Brigade Forms of Organization and Payment of Labor as an Attempt to Solve the Problems of Soviet Production in the 1960-1980s (a Case Study of the Altai Tractor Plant)

УДК 94(571.150):331.103.5 ББК 63.3(2Рос-4Алт)63 + 65.03(2Рос-4Алт)63

Abstract

The article established the tasks of spreading brigade forms of labor organization in the industry of the USSR in the 1960-1980s. These tasks were to reduce production costs, increasing labor productivity, strengthening technological and labor discipline, and reducing the labor demand of enterprises. It was supposed to accomplish the assigned tasks through a more rational organization of work, the spread of for-profit model and a collective form of material reward, which tightened the connection between the quantitative and qualitative results of labor.

Based on a microhistorical approach, the author determined the results of the spread of brigade work at the Altai Tractor Plant. By the end of the 1980s, the enterprise united about 80% of workers into brigades with collective payment, which did not have a positive impact on its performance indicators. One of the reasons was that the brigade members restrained the intensity of their work, which was a consequence of the workers’ prevailing idea that the level of wages did not correspond to the difficult working conditions, which, in turn, were caused by the poor technical condition of the enterprises and the irregularity of production. The second reason was the existing model of relationships between workers and factory managers. The latter, fearing an increase in staff turnover, took a formal approach to the spread of collective forms of labor organization and labor remuneration and ignored the practice of restraining labor costs by workers.