Ration card system — a system of supplying the population with consumer goods under conditions of shortage. Under this system, to purchase an item one had to not only pay money for it, but also present a single-use coupon granting the right to buy it. Cards (coupons) set specific per-person monthly consumption limits for goods.
The essence of the coupon system was that to buy a scarce item it was necessary not only to pay money, but also to hand over a special coupon authorizing the purchase of that item.
Coupons for food and some consumer goods were obtained at one’s place of registered residence from the local housing office. At the workplace (usually via the trade-union committee), distribution of certain foods and manufactured goods was organized, received through in-kind exchange between enterprises.
The reason for the emergence of the coupon system was the shortage of certain mass-consumption goods.
The aim of introducing coupons was to provide the population with a minimally guaranteed set of goods. Demand was supposed to fall, 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; for example, coupons were also issued for salt.
Without a coupon, goods could be bought at markets and from speculators.
The intended consumption norm could differ depending on the status of a locality; for example, 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 cities it was 150 grams; for most localities it was 100 grams. 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 the Chelyabinsk Region in 1983 coupons were redeemed 67% with sausage, 23% with poultry, and 10% with beef and pork (mainly for war invalids and diabetics). In 1985 the supply situation for meat products worsened, and coupons were redeemed mainly with boiled sausage, 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 товар stocks. This led to an increased shortage of certain goods and some expansion of the coupon system; and as shortages grew in 1989–1990, coupons for many foodstuffs and some other goods were introduced everywhere (tobacco products, vodka, sausage, soap, tea, cereals, salt, sugar; in some cases, in remote areas, bread, milk, mayonnaise, laundry detergent, women’s underwear, etc.).
Since large and “closed” cities of the USSR 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, due to the growing food shortage, 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, and products began to disappear both specialty meat items and ordinary goods that previously had not been in short supply: sugar, cereals, 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 some goods in certain regions, coupons remained in use longer.
Coupon (card) 1 Kopeck. Sugar. March - January 1992.
Kostroma.
