Russia: Borrowing from the Capitalists

(7 of 10)

Solving the equation of the Soviet economy would clearly be a computer expert's supreme triumph, since it would involve programming some 50 million unknowns and 5,000,000 constants all in motion. The Kremlin has endowed a Central Economic-Mathematical Institute to explore the feasibility of a network of 50 key computer stations across the U.S.S.R. linked to a "Big Daddy" blinker in Moscow. Presumably the monster would constantly engorge raw data on the economy at the local level, process it in Moscow, and electronically burp prices and other economic orders back to the provinces.

This Orwellian vision draws scalding scorn from the liberal economists. "Do you mathematicians expect to be able to see from the main computing center," asks Ivan Malyshev, deputy chief of the Central Statistical Administration, "all our vast territory from the cold rocks of Murmansk to the flaming sun of Kolkhida in the Caucasus, to see how people sow and reap, how every chemical complex functions, how every machine operates? If something goes wrong in Khabarovsk, can you merely press a button and straighten things out? A strange Utopia. Society is not the sum of mathematical zeros and digits. It is a living, creative body."

No Sides. Though Khrushchev permitted these polemics to take place, he probably never fully understood what the argument was all about. Still, he let the reformers start their experiments in the Bolshevichka and Mayak factories.

Escaping from the plan at first proved an unsettling business for the two firms. Despite Moscow's explicit authorization, many of the suppliers were suspicious—and unwilling to guarantee delivery dates in advance. Stores, however, were delighted at last to be able to order what their customers wanted with the reasonable certainty that they would get it, and get it on time.

Orders in hand, Bolshevichka and Mayak set their own production schedules, decided how many workers would be needed to do the job. Profits were pegged only to what their stores could actually sell, and worker piece-rate bonuses were accordingly awarded for quality. To get a better reading of consumer tastes, Bolshevichka set up its own shoppers' clinic. Within six months, both profits and quality had soared and, of critical interest to the Kremlin, inventories were sharply reduced: the turnover of Bolshevichka and Mayak goods in the retail stores was speeded up by some three weeks.

Bolshevichka today gleams with pride: flowers adorn each work table, the walls are freshly painted and adorned with photographs of its workers shaking hands with Party bigwigs, who arrive in ever increasing numbers to see the miracle that has come to pass. To one and all, beaming Director Petr Noskov reports that Bolshevichka's profit margin has risen to 7%, that the average pay is up from $94 a month to $110, and that the factory is now making better suits at a cheaper price ($85 v. $96) and are (oh, that Capitalist idiom) "selling like hot cakes."

McNamaraish. Now, at the top of all this, stands Premier Aleksei Kosygin, a trained economist, widely and well-traveled in Western economies.