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Five-Year Plan (USSR)
Encyclopedia
The Five-Year Plans for the National Economy of the Soviet Union (Russian
: пятилетка, Pyatiletka) were a series of nation-wide centralized exercises in rapid economic development
in the Soviet Union
. The plans were developed by a state planning committee
based on the Theory of Productive Forces
that was part of the general guidelines of the Communist Party
for economic development. Fulfilling the plan became the watchword of Soviet bureaucracy
. (See Overview of the Soviet economic planning process)
The same method of planning was also adopted by most other communist state
s, including the People's Republic of China
. In addition, several capitalist states have emulated the concept of central planning, though in the context of a market economy, by setting integrated economic goals for a finite period of time. Thus are found "Seven-year Plans" and "Twelve-Year Plans". Nazi Germany
emulated the practice in its Four Year Plan
designed to bring Germany to war-readiness.
Several five-year plans did not take up the full period of time assigned to them: some were successfully completed earlier than expected, while others failed and were abandoned. Altogether, there were thirteen five-year plans. The initial five-year plans were created to serve in the rapid industrialization of the Soviet Union, and thus placed a major focus on heavy industry
. The first one was accepted in 1928, for the period from 1929 to 1933, and completed one year early. The last Five-Year Plan was for the period from 1991 to 1995 and was not completed, as the Soviet Union was dissolved in 1991.
inherited and upheld the New Economic Policy
(NEP) from Vladimir Lenin
. In 1921, Lenin had persuaded the 10th Party Congress
to approve the NEP as a replacement for the War Communism
that had been set up during the Russian Civil War
. In War Communism, the state had assumed control of all means of production, exchange and communication. All land had been declared nationalized by the Decree on Land
, finalized in the 1922 Land Code
, which also set collectivization as the long-term goal. Although the peasants had been allowed to work the land they held with the production surplus to their needs being bought by the state (on the state's terms), the peasants cut production; whereupon food was requisitioned. Money gradually came to be replaced by barter and a system of coupons.
Under the NEP, the state had controlled all large enterprises (i.e. factories, mines, railways) as well as enterprises of medium size, but small private enterprises, employing fewer than 20 people were allowed. The requisitioning of farm produce was replaced by a tax system (a fixed proportion of the crop), and the peasants were free to sell their surplus (at a state-regulated price) - although they were encouraged to join state farms (Sovkhozes, set up on land expropriated from nobles after the 1917 revolution), in which they worked for a fixed wage like workers in a factory. Money came back into use, with new bank notes being issued and backed by gold.
The NEP had been Lenin's response to a crisis. In 1920, industrial production had been 13% and agricultural production 20% of the 1913 figures. Between February 21 and March 17, 1921, the sailors in Kronstadt
had mutinied. In addition, the Russian Civil War
, which had been the main reason for the introduction of War Communism
, had virtually been won; and so controls could be relaxed.
In the 1920s, there was a great debate between Bukharin, Tomsky
and Rykov on the one hand, and Trotsky, Zinoviev
and Kamenev on the other. The former group considered that the NEP provided sufficient state control of the economy and sufficiently rapid development, while the latter argued in favour of more rapid development and greater state control, taking the view, among other things, that profits should be shared among all people, and not just among a privileged few. In 1925, at the 14th Party Congress, Stalin, as he usually did in the early days, stayed in the background but sided with the Bukharin group. However, later, in 1927, he changed sides, supporting those in favour of a new course, with greater state control.
. Because meeting the goals of the five-year plans had top priority as a measure of progress toward a communist utopia, official lying about productivity became part of the economic system. The attempt to turn an illiterate peasant society into an advanced industrial economy in a single decade brought intense suffering, but hardship was tolerated because, as one worker put it, Soviet workers believed in the need for "constant struggle, struggle, and struggle" to achieve a Communist society. These five-year plans outlined programs for huge increases in the output of industrial goods. Stalin warned that without an end to economic backwardness "the advanced countries...will crush us." (Hunt 845)
".This was intended to improve the efficiency of agriculture and eliminate the "kulak
" class of landowners, which was deemed hostile to the Soviet regime, while improving the position of poor peasants. The disruption and repression associated with collectivization was a primary cause of the famine of 1932, which resulted in millions of deaths.
From 1928 to 1940, the number of Soviet workers in industry, construction, and transport grew from 4.6 million to 12.6 million and factory output soared. Stalin's first five-year plan helped make the USSR a leading industrial nation.
The government's heavy handed running of the country continued and the agriculture revival was rather unsuccessful because almost all of the farmers had already been evicted, imprisoned or murdered as the political persecutions shifted into high gear, starting the era of The Great Purge. The Second Five-Year Plan was the start of the deterioration in the standard of living because the focus of "planners' preferences" replaced consumer preferences in the country's economy, with the move to focus on military goods and heavy industry, the economy suffered. This resulted in a much lower quality and quantity of available consumer goods
.
The first two years of the Third Five-Year Plan proved to be even more of a disappointment in terms of proclaimed production goals. Even so, the value of these goals and of the coordination of an entire economy's development of central planning has been undeniable. For the 12% to 13% rate of annual industrial growth attained in the Soviet Union during the 1930s has few parallels in the economic history of other countries. Since Russia's economy had always lagged behind the rest of Europe, these increases appeared all the more dramatic. Additionally, this high rate of growth was continued after World War II, as much devastation needed to be repaired, and continued into the early fifties, after which it had gradually declined.
Much of the USSR at this stage had been devastated by the war. Officially, 98,000 collective farms had been ransacked and ruined, with the loss of 137,000 tractors, 49,000 combine harvesters, 7 million horses, 17 million cattle, 20 million pigs, 27 million sheep; 25% of all capital equipment had been destroyed in 35,000 plants and factories; 6 million buildings, including 40,000 hospitals, in 70,666 villages and 4,710 towns (40% urban housing) were destroyed, leaving 25 million homeless; about 40% of railway tracks had been destroyed; officially 7.5 million servicemen died, plus 6 million civilians, but perhaps 20 million in all died. In 1945, mining and metallurgy were at 40% of the 1940 levels, electric power was down to 52%, pig-iron 26% and steel 45%; food production was 60% of the 1940 level. After Poland, the USSR had been the hardest hit by the war. Reconstruction was impeded by a chronic labour shortage due to the enormous number of Soviet casualties in the war. Moreover, 1946 was the driest year since 1891, and the harvest was poor.
The USA and USSR were unable to agree on the terms of a US loan to aid reconstruction, and this was a contributing factor in the rapid escalation of the Cold War
. However, the USSR did gain reparations from Germany, and made Eastern European countries make payments in return for the Soviets having liberated them from the Nazis. In 1949, the Comecon
(Council for Mutual Economic Aid) was set up, linking the Eastern bloc
countries economically. One-third of the Fourth Plan's capital expenditure was spent on Ukraine, which was important agriculturally and industrially, and which had been one of the areas most devastated by war.
By 1947, food rationing had ended, but agricultural production was barely above the 1940 level by 1952. However, industrial production in 1952 was nearly double the 1941 level.
, following Stalin's death in 1953. Some of Khrushchev's policies included nationalization
, the Virgin Lands Campaign
, creation of a minimum wage
alongside overall wage reform and the production of consumer goods
which raised the living standards of the Soviet people
in return.
in 1959. It was the reconsideration of the 6th pyatiletka. This period was marked with a significant economic growth of the Soviet Union.
s of grain were imported by the USSR. Détente and improving relations between the Soviet Union and the United States allowed for more trade.
declared the slogan "Plan of Quality and Efficiency" for this period.
annually, almost twice as much as during the Tenth Five-Year Plan and three times as much as during the Ninth Five-Year Plan (1971–75). The bulk of this grain was sold by the West; in 1985, for example, 94 percent of Soviet grain imports were from the nonsocialist world, with the United States
selling 14.1 million tons. However, total Soviet export to the West was always almost as high as import, for example, in 1984 total export to the West was 21.3 billion rubles
, while total import was 19.6 billion rubles.
, the acceleration of economic development (quickly forgotten in favor of a more vague motto perestroika
) ended among a profound economic crisis in virtually all areas of Soviet economy and drop in production.
The 1987 Law on State Enterprise and the follow-up decrees about khozraschyot
and self-financing in various areas of the Soviet economy were aimed at the decentralization
of the planned economy
.
in 1991.
. The State Bank had tabulating machines in 14 branches. Other users included the Central Statistical Bureau, the Soviet Commissariat of Finance, Soviet Commissariat of Inspection
, Soviet Commissariat of Foreign Trade, the Grain Trust, Soviet Railways, Russian Ford, Russian Buick, the Karkov tractor factory, and the Tula Armament Works. IBM
also did a good deal of business with the Soviet State in the 1930s, including supplying punch cards to the Stalin Automobile Plant.
2122 Pyatiletka
discovered in 1971 by Soviet
astronomer Tamara Mikhailovna Smirnova
is named in honor of Five-Year Plans of the USSR.
Russian language
Russian is a Slavic language used primarily in Russia, Belarus, Uzbekistan, Kazakhstan, Tajikistan and Kyrgyzstan. It is an unofficial but widely spoken language in Ukraine, Moldova, Latvia, Turkmenistan and Estonia and, to a lesser extent, the other countries that were once constituent republics...
: пятилетка, Pyatiletka) were a series of nation-wide centralized exercises in rapid economic development
Economic development
Economic development generally refers to the sustained, concerted actions of policymakers and communities that promote the standard of living and economic health of a specific area...
in the Soviet Union
Soviet Union
The Soviet Union , officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics , was a constitutionally socialist state that existed in Eurasia between 1922 and 1991....
. The plans were developed by a state planning committee
Gosplan
Gosplan or State Planning Committee was the committee responsible for economic planning in the Soviet Union. The word "Gosplan" is an abbreviation for Gosudarstvenniy Komitet po Planirovaniyu...
based on the Theory of Productive Forces
Theory of Productive Forces
The Theory of Productive Forces is a widely-used concept in communism and Marxism placing primary emphasis on technical advances and strong productive forces in a nominally socialist economy before real communism, or even real socialism, can have a hope of being achieved.The most influential...
that was part of the general guidelines of the Communist Party
Communist Party of the Soviet Union
The Communist Party of the Soviet Union was the only legal, ruling political party in the Soviet Union and one of the largest communist organizations in the world...
for economic development. Fulfilling the plan became the watchword of Soviet bureaucracy
Bureaucracy
A bureaucracy is an organization of non-elected officials of a governmental or organization who implement the rules, laws, and functions of their institution, and are occasionally characterized by officialism and red tape.-Weberian bureaucracy:...
. (See Overview of the Soviet economic planning process)
The same method of planning was also adopted by most other communist state
Communist state
A communist state is a state with a form of government characterized by single-party rule or dominant-party rule of a communist party and a professed allegiance to a Leninist or Marxist-Leninist communist ideology as the guiding principle of the state...
s, including the People's Republic of China
People's Republic of China
China , officially the People's Republic of China , is the most populous country in the world, with over 1.3 billion citizens. Located in East Asia, the country covers approximately 9.6 million square kilometres...
. In addition, several capitalist states have emulated the concept of central planning, though in the context of a market economy, by setting integrated economic goals for a finite period of time. Thus are found "Seven-year Plans" and "Twelve-Year Plans". Nazi Germany
Nazi Germany
Nazi Germany , also known as the Third Reich , but officially called German Reich from 1933 to 1943 and Greater German Reich from 26 June 1943 onward, is the name commonly used to refer to the state of Germany from 1933 to 1945, when it was a totalitarian dictatorship ruled by...
emulated the practice in its Four Year Plan
Four year plan
The Four Year Plan was a series of economic reforms created by the Nazi Party. The main aim of the four year plan was to prepare Germany for war in four years...
designed to bring Germany to war-readiness.
Several five-year plans did not take up the full period of time assigned to them: some were successfully completed earlier than expected, while others failed and were abandoned. Altogether, there were thirteen five-year plans. The initial five-year plans were created to serve in the rapid industrialization of the Soviet Union, and thus placed a major focus on heavy industry
Heavy industry
Heavy industry does not have a single fixed meaning as compared to light industry. It can mean production of products which are either heavy in weight or in the processes leading to their production. In general, it is a popular term used within the name of many Japanese and Korean firms, meaning...
. The first one was accepted in 1928, for the period from 1929 to 1933, and completed one year early. The last Five-Year Plan was for the period from 1991 to 1995 and was not completed, as the Soviet Union was dissolved in 1991.
Background
Joseph StalinJoseph Stalin
Joseph Vissarionovich Stalin was the Premier of the Soviet Union from 6 May 1941 to 5 March 1953. He was among the Bolshevik revolutionaries who brought about the October Revolution and had held the position of first General Secretary of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union's Central Committee...
inherited and upheld the New Economic Policy
New Economic Policy
The New Economic Policy was an economic policy proposed by Vladimir Lenin, who called it state capitalism. Allowing some private ventures, the NEP allowed small animal businesses or smoke shops, for instance, to reopen for private profit while the state continued to control banks, foreign trade,...
(NEP) from Vladimir Lenin
Vladimir Lenin
Vladimir Ilyich Lenin was a Russian Marxist revolutionary and communist politician who led the October Revolution of 1917. As leader of the Bolsheviks, he headed the Soviet state during its initial years , as it fought to establish control of Russia in the Russian Civil War and worked to create a...
. In 1921, Lenin had persuaded the 10th Party Congress
10th Congress of the RCP(b)
The 10th Congress of the Russian Communist Party was held during March 8-16, 1921 in Moscow. Halfway through the Congress, the Kronstadt uprising started.Major points discussed included:...
to approve the NEP as a replacement for the War Communism
War communism
War communism or military communism was the economic and political system that existed in Soviet Russia during the Russian Civil War, from 1918 to 1921...
that had been set up during the Russian Civil War
Russian Civil War
The Russian Civil War was a multi-party war that occurred within the former Russian Empire after the Russian provisional government collapsed to the Soviets, under the domination of the Bolshevik party. Soviet forces first assumed power in Petrograd The Russian Civil War (1917–1923) was a...
. In War Communism, the state had assumed control of all means of production, exchange and communication. All land had been declared nationalized by the Decree on Land
Decree on Land
The Decree on Land, written by Vladimir Lenin, was passed by the Second Congress of Soviets of Workers', Soldiers', and Peasants' Deputies on 26 October 1917, following the success of the October Revolution. It decreed an abolition of private property, and the redistribution of the landed estates...
, finalized in the 1922 Land Code
1922 Land Code
The 1922 Land Code of the RSFSR was the first principal document that systemized land legislation in the RSFSR...
, which also set collectivization as the long-term goal. Although the peasants had been allowed to work the land they held with the production surplus to their needs being bought by the state (on the state's terms), the peasants cut production; whereupon food was requisitioned. Money gradually came to be replaced by barter and a system of coupons.
Under the NEP, the state had controlled all large enterprises (i.e. factories, mines, railways) as well as enterprises of medium size, but small private enterprises, employing fewer than 20 people were allowed. The requisitioning of farm produce was replaced by a tax system (a fixed proportion of the crop), and the peasants were free to sell their surplus (at a state-regulated price) - although they were encouraged to join state farms (Sovkhozes, set up on land expropriated from nobles after the 1917 revolution), in which they worked for a fixed wage like workers in a factory. Money came back into use, with new bank notes being issued and backed by gold.
The NEP had been Lenin's response to a crisis. In 1920, industrial production had been 13% and agricultural production 20% of the 1913 figures. Between February 21 and March 17, 1921, the sailors in Kronstadt
Kronstadt
Kronstadt , also spelled Kronshtadt, Cronstadt |crown]]" and Stadt for "city"); is a municipal town in Kronshtadtsky District of the federal city of St. Petersburg, Russia, located on Kotlin Island, west of Saint Petersburg proper near the head of the Gulf of Finland. Population: It is also...
had mutinied. In addition, the Russian Civil War
Russian Civil War
The Russian Civil War was a multi-party war that occurred within the former Russian Empire after the Russian provisional government collapsed to the Soviets, under the domination of the Bolshevik party. Soviet forces first assumed power in Petrograd The Russian Civil War (1917–1923) was a...
, which had been the main reason for the introduction of War Communism
War communism
War communism or military communism was the economic and political system that existed in Soviet Russia during the Russian Civil War, from 1918 to 1921...
, had virtually been won; and so controls could be relaxed.
In the 1920s, there was a great debate between Bukharin, Tomsky
Tomsky
Tomsky , Tomskaya , or Tomskoye may refer to:*Mikhail Tomsky , Russian Bolshevik leader*Nikolai Tomsky , Russian sculptor*Tomsky District, a district of Tomsk Oblast, Russia...
and Rykov on the one hand, and Trotsky, Zinoviev
Grigory Zinoviev
Grigory Yevseevich Zinoviev , born Ovsei-Gershon Aronovich Radomyslsky Apfelbaum , was a Bolshevik revolutionary and a Soviet Communist politician...
and Kamenev on the other. The former group considered that the NEP provided sufficient state control of the economy and sufficiently rapid development, while the latter argued in favour of more rapid development and greater state control, taking the view, among other things, that profits should be shared among all people, and not just among a privileged few. In 1925, at the 14th Party Congress, Stalin, as he usually did in the early days, stayed in the background but sided with the Bukharin group. However, later, in 1927, he changed sides, supporting those in favour of a new course, with greater state control.
Plans
Each five-year plan dealt with all aspects of development: capital goods (those used to produce other goods, like coal, iron, and machinery), consumer goods (e.g. chairs, carpets, and irons), agriculture, transportation, communications, health, education, and welfare. However, the emphasis varied from plan to plan, although generally the emphasis was on power (electricity), capital goods, and agriculture. There were base and optimum targets. Efforts were made, especially in the Third Plan, to move industry eastward to make it safer from attack during World War IIWorld War II
World War II, or the Second World War , was a global conflict lasting from 1939 to 1945, involving most of the world's nations—including all of the great powers—eventually forming two opposing military alliances: the Allies and the Axis...
. Because meeting the goals of the five-year plans had top priority as a measure of progress toward a communist utopia, official lying about productivity became part of the economic system. The attempt to turn an illiterate peasant society into an advanced industrial economy in a single decade brought intense suffering, but hardship was tolerated because, as one worker put it, Soviet workers believed in the need for "constant struggle, struggle, and struggle" to achieve a Communist society. These five-year plans outlined programs for huge increases in the output of industrial goods. Stalin warned that without an end to economic backwardness "the advanced countries...will crush us." (Hunt 845)
First Plan, 1928–1933
During this period, Stalin pursued the policy of "collectivization" in agriculture to facilitate the process of rapid industrialization; this involved the creation of collective farms in which peasants worked cooperatively on the same land with the same equipment. This was considered another form of "serfdomSerfdom
Serfdom is the status of peasants under feudalism, specifically relating to Manorialism. It was a condition of bondage or modified slavery which developed primarily during the High Middle Ages in Europe and lasted to the mid-19th century...
".This was intended to improve the efficiency of agriculture and eliminate the "kulak
Kulak
Kulaks were a category of relatively affluent peasants in the later Russian Empire, Soviet Russia, and early Soviet Union...
" class of landowners, which was deemed hostile to the Soviet regime, while improving the position of poor peasants. The disruption and repression associated with collectivization was a primary cause of the famine of 1932, which resulted in millions of deaths.
From 1928 to 1940, the number of Soviet workers in industry, construction, and transport grew from 4.6 million to 12.6 million and factory output soared. Stalin's first five-year plan helped make the USSR a leading industrial nation.
Second Plan, 1933–1937
Because of the successes made by the first plan, Stalin did not hesitate with going ahead with the Second ((Five-Year Plan)) in 1932, although the official start-date for the plan was 1933. The Second Five-Year Plan gave heavy industry top priority, putting the Soviet Union not far behind the Germans as one of the major steel-producing countries of the world. Further improvements were made in communications, especially railways, which became faster and more reliable. As was the case with the other five-year plans, the second was not as successful, failing to reach the recommended production levels in such areas as the coal and oil industries. The second plan employed incentives as well as punishments and the targets were eased as a reward for the first plan being finished ahead of schedule in only four years. With the introduction of childcare mothers were encouraged to work to aid in the plan's success.The government's heavy handed running of the country continued and the agriculture revival was rather unsuccessful because almost all of the farmers had already been evicted, imprisoned or murdered as the political persecutions shifted into high gear, starting the era of The Great Purge. The Second Five-Year Plan was the start of the deterioration in the standard of living because the focus of "planners' preferences" replaced consumer preferences in the country's economy, with the move to focus on military goods and heavy industry, the economy suffered. This resulted in a much lower quality and quantity of available consumer goods
Third Plan, 1938–1941
The Third Five-Year Plan ran for only 3 years, up to 1941, when Germany declared war on the Soviet Union during the Second World War. As war approached, more resources were put into developing armaments, tanks and weapons, as well as constructing additional military factories east of the Ural mountainsUral Mountains
The Ural Mountains , or simply the Urals, are a mountain range that runs approximately from north to south through western Russia, from the coast of the Arctic Ocean to the Ural River and northwestern Kazakhstan. Their eastern side is usually considered the natural boundary between Europe and Asia...
.
The first two years of the Third Five-Year Plan proved to be even more of a disappointment in terms of proclaimed production goals. Even so, the value of these goals and of the coordination of an entire economy's development of central planning has been undeniable. For the 12% to 13% rate of annual industrial growth attained in the Soviet Union during the 1930s has few parallels in the economic history of other countries. Since Russia's economy had always lagged behind the rest of Europe, these increases appeared all the more dramatic. Additionally, this high rate of growth was continued after World War II, as much devastation needed to be repaired, and continued into the early fifties, after which it had gradually declined.
Fourth and Fifth Plan, 1945–1955
Stalin in 1945 promised that the USSR would be the leading industrial power by 1960.Much of the USSR at this stage had been devastated by the war. Officially, 98,000 collective farms had been ransacked and ruined, with the loss of 137,000 tractors, 49,000 combine harvesters, 7 million horses, 17 million cattle, 20 million pigs, 27 million sheep; 25% of all capital equipment had been destroyed in 35,000 plants and factories; 6 million buildings, including 40,000 hospitals, in 70,666 villages and 4,710 towns (40% urban housing) were destroyed, leaving 25 million homeless; about 40% of railway tracks had been destroyed; officially 7.5 million servicemen died, plus 6 million civilians, but perhaps 20 million in all died. In 1945, mining and metallurgy were at 40% of the 1940 levels, electric power was down to 52%, pig-iron 26% and steel 45%; food production was 60% of the 1940 level. After Poland, the USSR had been the hardest hit by the war. Reconstruction was impeded by a chronic labour shortage due to the enormous number of Soviet casualties in the war. Moreover, 1946 was the driest year since 1891, and the harvest was poor.
The USA and USSR were unable to agree on the terms of a US loan to aid reconstruction, and this was a contributing factor in the rapid escalation of the Cold War
Cold War
The Cold War was the continuing state from roughly 1946 to 1991 of political conflict, military tension, proxy wars, and economic competition between the Communist World—primarily the Soviet Union and its satellite states and allies—and the powers of the Western world, primarily the United States...
. However, the USSR did gain reparations from Germany, and made Eastern European countries make payments in return for the Soviets having liberated them from the Nazis. In 1949, the Comecon
Comecon
The Council for Mutual Economic Assistance , 1949–1991, was an economic organisation under hegemony of Soviet Union comprising the countries of the Eastern Bloc along with a number of communist states elsewhere in the world...
(Council for Mutual Economic Aid) was set up, linking the Eastern bloc
Eastern bloc
The term Eastern Bloc or Communist Bloc refers to the former communist states of Eastern and Central Europe, generally the Soviet Union and the countries of the Warsaw Pact...
countries economically. One-third of the Fourth Plan's capital expenditure was spent on Ukraine, which was important agriculturally and industrially, and which had been one of the areas most devastated by war.
By 1947, food rationing had ended, but agricultural production was barely above the 1940 level by 1952. However, industrial production in 1952 was nearly double the 1941 level.
Sixth Plan, 1956–1960
Another Plan to improve industry was carried out in 1956 by Nikita KhrushchevNikita Khrushchev
Nikita Sergeyevich Khrushchev led the Soviet Union during part of the Cold War. He served as First Secretary of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union from 1953 to 1964, and as Chairman of the Council of Ministers, or Premier, from 1958 to 1964...
, following Stalin's death in 1953. Some of Khrushchev's policies included nationalization
Nationalization
Nationalisation, also spelled nationalization, is the process of taking an industry or assets into government ownership by a national government or state. Nationalization usually refers to private assets, but may also mean assets owned by lower levels of government, such as municipalities, being...
, the Virgin Lands Campaign
Virgin Lands Campaign
The Virgin Lands Campaign was an initiative by Nikita Khrushchev to open up vast tracts of unseeded steppe in the northern Kazakh Soviet Socialist Republic and the Altay region of the Russian Soviet Federative Socialist Republic, started in 1954....
, creation of a minimum wage
Minimum wage
A minimum wage is the lowest hourly, daily or monthly remuneration that employers may legally pay to workers. Equivalently, it is the lowest wage at which workers may sell their labour. Although minimum wage laws are in effect in a great many jurisdictions, there are differences of opinion about...
alongside overall wage reform and the production of consumer goods
Consumer goods in the Soviet Union
The industry of the Soviet Union was usually divided into two major categories. Group A was "heavy industry," which included all goods that serve as an input required for the production of some other, final good...
which raised the living standards of the Soviet people
Soviet people
Soviet people or Soviet nation was an umbrella demonym for the population of the Soviet Union. Initially used as a nonspecific reference to the Soviet population, it was eventually declared to be a "new historical, social and international unity of people".-Nationality politics in early Soviet...
in return.
Seventh Plan, 1959–1965
Unlike other planning periods, it was a 7-year plan (semiletka), approved by the 21st Congress of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union21st Congress of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union
The 21st Congress of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union took place in Moscow, USSR 27 January - 5 February 1959. It was a mid-term or "Extraordinary" Congress, timed so that Khrushchev could try to consolidate his power over rivals after the attempted coup of the so-called "Anti-Party Group"...
in 1959. It was the reconsideration of the 6th pyatiletka. This period was marked with a significant economic growth of the Soviet Union.
Ninth Plan, 1971–1975
Some 14 million tonneTonne
The tonne, known as the metric ton in the US , often put pleonastically as "metric tonne" to avoid confusion with ton, is a metric system unit of mass equal to 1000 kilograms. The tonne is not an International System of Units unit, but is accepted for use with the SI...
s of grain were imported by the USSR. Détente and improving relations between the Soviet Union and the United States allowed for more trade.
Tenth Plan, 1976–1981
Leonid BrezhnevLeonid Brezhnev
Leonid Ilyich Brezhnev – 10 November 1982) was the General Secretary of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union , presiding over the country from 1964 until his death in 1982. His eighteen-year term as General Secretary was second only to that of Joseph Stalin in...
declared the slogan "Plan of Quality and Efficiency" for this period.
Eleventh Plan, 1981–1985
During the Eleventh Five-Year Plan, the country imported some 42 million tons of grainGRAIN
GRAIN is a small international non-profit organisation that works to support small farmers and social movements in their struggles for community-controlled and biodiversity-based food systems. Our support takes the form of independent research and analysis, networking at local, regional and...
annually, almost twice as much as during the Tenth Five-Year Plan and three times as much as during the Ninth Five-Year Plan (1971–75). The bulk of this grain was sold by the West; in 1985, for example, 94 percent of Soviet grain imports were from the nonsocialist world, with the United States
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
selling 14.1 million tons. However, total Soviet export to the West was always almost as high as import, for example, in 1984 total export to the West was 21.3 billion rubles
Soviet ruble
The Soviet ruble or rouble was the currency of the Soviet Union. One ruble is divided into 100 kopeks, ....
, while total import was 19.6 billion rubles.
Twelfth Plan, 1986–1990
The last, 12th plan started with the slogan of uskoreniyeUskoreniye
Uskoreniye was a slogan and a policy announced by Communist Party General Secretary Mikhail Gorbachev on April 20, 1985 at a Soviet Party Plenum, aimed at the acceleration of social and economical development of the Soviet Union...
, the acceleration of economic development (quickly forgotten in favor of a more vague motto perestroika
Perestroika
Perestroika was a political movement within the Communist Party of the Soviet Union during 1980s, widely associated with the Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev...
) ended among a profound economic crisis in virtually all areas of Soviet economy and drop in production.
The 1987 Law on State Enterprise and the follow-up decrees about khozraschyot
Khozraschyot
Khozraschyot or Khozraschet was an attempt to simulate the capitalist concepts of profit and profit center into the planned economy of the Soviet Union....
and self-financing in various areas of the Soviet economy were aimed at the decentralization
Decentralization
__FORCETOC__Decentralization or decentralisation is the process of dispersing decision-making governance closer to the people and/or citizens. It includes the dispersal of administration or governance in sectors or areas like engineering, management science, political science, political economy,...
of the planned economy
Planned economy
A planned economy is an economic system in which decisions regarding production and investment are embodied in a plan formulated by a central authority, usually by a government agency...
.
Thirteenth Plan, 1991
This plan, which would have run until 1995, only lasted about one year due to the dissolution of the Soviet UnionDissolution of the Soviet Union
The dissolution of the Soviet Union was the disintegration of the federal political structures and central government of the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics , resulting in the independence of all fifteen republics of the Soviet Union between March 11, 1990 and December 25, 1991...
in 1991.
Information technology
State planning of the economy required processing large amounts of statistical data. The Soviet State had nationalized the Odhner calculator factory in St Petersburg after the revolution. The state began renting tabulating equipment later on. By 1929 it was a very large user of statistical machines, on the scale of the US or GermanyGermany
Germany , officially the Federal Republic of Germany , is a federal parliamentary republic in Europe. The country consists of 16 states while the capital and largest city is Berlin. Germany covers an area of 357,021 km2 and has a largely temperate seasonal climate...
. The State Bank had tabulating machines in 14 branches. Other users included the Central Statistical Bureau, the Soviet Commissariat of Finance, Soviet Commissariat of Inspection
Rabkrin
Rabkrin, RKI or Workers' and Peasants' Inspectorate was a governmental establishment in Soviet Russia and the early Soviet Union responsible for scrutinizing the state, local and enterprise administrations during 1920-1934. It was established on February 7, 1920 to replace the People's...
, Soviet Commissariat of Foreign Trade, the Grain Trust, Soviet Railways, Russian Ford, Russian Buick, the Karkov tractor factory, and the Tula Armament Works. IBM
IBM
International Business Machines Corporation or IBM is an American multinational technology and consulting corporation headquartered in Armonk, New York, United States. IBM manufactures and sells computer hardware and software, and it offers infrastructure, hosting and consulting services in areas...
also did a good deal of business with the Soviet State in the 1930s, including supplying punch cards to the Stalin Automobile Plant.
Honors
The minor planetMinor planet
An asteroid group or minor-planet group is a population of minor planets that have a share broadly similar orbits. Members are generally unrelated to each other, unlike in an asteroid family, which often results from the break-up of a single asteroid...
2122 Pyatiletka
2122 Pyatiletka
2122 Pyatiletka is a main-belt asteroid discovered on December 14, 1971, by T. M. Smirnova at the Crimean Astrophysical Observatory. It is named in honor of Five-Year Plans of the USSR.- External links :...
discovered in 1971 by Soviet
Soviet Union
The Soviet Union , officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics , was a constitutionally socialist state that existed in Eurasia between 1922 and 1991....
astronomer Tamara Mikhailovna Smirnova
Tamara Mikhailovna Smirnova
Tamara Mikhailovna Smirnova was a Russian astronomer.From 1966 to 1988 she was a staff member of the Institute of Theoretical Astronomy at Leningrad. She co-discovered the periodic comet 74P/Smirnova-Chernykh, along with Nikolai Stepanovich Chernykh. She has also discovered various asteroids...
is named in honor of Five-Year Plans of the USSR.
See also
- Five-year plan (disambiguation) for similar plans in other countries
- Soviet calendar
- Eastern Bloc economiesEastern Bloc economiesAfter the Soviet Union's occupation of much of the Eastern Bloc during World War II, Soviet leader Joseph Stalin implemented socioeconomic transformations of each of the Eastern Bloc economies that comported with the Soviet Communist economic model...