Workday - what is it? Today this word can be found very rarely, for example, in historical and fiction. It sometimes has a negative connotation, since it is connected with wages on collective farms during the difficult years for our country. The meaning of “workday” will be described in more detail in the article.
General concept
What does workday mean? This is both a form of accounting and a measure of the quantity and quality of labor, applied from 1930 to 1966. on collective farms. As such, salaries to collective farmers were not accrued.
Collective farms had to make mandatory deliveries to the state, as well as make an in-kind payment for the provision of services by machine and tractor stations.
After the repayment of obligations to the state, the remaining income went to the disposal of the collective farm. Of this income, each collective farmer was entitled to a share; it was calculated in accordance with the workdays that he worked.
The application of the workdays system began in 1930, first on individual collective farms. Legally, it was enshrined in the Decisions of the CEC and the Council of People's Commissars of the USSR and the Collective Farm Center, which introduced the workday as a single measure of labor accounting and the procedure for distributing income on collective farms.
System flaws
At first, in 1930-1934, the disadvantages of introducing the system were that it was not possible to avoid equalization in the distribution of income. And also due to improper standardization and pricing on some collective farms, workdays were much less for those who were engaged in production (livestock, field farming) than for workers in economic, administrative, and auxiliary work.
In addition, workdays were accrued without taking into account the quality of work, and income was distributed “among consumers”. This to some extent influenced the onset of the crisis in collective farm production in 1931-1932.
Linking to quality and work results
In order to increase the piecework production of collective farmers in field cultivation, in 1933 the prices were revised. Instead of five, seven pricing groups were introduced. The work of the seventh, highest group, was evaluated in two workdays. The People's Commissariat of the USSR proposed to collective farms that the foremen not accept substandard work and do not accrue workdays for it.
If the work was not satisfactory enough, the board of the collective farm made deductions from the total number of workdays of the brigade, including the brigadier - not more than 10%.
Initially, a workday is an indicator that did not take into account the final result of labor, since it is received much later in agriculture. This was his convenience.
That is, there was no link to obtaining a crop or profitability of livestock. But after the completion of the production cycle and the sale of part of the production in proportion to the workdays, it was possible to distribute either a natural product or cash.
In 1935, collective farms were recommended to distribute income according to the results obtained. After that, at general meetings, they began to approve the norms and prices in workdays for each work. At the same time, such indicators as qualifications, complexity, difficulty of work for a particular collective farm were taken into account. Once a week, a note was made in the collective farmer's workbook on the number of workdays worked out.
Tighter standards
In 1939, depending on the terrain, a minimum of workdays was introduced. It was a mandatory annual rate (60, 80, 100). For those who, without justifiable reason, did not comply with the standard, they provided for exclusion from the collective farm, deprivation of a personal plot and benefits for collective farmers. In 1941, in order to increase labor productivity, there was an established surcharge for achieving increased crop yields and productivity in animal husbandry.
In 1941, due to the introduction of martial law in the country, due to the need to seize grain to the maximum, the payment of workdays was either cut or completely disappeared. At the same time, in 1942, the necessary minimum increased to annual rates - 100, 120, 150 workdays.
For those who did not comply with production standards, criminal liability was provided. These were corrective labor work on the collective farm for a period of six months with 25% of the workdays being retained in favor of the economy.
In the first post-war years, the output for workdays of cereals and legumes greatly decreased. This was due to the restoration of the national economy, the increased need for grain, with drought and a drop in productivity. As a result, in the winter of 1946-1947. famine broke out in the country.
From 1948 to 1966
In 1948, the government recommended that collective farms distribute incomes taking into account the harvest, which is collected by the team and the link. This should have led to higher yields and higher pay.
In 1956, collective farms were given the right to set a minimum of workdays on their own. In 1959, they began to introduce a guaranteed minimum of cash payments. Moreover, part of the payment was a monthly advance, and the final payment was made at the end of the year.
In 1966, workdays were canceled. Instead, they introduced guaranteed pay on collective farms, which included the right to additional payments and bonuses. Even during the reign of N. S. Khrushchev (from 1953 to 1964), the expression that the workday was not a measure of labor costs for the production of products that can be recognized as correct, objective became known.
In a number of publications, beginning in the mid-80s, a workday was called only a “stick”, which was put in the office book, and identified with the unpaid labor of collective farmers.