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Lmao 2.5kg of meat? Forget it. If you got any, it was a day to celebrate. You couldn't get shit for stamps and you had to stand in long queues to get the scraps that you could get. You waited for hours for a delivery that immediately disappeared or didn't come at all. You literally bought what you could. People used to barter the stamps and a grey market to get what you needed popped up. The only way to get what you wanted was to pay with dollars.
0.5 liter of vodka? What were they supposed to do the other 29 days of the month?
Let alone the rest of the first day?
I'm not gonna say that's anywhere near sufficient, but as a US citizen where do I sign up
To be ration-limited by what you can purchase? I'm sure that's a fad diet somewhere.
I might bring tankies out of the woodwork for saying this, but I remember one time a tankie told me that scarcity in communist countries is by design and it's a good thing, after I pointed out that people had to be on the waiting list just to get a car. What if the person lives in rural with no access to public transport?
I understand capitalism is wasteful, but doing the extreme opposite and making people wait to own a car or giving someone bare essentials is not a good thing. Having a scarcity economy is not good, especially considering that the Soviet Union produced more tanks than cars throughout its history. The American military industrial complex is rightly criticised for overspending, but communist countries are worse since the case is that more tanks were made than civilian cars. It means more budget went to the military than to producing consumer good. Talk about priorities.
Soviet Union had a limited ability to produce things, especially heavy machinery. Their leadership quickly realised that they can't outproduce the Western countries on everything, so they decided to only match their military production capabilities. Which led to them falling further and further behind.
Well if you really want to be restricted purchasing the maximum amount of those items then you don't need to sign up. Just limit your monthly amount to be as displayed.
I was trying to figure out how to make it work for week but a month?
Half a liter of vodka monthly? Aren't the Poles known for their consumption of vast quantities of the stuff?
Yeast is not on the list but the 2kg of sugar wasn't just for cakes I'm sure.
That is around 970 calories a day if you take 1/30th of each edible item on the Table.
It's not enough, but surprisingly almost half the needed amount.
You supplement it with potatoes, carrots, cabbage, cucumbers and other veggies. And some apples and seasonal fruit.
Things sucked but people weren't malnourished back then.
Also not shown here: gasoline was also rationed, as were cars themselves.
If Poland is anything like the US, families were expected to keep a garden where they grew many vegetables and fruits, and often kept chickens.
Their priorities were fucked up. Cigarettes and alcohol, obviously, but more sugar than rice? Huh?
Also, lots of meat but no other food groups?
Elsewhere in the comments it's mentioned that these were just the rationed things; there were unrationed foodstuffs.
Rice is not precisely native to Poland... The staple food is potatoes, which weren't rationed.
I'm as anti-capitalist as it comes but how the hell would this even last half a week, let alone a night with the vodka, rice, and sweets
Pretty sure they’d grow their own vegetables
The rice is about 6 us measuring cups worth, and 1 cup is enough for 2 people to have a meal after it soaks up a bunch of water (plus a bit little vodka and sugar for taste).
The Flour can make several loaves of bread as well, it's about 5000 Calories for that bag without considering oil added for a nice focaccia or butter and milk for a classic brioche.
If each person gets this then it can ~~be sufficient~~ last a week or two, but I assume it was supplementary in nature.
Would they have been expected to grow their own vegetables, or did they just embrace the average young male diet?