SOVIET STATISTICS

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP80-00926A001400020001-5
• Release Decision: RIPPUB
• Original Classification: C
• Document Page Count: 39
• Document Creation Date: December 22, 2016
• Document Release Date: September 13, 2012
• Sequence Number: 1
• Content Type: REPORT

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Soviet Statistics
The drive for industrialization and for the collectivization of
agriculture with the expropriation of poor devils who operated their few
hectares with one tiny horse and the "extinction of the kulake (they..
4,4"x ifa -Etc,/ IN h? ta,
mostly had 2-3 horses) Re a class" as the principal meane eignified also
the end of neutral, i.e. fact-finding, unbiased etatistice. Fartty,clasej
or merxian statist ice took their place. Discontinued statistics* end
1014IrtAte
economic MAgs4Loe-aw form a real graveyard in the Union. Correct data have
been twisted by selecting unrepresentative years (only good or only poor
crop years; only upswings or downewings); by treating deta in roubles
of declining value as if they were in roubles of constant value; by
having data for part of the phenomenon to represent the whole phenomenon;
by otherwise concealing the unfavorable portion of the data; by disre-
garding changes in boundaries but only when this makes the picture more
favorable; and the like. Data have been simply produced ad hoc on a large
scale. 'That in Soviet ':-.ussia is published as statistics is figures cor-
responding to the Party line. Yeither does a science of economics exisl,
rearranging
unless you call rewording and xxxgFarxxxmxmagragftg Stalin';- statements
science.
The League of Yetione, international Labor Review, International
Institute of Vricultare and to a large extent also official statistical
offices of individual countries believe it impossible to use any but
official statistics of the respective countries, and thus put their
authority behind the biased 7,oviet statistics. The estimate by the league
of Nations of the share of the 17= in world industrial Altput in r36-78,
higher than that of a for all practical purposes official Goviet pub-
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,to
I)
11cations by about 75 per cent, is only the most formidable case.
Thaviets are not loath to make full use of this support by ex-
/197--161 AZ hcA(k447f g fr,ais 7-4 'C-4 414,1,1 Ak?
se gfrn onste source of data computed with the
use of their own statistics. US3 and the apitalist CountrieL (Yoscow,
1939, p.91) gives the International Labor Gffice as source for their
wage indexes,according to which wages rose in 1928-3C by 293 per cent
44.4r
in the 1J-11 toM fell by 13 per cent in the USA, by 17 per cent in Germany,
and so on (see page.... below on thc nature of these indexes).The same
source (p.128) used the indexes of industrial output of the League of
/ca 7t4
Nations, similar to those mentioned in the preceeding pe, whileiror its
international comparisons of yields and output of grain, the incorrect-
ness of which is discussed below on p....,the International Znetitute of
AgricultUre in :Wme is quoted as source.
quite a few private investigators abide to the Soviet request that
their statistics be given as they are, without any prowling. The great
majority, even including people antagonistic to the Soviets, simply cannot
wade through all the intricacies of the Soviet statisticOnd unwillingly
make themselves to their speaking-trumpets.
All in all, the plIblished
statistical evidence d its interpretation 4n the Soviet VnionA.s almost
as greatly biased outside as inside of the iron curtain.
The tempering with statistics in te, Union started almost twenty
years ago. It testifies to the immense propaganda ability of the Commu-
nists, to their phenomenal success in frightening most everybody with
being stamped reactionary, fashist-and the like, that A. Bergson of AA/
17-75ee Y.Jasny, "Intrirrxre= useraff7r6771-OriFI?Ibcome-TWUexePT-Tournal.
of Political Economy, IV, 147, pp.307-10.
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1)
Columbia University/ is able to make the statement: "There seems to be a
10
near conserstbisamoe among students of soviet statistics that the govern-
ment does not deliberately distort what it publishes?.
The present writer was one of those whose existence caused Bergson
to qualify his statement with "near". He goes even further when he believ-
9///N1
! es incorrect the attitude of those, who, while not se11-4-4ewe-sicei-str?d-isreKetly
(4 A
$ a Itf -4 iesAssts /44-s
the Soviet statistics, trent all of them as if they were statistics like
/1)
those of other countries. These writers not only mislead the American
reader as to the real nature of Soviet stetistics of the 'thirties and
''forties but commit also a grave unjustice to the SWesinn statistics and
statisticians of the 'twenties.
-Fortunately the rank of those necessitating s qualification in
2)
Bergson's statement is increasing. Harry Schwartz of Syracuse University
says that "purposely ambiguous data are published" in Soviet L-Aissio. Srof.
3)
Harris of Harvard has to be conerstulsted that, while having as his
collaborators BetsiesessAttsAL Sugov, tibe-sketstin a contributor to :Aleskii Colost
a for all purposes communist paer in !Tew coul d see "en intention
tox presert biased ststistics" in the official computations of national
income.
Pre-Revolution Statistics.
3tatistic3 were on the whole in a very backward state in Tsarist
time. The Central Statistics' Committee, attached to the Yinistry of
T)"The Fourth Five Year Sian: Heavy Versus Consumers' Goods Tnduetries",
Eelitical Science c.uarterly, LXIT, 1047,p.196.
-
2 Russia's Postwar Lconomy, Syracuse University 1.ress,
3)-
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Interior, Russia's principal statistical office, was definitely a muffy
ainstitution. There were, however, also some good statistics assembled and
othrty wei
pubilsed by iliveyinietries. But it 1r the "/emstvo" statistics, of which
iiussia will be proud forever.
"Semetvos" were selfgoverning provincial organizations with limit?
ed functions, but these included statistics. While the jemstvos were in
the hands of the nobility, this left the statistical work to the intent-
genzin. T'sere war n) opportunity of legal politics] activity for the
liberal intelligenzia in Tsarist uss1a. otentin7 ministers and congress.
men were spread over such deep provinces as Voronezh, 1;:yesen, and Ssmara
In the modest role of chiefs or staff-membere of etistvo statistical of-
flees and did an excellent job. Detailed statistical surveys of the whole
Ow in
peasant life were made extensively by4/emstvo statisticians already Jot
the leight1tti.
iiVearlrer than in any other country of the world.
The Golden Ert2/.
tatistics were the great. favorite of the early Iliolebevic reign.
The econ ry had to be a planned one end for this much more statistics
?
drs pi frii al&
were ri-94044d then had beer collected under the Tsar. Lenin's pronouncement
"Socialism is count", "Count and control are the key, the basis of
rip"- r??14.1 4.44.Z
cialisms' and the like. were (rioted endlessly 135simami4ingwi obeyed. The demand
r?
fpr statistics end statisticians was insatiable.
The nobility of the /emstvos was unable to do the statistics them.
selves, and entrusted It to the intelligertin.in a similar way the by no
means numerous kolsbeviks filled up the leading positions .in the govern-
ment and had to leave the ststistical and even the planning work to the
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mensbevill, narodnikSond the lite. The mensbevill naturelly concentrat-
411 ed on industrial statistics and genern1 plerning: the rarodrileS we- e busly,
V.A6,014,4iNe0 with the peasant problems.
stAfi)ti., HGai tovw a44)14 .4.41c-d /44,
Wie iolobevikpO rhiloso,ehy,,dun?eayb dtected in the atsti st-
concept of the netionel inceme, for example, wae (]eveloped
strictly in accOrdence with the 2rPrxinr doctrine nre differently fror
444 0.0141,1
t'ee rest of the world. The classing inx the statistics of r peavart wt:At
horses and 2 cows, both together yieldinv'2ee-2E.e-ee quarts of milk
ler year, and o biree n helper for two months a year, ee entrepreneur,
a kind of exploiter, would certainly not be accepted by the ststisticiane
under another government. There were slo Commuriets placed in responsible
positions to gunrd over those doing the actual work. Put even these did
not visualize strtistice ss snythinp but truthful fact-findirg.
It wac really a golden ere for stetirtics and statictie,lang.
e'ersons who under the Tear had to limit their activitiee to one guberniya
got e country-wide scope of onerstion. V.-.(lroman, the former chief of the
4asen etetleticrl office, became chief of the economic section of the
Cplan (tate :lsnrinc Comriseion). .e.I..opov, the former chief of the
Tula stniietical office, was mrde chief of the Central :tatietical effice.
!te7).Yendrstjev got P CPTICe to organize the Institute for Businese e-
aesei
search. Lfle eituntor foricesearch, collecting dstrplelenning* Was in-
deed so favorele, that euch nromlnent economists as 't.7-.Chelinzev sud
P.2akerov, who had exiled themselves, returned to eussia.
It may seem,unbellevable now but the statieticians of the 7os-
plan were suffered to raise t:e standing estimete of the pre-revolution
grain ,eroduction by ln eer cent, rithouch the outputs of the Tenrist time
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a c ehlt osji
served as a yardeticke of lolshevik eil-e-eie-we-e.s. The grain output of the
4111141/04.4/14
later 'twenties was above the unrevisedA data; the revision put them below
the latter. The bolshevik . Arumilin chief of the statistical eection
EdicAi
of theosplan and i4 tice--recidentAhad a bir hnnd in this action.
It lo easy to find ehortcominre in the let ]ive Year .elar,buttee
a statiEtical and pinnninc effort, it we:: a great schievment, especielly
if time and place are c'neidered. -tatieticel Handbook U:;:;..1 126 ie like-
wise a ublication of which it compilere juetly be proud. C,ther
publication' of cuch kind could be neeed.
The 7-ew eenuecte rale the eurea.
Alen in the lnte 'twentiev the 4.erty embarked on the great in-
dustrialiyation ard collect Nizetkm drive ;5th "the extinction of the
ulak as f class es one of the principal means, it could not entruet the
planning of this work to former, open or secret, menehevikS or narodniky.
=
But the etatieticel npperetus need not be tereered Wth, unleee the ueual
methods of collectinr nre nrnlyeing otetiotical data had to be abtndon&d.
0)/144-
?he principaloattack WAP indeed not againet planninu but a purely
etatieticel problem - t're- estimate of the grain crop by the _;xpert
Committee at the Central c'tetistical Board, of which V..('-roman of the
Gosplan wac a member. The estimate of the ,;ommittee, whichtilow that
of l2S, was declaxed too low. '.1.1.1sesm of tlieWT9PeciWWWWW7WWW1
and statististiene then followed ee on avalanche. ---
stet:I stic4 TWeivISS
WilYSAY? A-1x AlietW. WW1,' 't-iir.sc Von' "ErVIATIV wvermly
17 ee:olotovst, speech :It the :fret Loscow er'y conference,:eptember 34,
1C"39.After the liquidatier of the Committeetestimpte above thet of 1928
wae releaeed,1041acetteme