I know that (at least before Gorbachev) every industry in the USSR was state owned, everyone was assigned a job by the government etc. What I'm interested in is how did Soviet rubles work? Were you just allowed to go and buy as much stuff as you wanted? If people had goods provided for them by the government then what were rubles for? Could anybody have more cash than anybody else?
I know this is probably a bit of a noob question but I'm really interested how a planned economy makes currency work, seeing as I can't imagine it being used for anything apart from buying goods in some kind of marketplace.
Basically Soviet Union had the same monetary system as the rest of the world.
The only great difference I can think of is that there were two types of money: cash (for individuals) and cashless ('beznal') for government-controlled factories/industries/etc. For some time Soviet rouble existed as two separate entities Since for most cases there were no means of legally convert that beznal into cash.
ANd when perestroika came along with a lot of economical freedoms, rouble took a serious hit from all that beznal money laundering. That was one of the reasons of crazy inflation in 90s.
Were you just allowed to go and buy as much stuff as you wanted?
Of course not. You need to pay for that stuff with hard-earned money.
If people had goods provided for them by the government then what were rubles for?
There were not so many goods provided by the government. So for you'll have to pay for rest of the stuff.
Could anybody have more cash than anybody else?
Yes, definitely. By legal and by illegal means.
There are several books/articles in Russian, if you're interested. Not sure that Google can translated them without hiccups though.