IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/cup/jechis/v58y1998i04p1032-1062_02.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Prices, Planners, and Producers: an Agency Problem in Soviet Industry, 1928–1950

Author

Listed:
  • Harrison, Mark

Abstract

Soviet planners developed the “unchanged prices of 1926/27” to facilitate the solution of an agency problem—the regulation of self-interested producers as they worked to fulfill plans for heterogeneous products denominated in rubles. The system limited but did not eliminate producers' opportunistic behavior, which took the form of inflating the plan prices of new products. Through the 1930s and 1940s the “unchanged” prices proved resistant to reform, and following their abolition in 1950 the system was soon afterwards reinstated with a new base year. The history of the “unchanged” prices illustrates the limits of command.

Suggested Citation

  • Harrison, Mark, 1998. "Prices, Planners, and Producers: an Agency Problem in Soviet Industry, 1928–1950," The Journal of Economic History, Cambridge University Press, vol. 58(4), pages 1032-1062, December.
    • Handle: RePEc:cup:jechis:v:58:y:1998:i:04:p:1032-1062_02
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://www.cambridge.org/core/product/identifier/S0022050700021720/type/journal_article
    File Function: link to article abstract page
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Kim, Byung-Yeon & Kim, Suk Jin & Lee, Keun, 2007. "Assessing the economic performance of North Korea, 1954-1989: Estimates and growth accounting analysis," Journal of Comparative Economics, Elsevier, vol. 35(3), pages 564-582, September.
    2. Smirnov, Sergey, 2015. "Economic Fluctuations in Russia (from the late 1920s to 2015)," Russian Journal of Economics, Elsevier, vol. 1(2), pages 130-153.
    3. Harrison, Mark, 2000. "Soviet Industrial Production, 1928 to 1955: Real Growth and Hidden Inflation," Journal of Comparative Economics, Elsevier, vol. 28(1), pages 134-155, March.

    More about this item

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:cup:jechis:v:58:y:1998:i:04:p:1032-1062_02. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    We have no bibliographic references for this item. You can help adding them by using this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Kirk Stebbing (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://www.cambridge.org/jeh .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.