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I started to work as a senior lab assistant with the salary of 83 rubles per month, but soon they gave me a raise to 105 rubles. [Editor’s note: This is probably a slip of the tongue. At that time his salary was probably 830 rubles. In 1961, upon denomination of money in the USSR his salary was 83 rubles. Before 1961 1 kg of bread in the USSR cost about 1.4 rubles and 1 liter of milk 1.2 rubles and after 1961 about 14 & 12 kopeck, accordingly.] This was the average salary of a young specialist in the country, but it was hard to live on it. The chief accountant, Anatoliy Raskin, an old Jew, was quite an important person in the institute. I think that because of Jewish solidarity he soon increased my salary to 120 rubles, but again, it wasn’t that much, particularly as we lived as a family paying our expenses separately from my parents.
Period
Interview
Alexander Grin