Social changes

• consumer goods such as radios, televisions and. Fridges became widely available
• construction of prefabricated flats to assist overcrowding
• peasants eligible for taxes and bachelor tax removed
• Wage equalisation + 40 hour work week saw increases in wealth of lowest paid
• factory trade unions gain responsibility and role in negotiation
• housing education and medicine

  • 1956 - 1965 - 108 million people moved into new apartments though low quality they made drastic changes as they had doors and privacy
• Higher education numbers Trebled under Krushchev

  • 1958 leavers age raised to 15 and tertiary fees in senior classes abolished
  • Spoke out against elitism within universities
  • proposed mandatory work experience though it was watered down and dropped after much resistance
• campaign against religion

  • Stalin tolerated after war
  • krushchev revives Lenin’s militant atheism
  • children banned from services in 1961
  • up to 64 3/4 of all churches shut and mosques targeted too
  • clergymen sent to labour camps