In the November issue, Rodina spoke about the last Minister of Finance of the Russian Empire, Petr Barka, whose memoirs were recently published for the first time. Like Bark, many prominent officials of our fatherland are undeservedly forgotten. We will remember them under the heading "Servants of the Fatherland". Let's start with Arseny Zverev, whom experts consider the best finance minister in Russian history.

If someday a common monument to the creators of the Great Victory appears in Russia, then next to the marshals in ceremonial uniforms should be a modest man in civilian clothes - People's Commissar of Finance Arseny Zverev. Thanks to him, the monetary system of the USSR successfully survived not only the Great Patriotic War, but also the most difficult post-war years.

Nicknamed the Beast

In his memoirs "Notes of the Minister" Arseny Grigorievich with obvious pleasure emphasized two facts from his fascinating biography. First, only Jean-Baptiste Colbert, the superintendent of Louis XIV, the royal minister of finance, was in charge of the cash flow for the longest time. Second: he climbed to the top of the career ladder from the very bottom, from the village of Negodyaevo near Moscow, which was renamed Tikhomirovo for euphony in the Soviet years.

Arseny's father and dozens of his brothers and sisters bent their backs at a weaving factory in the neighboring town of Vysokovsk. When the boy was twelve, Zverev Sr. took him to the factory; Arseny quickly grew up to be a parser, filling the fabric base into the machines. It was a responsible job, for which 18 rubles were supposed; the boy became the main breadwinner of the family. And then my Bolshevik brother taught: life will get better when the workers take power into their own hands. Arseny believed this truth for the rest of his life.

Fired for participating in the strike, he went to Moscow, to the famous Trekhgornaya manufactory. There he met the revolution and joined the party. In the Civil War, he graduated from the cavalry school in Orenburg, chased the White Cossack bands across the steppes. When he went to bed, he put a saber and a carbine next to him: a rare night went without a combat alarm. In 1922 he was demobilized, having received a "memory" wound in his shoulder and a military order.

The young communist was sent to his native Klin district to explain the party's policy. Along the way, I had to deal with grain procurement. Zverev achieved his goal, sometimes by persuasion, and sometimes with a revolver, he could not be bribed or intimidated. Soon the zealous worker was transferred to Moscow to the post of regional financial inspector. The monetary reform revived the financial system, the depreciated "sovznaki" were replaced by gold rubles, Zverev, among others, had to fill the treasury with these rubles. He quickly became a storm for the Nepmen.

In his memoirs, Zverev proudly conveys their conversations: "It's not for nothing that they gave him such a surname - a real beast!"

In September 1937 - the black clouds of the Great Terror were already hanging over the country - he probably went through not the most pleasant moments when he was summoned to the Kremlin late in the evening. But Stalin, whom Zverev saw for the first time, invited him to take the post of chairman of the State Bank. Not feeling like a specialist in the banking sector, Zverev refused. Nevertheless, the leader soon appointed him deputy people's commissar of finance Vlas Chubar. Six months later, when he was arrested, Zverev took his place.

People's Commissar, and since 1946 as a minister, he worked for 22 years, of which not one was easy. But the most difficult years were the years of the war.

War and money

In June 1941, Zverev asked to go to the front - he was the brigadier commissar of the reserve. But something else was demanded of him: to prevent the collapse of the financial system. Already in the first months, the enemy occupied the territory where 40% of the population lived and 60% of industrial products were produced. Budget revenues fell sharply, the printing press had to be turned on, but the population again became the main resource for replenishing the treasury. Already at the beginning of the war, citizens were forbidden to withdraw more than 200 rubles a month from savings books. Taxes rose from 5.2% to 13.2%, and the issuance of loans and benefits stopped. Prices for alcohol, tobacco and those goods that were not issued with ration cards rose sharply. Workers and employees were forced to voluntarily and compulsorily buy bonds of war loans, which gave the treasury another 72 billion rubles. Getting money in any way was combined with the strictest economy.

Zverev wrote: "Every penny let loose could result in the death of a warrior fighting at the front."

The drug addict and his apparatus succeeded in the impossible: the expenditures of the Soviet budget during the war years only slightly exceeded revenues. At the same time, the money went both to restore the economy in the liberated regions (even before the end of the war, 30% of fixed assets were restored), and to retire the widows and orphans of those killed at the front. When our troops crossed the border, the costs of saving from starvation the inhabitants of devastated Eastern Europe were added (do they remember this now?). True, incomes also increased: whole enterprises were massively exported to the USSR from Germany and its allied countries.

People's Commissar Zverev managed to control and direct this entire complex circulation of cash flows. In the liberated areas, the first thing its employees did was open savings banks. And since they often had large sums with them, they never parted with weapons. It was not for nothing that after the war they were dressed in green uniforms with shoulder straps, and the People's Commissar himself rightfully received the Order of the Red Star.

Reform architect ...

During the war, the amount of money in circulation has quadrupled. Back in 1943, Stalin consulted with Zverev about the monetary reform, but it took shape only four years later. The plan developed by the Ministry of Finance provided for the exchange of old money for new in a ratio of 10 to 1. However, deposits in savings banks were exchanged differently: up to 3000 rubles in a ratio of 1 to 1, one third of deposits from 3 to 10 thousand rubles were withdrawn, more than 10,000 - half. Bonds of loans issued during the war years were exchanged for new ones at a ratio of 3 to 1, and those of pre-war loans - 5 to 1. As a result of accumulation, many citizens "dried up".

“When carrying out the monetary reform, well-known sacrifices are required,” said the Resolution of the Council of Ministers and the Central Committee of the All-Union Communist Party of Bolsheviks of December 14, 1947. “The state takes on most of the sacrifices. this will be the final sacrifice. "

In preparing the reform, the main condition was strict secrecy. According to legend, on the eve of the event, Zverev himself locked his wife Yekaterina Vasilyevna in the bathroom for the whole day so that she would not let her friends talk. But the event was too large-scale to be kept secret. A month earlier, trade workers and speculators closely associated with them rushed to buy goods and products. If the usual daily turnover of the Moscow Central Department Store was 4 million rubles, then on November 28, 1947 - 10.8 million. Muscovites bought not only tea, sugar, canned food, vodka, but also luxury items such as fur coats and pianos. The same thing happened all over the country: in Uzbekistan, the entire stock of skullcaps that had been gathering dust there were swept off the shelves for several years. Large deposits were withdrawn from the savings banks and carried back in small portions, registering for relatives. Those who were afraid to take money to the bank skipped it in restaurants.

This was preceded by a discussion in the Central Committee - many proposed to correlate the new prices for goods with commercial ones, but Zverev insisted on keeping them at the level of rations. Prices for bread, cereals, pasta, beer were even reduced, but prices for meat, butter, industrial goods rose. But not for long: every year until 1953, prices were reduced, and in general, food prices fell 1.75 times during this period. The salary remained at the same level, so the well-being of citizens as a whole has increased. Already in December 1947, with a salary of the urban population of 500-1000 rubles, a kilogram of rye bread cost 3 rubles, buckwheat - 12 rubles, sugar - 15 rubles, butter - 64 rubles, a liter of milk - 3-4 rubles, a bottle of beer - 7 rubles , a bottle of vodka - 60 rubles.

In order to create an impression of abundance, goods from "state reserves" were thrown into the sale - in other words, what had been held before. The citizens, accustomed to empty regiments during the war years, were sincerely glad.

Of course, prosperity in the country did not come, but the main goal of the reform was achieved: the money supply decreased by more than three times, from 45.6 to 14 billion rubles. Now the strengthened currency could be transferred to a gold basis, which was done in 1950 - the ruble was equated to 0.22 grams of gold. Zverev had to become an expert in smelting gold, cutting precious stones, and minting coins. He often visited the Mint and factories of Goznak, subordinate to the Ministry of Finance. He also took care of financial advertising, which often caused a smile ("I saved up - I bought a car"). But the success of the policy of the Ministry of Finance was proved not by advertising, but by life itself. Before the reform, they were given 5 rubles 30 kopecks per dollar, and after that - already four rubles (today we can only dream of such a rate).

The most surprising thing: Zverev remained himself. And he continued to argue with Stalin. When the leader ordered to impose additional taxes on the collective farms, he objected: "Comrade Stalin, even now many collective farmers will not have enough of a cow to pay the tax." Stalin said dryly that Zverev did not know the state of affairs in the village, and interrupted the conversation. But the minister insisted on his own - created a special commission in the Central Committee, convinced everyone that he was right and made sure that the tax was not only not increased, but also reduced by a third.

... and an opponent of reform

He also argued with the new leader Nikita Khrushchev, especially when he started ill-considered experiments in agriculture. The authorities considered it unreasonable to directly raise prices, so it was decided to carry out a new monetary reform under the official pretext of "saving a penny": nothing can be bought for a penny, so the ruble's denomination needs to be increased tenfold. As a result, the denomination of the ruble, devaluation ...

The 1961 reform took place without Zverev - when he was instructed to prepare it according to the given parameters, he flatly refused. Wild rumors circulated in Moscow that he had fired at Khrushchev right at a meeting of the Central Committee, after which he was sent to a special psychiatric hospital. Of course, there was no shooting, but public criticism of the leader in a harsh form could well have taken place - Arseny Grigorievich in a dispute was never shy in expressions. In May 1960, he was "of his own free will" removed from the post of minister ...

P.S. The memoirs of Arseny Grigorievich Zverev were published only after his death. And in a greatly abbreviated form - the author too actively praised Stalin and scolded some of his successors. Reputedly the most effective finance minister in our history, passed away in July 1969.

The most private people. From Lenin to Gorbachev: An Encyclopedia of Biographies Zenkovich Nikolai Alexandrovich

ZVEREV Arseny Grigorievich

(02/18/1900 - 07/27/1969). Candidate member of the Presidium of the CPSU Central Committee from 10/16/1952 to 03/05/1953. Member of the Party Central Committee in 1939-1961. Member of the CPSU since 1919

Born in the village of Tikhomirovo (now the Klinsky district of the Moscow region) in a working class family. Russian. From 1913 he worked at a textile factory, from 1917 at the Trekhgornaya Manufactory. In 1919 he volunteered for the Red Army, took part in the Civil War. Was a private soldier, then a platoon commander of a cavalry regiment. From 1923 to 1929, at party and Soviet work in the Klin district. He was the head of the agitation and propaganda department of the district committee of the RSDLP (b), sales agent, finagent, deputy head, head of the district financial department, was elected chairman of the executive committee of the district council. In 1925 he graduated from the Central Courses of the People's Commissariat of Finance. In 1929 he was the head of the tax administration of the regional financial department in Smolensk, in 1930 he was the head of the regional financial department in Bryansk. In 1933 he graduated from the Moscow Institute of Finance and Economics. He worked in Moscow as the head of the regional financial department, chairman of the Molotov regional executive committee. In 1937, the first secretary of the Molotov district committee of the All-Union Communist Party of Bolsheviks in Moscow. In September of the same year, he was nominated by VM Molotov as Deputy People's Commissar of Finance of the USSR as a party worker who had a financial education. From January 19, 1938 to 1960, the People's Commissar (Minister) of Finance of the USSR, in February - December 1948 he was deputy, first deputy minister. According to VM Molotov, the nomination was as follows: “I asked: give me information about the workers, party, reliable, who graduated from a financial institution. I was given a list. I stopped at Zverev. He was summoned to Stalin for negotiations. He came in with a terrible flu, with a fever, wrapped up. By its type, it is a bit like Sobakevich, such a bear ”(Chuev F. I. Molotov. M., 1999. p. 356). MA Sholokhov called him "our iron people's commissar of finance." Was inexhaustible in the search for objects to tax, including fruit trees, which led to the massive deforestation of orchards. Justifying his actions, VM Molotov said: “He is ridiculed for the fact that he imposed taxes on everyone. And from whom to take? The bourgeoisie

Zverev A., Tunimanov V. Lev Tolstoy

DEAR ARSENIY 1 So, in another month. But I understood that no month was required, that Korney Ivanovich was simply “preparing me”, that Ulrich had probably already told him everything with complete certainty: “Bronstein died.” Well, yes, as I thought: he died of inflammation

ZVEREV Grigory Alexandrovich Colonel of the Red Army Major General of the Armed Forces of the KONR Born on March 15, 1900 in Alchevsk, Donetsk province. Russian. From the workers. Graduated from a two-year city school. Member of the CP since 1926 (ticket number 0464518). In the Red Army since 1919 In 1922 he graduated from the 44th Infantry Yekaterinoslavsky

Alexey Zverev. Nabokov

"Always yours Sergey Zverev" At some point, the radio stopped talking about my victories altogether. There were a lot of them, and they told me directly that if I hadn't borrowed something or had failed miserably somewhere, it would have been news. My regular Grand Prix is gone

SERGEY ANATOLIEVICH ZVEREV (born in 1965 or 1967) He is undoubtedly talented, and talented in everything. World renowned top stylist, make-up artist and leading hairstyle and clothing designer, undisputed European champion and world champion in hairdressing, four-time winner

Zverev Grigory Aleksandrovich Colonel of the Red Army. Major General of the Armed Forces of the KONR. Born on March 15, 1900 in Alchevsk, Donetsk province. Russian. In 1919 he went to the Red Army. In 1926 he joined the All-Union Communist Party of Bolsheviks. He was the commander of the 190th Infantry Division. In captivity since August 11, 1941. In June 1943

Arseny Grigorievich Zverev was one of the closest associates of I.V. Stalin in the 1930s - early 1950s. He served as People's Commissar, and then Minister of Finance of the USSR and carried out the famous monetary, "Stalinist" reform in the country, did a lot for the development of the economy of the Soviet Union.

In his book, the materials of which formed the basis of this article, A.G. Zverev talks about his meetings with Stalin, about how the most important issues of managing the country's finances were resolved. According to Zverev, I.V. Stalin was well versed in financial problems and pursued highly effective economic policies, as evidenced by numerous examples.

We will devote this article to Zverev himself and some of his recipes for organizing the economic life of our country.

Briefly about Zverev

Arseny G. Zverev has come a long way. He began to work as a textile worker at the Vysokov manufactory, about this period of his life in tsarist times in his book "Stalin and Money" he wrote:

You work ten hours and wander, staggering with fatigue, to the hostel. In a small closet with a low ceiling, dirty walls and smoky windows, on hard bunks, older comrades or peers lie, muttering in their sleep. Someone plays cards, someone swears in a drunken argument. Their lives are broken, their dreams are suppressed. What do they see besides dull, exhausting and monotonous work? Who educates them? Who cares about them? Pull the veins out of yourself, enrich the owners! And no one bothers you to leave your labor in the tavern ...

A very eloquent description of the pre-revolutionary state of society, somehow very close to us, isn't it?

Arseny G. Zverev

After the February revolution, Zverev moved to Moscow and took an active part in the life of the workers of the Prokhorov Trekhgornaya Manufactory, where he gained his first experience of political activity. Then, when the October Socialist Revolution broke out, many plants and factories were nationalized. In 1918, Arseny Grigorievich Zverev joined the party and asked to go to the front, but in 1920 he was sent to Orenburg to enter the cavalry school. He writes about the most difficult days of the flared civil war:

The most painful memories of the famine in the spring of 1921. Trains packed with people pass through the station every day. This is from the starving Center and the Volga region going to Tashkent - "the city of bread". Some, having crawled out of the teplushka for water, remain lying near the railway, not having the strength to rise from the ground. The bagmen will scream. Children cry. Here are a few people with shaking fingers rolling cigarettes, with cabbage and nettle tops instead of tobacco, from leaflets issued by the provincial health department "On the methods of using surrogate bread." Off to the side, on bonfires, they burn the dress of typhoid lice-covered with lice. Kazakh families are slowly wandering towards the embankment. They gathered near the Caravan Saray in the hope of help. But not everyone was able to help: the city workers themselves are on scanty rations.

No other political party, no other power in the world could have withstood what our country went through in the terrible years 1921-1922. Only the Communist Party, only Soviet power, was able to raise the state from ruins, put people on their feet, open up the horizons of a new life conquered in the days of the socialist revolution, foreign military intervention and civil war!

Since 1925, Zverev worked as the head of the Klin district financial department, in the position of which he faced current problems:

While studying the system of regional taxation, I very quickly came across attempts by many private owners to conceal the true size of their income and to deceive the state authorities. First of all, this concerned resellers, speculators, brokers and other "intermediaries" of the trading world.

In the spring of 1930 he became the head of the Bryansk regional financial department, and already in 1932 he became the head of the Bauman regional financial department of Moscow, this is how he described his work there:

What did the daily life of Zavrifo consist of? There was no standard. Day after day never came. A note that has survived since 1934, which I wrote as a memo, once sitting in the office of the chairman of the district executive committee, D.S.Korotchenko, will give some idea about individual touches of the daily routine. He received the workers, listened to their demands, complaints, requests and wishes, and every time he drew my attention to them when it came to forthcoming expenses. In a few hours of reception, I wrote down so many questions that I still wonder how we managed to do all this in a short time. I will list just a few of them. To increase the number of tram cars approaching the factory gates; build another school in Syromyatniki; open courses for admission to the workers' school; to asphalt Khludov passage; build a kitchen factory; organize a laundry at one of the factories; clean the Yauza from dirt; plant greenery on Olkhovskaya street; to launch an additional electric train on the Nizhny Novgorod railway; open a grocery store at Chistye Prudy; introduce children's shows in the cinema on Spartakovskaya; open a playground on Pokrovsky square; to equip the dormitory of the button factory with a cinema ... There were not one, but dozens of such days.

After meeting with I.V. With Stalin, he refuses the offer to head the State Bank, because he did not consider himself competent enough for this work. However, since September 1937, Zverev was appointed Deputy People's Commissar of Finance of the USSR, and in January 1938 - February 1948 he became People's Commissar (since March 1946 - Minister of Finance) of the USSR.

After the war, at the direction of I.V. Stalin, Zverev developed a financial reform project and implemented it as soon as possible, which allowed the USSR, the first of the countries that participated in World War II, to abandon the rationing system for distributing food and goods to the population, and then constantly reduce their prices. This continued until the death of Stalin, after which many of the achievements of the previous period were lost; was soon retired and A.G. Zverev.

The circumstances of his departure are still shrouded in mystery. Most likely the reason for the resignation was the disagreement of A.G. Zverev with the financial policy of Khrushchev, in particular with the monetary reform of 1961.

Writer and publicist Yu.I. Mukhin writes about it this way:

1961 saw the first rise in prices. The day before, in 1960, the Minister of Finance A.G. Zverev. There were rumors that he tried to shoot Khrushchev, and such rumors convince that Zverev's departure was not without conflict.

Khrushchev could not dare to openly raise prices in conditions when the people clearly remembered that under Stalin prices did not rise, but decreased annually. The official goal of the reform was to save a penny, they say, nothing can be bought for a penny, so the ruble must be denominated - its denomination must be reduced by 10 times.

In reality, Khrushchev carried out the denomination only to cover up price increases. If the meat cost 11 rubles, and after the price increase it should have cost 19 rubles, then this would immediately catch the eye, but if the denomination was carried out at the same time, then the price of meat was 1 rubles. 90 kopecks at first it is confusing - it seems to have dropped in price. From that moment on, an imbalance arose between state stores and the black market, where it became more profitable for merchants to sell goods, from that moment goods from stores began to disappear.

Zverev had a conflict with Khrushchev precisely over this reform. Thus, Khrushchev (or with his hands) laid the foundation for the plundering of the country, giving a signal to all corrupt officials.

In his book, Arseny Zverev tells about his life path - from a simple working guy to a minister - and proves that this was possible only in the Soviet country, where every citizen had broad prospects for realizing his best abilities.

We will give several recipes that this outstanding economist of the “Stalinist” era used in his work.

Economic recipes from Zverev

On the role of the state bank

The turning point on a national scale was also helped by the new principles of building the credit system. Since 1927, the State Bank has been in charge of it from beginning to end. Sectoral banks have turned into long-term credit institutions, and the State Bank - short-term. This delimitation of functions, along with increased control over the use of loans, ran up against the obstacle in the form of a commercial bill of exchange. Therefore, within two years, other forms of settlements and lending were introduced: check circulation, intrasystem settlements, direct lending without bills of exchange.

How do you build factories?

The ability not to spray funds is a special science. Let's say you need to build seven new enterprises in seven years. How to make it better? One plant can be erected annually; as soon as he gets into business, take on the next one. You can build all seven at once. Then, by the end of the seventh year, they will begin to produce all products at the same time. The construction plan will be fulfilled in both cases. What, however, will turn out in another year? In this eighth year, seven factories will provide seven annual production programs. If we go the first way, then one plant will have time to provide seven annual programs, the second - six, the third - five, the fourth - four, the fifth - three, the sixth - two, the seventh - one program. There are 28 programs in total. The winning is 4 times. Annual profits will allow the state to take some part of it and invest it in new construction. Skillful investment is the crux of the matter. So, in 1968, each ruble invested in the economy brought the Soviet Union 15 kopecks of profit. Money spent on unfinished construction is dead and does not generate income. Moreover, they "freeze" the subsequent costs. Let's say we invested 1 million rubles in the construction of the first year, another million the next year, and so on. If we build for seven years, then 7 million were temporarily frozen. This is why it is so important to accelerate the pace of construction. Time is money!

About financial reserves

The five-year plan, however, must provide for the speed of advancement of entire parts of the national economy. Naturally, the mistakes and imbalances made in the annual plan will increase and overlap in five years.

This means that it is useful to have the so-called "deflection reserves". If they are present, the wind will not break the tree, it can bend, but it will withstand. If they are not there, strong roots will protect the tree only until a very strong hurricane, and then close to a windbreak.

Consequently, it is difficult to ensure the successful fulfillment of socialist plans without financial reserves. Reserves - cash, grain, raw materials - are another constant item on the agenda at meetings of the Council of People's Commissars and the Council of Ministers of the USSR. And in order to optimize the national economy, we tried to use both administrative and economic methods of solving problems. We did not have computers like today's electronic calculating machines. Therefore, they did this: the governing body gave the subordinate tasks not only in the form of planned figures, but also reported the prices for both production resources and products. In addition, they tried to use "feedback", controlling the balance between production and demand. Thus, the role of individual enterprises also increased.

On the research and development cycle and its financing

An unpleasant discovery for me was the fact that scientific ideas, while they were being researched and developed, ate up a lot of time, and therefore money. Gradually I got used to it, but at first I just gasped: for three years we had been developing the design of the machines; they created a prototype for a year; they tested it for a year, altered it and "adjusted it": for a year they prepared technical documentation; another year passed to the development of the serial production of such machines. In total, seven years. Well, if we were talking about a complex technological process, when semi-industrial installations were required for its development, seven years might not be enough. Of course, simple machines were built much faster. And yet, the cycle of full implementation of a major scientific and technical idea took, on average, up to ten years. It was consoling that we were ahead of many foreign countries, because world practice then showed an average cycle of 12 years.

It was here that the advantage of the socialist planned economy was revealed, which made it possible to concentrate funds in the areas and directions necessary for society, despite someone's purely personal will. By the way, there is a huge reserve of progress here: if you reduce the implementation time of ideas by several years, this will immediately give the country an increase in national income by billions of rubles.

Another way to get a return on investment as soon as possible is to temporarily slow down some construction projects when there are too many of them. Mothballing some, and thus speeding up the construction of other enterprises and starting to receive products from them is a good solution to the problem, but, alas, also limited by specific conditions. If, for example, in 1938-1941 we did not build many large objects at once in different parts of the country, then after the beginning of the Great Patriotic War we would not have had the necessary production backlog, and then the defense industry could be in a breakthrough.

Conclusion

The main difference between Zverev and today's economists was that people for him were not just another economic resource, but the main beneficiaries of the development of the entire economy. Having passed the way from a factory worker to the Minister of Finance of the USSR, Zverev did not lose this quality - humanity and concern for people, although he had to make difficult decisions in the interests of the state, but even then he understood that the state was created for the working people and by the forces of the working people themselves.

Our current economists, unfortunately, think more about numbers and indicators than about why they generally work and why they are called to their positions. And the result of such a policy turns out to be worthless.

In the second part of the material, we will try to evaluate the results of the most difficult case of Zverev in his high post - the monetary reform of 1947 and analyze the possibilities of using this invaluable and unprecedented experience in modern conditions.

Materials:

A.G. Zverev "Stalin and Money"

We will devote this article to Zverev himself and some of his recipes for organizing the economic life of our country.

Briefly about Zverev

Arseny G. Zverev has come a long way. He began to work as a textile worker at the Vysokov manufactory, about this period of his life in tsarist times in his book "Stalin and Money" he wrote:

A very eloquent description of the pre-revolutionary state of society, somehow very close to us, isn't it?

Arseny G. Zverev

Since 1925, Zverev worked as the head of the Klin district financial department, in the position of which he faced current problems:

Writer and publicist Yu.I. Mukhin writes about it this way:

Zverev had a conflict with Khrushchev precisely over this reform. Thus, Khrushchev (or with his hands) laid the foundation for the plundering of the country, giving a signal to all corrupt officials.

We will give several recipes that this outstanding economist of the “Stalinist” era used in his work.

Economic recipes from Zverev

On the role of the state bank

How do you build factories?

About financial reserves

On the research and development cycle and its financing

Conclusion

Materials:

A.G. Zverev "Stalin and Money"

The Great October Socialist Revolution not only opened a new era in the history of mankind as a whole, but also created a special type of person - a Soviet citizen, infinitely devoted to Marxist-Leninist ideas, the cause of the Communist Party. This is exactly what Arseny Grigorievich Zverev was. His memoirs vividly and vividly show the path he traveled from a young textile worker at the Vysokovskaya manufactory to a statesman of a socialist state, a prominent theoretician and prominent practitioner-economist, who headed the USSR Ministry of Finance for over two decades.

I was lucky to work under the leadership of A.G. Zverev for many years. We first met in 1930. It was a time when the question of personnel was acute in the country. The country needed thousands of highly educated specialists. Solving this problem, the party sent many communists to study at the expense of the "party thousand." On a Bolshevik ticket, Arseny Grigorievich Zverev came to the Moscow Institute of Finance and Economics.

I taught political economy there. Zverev quickly stood out among his classmates. Affected by practical work, which helped him to master the course of academic disciplines. Attentive to his comrades, sociable, student Zverev was soon elected secretary of the university party organization, and then a member of the Bauman district committee of the CPSU (b).

In his memoirs, Arseny Grigorievich tells in detail about this period of his life. Strenuous studies, great social work, lectures and reports at factories and factories - this is how all students lived, without exception, including the author of this book. If you managed to get six hours of sleep, he writes, then such a day was considered good and easy. Sometimes it’s hard to believe that in these conditions it was somehow possible to carry out our plans, almost without stumbling. Nevertheless, it is a fact! Our children and grandchildren sometimes complain about being overworked. Honestly, if any of us had then the capabilities of the current generation, we would consider ourselves lucky. Subsequently, over the course of many years, I happened to be a witness of the intense activity that A.G. Zverev carried out in the post of People's Commissar, and then Minister of Finance of the country.

For more than twenty years he was a member of the Central Committee of the CPSU, and was repeatedly elected a deputy of the Supreme Soviet of the USSR. The years of building socialism, the Great Patriotic War, then the restoration of the national economy and the elimination of the damage caused to our country by Hitler's Germany. Time, to the limit saturated with historical events. The talent of Arseny Grigorievich, an outstanding organizer and leader, unfolded to its full extent. The "Notes" clearly traces how the complex economic problems that faced the USSR were solved.

Financial workers played an important role in this matter. Extensive practical experience and deep economic knowledge, constant and close contact with the collective, reliance on the communists gave A. G. Zverev the opportunity to find the correct answer to the most difficult questions put forward by life. During the years of my work in the Ministry of Finance (consultant to the People's Commissar, head of the department of monetary circulation, deputy minister of finance), I often had to observe when the persons present at the meetings made contradictory proposals. But the minister usually acted very calmly, quickly finding a way out of difficult economic situations. And if he was already convinced of the correctness of the decision, then he firmly and staunchly defended it then in any instance.

Particularly memorable in this respect is the initial period of the Great Patriotic War. It was necessary to find and immediately mobilize colossal funds for defense needs. Under the leadership of A.G. Zverev, the financial system was quickly and clearly rebuilt in a military manner, and throughout the war, the front and rear were uninterruptedly provided with financial and material resources.

In everything, A.G. Zverev was distinguished by deep adherence to principles. He steadfastly stood guard over the socialist ruble and put state interests above all. As an innovative economist, he conducted extensive research and teaching work in the field of socialist finance. Already in the last years of his life, Arseny Grigorievich defended his doctoral dissertation, became a professor at the All-Union Correspondence Institute of Finance and Economics and a member of the Higher Attestation Commission. "And many other works. All of these works are imbued with the idea of \ u200b \ u200bfighting for a full-blooded, all-encompassing and revenue-generating state budget. This is the author of the Notes considered the first commandment of every Soviet financier.

The reader will find in the book a lot of valuable materials about the specific activities of a financial worker of a district, regional and national scale. The stories about the author's meetings with prominent political figures in our country are also of great interest. The reader on the history of our Motherland will find numerous facts in the book. The author himself was an active participant in important events in the life of the Soviet Union, and his story about them is very interesting.

I would like to finish my word about the author of this book with its final lines. The author writes: “Bequeathing to Soviet Russia a march into communism, V. I. Lenin in his last public speech said:“ Before the communist said: “I give my life,” and it seemed to him very simple ... another challenge. We must now calculate everything, and each of you must learn to be calculating. " Lenin's words fully retain all their meaning to this day. Learning to be calculating is not easy. But without this there is no progress. In order for the shining heights of communism not to remain a dream, they must be reached. And the road lies through the highly productive, planned, accounted for and reasonably used labor of the human collective. " The bright and great life of A. G. Zverev, traced in the "Notes of the Minister", is of considerable interest both for the older generation and for young people.

Corresponding Member of the USSR Academy of Sciences K. N. PLOTNIKOV

FIRST QUARTER CENTURY

From the village to the factory

West of Wedge. - Weaving everyday life. - I and the prophet Jonah. - Vysokovskaya factory. - Vladykin and others. - "It's too early for you to go on strike!"

If you have ever traveled from Moscow to the city of Kalinin through Klin, then you have noticed that the hills of the Dmitrov ridge are replaced by a swampy plain under Klin. This is the right bank of the Upper Volga. At the beginning of this century, there were almost continuous forests, interspersed with felling and scarce arable land. In the direction of the Volga and its large tributaries, the rivers Malaya Sestra, Yauza (not to be confused with the Moscow river of the same name), Vyaz flow. To the west of Klin, on the old road to Rzhev, are the villages of Vysokovsk, Nekrasino, Petrovskoe, Paveltsevo ... This land is my homeland. Here I was born in 1900 into a poor family of a worker and a peasant woman. I was sixth, followed by seven more brothers and sisters.

The Klinsky district of the Moscow province has long supplied workers for the textile industry. From all the villages closest to the road - Troitskaya, Smetanina, Negodyaeva, Teterina and others - men and women were drawn to the village of Nekrasino, looking for food for themselves and their families. There was a spinning and weaving factory nearby. Its first owner was "his brother" - the merchant G. Kataev, who came out of the peasants. Having become an entrepreneur, he very quickly profited from the sweat and tears of his fellow countrymen. Twelve years later, the factory burned down. But a year later he built a new building, a stone one. The cheapness of labor and the high demand for fabrics attracted the capital of a number of wealthy people here. The largest manufacturers of the Moscow province and several foreigners formed the joint-stock "Partnership of Vysokovskaya Manufactory".