Pathfinder. 1991, no. 1, pp. 78-81.
FOOD CARDS IN THE USSR
Despite the undoubted achievements in the economy, the standard of living of the population remained very low. By the beginning of 1929, a card system was introduced in all cities of the USSR. The distribution of bread to the population on ration cards was started in the cities of grain-producing Ukraine. In March 1929, this measure also affected Moscow. Bread was followed by rationed distribution of other scarce products: sugar, meat, butter, tea, etc. By mid-1931, cards for industrial goods were introduced, and in 1932-1933. even for potatoes. The place of trade was occupied by goods distribution using so-called “fence documents” and orders through closed distributors, workers’ cooperatives and workers’ supply departments.
Under these conditions, theft became widespread. People's Commissar of Supply Mikoyan admitted in the spring of 1932: “Everyone, even the communists, steals. It is easier for a communist to steal than for another. He has a party card, and there is less suspicion against him.” According to Mikoyan, an inspection of bread stores in Moscow showed that 12 carriages a day were being stolen.
The decision to abolish the card system in the USSR was made by the October 1934 plenum of the Central Committee. In December, a decree appeared that abolished bread cards from January 1, 1935. In September 1935, a decree was issued that abolished cards for meat, sugar, fats, and potatoes from October 1, 1935. However, the situation with food and manufactured goods continued to be difficult after that. Foreigners who visited the USSR at that time admitted that they were strongly impressed by the ability of Soviet people to find joy in the most prosaic things: “they stand in line for hours; bread, vegetables, fruits seem bad to you - but there is nothing else. Fabrics, things ", which you see seem ugly to you - but there is nothing to choose from. Since there is absolutely nothing to compare with - except perhaps the damned past - you happily take what they give you."
I.S. Ratkovsky, M.V. Khodyakov. History of Soviet Russia
FOUR WAVES OF FOOD CARDS
Cards and coupons were known back in Ancient Rome. The word “tessera” meant orders for the city plebs to receive a certain amount of grain, oil or wine. Bread distributions - frumentations were first introduced by Gaius Gracchus (153-121 BC), for this they used tesserae, which were bronze or lead coin-shaped tokens.
Rates, first for bread and then for soap, meat and sugar, were introduced during the French Revolution (1793-1797).
During World War I, food rationing was introduced in a number of warring European states, as well as in the United States.
During the Second World War, rationed food distribution was established in all European countries, as well as in the USA, Canada, New Zealand, Australia, Japan, India, Turkey, Algeria, Tunisia, etc.
Few people know that in the United States there are still several federal social charity programs in place, within the framework of which cash vouchers are issued for low-income people. Visitors to the exhibition could see the FOOD-STEMP (a $1 food stamp), as well as a “taxi pass” (state of Alabama, issued to retirees and immigrants for up to $20 per month).
In Russia, cards were first introduced under Nicholas II in 1916 in connection with the food crisis caused by the war.
Then the Provisional Government took advantage of this practice, establishing a card system in a number of cities on April 29, 1917. Rye, wheat, spelt, millet, buckwheat were distributed exclusively by ration cards...
Under Soviet rule, cards appeared again in August-September 1918 and existed until 1921; a “class approach” was practiced in organizing food distribution. The first card wave in Russia (1916-1921) was extinguished by the temporary flourishing of entrepreneurship during the period of the state’s new economic policy.
The second wave began to grow in 1929, when, at the end of the NEP, a centralized card system was introduced in the country's cities, which lasted throughout the entire period of collectivization and industrialization, until 1935.
With the beginning of the Great Patriotic War, centralized card distribution was reintroduced (third wave). Cards for food and some types of industrial goods appeared in Moscow and Leningrad already in July 1941. And by November 1942 they were circulating in 58 major cities of the country.
Card distribution of food and industrial goods in the USSR existed until December 1947.
The crisis year of 1963 almost gave us a card system again, in any case, the issue of this was discussed at a fairly high level.
The fourth coupon-card wave of the 1980-1990s subsided quite recently and left very vivid memories. In 1983, the first coupons for certain types of food (for example, sausage) appeared in certain cities of the country, including Sverdlovsk. And by 1989, a variety of coupons and cards were already circulating in most cities and rural areas.
The range of food products offered for distribution is mainly standard: vodka and wine, tea and sugar, flour and meat products. But there are also mayonnaise and confectionery products. An assortment of manufactured goods - from soap, washing powder and matches to galoshes (Tashkent, 1991) and lingerie (Elets, 1991). The names of the coupons are also different. From the humiliatingly straightforward “card for bread”, “coupon for potatoes”, to the diplomatically streamlined - “Order for purchase” (Irbit, 1992), “Invitation to place an order” (Irkutsk, 1985), “Book of newlyweds” (Tashkent), “buyer’s business card” (Moscow, 1991), “Limit card” (Nizhny Novgorod, 1991). Well, somewhere, and with care: “Alcohol is the enemy of your health” (vodka coupon, Kurgan, 1991).
A. Makurin. Half a shot... for entry to the exhibition
http://www.bonistikaweb.ru/URALSKIY/makurin.htm
TRADE CRISIS AND QUEUES
With the beginning of forced industrialization in the late 1920s and the associated destruction of the peasant economy and market during the NEP period, supply crises followed one after another. The beginning of the 1930s became a particularly difficult time for people - a half-starved existence of rations in the cities and mass starvation in the countryside. By the mid-1930s, the situation was stabilized. On January 1, 1935, cards for bread were abolished, on October 1 for other products, and after them for manufactured goods. The government announced the advent of an era of “free” trade, as opposed to the card distribution of the first half of the 1930s. Soon, however, new supply crises inevitably followed (1936-1937, 1939-1941), local famine and a spontaneous revival of rationing in the regions. The country entered the world war in a state of acute commodity crisis, with queues of many thousands.
Why, despite the proclamation of the era of “free” trade and time to enjoy life, the country did not part with “one-handed vacation standards,” cards, queues and local hunger?
“Free” trade did not mean free enterprise. The Soviet economy remained planned and centralized, and the state remained a monopoly producer and distributor of goods. Heavy and defense industries invariably took priority. During the Third Five-Year Plan, investment in heavy and defense industries increased sharply. According to official data, total military expenditures in 1940 reached a third of the state budget, and the share of capital goods in gross industrial output reached 60% by 1940.
Although during the years of the first five-year plans the state light and food industries did not stand still, the overall level of production was far from sufficient to satisfy the demand of the population. Even less ended up in stores, since a significant part of the product was used for non-market consumption - supplying government institutions, manufacturing workwear, industrial processing, etc. For the entire 1939, only a little more than one and a half kilograms of meat, two kilograms of sausages, about a kilogram of butter, five kilograms of confectionery and cereals were supplied to the retail trade per person. A third of industrial sugar production went to non-market consumption. The market stock of flour was relatively large - 108 kilograms per person per year, but this amounted to only about 300 grams per day. Non-market consumption also “ate up” a huge part of the funds of non-food goods. Only half of the cotton and linen fabrics produced, and a third of the woolen fabrics, went into trade. In fact, the consumer received even less. Losses from damage and theft in transport, storage and trade were enormous.
Mass repressions of 1937-1938 created chaos in the economy, the Soviet-Finnish war and other “military conflicts” of 1939-1940, as well as the supply of raw materials and food to Germany after the conclusion of the non-aggression pact, increased imbalances and exacerbated the commodity shortage on the domestic market on the eve of accession USSR in a big war.
While store shelves remained half empty, the population's income grew rapidly. By 1939, the purchasing funds of the population had reached the size envisaged by the plan for 1942, but the development of retail trade lagged behind the plan. The low supply of goods in trade led to the fact that the State Bank's cash plan was not fulfilled; money paid to the population was not returned through trade to the state budget. The budget deficit was covered by money emission. The total amount of money in circulation by the end of 1940 almost doubled compared to the beginning of 1938, while the physical volume of trade turnover decreased and per capita fell to the level of the end of the Second Five-Year Plan. The artificial containment of price increases also played a role in the aggravation of the commodity shortage.
In a planned economy, commodity shortages were also aggravated by the selectivity of Soviet trade - essentially centralized distribution, which redistributed commodity resources in favor of large industrial cities. As my teacher of the political economy of socialism at Moscow State University joked wittily and somewhat riskily during the Brezhnev years, the state solved the problem of Soviet trade simply - it sent goods to Moscow and several other large industrial cities, and the population itself transported them wherever needed. Moscow remained the unchanged leader. A little more than 2% of the country's population lived in the capital, but in 1939-1940 it received about 40% of meat and eggs, more than a quarter of all market funds of fats, cheese, woolen fabrics, about 15% of sugar, fish, cereals, pasta, kerosene, garments, silk fabrics, shoes, knitwear. Leningrad lived more modestly, but was also one of the elite cities. In 1939-1940, he received a fifth of the market funds for meat, fats, and eggs. For these goods, two cities - Moscow and Leningrad - “ate up” more than half of the country’s total market fund.
It is not surprising that cargo landings in large cities represented one of the most common methods of self-supply of the population in a planned economy. The pre-war years were entirely marked by the Politburo's struggle with the massive influx of buyers into large industrial centers. Until the fall of 1939, the “commodity landing” in large cities was not of a food nature. Residents of villages and small towns traveled around the country in search of textiles, shoes, and clothing. In the autumn of 1939, queues for food began to grow.
Moscow remained the center of gravity. The Moscow lines clearly had a multinational face; from them one could study the geography of the Soviet Union. According to the NKVD, in the late 1930s, Muscovites made up no more than a third of Moscow queues. During 1938, the flow of nonresident buyers to Moscow increased, and by the spring of 1939, the situation in Moscow resembled a natural disaster. The NKVD reported: “On the night of April 13-14, the total number of customers at the stores at the time of their opening was 30,000 people. On the night of April 16-17 - 43,800 people, etc.” Thousands of people stood outside every major department store.
The queues did not disappear. They lined up immediately after the store closed and stood overnight until the store opened. The goods were sold out within a few hours, but people continued to stand - “the next day.” Visitors wandered around acquaintances, train stations and entrances, spending entire holidays in Moscow. As one of them said:
NKVD reports indicate that the Soviet line was a unique form of social self-organization of the population, with its own rules, traditions, hierarchy, norms of behavior, morality and even clothing: as a rule, comfortable shoes, simpler clothes, warm clothes if standing at night was expected.
Order and self-organization, however, could not mislead anyone; they were only a calm, a conservation of strength before a decisive assault. As soon as the store doors opened, the line broke, the frenzied energy of the dissatisfied consumer burst out.
E.A. Osokina. Farewell ode to the Soviet queue
On May 5, 1942, World War II, which had been shaking the planet for several years, finally came to “the most prosperous people in the world”: US citizens. On this day they were informed that one of their basic freedoms - free trade - had cracked. Now they could buy some things only in limited quantities, and only with cards. First of all, sugar and gasoline.
For some mysterious reason, the card system for distributing food is clearly associated only and exclusively with socialism. They say that the “free world” can never descend to such squalor. The words are often cited as an argument Winston Churchill: “The inherent flaw of capitalism is the unequal distribution of wealth. The inherent virtue of socialism is the equal distribution of misery.”
The words are beautiful, no doubt. But they only shock the air, and not the more or less knowledgeable interlocutor. In a crisis situation, capitalism arranges such a wild leveling that all the achievements of the “totalitarian Soviet regime” fade.
Equally or fairly?
Even the most cursory glance at the history of trade and distribution of products during the Second World War is enough to be convinced that, in one way or another, cards were introduced by all the warring powers, from England to Japan, if you look alphabetically. Even in the relatively prosperous United States, since 1943, cards for canned food, meat, cheese, butter and (for some reason) peas have appeared.
Another thing is how all this joy was organized. Comparing the card system of England and the USSR, it is impossible to escape the buffoonish principle of sharing alcohol adopted by the Mitki, a group of St. Petersburg primitivist artists.
“Divide equally—the vodka is poured equally. Share fairly - Mityok drinks most of it himself.”
Food cards from 1942, according to which residents of the USSR received food. Photo: RIA Novosti
In the USSR, this “kingdom of equalization,” products were rationed and distributed exactly what was fair. Whoever works harder, harder or more dangerously has an advantage. A dependent's ration is less than a worker's ration, and a worker's ration, in turn, is less than a military ration certificate. The system is tough, but understandable: the memories of Soviet children of the war years are full of complaints about a constant feeling of hunger, but there are no reproaches against the miners or (even more so) the soldiers with their grain quota, two or three times higher than the children's standard.
In England, where capitalism with its “unequal distribution of wealth” ruled the roost, food rationing was distributed exactly equally. No, some categories, for example, pregnant and lactating women, enjoyed certain concessions. But the rest of the matter reached the point of absurdity. Thus, work cards were unified. The government did not care at all that some industries were more difficult, some were strategically important, and some were simply harmful or even destructive. Everything is equal for everyone, and there are no options.
Since January 1940, as soon as the cards were introduced, the traditionally strong trade unions in England tried to put pressure on the Food Department in order to somehow encourage workers in heavy industries. In vain. It took more than a year and a half and a series of severe military slaps from Germany for the officials to understand: whoever eats well, works well, forges front-line victory in the rear. And in the fall of 1941, they introduced... No, not different food supply standards. But just different canteens. Miners, foundry workers and dockers ate in category A canteens. The rest were in category B canteens. The cards still remained the same for everyone.
1 egg and 2 pockets
What could you get with them?
Here is the standard for a week's food rationing in England:
Meat - 230 g;
Butter - 57 g;
Sugar - 227 g;
Chicken or duck eggs - 1 piece;
Cooking fat - 113 g;
Milk - 1.4 l.
You can see that this does not include either vegetables or bread. Both were available throughout the war in free, albeit rationed, sale, according to the familiar pattern: “No more than a kilo per person.” Maybe at least this has some advantage of capitalism?
Maybe there is. But here's a funny nuance. In the USSR, the card system was abolished in 1947. And in England, at about the same time, this very system, on the contrary, was tightened. So, bread cards appeared there after the war: in 1946. Two years later, cards for potatoes also appeared, which no longer fits into any gates. By the way, cards for a number of products lasted in England until 1954.
Moreover. The desire for equalization gave rise to such enchanting idiocy there as rationing of clothing. British wartime laws prohibited trousers with cuffs: unnecessary waste of material. They regulated the number of pockets and buttons on men's jackets: pockets - no more than 2, buttons - no more than 3. Young ladies got it too: the heel height should not exceed 2 inches (a little more than 5 cm).
In our periodicals you can find ridicule about how Soviet women, having received synthetic or silk slips from the United States under Lend-Lease, foolishly mistook them for evening dresses. And they began to show off in their underwear in theaters and restaurants. This might actually seem funny. But not in a humiliating way. The real humiliation is here. In the wake of equalization and shortages in post-war England, women sewed bras for themselves from men's handkerchiefs. And underwear made from stolen parachute silk was considered the highest chic.
66 years ago, the card system for the distribution of goods was abolished in the USSR. The history of the exchange of food coupons was studied by a Reedus correspondent.
Sixty-six years ago, on December 14, 1947, the USSR abolished the card system for the distribution of goods, introduced due to wartime difficulties in 1941. The next time the rationed system of distribution of goods in the form of coupons returned to us thirty-six years later - in 1983. Then the population called them the invention of the communists. At the beginning of the twentieth century, when cards first appeared in Russia, they were considered a German invention.
In fact, food distribution systems have been around for centuries. Some civilizations, like the ancient Chinese, resorted to providing grain during natural disasters. The Sumerians of the third dynasty of Ur completely introduced a class approach to this matter already in the 22nd century BC. The entire Mesopotamia lived on rationed rations with a central distribution system: from helot slaves to high-caste officials. By order of the Inca, during lean years, the curacs distributed the necessary food to the poor in exchange for physical labor. They noted in the pile who received what. Residents of the capitals and largest centers of the Roman Empire, such as Antioch, Alexandria or Constantinople, used their tessarae all year round, receiving bread and other products for free.
Cards first appeared in Russia during the German War. Despite the regular famine among the peasantry due to crop failures, until 1914 no one even thought that food could disappear in Russian cities and the army could remain hungry. Officials came to their senses only in 1916. The massive conscription of farmers into the army reduced production volumes. Grain from Siberia to the center of Russia barely crawled along the busy railways, and even then officials preferred to exchange it with their allies for weapons and ammunition. As a result, rationed food distribution began in the spring, and cards appeared in the fall. For example, one citizen was entitled to two hundred kilos (three pounds) of sugar for a month. Peasants' standards were higher than those of the urban population. Privileged citizens were entitled to additional rations. They were canceled in February 1917, supplies dried up. As in the nineties, people tried to stock up on as many goods as possible, even if they were not needed now. In reserve. It was the “hamster instinct” and greed that contemporaries of those cruel events explained the disappearance of food supplies.
The February Revolution did not bring the expected relief. On March 25, 1917, the Provisional Government introduced a “grain monopoly.” By the October Revolution, most products were already distributed using ration cards: bread, cereals, meat, oils, eggs, confectionery, tea.
The Germans, devastation, civil war and intervention forced the young Soviet government to continue the card tradition. Unlike the monarchists and temporary workers, the communists brought an ideological theory to the distribution of products and came up with class rations. The country's population was divided into two groups: working and non-working, “male and female persons and their families living on income from capital, houses and enterprises or the exploitation of hired labor, as well as persons of liberal professions who are not in public service.” This group of the population received food after meeting the needs of the workers. Sometimes this meant death from hunger. The working population was divided into groups. If you do not take into account party leaders, the best rations were received by the military - the “Red Army”. In areas of epidemics, doctors were entitled to the same benefits. Next came the workers of the most important industrial enterprises (“class ration”), oil workers and miners (“special ration”), railway workers and watermen (“additional ration”). The workers of Petrograd and Moscow also had their own preferences. The card system was abolished in 1921 due to the transition to the New Economic Policy.
However, eight years later, in 1929, cards returned to use; the NEP did not justify itself. Bread cards were introduced in April, and by the new year the system covered all types of food products and some industrial products. Unlike War Communism, the food distribution system became more complex.
Firstly, all citizens were divided into categories. Workers were entitled to 800 grams of bread per day, their family members received 400. Employees had the right to 300 grams of bread, as did their family members. The third category included the unemployed, disabled and pensioners. Their norm became 200 grams of bread per day. Non-working elements, such as private traders, clergy and housewives under 56 years of age, did not receive cards at all.
Secondly, in 1931, four enterprise supply lists appeared: special, first, second and third. Workers at leading industrial enterprises in Moscow, Leningrad, Baku, Donbass, Karaganda, Eastern Siberia, the Far East and the Urals received more scarce products at higher standards. Representatives of the special and first lists made up 40% of the number of supplied citizens, but consumed 80% of the goods coming from state funds. Those who were included in the second and third lists: enterprises of the glass, porcelain, stationery, textile, match industries, non-industrial small towns, etc., received only bread, sugar, flour and tea from central funds. The rest had to be obtained from local resources.
Third, each supply list was divided into four supply rates depending on status. The highest category, “Group A,” included workers in factories and transport. “Group B” included ordinary workers, cooperative artisans, employees of healthcare and trade institutions, personal pensioners, old Bolsheviks and retired former political prisoners. The lowest category, “Group B,” included employees, their family members, artisans, handicraftsmen, pensioners, disabled people, the unemployed and peasants. Children formed a separate group; only those born after 1917 were included in it. This system existed until January 1, 1935.
Six years later, in July 1941, we had to return to the cards again: war. First they appeared in Moscow and Leningrad, and by November 1942 they were already operating in 58 major cities of the USSR. Bread, cereals, sugar, candy, butter, shoes, fabrics and sewing accessories, kerosene, salt, and soap could only be purchased with cards or from speculators. Even the most brutal war in human history did not eradicate the thirst for profit. The food was stolen by truck drivers carrying bread and grain along the road of life to besieged Leningrad. Frauds with cards occurred at all levels. House managers, in collusion with janitors, issued documents to fictitious persons, receiving food products using forged documents. House management employees appropriated the cards of the deceased. Printing house employees stole them directly from the workshops. Artists drew them by hand. Finally, cards began to simply be “lost” and restored, then both sets were sold. Even the fear of the death penalty could not save you from such machinations. In besieged Leningrad, many cases were heard when tons of bread were found in the bins of swindlers. By 1943, product speculation had reached such proportions that the NKVD was forced to conduct a special operation. In 49 constituent entities of the USSR, 1,848 cases were opened, involving 1,616 employees of card bureaus and 3,028 of their accomplices. It even got to the point that cards began to be transported to certain regions from Moscow printing houses. However, all these measures did not bring results. Fraudsters came up with more and more new ways to obtain goods using “false” documents. This practice stopped only on December 14, 1947, after the abolition of the card system.
In 1983, cards again entered our lives. Deficit. Everyone who was of conscious age in the eighties remembers this word. For vodka, for soap, for pasta, for sugar, for lingerie, for cigarettes - literally everything was sold with coupons. More precisely, these coupons were necessary for purchase. The presence of pieces of paper with different inscriptions did not guarantee receipt of the necessary goods; they simply were not there. For example, at my house I still have a stack of coupons from the early nineties: for cereals, butter, for something else. It was not possible to exchange them for goods then; today they are a rarity from a past life, a reminder of the past. With the release of prices, coupons lost their relevance; overnight it became possible to buy anything you wanted, as long as you had the money. However, in some regions they operated for quite a long time. For example, in Ulyanovsk, certain goods were sold using coupons until 1996.
More than twenty years later, it’s hard to believe that just recently there was nothing but pickles in grocery stores, and there were hours-long, kilometer-long lines at McDonald’s. You quickly get used to good things. However, the state still regulates prices for certain goods. But this regulation looks a little strange. The maximum retail price is printed on the cigarettes. The cost of milk or bread depends solely on the greed of the seller. A baguette for 140 rubles is no longer uncommon in Moscow. The Stalinist card system was introduced not least because of high market prices for food. I hope such a bitter cup does not threaten us in the near future.
