Rationing system — a system of supplying the population with consumer goods under conditions of shortage. Under this system, to purchase a product one had not only to pay money for it, but also to present a single-use coupon granting the right to buy it. Ration cards (coupons) set specific monthly per-person consumption norms.
The essence of the coupon system is that to buy a scarce product it is 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 organized for certain foods and manufactured goods obtained through in-kind exchange between enterprises.
The reason the coupon system emerged was a shortage of certain widely used goods.
The goal of introducing coupons was to provide the population with a minimally guaranteed set of goods. Demand was supposed to decline, since without a coupon the relevant goods were effectively not sold in the state retail network. In practice, it was sometimes impossible to use coupons if the corresponding 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 the locality; thus, when butter rationing was introduced in the Chelyabinsk Region in 1981, the norm for Chelyabinsk, Magnitogorsk, and five other large cities was 200 grams per person per month; for some smaller towns, 150 grams; for most localities, 100 grams. How coupons were fulfilled with a specific type of product could vary; thus, with a guaranteed norm of 2 kilograms of meat products per person per month, in the Chelyabinsk Region in 1983 coupons were redeemed 67% with sausages, 23% with poultry, and 10% with beef and pork (mainly for war invalids and diabetics). In 1985 the situation with meat supplies worsened, and coupons were redeemed mainly with boiled sausages, pork, and lean mutton.
Perestroika, on the one hand, partially abolished mandatory state procurement deliveries, and on the other hand eliminated the foreign-trade monopoly, as a result of which exporting enterprises and cooperatives accumulated large amounts of money not backed by goods. This led to an increase in 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.).
Since large and “closed” Soviet cities were supplied with food better than the provinces, in attempts to stop nonresidents from taking scarce goods (meat, meat and fish products) out of the city, the leadership of some cities began to propose introducing meat coupons. In the late 1970s and the first half of the 1980s, as food shortages 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, butter).
The coupon system began to be introduced on a large scale in 1989 and became most widespread in 1990–1991, when total shortages peaked; both meat products and ordinary goods that previously had not been scarce began to disappear as well: sugar, groats, vegetable oil, and others.
The coupon system faded out from the beginning of 1992 due to price liberalization, which caused hyperinflation (in 1992 alone prices rose 26-fold) and the spread of free trade. For a number of goods in some regions, coupons remained in use longer.