The 1965 Soviet economic reform, sometimes called the Kosygin reform (Russian: Косыгинская реформа) or Liberman reform, named after E.G. Liberman, was a set of planned changes in the economy of the USSR. A centerpiece of these changes was the introduction of profitability and sales as the two key indicators of enterprise success. Some of an enterprise's profits would go to three funds, used to reward workers and expand operations; most would go to the central budget.[1]
The reforms were introduced politically by Alexei Kosygin—who had just become Premier of the Soviet Union following the removal of Nikita Khrushchev—and ratified by the Central Committee in September 1965. They reflected some long-simmering wishes of the USSR's mathematically-oriented economic planners, and initiated the shift towards increased decentralization in the process of economic planning. The reforms, coinciding with the Eighth Five-Year Plan, led to continued growth of the Soviet economy. The success of said reforms was short-lived, and with the events of Prague in 1968, fueled by Moscow's implementation of the reforms in Eastern Bloc countries, led to the reforms being curtailed. Economists like Lev Gatovsky and Liberman were instrumental in framing the theoretical underpinnings of the Soviet economic reforms of the 1960s, advocating for the use of profit motives and market mechanisms within a socialist framework.[2][3][4]
- ^ Bland, W. B. (1980). The Restoration of Capitalism in the Soviet Union (PDF) (1st ed.). Wembley: Selecteditions.
- ^ Gatovsky, L. (1965). "Unity of Plan and Cost Accounting". Kommunist (Communist). 2 (15): 80.
- ^ Bland, W. B. (1980). The Restoration of Capitalism in the Soviet Union (PDF) (1st ed.). Wembley: Selecteditions.
- ^ Bland, W. B. (1980). The Restoration of Capitalism in the Soviet Union (PDF) (1st ed.). Wembley: Selecteditions.