New factories to produce poker cards, board games, and an update to Chess (now, with new pieces like The Elephant Troop, BIG Bote and The Commissar! Or alternatives, to pieces like the King, Queen etc with equivalent points and rules for operation).
A popular Soviet toy for boys is miniature figurines of soldiers.
Edit: I'd suggest maybe budgeting for a new ministry of technological development so that we can fund projects that don't have immediate military utility.
Under the current conditions, most likely it will be a committee under the Council of Ministers. For this intersects with the activities of too many ministries and departments.
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[x] Conditional support will be given to the major reshuffling of the Finance Ministry, Gosplan and TsSU; to avoid directly slighting those involved in that sector (Kirilenko, Shelepin and Semichastny), the cut-downs won't be as severe for the time being. Garbuzov won't be removed yet, but he'll be slowly pushed out.
As for the economy, I propose to start a debate. So far I have seen only the emphasis on the chemical industry and the production of televisions. Undoubtedly, it is necessary to eliminate the backlog in the production of consumer goods. However, you are forgetting one more thing - according to the results of the seven-year plan, agricultural production grew by only fifteen percent, instead of the promised seventy. The dependence on food imports has already increased - in particular, we buy grain in the USA. It is necessary to update and reorganize the agricultural complex.
At the same time, Comrade First Secretary promises us a Technical Revolution - and after all, behind the production of electronics there is a huge complex of connected industries and directions.
We also need to carry out a number of organizational updates.
In particular, it is necessary to introduce reserves. EXAMPLE In pursuit of 100% return on equipment, one often achieves "100%" only by average statistical standards. Norm and reality are not quite the same thing. We conducted a special inspection at the factories. It turned out that the usual capacity utilization is in fact - how much would you think? - no more than fifty percent possible. No more than fifty, even in a relatively well-organized production.
These are the facts... So far, enterprises often hide their real capabilities. They are afraid: it is worth showing all the trump cards, as an unlucky planner will immediately give a plan "to the very top", will not leave any reserves at all. And without them, in conditions where the interactions between enterprises are not yet sufficiently coordinated, the tense plan will immediately be in danger of failure.
...And production workers - intuitively - feel the need for reserves. And, not getting the right to keep them openly, officially, they acquire what we call hidden reserves. Well, where there is secrecy, there is excess. The reserves actually hold more than they should. So the official recognition of the usefulness of cold capacities would lead not to "unloading", but to additional strain on production plans. Seventy, eighty percent - more than fifty, the math is simple.
In general, the main problem of our economy - In theory, the object and subject of management coincide - society is self-management. In reality, the subject of management does not coincide with society - there is a struggle between them: for withholding resources, etc.