Ration card system — a system of supplying the population with consumer goods under conditions of shortage. Under this system, in order to buy a product one had to not only pay money for it, but also present a single-use coupon granting the right to purchase it. Ration cards (coupons) set specific monthly consumption norms per person.
The essence of the coupon system was that to purchase a scarce product it was necessary not only to pay money, but also to hand over a special coupon authorizing the purchase of that product.
Coupons for food and some consumer goods were obtained at the place of registered residence from the housing office. At the workplace (usually through the trade-union committee), distribution was arranged for some food and manufactured goods received via in-kind exchanges between enterprises.
The reason the coupon system emerged was the shortage of certain mass-demand goods.
The goal of introducing coupons was to provide the population with a minimally guaranteed set of goods. Demand was expected to decline, since without a coupon the corresponding goods in the state retail network were effectively not sold. In practice, it was sometimes impossible to use coupons if the relevant goods were not available in stores. Some goods, if they were in surplus, were sold without coupons even though coupons were issued for them as well—for example, for salt.
Without a coupon, goods could be bought at markets and from speculators.
The assumed consumption norm could differ depending on the status of a locality; for example, when butter rationing was introduced in Chelyabinsk Oblast in 1981, the norm for Chelyabinsk, Magnitogorsk, and five other large cities was 200 grams per person per month; for some smaller towns it was 150 grams; for most localities it was 100 grams. The fulfillment of coupons with a specific type of product could vary; for example, with a guaranteed norm of 2 kilograms of meat products per person per month, in Chelyabinsk Oblast in 1983 coupons were redeemed as 67% sausage, 23% poultry, and 10% beef and pork (mainly for war invalids and diabetics). In 1985 the supply situation worsened, and coupons were redeemed mainly with boiled sausages, pork, and lean mutton.
Perestroika, on the one hand, partially abolished mandatory state deliveries, and on the other, eliminated the foreign-trade monopoly, as a result of which exporting enterprises and cooperatives accumulated large amounts of money not backed by available goods. This led to increased shortages of certain goods and some expansion of the coupon system; and as shortages grew in 1989–1990, coupons were introduced everywhere for many food products and some other goods (tobacco products, vodka, sausage, soap, tea, groats, salt, sugar, and in some cases, in remote areas, bread, milk, mayonnaise, laundry detergent, women’s underwear, etc.).
Because large and “closed” cities of the USSR were supplied with food better than the provinces, and in attempts to stop nonresidents from taking scarce goods out of the city (meat, meat and fish products), the leadership of certain cities began to propose introducing coupons for meat. In the late 1970s through the first half of the 1980s, as the food shortage intensified, in some cities and regions of the country (Perm, Sverdlovsk, Chelyabinsk, Vologda, Zheleznogorsk, and others) attempts were made to regulate consumption by introducing rationing and coupons for certain types of food (meat, meat products, sausage, animal butter).
The coupon system began to be introduced on a large scale in 1989 and became most widespread in 1990–1991, when the total shortage reached its peak; not only meat products but also ordinary goods that previously had not been in short supply began to disappear: sugar, groats, vegetable oil, and others.
The coupon system faded away from the beginning of 1992 due to price liberalization, which triggered hyperinflation (in 1992 alone, prices increased 26-fold) and the spread of free trade. For some goods in certain regions, coupons remained in use longer.