From: lessgovt@gmail.com   
      
   QUORA: HOW WERE THE LIVING CONDITIONS FOR LOWER SOCIOECONOMIC STATUS PEOPLE IN   
   THE SOVIET UNION?   
   answered by Elena Gold, Born in the USSR. Writing a book about Russo-Ukrainian   
   war, Oct 6   
   I lived through the last 20 years of the USSR. You may not know it, but there   
   were no “lower socioeconomic status” people in the USSR — because   
   everyone (except top communist officials) was “equally equal”.   
      
   The family of the guy who was cleaning our yard lived in the same apartment   
   building, in a larger apartment than we had — they had a 3-room apartment as   
   compared with our 2-room apartment. (Russians calculate all rooms, not just   
   bedrooms – a walk-   
   through living room is a “room”).   
      
   My parents were engineers and both were managers at a large factory (5,000   
   employees); my father was a top manager of the factory, my mother was the   
   chief of the chemical laboratory.   
      
   My mother was a member of the Communist Party; my father wasn’t — although   
   he was pressed, all managers had to be in the Party. But he refused. They   
   stopped pestering him, because he was a great engineer. But it limited his   
   career potential. He    
   couldn’t rise any further.   
      
   Our apartment was 42 square meters in size: 2 rooms, separate toilet,   
   bathroom, kitchen, a hall-corridor connecting the rooms.   
      
   There was a norm of 7 square meters per person when they were giving   
   apartments to people. Only the room space counted; corridors, kitchens,   
   bathrooms didn’t count. Our apartment was 27 square meters of “useful   
   squareage”.   
      
   There were 4 of us; I had a younger brother.   
      
   The squareage norm was applicable to everyone, from the factory director to   
   the cleaner.   
      
   But managers or those close to the distribution committee could pick the floor   
   or particular apartment, when they were distributed.   
      
   For Communist Party officials, builders were building “high comfort”   
   apartments: with giant halls, kitchens, several bathrooms, big balconies and   
   storage rooms. These buildings were also in the city centre. So, the   
   “norm” was officially the same,    
   but the actual apartment could be 2–3 times the size of the “standard   
   apartment”.   
      
   The queue to get an apartment could take from 1 year (in construction   
   companies which were building apartments) or 10–15 years (if you worked at   
   school or kindergarten).   
      
   My parents got the apartment in 6 years, after they got married, already   
   having 2 kids. They weren’t managers when they started working at the   
   factory; they were “young specialists” after completing the university.   
   Then they rose in ranks.   
      
   Until then, my mother lived in a dormitory, as a “young specialist”.   
      
   My father lived with his parents, who lived in the city in a room in a   
   communal apartment: there were 3 rooms in a much bigger “older style”   
   apartment; a family was living in each room, with a common kitchen and   
   bathroom.   
      
   My father could get a dormitory but living there would be worse: 4–6 people   
   in a room, with a common kitchen for 20–30 rooms, common showers and a   
   bathroom.   
      
   When my parents got married, they were given a room in a “family   
   dormitory”, where a couple could have their own small room. When they had   
   the first child (me), they got a room in a communal apartment.   
      
   Everyone who didn’t have an apartment and had a job, was in the queue to get   
   an apartment, but it could take a decade or two, if you were single. Young   
   specialists had a preference, and so did married couples with kids. There were   
   several queues for    
   different kind of applicants; when the factory was getting 10–15 apartments   
   to distribute, those “more eligible” were the first to get an apartment.   
      
   Like: 1 person from the list 1, 1 person from the list 2, etc. For instance,   
   families with 3+ kids were on a different list to families with 1–2 kids.   
   Very complex system.   
      
   Professional Communist Party workers were employed by party committees   
   (district, city, region, republic, federal), and they had their own queues for   
   apartments.   
      
   You couldn’t get your own house in the city, only a new apartment, through   
   the queue at your workplace. But you could swap your home to another one, by   
   mutual agreement with the family who lived there.   
      
   Some people still owned houses in the city. But the houses didn’t have   
   internal plumbing, and the government didn’t intend to make them   
   comfortable. These houses could be demolished any time, then you’d get a new   
   apartment. All the land was owned    
   by the state, and so were the apartments. You were given the right to occupy   
   the apartment. Your family and kids could still live there after your death.   
      
   Apartments were distributed by your place of work. You couldn’t buy an   
   apartment. Only get it at work.   
      
   That was the essence of the USSR system: unless you were an obedient servant   
   of the regime, you could “get” nothing.   
      
   To get more, you needed to be an activist, become a communist party member and   
   promote the party narratives actively. Activism was rewarded by career   
   advances.   
      
   People owned nothing, except their chattels: furniture, clothing, household   
   items.   
      
   This was applicable to party officials.   
      
   Party officials and top managers (members of the party as well) could get   
   various perks: access to cafes with better food; ability to purchase goods   
   with a shorter waiting time. All goods like a fridge, you had to sign up and   
   wait for months until it’s    
   available.   
      
   Party officials had shorter queues or no queues in their “special stores”.   
   In the special stores at the building of the party committee, they could buy   
   delicacies like caviar, smoked salmon or salami, not available in grocery   
   stores for the public.    
   You could only get in the building by the employee ID.   
      
   On top of that, Party officials had the right to a “government country   
   home” (dacha). These countryside homes were also distributed by the place of   
   work. Top authors, directors had their own villages, so did top party   
   officials. After the death of    
   the person, the house would be given to someone else; the family couldn’t   
   keep it, because it was a “status perk”.   
      
   Top managers had a government chauffeur with a car allocated to them. I think   
   that all chauffeurs were KGB spies, reporting on the boss.   
      
      
   [continued in next message]   
      
   --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05   
    * Origin: you cannot sedate... all the things you hate (1:229/2)