The man who ran Soviet statistics for 35 years
"We have no other figures. Comrade Starovsky is a very cautious man. I take my figures from him. This is our all-Union bookkeeping. I trust him." — Khrushchev, CPSU Presidium, 19 August 1964.
Headed the Central Statistical Administration (TsSU) of the USSR from 1940 to 1975, overseeing all Soviet state statistics for 35 years, the longest tenure of any statistical chief. Beginning with the 1939 census, he managed every postwar Soviet population and economic census, producing the foundational data on which Gosplan built the national economic plans. A Doctor of Economics and corresponding member of the Academy of Sciences, he laid the methodological groundwork for Soviet mathematical statistics and was the only statistical authority Khrushchev ever publicly declared he trusted. Yet in the 1960s he played a decisive role in blocking Glushkov's OGAS computer-network project, defending the existing punched-card system, a controversial turning point in Soviet information-technology history.
Activities and affiliations
Career Timeline
- 1919–1923Clerk and statistician, Ust-Sysolsk District Statistical Bureau
- 1924–1926Statistician, VSNKh USSR; graduated Faculty of Soviet Law, Moscow State University
- 1926–1930Statistician and researcher, TsSU USSR; postgraduate studies, RANION Institute of Economics
- 1931–1937Researcher, deputy head of personnel, TsUNKhU, Gosplan USSR
- 1937–1939Deputy head, All-Union Census Bureau, TsUNKhU
- 1940–1941Head of TsUNKhU, Gosplan USSR
- 1941–1948Head of TsSU, Gosplan USSR — Deputy Chairman of Gosplan
- 1948–1975Head of TsSU under USSR Council of Ministers (ministerial rank from 1957)
Related historical events
- 1941–1945The Great Patriotic WarWartime urgent-census developerDuring the war, he developed and used urgent censuses to obtain statistical information quickly.
- 1965–1970The Kosygin ReformOpposed OGAS · defended the statistical agency's institutional prerogativeDuring the computerization debates of the Kosygin reform era, he most fiercely opposed Glushkov's OGAS nationwide computer-network project. As head of TsSU he defended the existing punched-card system and played a decisive role in blocking the networked-planning vision, a pivotal turning point in Soviet information-technology history.
Wartime statistics and population censuses
Starovsky led the development of the program and methods for the 1939 census, conducted after the results of the 1937 census had been annulled. The official count was about 170 million. A historical account notes that the figures were presented in a way that obscured the severe demographic trauma the population had undergone. The 1939 form omitted questions about religious belief, while its nationality classifications consolidated several groups into larger categories.
During the war, Starovsky developed and used “urgent censuses” to obtain statistical information quickly. The Central Statistical Administration used them to identify reserves in production capacity and stocks of metals and raw materials; each count was conducted within 7 to 15 days. A Moscow State University chronicle records 142 such counts in total between 1941 and 1947. In 1947, soon after the war, he proposed a one-time all-Union population count to establish the number of people killed; Stalin rejected the proposal.
Postwar demographic work continued with the censuses of 1959 and 1970. The 1959 census used sampling for the first time in compiling family data, and the 1970 census broadened the range of topics covered. Together, the censuses established continuous series of demographic indicators. Starovsky also supported the creation of a demography department that remained active for decades.