Statistics, as you know, knows everything. Including about the socio-economic situation in Russia on the eve of the 1917 revolution. But not every researcher is able, having deeply delved into the countless columns of dead figures, to see behind them the living, dramatic realities of a turning point era.

Professor of St. Petersburg University Boris Nikolaevich Mironov is one of the best Russian historians who can see and analyze. The author of the recently published three-volume monograph "The Russian Empire: From Tradition to Modernity" offered the most interesting statistical calculations especially for this issue of Motherland.

The numbers speak for themselves to the thoughtful reader...

Salaries

During any war there is a decrease in the standard of living. However, during the First World War, up to the February revolutionary events of 1917, the decline in well-being can be considered moderate. The decrease in the real wages of workers was not as significant as is commonly thought. In 1914-1916, according to the calculations of the outstanding Russian economist and public figure S.N. Prokopovich, it grew by 9% and only from 1917 began to decline. From the point of view of S.G. Strumilin, real wages began to decline from 1914, but in this case in 1916 it was only 9% lower than in 1913, but in one revolutionary year of 1917 it fell by 10%.

A catastrophic drop in wages occurred after the Bolsheviks came to power, in 1918 (Tables 1, 2).

The reason for the discrepancies in the estimates of Prokopovich and Strumilin is as follows: the former more fully took into account, in addition to rations, the expenses of entrepreneurs on housing, insurance and medical care, which amounted to a rather significant amount - 8.3% of the monetary payment.

Economy

The decline in industrial production was insignificant - according to the most pessimistic estimates in 1915-1916. - only 4% (in 1917 - by 20%). The CSO recorded for 1915-1916. even an increase in production by 16% (in 1917, a decline of 39.6%).

Labor productivity for 1914-1916 increased by a third (31.6%). According to the most pessimistic estimates, the decline in real wages by the beginning of 1917 amounted to only 9%, and according to optimistic estimates, it increased by 9%.

The financial situation of the village was stable thanks to good harvests and government assistance to families who sent their workers to the war. The main reason for this was the record grain harvest in 1914-1917, which, on a nationwide scale, fully satisfied the demand of the population.

The increased consumption of the army was compensated by the prohibition of exports, which in peacetime absorbed more than 20% of the grain harvest.

Food

During the war, the financial situation of the Russian population was much better than in all the warring countries, especially in Germany. There, the rationing system for bread was introduced in January 1915, gradually extended to the whole country and to all the most important foodstuffs. The city norm of issuing bread on cards per person per day was 200–225 g in 1916, and 170 g in 1917. German norms of bread resemble the Leningrad blockade, when 125–250 g were issued per person per day.

In Russia, the rationing system arose only in the summer of 1916. In provincial cities, only sugar and bread were subject to rationing, and at rates several times higher than in Germany. In Moscow, the rationing system for bread was introduced only on March 6, 1917. In Petrograd, on the eve of the February events, one and a half pounds (615 g) of bread was issued per person per day, workers - 2 pounds (820) - in 3.6-4, 8 times more than in Germany.

Moreover, in 1916 the number of strikers per 1,000 people of the working population in Germany was 69 times less than in Russia.

Contributions

People's deposits in savings banks - the country's main bank for the general population - during the war also say a lot about the standard of living of the population. By January 1, 1917, the number of depositors increased by 1.5 times, and the amount of deposits, taking into account inflation, by a third.

The number of depositors is 12.7 million. And this is not the bourgeoisie and landowners - there were only about 120 thousand merchants and entrepreneurs throughout the empire, and about 100 thousand landowners.

The depositors consisted of 30% peasants, 12% philistines, 13% workers, i.e. 55% of the workers. (Table 3).

Crime

The crime rate during the war years decreased by 26% (Table 4).

In 1914-1916, judging by the number of investigations per 100,000 population in eight judicial districts, crime was about 26 percentage points lower than in 1911-1913, including 29 percentage points in the countryside, and in the city - by 6. In general, the frequency of committing all types of crimes has decreased throughout the country, and in the city only the number of thefts (per 100 thousand population) has increased slightly (by 5 points). It is unlikely that such a significant decrease in crime can be explained only by the departure of millions of healthy men to the army, because the crime of women and children who were not subject to mobilization has fallen.

Significantly significant (by 34 points) reduction in the number of state crimes. In 1916, a slight increase in crime compared with 1915 was revealed (in general - by 12 points, in the countryside - by 11, and in the city - by 19 points) due mainly to thefts, robberies and robberies. But the level of 1913 was still not surpassed: in 1916, in the country as a whole, crime was 24 points lower, in the countryside - by 28, and in the city - by 3 points lower than in 1913. And this despite the fact that that during the war, by the summer of 1916, under the influence of mass migrations of peasants drafted into the army to the cities, the share of the urban population increased from 15.3% to 17.4%, or 2.1%.

Suicide

The suicide rate fell by 3 times.

In terms of suicide rates in the post-reform period, Russia occupied the penultimate place in Europe. From 1870 to 1910, the suicide rate changed cyclically with an overall upward trend; the peak was in 1891-1895, then there was a decrease. It is important to note that suicidality grew only among the townspeople, while in the countryside, after a slight rise in the 1880s - the first half of the 1890s. it declined at the beginning of the 20th century. returned to the level of 1819-1825. During the First Russian Revolution of 1905-1906. the suicide rate decreased and began to grow only from 1907, after its completion, reaching a maximum by 1913 (Table 5).

During the First World War, judging by Petrograd, Moscow and Odessa, the suicide rate decreased by 2.8-3 times, and from 1918 it began to grow in the whole country in 1923-1926. surpassed the pre-war level by 1.5 times (5.6 versus 3.7 per 100 thousand).

For comparison, in 1989 the suicide rate in the Russian Federation was 5.9 times higher than in 1912 (25.8 per 100 thousand), in 1994 - 9.5 times (41.8 per 100 thousand). 100 thousand), in 2008-2009 - 6.6 times (29 per 100 thousand).

Review of Boris Mironov's recently published three-volume monograph "The Russian Empire: From Tradition to Modernity" - p. 88.

Shackles are also a parabola
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This is an outline for an article that I will not write. When I collected the facts, I realized that this is only half: the second half is the history of the capitalists in 1917. Why were they greedy then? Did they want Soviet power? But let others write about it.
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Until February

By 1917, there were 15 million workers in Russia - a tenth of the population. They were employed in industry, construction, agriculture and transport.

Under tsarism, workers had few rights. The authorities made only small concessions: the law of 1897 reduced the working day to 11.5 hours, the laws of 1901 and 1903 gave workers pensions for injuries at work and the right to choose elders, and manufacturers were forbidden to lower wages, pay in goods and introduce fines of more than a third salaries...

After the revolution of 1905, the authorities reduced the working day to 10 hours and gave the right to trade unions (“Zubatov’s”). But the concessions also humiliated the workers. In 1905, the landowners elected one deputy to the Duma from 2,000 people, the capitalists - from 4,000, the peasants - from 30,000, the workers - from 90,000. , assault.

In 1912, the Convention of the Petrograd Society of Manufacturers and Breeders banned the permanent bodies of workers - only "councils of elders" were allowed. The Convention curtailed the rights of workers: “interference is not allowed in the hiring and dismissal of workers, in the establishment of wages and conditions of employment and the development of internal rules.”

Before 1914, workers were outraged by working conditions: long working hours; low salary; wage gap between men and women; lack of safety precautions (frequent accidents); many fines (up to 40% of salary); cramped housing...

On July 24, 1914, a tsarist decree banned trade unions, meetings, strikes, the workers' press, and the singing of revolutionary songs. On July 26, 1914, 15 trade unions were closed in St. Petersburg. By 1917 there were only 10,000 trade union members in Petrograd.

The economics of war

The Russian economy was not ready for war. There was a shortage of fuel, ore, metal, and other raw materials. By the winter of 1916, the average Donbass worker was extracting a quarter less coal than before the war. At the end of 1916, due to a shortage of coal, the factories worked intermittently. By 1917, iron and steel were being smelted a quarter less than in 1913.

The factories were not strong enough. The equipment was worn out. In 1914-1917, a Russian soldier received 20 times (by weight) fewer shells than a German one. Before the war, 44 thousand rifles were produced per month, in 1917 - 130 thousand, but the front at the beginning of the war demanded 60 thousand, and in 1916-1917 - 200 thousand. Often two or three soldiers had one rifle.

Production fell in the light and food industries, where before the war raw materials were imported: half of the equipment was idle, and the shortage of goods was growing at the front and in the rear.

The transport fell apart. In the first half of 1916, untransported cargo was one and a half times more than in the second half of 1914.

In 1915-1916, state expenditures exceeded revenues by 75%. By 1917, the state's debt had grown to 33 billion rubles. Debt growth (data as of January 1): 1914 - 8.8 billion rubles, 1915 - 10.5, 1916 - 18.9, 1917 - 33.6.

By 1917, the real wages of workers fell to a quarter of what they were before the war. In the first year of the war, "popular consumption" decreased by 25%, in the second by 43, in the third - by 52. ​​In 1915-1916, with a doubling of wages, the prices of necessary goods grew 5-6 times. By 1916, food, shoes, and clothing were 3-4 times more expensive than in 1914.

Meanwhile, industrialists and merchants received superprofits from the war. Thus, the profit of the owners of 142 textile factories increased from 63 million rubles in 1913 to 174 million in 1915. According to the Minister of War in 1916, D.S. Shuvaeva, "300-400% profit from military orders is common, and sometimes this profit reaches 1000-1200%."

Strikes and protests before the revolution

Before the war, the number of strikes increased: 1910 - 222, 1911 - 466, 1912 - 2032, 1913 - 2404.

From 1915 to February 1917, over 300 workers protested because of shortages of food and goods. Police and troops suppressed the protests with weapons, there were killed and wounded.

In the winter of 1914-1915, speculators hid food in travel depots, and the lack of food multiplied the protests. At first there was a lack of meat, sugar, flour, later shoes, fabrics, kerosene.

On April 8, 1915, in Moscow, behind Presnenskaya Zastava, a crowd of up to 5 thousand people, mostly workers, protested against food prices and shouted “Friendly, comrades!” attacked shops and stores. In the bakery and bakery, the goods were taken out into the street and dismantled.

On May 1, 1915, 62 political strikes of workers took place in both capitals and 9 more in other cities. In Moscow, the May Day strike was carried out by 15 enterprises.

On June 5-6, 1915, in Kostroma, the protest of workers against working conditions ended in execution: 12 people were killed, 45 were injured. August 10, 1915 in Ivanovo-Voznesensk, after a strike against low wages, a peaceful demonstration was shot: 30 workers were killed, 53 were injured. In response to the shootings in Kostroma and Ivanovo-Voznesensk, 69 local businesses went on strike calling "Down with!" They were supported by strikes in Petrograd, Moscow, Nizhny Novgorod, Sormovo, Tula, Kharkov, Yekaterinoslav.

In September 1915, political strikes were held at 60 enterprises in Petrograd. In Moscow, 58,000 workers from 162 enterprises took part in the strike over the dissolution of the Duma. On Strastnaya Square, 4 people were killed and 40 wounded in a clash with the police.

From the autumn of 1915 until February 1917, protests erupted every month over shortages of food and other goods. On October 1, 1915, in Pavlovsky Posad, Moscow province, two thousand women and teenagers smashed grocery stores. On October 3, the protest merged with a strike of 12,000 workers from the Glukhiv manufactory due to low wages, and the crowd was dispersed at the market square with weapons, two workers were killed.

In February 1916, a strike at the Putilov factory demanded a 70% increase in wages, and the factory was closed. On February 7, 1916, the government decided to punish the strike by arrest, and send the workers to the front. From February 29 to March 3, 49 enterprises supported the Putilovites with strikes.

From spring to August 1916, thousands of workers (Moscow, Kostroma, Tver, Nizhny Novgorod, Voronezh provinces) opposed high prices and lack of food.

In October 1916 there were 119 political strikes in Petrograd.

On November 5, 1916, in Samara, in the bazaar, the police forcefully quelled the revolt of women. On November 12, the workers of Samara sent a letter to the Duma against the "execution of the hungry wives of the Samara poor." In 1916, the "woman riots of soldiers" were growing throughout the country.

In 1916 there were 252 political strikes in Russia (in 1915 - 355) and 273,000 strikers (in 1915 - 165). In 1916, the geography of the protest also expanded.

On January 9-13, 1917, 214 strikes marked Bloody Sunday. In Petrograd, 145,000 workers were on strike; in Moscow, 36,000. There were strikes in 12 other cities.

From September 1916 to February, three-quarters of the strikes in Petrograd were political.

From July 19, 1914 to February 22, 1917, 52 political demonstrations took place in Russia in the "classical form" (red flags, banners, slogans, singing revolutionary songs): in 1914 - 3; in 1915 - 11; in 1916 - 20; at the beginning of 1917 - 18.
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February

On February 14, the Duma resumed its work, and at the demonstrations they carried the slogans “Down with the war!”, “Down with the government!”, “Long live the second revolution!”, “Long live the republic!” In Moscow, 12,500 workers from 16 enterprises went on strike that day.

On February 17, the workers of one of the workshops of the Putilov factory went on strike. They demanded higher wages and the reinstatement of those laid off. Other departments have joined them.

On February 22, the Putilov factory declared a lockout, and all of its 36,000 workers stopped work and called on other workers for solidarity.

On February 23, on International Women's Day, Petrograd workers protested against high prices, queues, and the lack of bread in bakeries. Anti-war speeches were heard in the textile factories in the morning, then the workers quit their jobs and went to call the workers of neighboring factories to join. Then together they gathered other workers. Revolutionary songs were sung along the way, trams were disabled, police officers were attacked, bakeries and food stores were smashed. According to the police, on February 23, 87,534 people were on strike at 50 enterprises. More often they demanded: “Bread!”

On the morning of February 24, the workers came to the workshops, but after the meetings they again went out into the street. 200 thousand people were on strike. Clashes with the police increased. Calls against the war and the government multiplied. The students joined the workers.

On February 25, 300,000 people went on strike. Craftsmen, employees, and the intelligentsia joined the protest. The police walked the streets only in groups. Slogans against the war and the government, for the eight-hour working day, for the republic and the Constituent Assembly prevailed. The people seized Nevsky Prospekt. They began to say that a revolution was underway.

February 26, Sunday, the number of strikers remained. The police fired into the crowd, especially on Nevsky Prospekt. But the crowd dispersed to gather when the shooting died down. The destruction of police stations began. Unrest broke out in the garrison.

On February 27, all workers in Petrograd took to the streets. In the morning the soldiers were called to join, and in the afternoon the soldiers left the barracks. There were armed clashes with the police, police stations were set on fire, and political prisoners were released from prison. One policeman reported that he had heard from a cab driver: “Tomorrow the cab drivers will not constantly carry the public, but will only carry the leaders of the riots.”

On the night of February 28, at the Sestroretsk Arms Plant, workers seized 15,000 rifles and 190,000 cartridges from the warehouse. During the days of the February Revolution, the workers of Petrograd took up to 40,000 rifles and 30,000 revolvers from military arsenals.

Economy after February

In 1917, industrial production in Russia fell by a third. The equipment was worn out. The shortage of fuel and metal aggravated. The smelting of iron and steel, coal mining, and the production of machinery were declining. In March, 150 million poods of coal were mined in the Donbass, 119 in July, and 110 in September. Oil production in the Baku region fell from 24.8 million poods in January to 18.9 million poods in November. In the ferrous metallurgy, 42 blast furnaces were operating in the spring, and 33 by the end of October. The production of non-military goods dropped even more. The production of fabrics in 1913 decreased by 4 times compared to 1913. Fuel starvation hit transport: the average daily loading on the railway in January-September fell to 19,500 wagons - this is 22% less than in 1916. Wagons and steam locomotives were out of order, and there was nothing to replace them. Conscription to the army reduced the quality of work: the output of women, adolescents and prisoners of war (a third of the workers of the Donbass and the Urals) was half the average. Finances were upset: the bankers of England and France reduced loans, the Freedom Loan did not sell, and the government printed money that was not backed by goods: in April - 476 million rubles, in September - almost 2 billion rubles.

The state debt of Russia (as of January 1): 1914 - 8.8 billion rubles, 1915 - 10.5, 1916 - 18.9, 1917 - 33.6. By July 1, 1917, the state debt reached 43.9 billion rubles.

The collapse of the economy reduced the number of workers. Without supplies and loans, enterprises closed. From March to October, 799 plants, factories, mines, mines were closed. Often the owners stopped the enterprises in order to dismiss demanding workers.

Food delivery has deteriorated. The provisional government introduced a grain monopoly, but did not provide a surplus appropriation. More than half of the surplus grain was hidden by speculators. By October, grain procurements had fallen even further, and the workers were malnourished. The rise in prices outpaced the rise in wages. According to the Moscow Labor Exchange, from February to October, the average salary increased by 53%, prices for essential goods - by 112 (for rye bread - by 150, for potatoes - by 175, for clothes and shoes - by 170).
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1917, end of February. Petrograd. Workers, soldiers and sailors
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March

After February, the workers believed that the revolution should raise their standard of living, that they should "live as it is worthy of a working and free citizen."

First of all, the workers destroyed the “black lists” of those inclined to protest. At the Thornton factory, they burned the personnel department file - the director assured that there was no political sense there, but the workers saw notes in English with the names and did not believe it.

On March 3, a meeting of workers in the Vyborg District called on the Soviet to overthrow the Provisional Government and declare itself the "Provisional Revolutionary Government".

On March 4, many Petrograd workers went on strike in order to return to the machines only if they fulfill their demands: an eight-hour working day, removal of the administration, elective management of the plant, higher wages, etc.

On March 10, the Soviet and the Petrograd Society of Manufacturers and Breeders agreed to allow an eight-hour working day and factory committees. It was said that the owners recognized the factory committees in order to mitigate extreme requests with their help.

The workers elected enterprise committees (factory committees, factory committees, factory committees, factory committees) at a general meeting. The main tasks of the FZK were: an eight-hour working day, wage increases, enterprise security, supply, cleaning of administration personnel (meetings of workers decided who to fire, and kicked out those who were rude, denounced, interfered with gathering, did not cope with the case). The factory committees created detachments of workers' militia to guard the factory and meetings. Later, the FZK gathered councils: district, city, etc.

On March 16, after a meeting of entrepreneurs with the Minister of Trade and Industry, the government postponed the introduction of an eight-hour working day until the Constituent Assembly. The employers said that this was not a question of agreement with the workers, but a matter of state. But from March to October, an eight-hour working day was introduced at most of the country's enterprises, more often on an “immediate order”: work was interrupted after eight hours.

In March, 74 enterprises were closed in the country. 50,000 workers were laid off in the Moscow industrial region. Therefore, the workers began to fear a lockout and interfere in management: they guarded the property of the plant, monitored production, supply, and export of products. At state-owned enterprises, workers tried to manage production.

At the Izhora Plant, a Council of Workers of 50 people was elected, including 6 engineers, and they removed the head of the plant, Admiral Voskresensky, and ruled for several days, until they realized that they could not cope, and returned the plant to its former power.

Cases of arrest and removal by workers of the administration of the enterprise (data of the Provisional Government for the country, 1917): in March - 59, in April - 5, in May - 0, in June - 4, in July - 5, in August - 17, in September - 21, in October - 16.

In the revolution, the workers had three main demands: 1) "bread" (increase in wages), 2) rights (improvement of working conditions) and 3) power (participation in enterprise management) -

1) In March, the workers achieved an increase in wages (up to 50%) and labor rates. They were also paid for “the days of the revolution until March 7” (when they were not at work). At the same time, they demanded: to issue a salary every two weeks; increase overtime pay; abolish piecework; set a minimum wage; sell defective products to workers at cost; supply the enterprise with food; impose taxes on capital and war profits, so that these funds go to the needs of the workers.

2) The first requirements for working conditions: an eight-hour working day, the destruction of "black books", the abolition of fines, the abolition of searches, the courtesy of the administration, the appeal to workers "on you", labor insurance, mutual funds, medical assistance, the right to assemble without permission and participation administration, the right to strike, rallies, issue of leaflets and newspapers, education and recreation, the right to dismiss the boss for cruelty, insults, abuse and arbitrary punishment, the dismissal of unwanted employees, the arming of workers for self-defense, the creation of a workers' militia and the Red Guard.

3) Governance requirements: election of governors; protection of the enterprise and its property; participation in the adoption of norms and prices; participation in the supply of raw materials and fuel; control of workers over production, distribution, order, finance, hiring and firing; the right to remove the administration; the right to create factory committees; the right of the factory committee to represent the workers before the administration, the employers and the government.

In March, the workers achieved an increase in wages and better working conditions, but their attempts to govern were regarded by the owners as an attack on property, and the workers, in turn, saw the employers' rebuff as a threat - and so the struggle for an agreement on the rights and property of workers and entrepreneurs unfolded. Both sides often did not concede, and much depended on the other parties: the authorities (government) and society (parties) ...

After February, the number of strikes fell: from March to June, 347 strikes were counted in the country, and 153,974 workers went on strike, an average of 4 times less than in January and February.

April

In March-April, about 30 trade unions arose in Petrograd (they number 200,000 people).

The committee of the Putilov factory declared: "The workers are preparing for the time when private ownership of factories and plants will be abolished and the instruments of production, together with the buildings erected by the hands of the workers, will pass into the hands of the working class."

A meeting of 5,000 workers and soldiers on the Vyborg side unanimously decided to impose a tax on capital and arm the workers. In many factories, workers denounced the Liberty Loan as taking money from the poor and demanded a tax on war profits.

The government began to prepare "unloading": the export of factories in Petrograd inland.

The workers said they would be fired under the pretext of a shortage of raw materials and fuel.

In a number of state-owned enterprises, the workers decided that they belonged to the people, and defended their participation in management, but by mid-April, after unsuccessful attempts to manage, limited themselves to "control" of the administration.

At the Admiralty Shipbuilding Plant, the workers gave the factory committee the right to control, including taking care of the composition of the administration, equipment, the progress of orders and finances. On March 15, the factory committee was instructed to purchase more tools and metal for the factory. But two weeks later, the factory committee decided to confine itself to supervision and the right to remove management employees. On April 7, at a general meeting, the workers abolished the election of administrative staff.

On April 15, the conference of state enterprises of Petrograd adopted a regulation on factory committees: “Unwilling to take responsibility for the technical and administrative organization of production in these conditions until the social economy is completely socialized, representatives of the general factory committee enter the factory management with only an advisory vote.”

From mid-April, the workers demanded that the state manage the economy, because "workers' control leads to state control." Lenin wrote about this in the April Theses: “Not the ‘introduction’ of socialism as our immediate task, but the transition immediately only to control by the S. R. D. over social production and distribution of products.”

The April conference of the RSDLP(b) put forward its demands: the nationalization of banks and a number of enterprises (oil, metallurgy, coal, sugar, transport); workers' control over production and distribution; proper exchange between city and countryside (cooperatives plus food committees); proper distribution of labor in production; abolition of trade secrets; fight against lockouts.

Entrepreneurs complained that the demands of workers reduced labor productivity, and the Petrograd Society of Manufacturers and Breeders conducted a survey. According to the survey, on April 10-15, out of 34 owners of mechanical plants, 10 indicated that labor productivity increased or did not change; 15 noted its decline due to lack of raw materials and fuel, 9 attributed the decline in productivity to an eight-hour working day.

On April 20-21, workers were killed in clashes with the crowd, and the factory committees began to strengthen the Red Guard. On April 22, the factory committee of the Optical-Mechanical Plant decided to arm the workers, and the general meeting worked out the charter of the Red Guard (published on April 28 in Izvestia).

On April 22, the general meeting of the Skorokhod shoe factory asked the Soviet for 500 rifles and 500 revolvers for the Red Guard: "Then they won't tear up the red flags."

On April 23, the law of the Provisional Government limited the rights of working committees: these rights "are discussed at a joint meeting of the committee and representatives of the administration of the institution and are established by mutual agreement of both parties." The law caused conflicts: in many enterprises, workers created their own rules and instructions.

On April 28, in the Duma of Petrograd, a conference on the creation of the Red Guard gathered 158 delegates from 90 enterprises employing 170,000 people. We decided to suspend the creation of the urban Red Guard, but not to abandon it locally.

In March-April in Russia, workers won 64 out of 70 strikes for higher wages.

In the provinces the strikes grew more slowly than in the big centres. In the Urals, only 4 strikes were counted in March-April, and 200 in July-October.
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1917. Petrograd. Workers and employees of the Mint celebrate May 1
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May

In early May, prices rose, and workers went on strike more, especially in the provinces - Donbass stood out. An outbreak of strikes occurred in the Urals: there, workers complained about downtime, working and living conditions, harassment, and during the strikes they sometimes disabled machines, beat up representatives of the administration, seized land and forests.

Owners began to sell enterprises more often or reduce production. The Novoye Vremya newspaper wrote that they were selling factories and sending capital abroad to move there, according to the proverb: "Where my treasure is, there is my heart." In Petrograd, the trade union of textile workers found out that industrialists were closing accounts and exporting goods, raw materials and parts of machine tools to Finland, and at a number of factories the working week was reduced. At one factory, the administration promised to cut production due to a shortage of cotton, but the factory's raw materials were loaded onto barges and taken away. It was also reported that the British breeder Munken went to Finland allegedly to buy coils, but ended up in England, where his partners and managers caught up with him - before that they had emptied the safe of the enterprise.

In this regard, it was said that the breeders made concessions in order to wait out the pressure of the workers, and then return everything, and were slow to fulfill their promises, fired the instigators, disrupted production, hid and removed materials, withdrew finances and stopped or closed factories. There were cases when the owners set fire to their enterprises.

The Commercial and Industrial Newspaper revealed that since April 54 out of 75 enterprises have been closed under the pretext of unnecessary requests from workers for wages, 21 due to supplies. The newspaper The Day concluded: "While in some cases these closures were motivated by a shortage of raw materials, in many others the aim was to intimidate the workers and the Provisional Government."

Rabochaya Gazeta wrote: “Factories are not being repaired, worn out parts are not being replaced with new ones, stocks of raw materials and coal are not renewed, work is carried out carelessly. Entrepreneurs ... reduce production, count on workers under the pretext of a lack of metal, coal, lack of orders, competition of imports.

Journalist John Reid said: “The secretary of the Petrograd department of the Kadet party told me that the economic ruin was part of a campaign to discredit the revolution. One Allied diplomat, whose name I gave my word not to mention, confirmed this on the basis of his own information. I know some coal mines near Kharkov, which were set on fire or flooded by the owners, Moscow textile factories, where engineers, quitting their jobs, made machines unusable, railway employees caught by workers at the moment when they put the locomotives out of action ... "(" Ten Days That Shook the World.

In mid-May, the Executive Committee of the Petrograd Soviet adopted a plan for state regulation of production, distribution and finance. But two days later, Minister of Trade and Industry Konovalov resigned over the plan. At the Congress of Military-Industrial Committees, he denounced the "exorbitant demands of the workers" and warned that "we will witness the closure of tens and hundreds of enterprises." Industrialists rejected government regulation of the economy. In addition, the societies of manufacturers and factory owners of Petrograd and Moscow called on Russian entrepreneurs to rebuff "the interference of factory committees in the affairs of enterprises."

In May, the movement for workers' control grew stronger. The workers sought protection from the crisis, but still rarely demanded administrative oversight and access to documents. The Petrosoviet studied “cases of control” in May-June at 84 enterprises and found that in 24.5% of cases control affected production, in 8.7% - finances and sales, in 24.6% - working conditions, in 24.1 % - hiring and firing, 7.5% - security of the enterprise. The workers declared all these questions to be the work of the factory committees, part of the "democratization of factory life."

On May 29, a conference of factory committees in Kharkov proposed instructions for factory committees, which were then used at many enterprises in the country. Factory committees took over the protection and productivity of labor, control "over all parts of production."

Petrograd - 568 delegates from 367 enterprises, where 337 thousand people worked.

Before the conference, the workers convened a meeting on fuel and raw materials, and many sent delegations to the Donbass and other regions to find raw materials and fuel and speed up its delivery - the factory committees saved the factories themselves: they sent messengers for fuel, took it on credit, checked warehouses and places its production, road junctions where deliveries could be delayed, negotiated with officials about orders and finances - and found oil, coal, orders and money. But at the conference, Lenin reproached the factory committees for the fact that instead of fighting for rights, like "errand boys", they were looking for fuel and orders for the capitalists.

From speeches at the First Conference of Factory Committees:

The factory committee of the Rosenkranz copper-rolling plant: “The first steps of the committee were to fight for the improvement of labor rates, which was achieved ... The plant was very unsatisfactorily provided with fuel, and only a trip of a representative of the factory committee to the south managed to set things right ... On the other hand, whole deposits of finished orders were formed, which the customers refused to accept. The factory committee took upon itself the settlement of this matter ... The lack of bricks was observed to stop the furnaces in the foundry, and only thanks to the intervention of the committee it was possible to get the necessary.

Delegate from the Benois plant: “The owner announced that there is no money and throws out 500 people ... From the digital data it is clear that production is growing, but the entrepreneur has no money.”

Worker Naumov: “Control is not yet socialism and not even taking production into one's own hands, but this is already going beyond the framework of the bourgeois system. We are not proposing to introduce socialism, no, but having taken power into our own hands, we must lead capitalism along the channel along which it would have outlived itself.”
June

In the first six months, the number of workers in the country grew by 12%, but then unemployment rose.

On June 1 and 2, the All-Russian Congress of Representatives of Trade and Industry rejected state regulation of the economy. P.P. Ryabushinsky, a banker and industrialist, explained: “In Europe, the state ... receives full control, to which we do not object. But we are afraid that such control is not possible in Russia… as long as our government itself continues to be in a position of control.” It was said at the congress that the participation of the state in production was helping the workers to the detriment of the cause.

In early June, at the First Conference of the Petrograd FLC, worker Zhivotov said that the sabotage by industrialists in the Donbass and in the textile industry indicated that the bourgeoisie was ready to cause “hunger riots and anarchy, and then declare a dictatorship and, with the help of military force, deal with anarchy, and at the same time with revolution." In the same place, the delegate Zeitlin called for the management of production: "Factory committees should inspect closing factories in order to adapt them for other purposes."

In June, the rise in prices exceeded the rise in wages in March, and workers demanded a raise.

On June 8, the workshops of the Putilov factory went on strike. On April 19, the director of the plant confirmed the new labor rates, but later the board of directors canceled the bonus. The plant committee appealed to the ministries (the plant was under state control), but in vain. On June 13, Deputy Minister of Labor Gvozdev arrived at the plant and supported the workers. But the board of directors of the plant persuaded him to postpone the measures until the tariff agreement between the trade union and the society of manufacturers. Then the Putilovites decided to go on strike and arm themselves. On June 18, they demonstrated with a banner: “We were deceived! Comrades, get ready for the fight!”

In June the workers began to struggle against the plan to "unload" Petrograd. The authorities declared the need for nearby raw materials and food to be the reason for the transfer of enterprises to the province.

From the decision of a rally of 700 workers of the Kozhevnikov textile factory: “The factory owners and factory owners intend to unload a part of the revolutionary proletariat beyond the Urals ...”. At another meeting, it was proposed "to unload the city not from workers, but from stock exchange dealers, officials and others idly wandering along Nevsky Prospekt."

The collapse of transport was against "unloading": the removal of factories required 200 thousand wagons, and they said that it was cheaper to transport raw materials and fuel to enterprises, and not vice versa. The breeders did not name the date for launching production at the new location and assured that they would not be in time until January 1919. Due to the rebuff of the workers, the government delayed the unloading.

In June workers' control became an instrument in the struggle for power in the enterprise.

On June 2, the director of the Langezipen plant announced the closure of the enterprise. He said that production had fallen by a third, losses of 10 million from government orders and no money, and all this from an eight-hour working day, rising prices and a shortage of fuel and raw materials. At the request of the workers of the Central Council, the factory committee established that the plant had changed its owner three times in a short period of time. When they found out, the director said that he had borrowed 450 thousand from a friend and would start production. But on June 5, the factory committee introduced its own control: it announced that in order to send products, raw materials and materials from the factory, its consent was needed and its orders were binding on everyone, and the order of the administration needed the sanction of the factory committee.

The Izvestia newspaper said that the Central Council of the factory committees received complaints about the closure of enterprises by the owners, allegedly due to losses and lack of funds, but during the check they often revealed cunning “capitalist machinations aimed at lockout.”

Workers began to introduce their control more often in order to save jobs. But even if they seized the enterprise, they did not declare themselves owners, but asked the government for help. The factory committees did not want to replace the administration.

At the end of May, Lebedev's plant administration rejected a demand for a pay rise, and the union urged the workers to take control of the plant, but the factory committee did not agree. On June 3, at a meeting of workers, the factory committee asked where they would get the money for wages and whether the technical staff would obey them, and the workers refused to seize the plant.
On June 18, in Petrograd, Moscow, Minsk and other cities, workers carried slogans against the “capitalist ministers,” but the Minister of Labor warned them: “Comrade workers, remember not only your rights, not only your desires, but also the possibilities for their realization ... ".

On June 27, negotiations on a new collective agreement began in the textile industry, but two months dragged on. The industrialists rejected the union's demands. Two days passed in tough negotiations that the owners should give the workers boiling water for tea: the owners relented, but said that "only due to exceptional circumstances."
-

(to be continued)

Not bad compared to today. But the revolution was still...

Regarding the question posed in the title, there are two opposing points of view: adherents of the first believe that the Russian worker eked out a miserable existence, while supporters of the second argue that the Russian worker lived much better than the Russian one. Which of these versions is correct, this material will help you figure it out. It is not difficult to guess where the first version came from - the entire Marxist historiography tirelessly repeated about the plight of the Russian worker. However, even among the pre-revolutionary literature there is a lot of literature that supported this point of view.

The most famous in this regard was the work of Evstafy Dementyev "The Factory, what it gives to the population and what it takes from it." Its second edition is circulating on the Internet, and it is often referred to by both bloggers and commentators arguing with them. However, few people pay attention to the fact that this very second edition was published in March 1897, that is, firstly, a few months before the adoption of the factory law establishing the 11.5-hour day.

Secondly, the book was handed over to the set a few months earlier, that is, before the monetary reform of Sergei Witte, during which the ruble was devalued one and a half times, and, therefore, all salaries in this book are still in old rubles.

Thirdly, and most importantly, according to the author himself, "The study was carried out in 1884-1885", and therefore, all his data are applicable only to the mid-80s of the century before last. Nevertheless, this study is of great importance for us, allowing us to compare the well-being of the worker of that time with the standard of living of the pre-revolutionary proletariat, for which we used the data of annual statistical collections, sets of reports of factory inspectors, as well as the works of Stanislav Gustavovich Strumilin and Sergei Nikolaevich Prokopovich .

The first of them, who became famous as an economist and statistician even before the revolution, became a Soviet academician in 1931 and died in 1974, three years before his centenary. The second, who began as a populist and social democrat, later became a prominent freemason, married Ekaterina Kuskova, and after the February Revolution was appointed Minister of Food of the Provisional Government. Prokopovich accepted Soviet power with hostility and in 1921 was expelled from the RSFSR. He died in Geneva in 1955.

Pre-revolutionary workers

However, neither one nor the other liked the tsarist regime, and therefore they cannot be suspected of embellishing contemporary Russian reality. We will measure well-being according to the following criteria: 1. Earnings. 2. Length of the working day. 3. Nutrition. 4. Housing.

Let's start with earnings.

The first systematic data refer to the end of the 1870s. So, in 1879, a special commission, which was attached to the Moscow Governor-General, collected information about 648 establishments of 11 production groups, which employed 53.4 thousand workers. According to Bogdanov's publication in Proceedings of the Moscow City Statistical Department, the annual earnings of the workers of the Mother See in 1879 amounted to 189 rubles. In a month, therefore, an average of 15.75 rubles came out. In subsequent years, due to the influx of former peasants into the cities and, accordingly, an increase in supply on the labor market, earnings began to decline, and only from 1897 did their steady growth begin. In the St. Petersburg province in 1900, the average annual salary of a worker was 252 rubles. (21 rubles per month), and in European Russia - 204 rubles. 74 kop. (17,061 rubles per month). On average, in the Empire, the monthly earnings of a worker in 1900 amounted to 16 rubles. 17.5 kop. At the same time, the upper limit of earnings rose to 606 rubles (50.5 rubles per month), and the lower one fell to 88 rubles. 54 kop. (7.38 rubles per month).

However, after the revolution of 1905 and the subsequent stagnation from 1909, wages began to rise sharply. For weavers, for example, wages increased by 74%, and for dyers by 133%, but what was hidden behind these percentages? The salary of a weaver in 1880 was only 15 rubles per month. 91 kopecks, and in 1913 - 27 rubles. 70 kop. For dyers, it increased from 11 rubles. 95 kop. - up to 27 rubles. 90 kop. Things were much better for workers in scarce professions and metalworkers. Machinists and electricians began to earn 97 rubles a month. 40 kopecks, higher artisans - 63 rubles. 50 kopecks, blacksmiths - 61 rubles. 60 kopecks, locksmiths - 56 rubles. 80 kopecks, turners - 49 rubles. 40 kop. If you want to compare this data with the current wages of workers, you can simply multiply these figures by 1046 - this is the ratio of the pre-revolutionary ruble to the Russian ruble as of the end of December 2010. Only from the middle of 1915, due to the war, inflationary processes began to occur, but from November 1915, the growth of earnings blocked the growth of inflation, and only from June 1917 did wages begin to lag behind inflation.

Salaries of workers by years

Working hours.

Now let's move on to the length of the working day. In July 1897, a decree was issued limiting the working day of the industrial proletariat throughout the country to a legal norm of 11.5 hours a day. By 1900, the average working day in the manufacturing industry averaged 11.2 hours, and by 1904 did not exceed 63 hours per week (excluding overtime), or 10.5 hours per day. Thus, for 7 years, starting from 1897, the 11.5-hour decree norm actually turned into 10.5-hour norm, and from 1900 to 1904 this norm fell annually by about 1.5%.

But what happened at that time in other countries? Yes, about the same. In the same 1900, the working day in Australia was 8 hours, Great Britain - 9, USA and Denmark - 9.75, Norway - 10, Sweden, France, Switzerland - 10.5, Germany - 10.75, Belgium, Italy and Austria - 11 o'clock.

In January 1917, the average working day in the Petrograd province was 10.1 hours, and in March it dropped to 8.4, that is, by as much as 17% in just two months.

However, the use of working time is determined not only by the length of the working day, but also by the number of working days in a year. In pre-revolutionary times, there were significantly more holidays - the number of holidays per year was 91, and in 2011 the number of non-working holidays, including the New Year holidays, will be only 13 days. Even the presence of 52 Saturdays, which became non-working from March 7, 1967, does not compensate for this difference.

Working hours

Nutrition.

The average Russian laborer ate one and a half pounds of black bread, half a pound of white bread, one and a half pounds of potatoes, a quarter of a pound of cereals, half a pound of beef, an eighth of lard and an eighth of sugar a day. The energy value of such a ration was 3580 calories. The average inhabitant of the empire ate 3370 calories of food per day. Since then, Russian people have almost never received such a number of calories. This figure was only exceeded in 1982. The maximum was in 1987, when the daily amount of food consumed was 3397 calories. In the Russian Federation, the peak of calorie consumption occurred in 2007, when consumption amounted to 2564 calories.

In 1914, a worker spent 11 rubles 75 kopecks per month on food for himself and his family (12,290 in today's money). This was 44% of earnings. However, in Europe at that time, the percentage of wages spent on food was much higher - 60-70%. Moreover, during the World War, this indicator in Russia improved even more, and the cost of food in 1916, despite rising prices, amounted to 25% of earnings.

This is how they ate

Housing.

Now let's see how things were with housing. As Krasnaya Gazeta, which once appeared in Petrograd, wrote in its issue of May 18, 1919, according to data for 1908 (taken most likely from the same Prokopovich), workers spent up to 20% of their earnings on housing. If we compare these 20% with the current situation, then the cost of renting an apartment in modern St. Petersburg should have been not 54 thousand, but about 6 thousand rubles, or the current St. Petersburg worker should receive not 29,624 rubles, but 270 thousand. How much was it then in money?

The cost of an apartment without heating and lighting, according to the same Prokopovich, was per earner: in Petrograd - 3 rubles. 51 k., in Baku - 2 rubles. 24 k., and in the provincial town of Sereda, Kostroma province - 1 p. 80 k., so that the average cost of paid apartments for the whole of Russia was estimated at 2 rubles per month. Translated into modern Russian money, this amounts to 2092 rubles. Here it must be said that these, of course, are not master's apartments, the rent of which cost an average of 27.75 rubles in St. Petersburg, 22.5 rubles in Moscow, and an average of 18.9 rubles in Russia. In these master's apartments lived mainly officials with the rank of collegiate assessor and officers. If in the master's apartments there were 111 square arshins per tenant, that is, 56.44 square meters. m, then in workers of 16 square meters. arshin - 8.093 sq. m. However, the cost of renting a square arshin was the same as in the master's apartments - 20-25 kopecks. per square arshin per month.

Children's room in the barracks for family workers at the Ramenskoye factory of the industrial and commercial partnership "P. Malyutin's sons"

Worker barracks in Lobnya for workers of the cotton-spinning factory of merchants Krestovnikovs

However, since the end of the 19th century, the general trend has been the construction by the owners of enterprises of working dwellings with an improved layout. So, in Borovichi, the owners of a ceramic factory of acid-resistant products, the engineers Kolyankovsky brothers, built wooden one-story houses with separate exits and personal plots for their workers in the village of Velgia. The worker could purchase this housing on credit. The initial amount of the contribution was only 10 rubles ...

Thus, by 1913, only 30.4% of our workers lived in rented apartments. The remaining 69.6% had free housing. By the way, when 400 thousand master's apartments were vacated in post-revolutionary Petrograd - some were shot, some fled, and some starved to death - the working people were in no hurry to move into these apartments even for free. Firstly, they were located far from the factory, and secondly, it cost more to heat such an apartment than the entire salary of 1918 ...

According to the results of a survey of workers in Kyiv in 1913. Questioning in 1913 was conducted among 5630 workers at 502 handicraft enterprises in Kiev. "I live like a beast"), however, it is the numbers, and not the subheadings, that give a real idea.

I. This article contains data for those 70% of workers whose annual family income did not exceed 600 rubles. 30% were highly skilled conscientious workers with experience - they lived very well and experienced almost no problems. These are those who were sometimes called the "working aristocracy" - what is interesting from this article is that there were not so few of them at all, as we (including myself) imagined: 30% is a lot.

II. 17% of the workers lived on the "bottom": they rented a corner, sometimes from the employer himself, they received the least, some of these 17% became "lumpen". However, it follows from the survey that even these, the poorest, had enough salaries for all essential needs (food, clothing, etc.), and at the same time they had free money on hand every month (at least 5% of their salary) - it is quite likely that they just drank them. At the same time, even if a person drank “like a shoemaker” (and indeed, according to the questionnaires, it was the shoemakers who drank the most at that time), he could not drink more than 9% of this low salary (cheap vodka was available as well as expensive drinks).

III. The main attention in this article is given to those 53% of workers who were neither among the labor "labor aristocracy" (30%), nor in these 17% of the poorest workers.

What is the average portrait of such a worker? He is like this:
1. This is the head of the family, who works alone in the family (in 60-70% of families) and provides for the family. At the same time, on average, less than half of earnings (up to 49%) were spent on food for families (and families were large) - and in Europe and the USA at that time they spent 20-30% more on food (!). Yes, the Russian worker consumed much less meat (due to its high cost), but this is perhaps the only major disadvantage that relates to nutrition. However, for the workers who came to the city from the countryside, this was hardly a "strong strain", since meat consumption was traditionally low in the Russian countryside.

2. Further, 40% of workers (mostly family workers) rented (rented) separate apartments. Since the analysis in this article is carried out only for those 70% of workers whose annual income was less than 600 rubles, and subtracting another 17% of the poorest from these 70%, we can conclude that most of the bulk of the "average" workers (53%) lived in separate apartments (rented) them. If I am mistaken, and the figure of 40% applies to all those surveyed, then minus the 17% of the poorest and 30% of the labor aristocracy (who already all rented or had their own separate apartments), one in five of the "average working families" rented separate apartments, and the rest - rooms in communal housing. And finally, 3% of the workers had their own housing (probably small wooden houses in Kyiv at that time). The average rent for housing was 19% of the family budget. In a similar way, things were not only in Kyiv, but also in other large cities of Russia. According to the memoirs of the Soviet Prime Minister A.N. Kosygin (he was born in 1904), - his father was a skilled St. Petersburg worker, - a family of six (four children) lived (rented) in a three-room separate apartment, and his father worked alone, and without problems supported the family.

N. S. Khrushchev at a breakfast in his honor, hosted on September 19, 1959 by the 20th Century Fox film studio, recalled:"I got married in 1914, twenty years old. Since I had a good profession (locksmith), I was able to immediately rent an apartment. It had a living room, kitchen, bedroom, dining room. Years passed after the revolution, and it pains me to think that I, a worker, lived much better under capitalism than the workers live under Soviet power. Here we have overthrown the monarchy, the bourgeoisie, we have won our freedom, and people live worse than before. As a locksmith in the Donbass before the revolution, I earned 40-45 rubles a month. Black bread cost 2 kopecks a pound (410 grams), while white bread cost 5 kopecks. Lard went for 22 kopecks a pound, an egg - a kopeck apiece. Good boots cost 6, at most 7 rubles. And after the revolution, wages dropped, and even very much, while prices rose a lot ... "

SUPPLEMENT ON THE HOUSING PROBLEM IN MOSCOW AND ST. PETERSBURG BEFORE 1917

(According to historians N. Petrova and A. Kokorin on March 25, 2010, TV "365" "Housing problem in Russia (until 1917) and in the USSR") The rapid growth of housing construction (construction boom) in Moscow began in the 1880s and continued without interruption for almost 35 years, until the beginning of the WWI - but also during the WWI, although the pace of housing construction fell, but not to zero, housing was still built even in the WWI. At the same time, the rate of housing construction constantly exceeded the rate of birth rate (and population growth), although in terms of population growth rate (3.5% per year, including birth rate), Moscow and St. Petersburg occupied 3-4 places in the world (!). Obviously, this means that living conditions in Moscow and St. Petersburg were continuously improving - right up to 1916-17.

Maxwell is one of Peter's most disgusting bunkhouses. Who built what? 1. City municipal services built housing mainly for workers of state-owned factories, and also, together with the owners of enterprises, for private plants and factories. Separate apartments in these council houses were very cheap, affordable for any worker (except for beginners and seasonal workers).

Nobel residential buildings 2. Many benefactors also built apartment buildings with low rents. These houses were called - "houses of cheap apartments". From about the first years of the 20th century onwards, both municipalities and philanthropists built for workers mainly houses with separate apartments, most of all with one-room apartments (average area 23 sq.m., with a separate kitchen, with high ceilings), well-maintained, with central heating. In these houses there were also children's rooms (such as kindergartens), laundries, and sometimes libraries.

Port Arthur .. 3. Of course, a lot of ordinary "profit houses" were also built, mainly with multi-room separate apartments, as well as private houses, including with the help of bank loans (such as mortgages), and the loan interest was low.

Havana workers' town A lot of middle-class Moscow and St. Petersburg families moved out of their rented apartments for the whole summer to dachas (from May to August-September) - they went to dachas with all their household belongings, and upon their return they looked for and quickly found themselves new housing - the choice housing was large, and for every pocket. As historians N. Petrova and A. Kokorev reported, in the 1910s in Moscow, a new fashion became widespread among citizens of medium and higher incomes - "work in the city, live outside the city", and mass construction of such settlements began in the Moscow region, with high quality housing, for non-poor citizens. This trend was interrupted in WWI.

Peter's usual tenement house. Returning to the housing of workers, let me remind you that more than half of the workers (skilled, with experience) did not wait for municipal housing, but rented suitable apartments themselves - one, two, and three-room apartments (and in the summer many sent their families to summer cottages, or to the village to relatives) Most of all in Moscow and St. Petersburg there were four-room apartments. Their rent cost about 90 rubles a month - of course, only a few workers could rent them. But a one-room apartment cost less than 10 rubles a month, a two-room apartment - much less than 20 rubles, in "cheap houses" - and much less than that. Let me remind you that about 30% of the workers received a salary of at least 50 rubles per month and could choose their own apartment for rent.

The house of a skilled worker Of course, there were basements, and attics, and bed-and-cell dormitories (they paid 2-5 kopecks a month) and communal apartments - but either seasonal workers huddled there, or those who had just arrived from the village and did not have patrons in fraternities, or drunken familyless. There were no more than 20% of such workers among the workers. Of course, there were rooming houses and shelters - as in all major cities of the world at that time.

Working barracks. It is also interesting that with the beginning of WWI, when noticeable inflation began, the Moscow City Duma forbade homeowners to raise rents for apartments, and forbade the families of soldiers to be evicted for non-payment. This decree was canceled by the Provisional Government in March 1917.

Worker's settlement Well, now a couple of documents from two eras.

Now about the hard life of firefighters, languishing under the unbearable oppression of Nikolashka Romanov, landlords and capitalists:

1908 again.

This article, covering in detail the plight of pre-revolutionary firefighters, was published in the magazine Pozharnoe delo in November 1908.

How to live? This burning question nestles deeper and deeper in the brain of every family man living today. In these times of high prices, this question is especially exciting for us firefighters who receive a penny to feed their families. I am positively afraid to raise this difficult question, because it is impossible not to notice that everyone around them lives, looking only at today, not daring to look into tomorrow, and they live, even being afraid to ask themselves - how do we live? But let it be what will be - it's time to touch your wounds, maybe to heal them, maybe not. And may my dear comrades not complain about me for trying to paint a picture of our unsettled life in all its ugliness.

Take, for example, the financial position of at least the capital's fire chief. This will be an average position, because there are fire-masters in the provinces who receive from 1,200 to 1,800 or more rubles. in year. In the capital, the fire-master receives a little over 1,000, and there are even lower salaries, even 600 rubles. a year or less, which is even creepy to talk about.

So, let's consider what it's like to live on a salary of 1,044 rubles. per year, i.e. 87 rub. per month, in the capital, where life is so prohibitively expensive. Of these 87 rubles. 4 rubles are also deducted. per month to the cashier. Consequently, on the 20th, you have to receive 83 rubles in your hands. silver (if you did not take an advance, did not participate in subscription lists for funerals, dinners, seeing off, offerings and other delights of bureaucratic life). You solemnly hand over these 83 rubles to your wife, without spending a penny of them even on a cab driver for fear of exchanging them. 83 rubles for one time is quite an impressive figure, of course. But look at the register of expenses that your wife presented to you - a very modest and accurate, economical woman, but a loving mother and a kind housewife, who, unfortunately, knows how to eat French rolls and drink coffee (how annoying it is in raising intelligent people!).

Out of curiosity, I quote these modest figures, timidly entered by a woman's hand in a register of household expenses compiled for the entire month in advance:

on the table.................................72 rub. (for five - the average family)

for Asya and Lyalya at the school for 7 rubles. ......14 rub. (children, thank God, are still only in the preparatory class)

for Asya's books...........................2 rub. (thank God also that it’s not Lyalya)

servants per month .............. 7 rubles.

interest in a pawnshop .............. 8 rubles. ("Let these things be gone!" - breaks out from us every month)

Total ..................... 103 rubles.

Here is a figure that every time on the 20th makes your poor wife blush for herself, an innocent timid silent, a figure that causes a whole swarm of goosebumps on your back. And where is the money for shoes, clothes, a cab driver, tobacco, cigarettes (if you smoke), guests, new clothes for children (I'm not talking about delicacies), other things, fifth or tenth? You have only 83 rubles in your hands. Where can you get the 20 rubles that are missing and not at all invented by your wife, but required by life itself? Steal, you mean? At best, ask for a loan (for the most part, of course, without return), or carry the last traces of your involvement in the intelligent class to the pawnshop?

It may be objected that, in addition to 87 rubles, each fireman also receives awards from insurance companies and from the authorities (these awards are collected in the capital about 500 rubles a year), and something else, etc. I will say: yes, he does, but that's all.

While your children are still in the preparatory class, you pay for them, let's say, only a hundred and fifty rubles. But if, thank God, they entered the gymnasium, prepare 200 rubles already. for two (plus expenses for books). Yes, and this is only if you do not have one or two more offspring, otherwise you will get acquainted with a fairy tale about a white bull, because homelands and christenings are not in vain. In addition, if you are a metropolitan fire chief, then you always have things to do outside the team: inspections, examinations, commissions, meetings, etc., business trips around the city (I’m already silent about personal matters), for which you must have your own crew (yes not a cab driver's droshky, but a carriage befitting your rank, with a neatly and decently dressed coachman).

The one-time expense for this is about 500-600 rubles. In the same case, if you have not acquired a carriage, you need pocket money for cabs, since traveling by horse is not always possible, and in any case it is inconvenient, if necessary, to quickly get into a fire that has happened. According to the most conservative estimate, there are on average about 200 such commission trips a year, that is, almost every other day, and sometimes several times a day. If we consider the average cost of a cab driver in both directions "with waiting" for 1 ruble, then it turns out that only a modest amount for cab drivers will be 200 rubles. per year, while traveling in our salary does not rely on any.

And now, if you, seeing the rain in the yard, take pity on your children and buy them galoshes, you will get into debt. If your wife has the imprudence to finally change the hat she received with a dowry from her parents, she will drag you into debt. If, when the spring sun turns forests and meadows green, when everyone is drawn closer to nature, away from the dusty city, if at that time you hire a summer cottage for your family. - God save you! You will get into debt.

What about entertainment, what about the pleasures to which every mortal has the right, who wants to think that life is not only terrible hard labor, but sometimes also pleasure?! And the test of God - your illness or your wife or children?!

But suddenly you also turn out to be an idealistic firefighter and cannot reconcile yourself to the shortcomings in the equipment of your wagon train, carelessly abandoned by the city, and dare to buy at your own expense some kind of torch or electric lantern, some newest device that does not matter. city? And if you can’t get it otherwise than at your own expense, you can’t do without it in a fire, according to your ideas, and suddenly you did it ...

Oh, then you finally become a criminal, even a doubly criminal: first, in front of your family, which you took off in bad weather in the middle of the street, and, secondly, in front of the authorities, from whom you risk receiving the unflattering epithet "entangled in debt." Is it worth talking about frock coats and boots burnt in the fires ...

Of course, I understand that 87 rubles. That was big money in the old days. But, firstly, it was the good old days, when, I remember, a pound of meat cost not 26 kopecks, as it is now, but only 16 kopecks, a pound of butter - not 48, but 30 kopecks. etc. Secondly, it was a time when they did not shout about intelligent firemen and no one called them to serve. I can still understand myself when my family and I can be able to live all our lives on cabbage soup and porridge, radish with kvass and black bread, and only on a holiday - a pie with porridge or cabbage. I am happy if I was brought up that way and my needs go no further than this. But, your will, why should my neighbor, comrade in the service, an intellectual who, unfortunately, grew up on French rolls and broth with pies, suffer and be unhappy? If he were an inveterate parasite, then, of course, he is dear to him there, he eats kvass and radishes - well, bon appetit; but, for mercy's sake, he serves, works in the sweat of his brow, has a family, also intelligent, like himself, children whom he must prepare for life - and the life is not of hookers, cooks or cabbies, but useful members of society, trained and educated. .. Why, let me ask, does he have to endure hardships, and endure where duty, love and promises called him?

And here's another thing: from me, living on cabbage soup and porridge, the service requires absolutely nothing, except for the faithful performance of my duties (that is, to be careful and regularly monitor the convoy and horse tails); but from an intellectual neighbor they demand a little more - both initiative, and ingenuity, and projects, and reorganization, and everything that accompanies the work of any intelligent and decent person. But let's imagine that my neighbor is that same idealistic fireman who is ready to eat air for the sake of his favorite business (he does not dare to dress in rags, because the service does not allow it). Well, what about his family? Children who, except for “mom, eat” or “mom, buy a doll today, and then a book,” don’t want to know anything at all, and the wife, who only sees outfits and pleasures in a dream and sighs over the darning of holey linen, and ... But I see, dear reader, that you are bored and tired of listening to the same endless moans. Well, I am ready to spare you and throw down my pen, but I declare that I am far from having finished what should have been painted in all its fullness of colors in the picture of the unsettled life of a Russian fire chief. In any case, it is obvious that it is impossible to live like this, and let them prove to us that prayer is behind God, and service is not lost behind the king! Our families pray and we serve...

Republished in the newspaper "Kharkiv Fire Bulletin", No. 35 (103), September 1, 2000, p. 6

But I will preface this with a scan of a couple of pages from an extremely Soviet book:

Taken from: Strumilin S.G. Problems of labor economics. M.: Nauka, 1982

Some information about the standard of living of Soviet people in Kuibyshev in 1940. The information is not statistical, as its source is Letter from a fellow officer Genin V.M. Molotov dated January 18, 1940

(GA GARF F. R - 5446. Op. 82. D. 119. L. 193 - 197).

The letter interested Molotov and he instructed his secretariat to reprint it. Now about what information the co-worker gives in his letter.

There are 5 people in Genin's family (he, wife, three children), of which only he works. His monthly salary is 450 rubles, of which he gives at least 30 rubles as income tax and cultural tax, and the state withdraws another 45 rubles from him under a "voluntary" loan. For the remaining 375 rubles, Genin cannot support his family, and for clarity, he provides information on the subsistence minimum for his family by products, data on the consumption of which and expenditures are kept by his wife. It turns out that the "subsistence" minimum of his family is more than 700 rubles (it is worth noting that in his letter Genin makes arithmetic errors twice in the calculation). Genin tries to cover the difference between salary and living wage through part-time jobs, furniture sales, and savings on everything. So, what does the expenditure part of the Genin family budget consist of as a percentage:

But the expenses are already in ruble terms (only 732.5 rubles per month):

Now let's see how many products are bought with this money:

Utility costs included: rent - 35 rubles water and light - 15 rubles kerosene - 6 rubles radio station - 4 rubles firewood - 40 rubles

Meat and butter included: butter (2 kg per month) - 80 rubles meat (15 kg per month) - 189 rubles per month (2 kg per month) - 3 rubles per kg. Sugar is bought per month for a family of 4 kg at 4 rubles per kg, tea (50 grams) - at 3.5 rubles. Since there are three children in the family, if possible, 1 liter of milk per day is bought for them at 2-3 rubles per liter.

The vegetables included: potatoes (30 kg per month) - 90 rubles cabbage (5 kg) - 20 rubles onions, carrots, etc. - 10 rubles The above data, I note again, Genin himself considers precisely the "living wage", which - as is already clear, his salary provides only half. The cost of such a "minimum" is more than 730 rubles. At the same time, it should also be taken into account that Genin gives averaged figures for prices, which indicates that the family buys part of the products not only in the market, but also in the state commercial trade network.

Now let's look at the indicators of food consumption per capita in this family per month (the data are averaged, since it is clear that, for example, children consume more milk than adults): Meat - 3 kg Butter - 0.4 kg Bread - 12 kg Sugar - 0.8 kg Potato - 6 kg Cabbage - 1 kg Milk - 6 liters ****

For comparison, the reports of the Central Statistical Bureau of the State Planning Commission:

So Summary:

Comparing the average wages of Russian workers before 1917 with the average wages of European and American workers, the Soviet academician S.G. Strumilin (in 1960) wrote:

"Russian workers' wages were among the highest in the world, second only to those of American workers. ....
The real level of wages in the industry of Russia was quite high and outstripped the level of wages in England, Germany, France.

"The average annual earnings in the US manufacturing industry, according to the 1914 qualification, reached $ 573 per year, $ 11.02 per week, or $ 1.84 per day. In terms of the Russian currency at parity, the daily earnings of an American worker was 3 rubles 61 kopecks in gold In Russia, according to the mass data of 1913, the annual earnings of workers in money and in kind amounted to 300 rubles for 257.4 working days, i.e. did not exceed 1 ruble 16 kopecks per day, not reaching thus, and a third (32.2%) of the American norm. Hence, usually hasty conclusions were drawn about the sharp lag in the standard of living of Russian workers from American standards. But taking into account the comparative high cost of living in these countries, conclusions are drawn differently. When comparing prices for the most important food products in Russia and the US, it turns out that products in the US are three times more expensive than in Russia. Based on these comparisons, we can conclude that the level of real wages in Russian industry should be estimated at no less than 85% of the US. ".

[Strumilin S.G., Essays on the economic history of Russia. M.: Publishing House of socio-economic literature, 1960., p.122-123]

However, adds S.G. Strumilin, this is without taking into account the lower rents in Russia, the lesser burden of taxation, and without taking into account unemployment, which is much lower in Russia.

O.A. Platonov in his book supplements this comparison:

"It is also known that" the high level of wages of Russian workers was combined with a greater number of days off and holidays than in other countries. For industrial workers, the number of days off and holidays was 100-110, and for peasants it even reached 140 days a year. Before the revolution itself, the length of the working year in Russia averaged about250, and in agriculture - about 230 days. For comparison, let's say that in Europe these figures were completely different - about 300 working days a year, and in England - even 310 days.

[Platonov O. A., Crown of Thorns of Russia (History of the Russian people in the XX century), Volume 1. M .: Algorithm, 2009., p.34-35]

Comparing the calorie content of a worker's diet before 1917 and in the USSR, I came to the conclusion that the level of nutrition in calories before the revolution of 1917 was again achieved in the USSR only in the late 50s - early 60s . At the same time (by the end of the 1950s, under N. Khrushchev), the pension law was also passed (Stalin's pensions for most people were beggarly), and mass housing construction began - and until the early 1960s, and the living conditions of Soviet workers were much worse than those of workers in Tsarist Russia until 1917

Useful thing revolution!