ABSTRACT
Spokesmen for the Soviet communist party and government have long maintained that their economic system—centrally planned socialism—would be able to produce such fast economic growth that the USSR would catch up with the capitalist West within a relatively short period of time. Instead of having achieved communism, the Soviet Union of the early 1980s is experiencing a painful time of troubles. Living standards are rising at a much slower pace; consumer markets are in severe disequilibrium; and there is widespread dissatisfaction with the quality, style, and mix of consumer goods and services as well as the pace at which matters are improving. The best overall measure of the standard of living of a given country is the quantity of goods and services consumed by the population on a per capita basis. Large lags in Soviet living standards can be found in all major categories of consumption except education.
