Documents / FOIA release
This Joint Committee Print, dated December 8, 1982, gathers studies that the Central Intelligence Agency's Directorate of Intelligence prepared for the Joint Economic Committee of the US Congress. It gives estimates of Soviet gross national product for 1950 to 1980, with indexes of industrial production, agricultural production and consumption, and explains the methods and data behind them. The foreword says official Soviet statistics inflate growth and that the CIA measures offer a more accurate picture. The document contains no UFO material.
“Gross”60+ pages
Approved for Release: 2019/07/19 C05210421 Table 5 Average Annual Percent Growth Rates of Total Consumption and Major Categories in Established Prices and at Factor Cost, Selected Years, 1950-80 1951-60 1961-70 1971-80 Established Prices Factor i W V Cost __ Established Factor Established Factor Prices 7 WV‘ ’Cost _ Wiir Prices" V Cost Total cVo7n_s'umption_H N 6.1 5.1 4.5 3.5 3.1 floods’ __ M64 H i W 5.7% 5.0 T9 if 4.377 m3.4W 3:0 ._F<22d --_ _._. . 5-1 4.8 if 4.3 7‘ W 3.7. T W 2.0 *SoQ goods » _ 8.8 1.8 T 7 7'7 7” "WT" "H7" 4.0 7 Durables 15.9 AT 15.9 5.8 4.0 8.67.8 7.8 8.6 Services 4.8 4.5 5.6 4.9 3.7 3.2 How did the situation in markets for consumer goods and services in 1970 conform to this theoretical standard? What adjustments in the 1970 established price weights would be needed, if they were to reflect relative utilities? We consider in turn, retail prices of goods, consumption in kind, and household services, including housing. The overall inarket for consumer goods and services in 1970 probably was not seriously in disequilibrium. In that year, the average savings rate was a low 5.2 percent, although the marginal propensity to save jumped sharply." This change probably reflected con- sumers’ reaction to the expected (and actual) rapid increase in the number of new cars made available for purchase by the population. Cash is required for purchase of such high-priced durable goods, and people’s expectations of being able to obtain one of these much desired items were greatly heightened. Clearly, however, there were numerous disequilibria in markets for individual goods and services—sur- pl‘uses of some items, manifested in Spring clearance sales and price cuts and some “above norm” inventory accumu1ations—and shortages of other goods, reflect- ed in sporadic queues and reported black markets. g With respect to products (mainly food) sold in both types of outlets, prices paid in ex-village collective farm markets (CFMs) exceeded the prices paid in state and cooperative retail outlets by an average of ~59 percent. A part of that difference reflects the much superior quality of the products sold in CFMs. We “’ JEC I979, p. 766. might assume that half of the differential is a quality premium, leaving the rest to be accounted for by the inability to obtain the fresh foods involved in state stores. If the total quantity supplied were sold on a single market, the uniform price would be above the average state store price, but below the CFM average price adjustedfor quality. Since the price and income elasticities of demand, as well as the individual prices and quantities of the products involved are not known, the equilibrium prices cannot be determined. If they were known, the relevant values used as weights in the index theoretically would need to be adjusted to reflect those prices. To provide an idea of the size of the adjustment, we assume that for the products involved (fresh foods) the average state price is 30 _percent below the average CFM price, taking into account quality differences. Valuing state store sales at that price adds 5.6 billion rubles to consumption. As Bergson notes, consumption in kind theoretically also should be valued at that “equilibrium” price— here assumed to be 3.0 percent above the state store level—less distribution and processing markups. ln 1970, food subsidies paid by the state to food proces- sors to compensate for the difference between pro- curement prices and retail prices for meat andlmilk amounted to some 11.9 billion rubles. The estimated gross subsidy per ton was 694 rubles for meat and 68.32 rubles for milk?“ Household consumption in kind can be revalued at the subsidized prices after deducting processing and distribution costs estimated at 10 percent of those values. The results then need to be again revalued to reflect the assumed retail “equi- librium” price of 30 percent above the state price level. For products other than meat and milk, a rough \ ’° Constance B. Krueger, ACES Bulletin, Fall, 1974, pp. 66-67. 332 Approved for Release: 2019/07/19 C05210421
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FOIA release, from the cia-readingroom collection. The PDF is mirrored here; the original link is under it. 399 pages are in the text index: search them above, or from the library's search.