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Changes in the Soviet Money Wage Level since 1940
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 07 August 2018
Extract
For purposes of appraising recent Soviet economic developments an important datum is the level of average money wages in the Soviet Union. This information is needed if we are to disclose successfully changes in Soviet real wages and to construct national economic accounts for the Soviet economy. In addition, a reasonably reliable picture of changes in the Soviet money wage level would reveal something about the considerations that have guided Soviet wage policy in this period. However, no official figures have been released on actual average earnings nor the actual, as distinct from the planned, wage bill for any year following 1940. This circumstance has led Western observers to attempt estimates of the Soviet wage level on the basis of admittedly inadequate data. A controversy has developed which is reflected in the rather wide range of estimates which have been advanced.
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- Copyright © Association for Slavic, East European, and Eurasian Studies 1955
Footnotes
1
The writer is grateful to Professor A. Bergson of Columbia University for his valuable comments on the various drafts of this paper.
References
2 A. Mikojan in Izvestija, April 27, 1954.
3 Sbornik važnejšikh zakonov i postanovlenij po zarabotnoj plate (Moscow,1945), p. 32. In a few sectors (at least construction and lumber camps) supplementary pay for overtime is based on 25 percent of the time rate for the first two hours and 50 percent of the time rate for the third hour.
4 In addition to the material bearing on this point which is presented below, we may cite the following statement from a Soviet source: “Perhaps never during such a relatively short period of time has wage revision, conducted moreover by standard-setting procedure, embraced simultaneously such a wide variety of economic branches as it did during the war.” (A. E. Pašerstnik in Izvestija Akademii Nauk SSSR, Otdelenie ekonomiki i prava, No. 2, 1945, cited in The American Review on the Soviet Union, May, 1946, p. 62.)
5 An article in Ugol, No. 10, 1940, p. 48, refers to the lowest rate established in March, 1940, for the Donbass area as 5.60 rubles. By September 16, 1946, the lowest rate in the Donbass coal industry wage scale had risen to 14.33 rubles ( Nikolski, V. S., Normirovanie i zarabotnaja plata na ugolnikh šakhtakh [Moscow, 1951], p. 113)Google Scholar. Given the nature of the September 1946 wage adjustment, it seems clear that the latter rate succeeded a rate of approximately 10 rubles. It is likely that this rate of 10 rubles for the least skilled jobs in the scalehad been established in 1943, marking an increase of close to 100 percent over the rate set for comparable work in 1940.
6 Aleksandrov, N. G. and Genkin, D. M., Sovetskoe trudovoe pravo (Moscow, 1946), p. 217,Google Scholar and Rudyk, A. Z., Kak proverit zarabotnuju platu na sakhte (Moscow, 1949), p. 24.Google Scholar
7 However, in addition to the basic rate increase shown in Table 2, a new job classification manual issued in 1944 provided for a greater concentration of job classifications in the upper grades of the scale than had prevailed up to this time. See Mitin, S. A., Spravočnik po trudu i zarabotnoj plate v stroitelstve (Moscow, 1948), p. 186 Google Scholar and Mitin, S. A., Posobie po trudu i zarplate na stroitelnykh i remontnykh rabotakh (Moscow, 1951), p. 87.Google Scholar On this count the data in Table 2 understate somewhat the effective increase in basic rates between 1940 and 1944 for workers in the construction industry.
8 Ministerstvo Elektrostanci Sojuza SSR, Spravočnik po trudu i zarabotnoj plate na elektrostancijakh, v setjakh i na zavodakh Ministerstva Elektrostanci SSSR (Moscow, 1946), pp. 7, 21. The decrees replaced rates which had been established in 1939 and 1940.
9 Sobranie postanovlenij i rasporjaźenij pravitelstva, No. 2, 1942, pp. 18-20; Levin, S. M., et al., Tekhničeskoe normirovanie v čërnoj metallurgi, 1950, p. 95.Google Scholar In the steel industry the increases may have been confined to direct production Workers. Maslova, N. S. in Proizvoditelnost’ truda v promyslennosti SSSR (Moscow, 1949), p. 195 Google Scholar cites a war time basic rate increase of 20-30 percent for these workers.
10 For librarians the decree authorizing war time increases in wage rates appears in Komitet po delam kulturno-prosvetitelnykh učreždenii pri Sovete Ministrov RSFSR, Sbornik rukovodjaščikh materialov po bibliotečnoj rabote, 1947, p. 95. For some categories of medical personnel and pharmacy employees the rates established in 1939 and 1942 are shown in Sobranie postanovlenij i rasporjaženij pravitelstva, No. 30, 1939, pp. 459-63, and in Artemev, F. A., Spravo;čnik medicinskogo rabotnika po voprosam truda i zarabotnoj plati (Moscow, 1950), pp. 173-83Google Scholar.
11 Where the 1939 and 1942 rates can be compared, most of the increases appear to range from 20 to 50 percent.
12 For chairmen and secretaries of agricultural Soviets, factory timekeepers, and theatrical performers, a wage handbook issued in 1946 lists as prevailing rates wage scales which had been established prior to the war (O trade i zarabotnoj plate služščaikh [Moscow, 1946], pp. 104-11, 180-81). For workers on motor vehicles, lumber camp workers and personnel in geological surveying, the difference between pre-war rates and those prevailing after September 16, 1946, can be accounted for by the increase granted on the latter date. See Table 4 below, Mitin, S. A., op. cit., 1951, pp. 60–61 Google Scholar, and Mitin, S. A., op. cit., 1948, pp. 218-19Google Scholar.
13 šegolev, G. G., Normy vyrabotki i oplata truda na gruzovykh rabotakh v morskikh portakh (1949), p. 71;Google Scholar Nikolaev, K. K., Oplata truda rabotnikov služb paravoznoj i elektrifikaci (Moscow, 1950), p. 6 Google Scholar; Kononov, N. P., Kak oplačivat trud rabočikh na lesozagotovkakh (Moscow, 1948), p. 3.Google Scholar
14 O trude i zarabotnoj plate služašcikh (Moscow, 1946), pp. 93, 181-82. The 1938 “personal rates” are given in Sobranie postanovlenij i rasporjaženij pravitelstva, No. 39, 1938. For the nature of these rates see Bergson, A., The Structure of Soviet Wages (Cambridge, 1946), pp. 166-69Google Scholar.
15 In both of these industries the difference between the basic rates prevailing during the war for most job classifications and those prevailing after September 16, 1946, can be accounted for by the increase granted on the latter date.
16 Izvestija, August 27, 1946.
17 Izvestija, September 17, 1946. The increase took the following form:
18 For most job classifications among drivers of motor vehicles, the September 1946 decree appears to have increased basic rates between 20 percent and 35 percent. The September 1946 decree increased wage rates for these workers which had originally been established in April, 1941. Since there are marked regional differentials in Soviet wage rates, the effect of the September 1946 decree depended partly on the geographic location of the enterprise. The increases we have cited for drivers of motor vehicles appear to have been applicable in most areas of the R.S.F.S.R. The 1941 rates are in Sobranie postanovlenij i rasporjaženij pravitelstva, No. 13, 1941, pp. 397-98. The rates resulting from the September 1946 decree are in Bronštein, L. A. and Budrin, B. N., Planirovanie i ucet avtomobilnogo transporta (Moscow, 1948), pp. 137-39Google Scholar.
19 Compare the rates appearing in Ministerstvo Elektrostanci sojuza SSSR op. cit., pp. 8-12, with those in Levin, S. M. and Antonov, N. I., Organizacija zarabotnoj plati v čёrnoj metallurgi (Moscow, 1950), pp. 270-73.Google Scholar
20 The basic rates for engine crews on railroads appearing in a 1950 wage handbook ( Nikolaev, K. K., op. cit., pp. 6–7 Google Scholar) can be derived for most of the railroad lines by adding the increases authorized on September 16, 1946, to the rates established on March 1, 1942. For the steel industry, the basic rates listed in a 1950 wage handbook for the major categories of production workers are said to have been established by a decree of the Ministry of the Steel Industry on September 18, 1946. This is obviously a Ministry directive applying to the steel industry the increase authorized two days earlier for all industrial sectors. See Levin, S. M. and Antonov, N. I., Organizacija zarabotnoj plati v čërnoj metallurgi (Moscow, 1950), p. 10.Google Scholar The same source (p. 270) shows rates for workers in electric power plants which differ from those established during the war only by the increases authorized on September 16, 1946. See Ministerstva Elektrostanc Sojuza SSR, op. cit., p. 8.
21 A wage handbook issued in 1951 refers to the prevailing basic rates for both of these groups of workers as having been in effect since the September 1946 decree. See Mitin, S. M., op. cit., 1951, pp. 60, 62.Google Scholar
22 Ter-Terian, S. S., Normirovanie, učёt i oplata truda v stroitelnom proizvodstve (Moscow, 1953), p. 11 Google Scholar.
23 Šegolev, G. G., op. cit., p. 71.Google Scholar
24 In addition to the increase for the coking coal sector of the industry, the only wage scale revision since September, 1946, appears to be the incorporation of a new rate for the highest grade of the wage scale. The rates prevailing in 1951 for the remaining eight grades of the nine-grade scale had been in force since September 16, 1946. Compare Korčagin, N. V., Šakhtnyj normirovščk (Moscow, 1948), p.66 Google Scholar, and Nikolski, V. S., Normirovanie i zarabotnaja plata na ugolnykh čakhtakh (Moscow, 1951), p. 113.Google Scholar
25 It may be noted that with the return of the 8 hour day in 1945 both the duration of the working day and the length of the work week remained above those prevailing during the first half of 1940. It does not appear, however, that on these grounds alone the 1945 wage level could be expected to markedly exceed the average for 1940. No change in daily basic rates was to accompany the shift from a 6 and 7 hour day to an 8 hour day decreed on June 26, 1940. The change from a system of 5 days of work followed by 1 day of rest to one involving 6 days of work followed by 1 day of rest also authorized at this time involved an increase of 8-9 working days per year. In at least one sector however (construction), a reduction of 2.6 percent in daily rates in July, 1940 was presumably intended to nullify the effect of these additional 8-9 days on annual earnings ( Nikolski, V. S., op. cit., p. 118 Google Scholar and Mitin, S. A., Spravočnik po trudu i zarabotnoj plate v stroitelstve [Moscow, 1943], p. 32.Google Scholar)
26 The New York Times, August 24, 1945.
27 Kommunist, No. 11, 1953, pp. 76-77.
See below, p. 221 and estimates of Wiles and Schwartz in Table 7.
29 Wiles, P. in Bulletin of the Oxford University Institute of Statistics, January, 1954, p. 21.Google Scholar
30 Planovoe khozjajstvo, No. 1, 1954, p. 40.
31 Stal, No. 11, 1947, p. 1044.
32 Judging by the series on railroad operating personnel presented by Redding, A. D. in Soviet Studies, July, 1953, p. 33 Google Scholar, such personnel were to constitute about 80 percent of the work force envisioned in the 1941 plan for the railroad sector. See American Council of Learned Societies Reprints: Russian Series No. 30, Gosudarstvennyj plan razvitija narodnogo khozjajstva SSR na 1941 god, p. 512. Hence changes in operating personnel earnings may be viewed as roughly representative of those in the railroad sector of the economy.
33 For at least one job classification (switchman) average monthly earnings in 1946 (based on the whole year's earnings) were slightly below the 1945 level. Migal, S. P., Zarabotnaja plata na železodorožnom transporte (Moscow, 1951), pp. 68, 73, 86 Google Scholar.
34 Voznesensky, N. A., The Economy of the U.S.S.R. During World War II (Washington, 1948), p. 70 Google Scholar.
35 Gosudarstvennyj plan … na 1941 god, op. cit., p. 512.
36 Socialističeskoe strohelstvo 1933-1938 (1939), p. 139. Between 1929 and 1938, however, average earnings in industry increased approximately 3.9 times, while for the whole economy they rose about 4.3 times.
37 Gosudarstvennyj plan … na 1941 god, op. cit., p. 512.
38 See p. 200 above and The American Review on the Soviet Union May, 1946, p. 62.
39 The failure to announce the increase in earnings for all workers and employees when the increase for all-industry was revealed may itself imply a smaller rise for the industry sector than for all workers and employees. Regional data also suggests this ( Wiles, P., op. cit., p. 21 Google Scholar).
40 Planovoe khozjajstvo, No. 1, 1954, p. 18.
41 A. Mikojan in Izvestija, April 27, 1954, stated that, including the price reductions of April, 1954, “during 4 years of the fifth Five Year Plan prices were lowered by more than 25%.” He also announced that “during the first 3 years of the 5 year plan real wages increased 30.5%.” If we may assume a lowering of prices by approximately 20 percent between 1950 and 1953, a rise of about 4-5 percent in money wages is suggested. Between 1947 and 1948 the wage fund increased 10 percent while the number of workers and employees rose 6.2 percent indicating a rise of 3.5 percent in earnings. If we assume that earnings rose at the rate of 2 percent per year between 1948 and 1950, then for the whole period 1947-53 a n increase of 12-13 percent in average earnings results. This picture of a slowly rising money wage level in recent years is also indicated in an article in Soviet Weekly, April 1, 1954, p. 9, which shows wage increases for a group of food and light industries (bakeries, fisheries, meat industry, tobacco industry, confectionary industry) between 1950 and 1953 ranging from 5 to 9 percent. See also Soviet Weekly, March 4, 1954, for a similar picture of earnings of power station personnel.
42 S. Schwarz has recently expressed the view that these estimates, while essentially correct, should be raised by a “few percent.” (Bulletin of the Oxford University Institute of Statistics, January, 1954, p. 17.)
43 V. M. Molotov, in Pravda, November 7, 1948, stated that the wage fund in 1948 was “almost double” that of 1940. The number of workers and employees had increased by about 3 million between 1940 and 1048 (A. Bergson, ed., Soviet Economic Growth (1953), p. 110.
44 N. Jasny presents estimates close to those of Wiles in The Soviet Price System (Stanford, 1051), p. 24. In a later work he indicates that data on social security payments suggest a lowering of these estimates by “about 4%” and expresses the belief that the resulting figures are correct within 1 percent. This unusual expression of confidence in quantitative estimates derived from Soviet data is in N. Jasny, Soviet Prices of Producers’ Goods (Stanford, 1952), p. 10.
45 Bergson, A., “A Problem in Soviet Statistics,” The Review of Economic Statistics, XXIX, 234-42.Google Scholar
46 Akademija Nauk SSSR Institut Ekonomiki, Političeskaja ekonomija (Moscow, 1954), p. 62.