The tax base of the 1992 budget was to include a new value-added tax ( VAT--see Glossary), several excise taxes, and a revised system of enterprise and personal income taxes. Hard-currency export earnings were to be taxed at 25 percent. The fastest-groÍÍÍÍwing expenditure categories were national defense and allowances to citizens to mitigate the effects of price liberalization. The 1992 budget called for a cut of about 45 percent in real expenditures (equivalent to a nominal increase of 155 percent), which would still leave a deficit of 1.2 billion rubles, or 11 percent of total expenditures. Budgets were extremely difficult to plan because of the Azerbaijani blockade and the unpredictable inflation rate.

Data as of March 1994