Party in the USSR

[Montmorency]

As for connections, black market and informal exchange (which symptomatically were not mentioned in the sources so I assume deemed fabulously important by you):

Check again, but that isn't even the crux of my argument since the black market and blatnost component is already acknowledged - you gave examples yourself.

You seem to still be confused about my point, which isn't that money did not play a role in the exchange of basic goods for individual citizens, but that its usage and function was very limited compared to Western economies outside of the exchange of hard cash for immediate transactions, and that even there living standards and actual consumption were predicated much less on the exchange of cash but on direct transfers from the government to the citizen in the form of goods, services, accomodations, and so on.

As an aside, I didn't quote much about the economies of collective farm communities and suchlike (post-Stalin), but an interesting inversion from what we usually expect when comparing urban and rural folk is that even though this demographic was substantially poorer than urban Soviets, going by commercial exchange and holdings in terms of banked savings and private (hard cash) stockpiling, we see that the average collective-farm household had substantially more money than the average urban household.

But the urban households were 'richer', and enjoyed better standards due to their location in the networks of infrastructure (and of course political value). On the other hand, often when we think more generally of rural vs. urban we observe that rural people have very little money but can have a considerable amount of commodity production and stock enabling fair subsistence (the main downsides being in terms of high technology, education, and emergency/health services), while urban dwellers have more money and better access to goods and services but may live by lower standards due to long-term risks in health and community safety (as potential examples).

For a relevant bit, recall a few months ago when you were comparing the virtues of American and Ukrainian lifestyles by noting that Ukrainian people had a stronger connection with the agricultural and ecological substrate enabling their own (often urban) lives, while Americans seemed to only know 'farm -> food at the store'.

[Strike For The South]

Can Russians not do anything right? This much ink spilled over how not to get your checking account stolen. Life is rough when you're trying to buy knock off blue jeans and moldy potatoes.