A History of the Ministry of Information, 1939-46
SECTION 1
The rate at which the coupons were spent
On demobilisation men were given 90 coupons and women 146. Current civilians' coupons were added to these at the rate of 3 a month for the remainder of the current rationing period, and some coupons had become valid since informants were demobilised; these were recorded together as the civilian issue they received. In a few cases a hardship or an industrial allowance of coupons was received as well.
Where women had received maternity coupons this was not recorded and no information about their expenditure was asked for.
Table 1
Number of coupons received
| MEN | ||||||
| Number of Coupons | ||||||
| Number of men | Demobilisation issue | Normal Civilian issue | Industrial or hardship issue * | Total coupons received | ||
| Whole sample | 510 -/ | 45,900 | 12,579 | 261 | 58,740 | |
| Occupation | ||||||
| Non-manual | 104 | 9,360 | 2,614 | 10 | 11,984 | |
| Factory work | 94 | 8,460 | 2,386 | 20 | 10,866 | |
| Other manual work | 165 | 14,850 | 4,098 | 231 | 19,179 | |
| Miscellaneous | 61 | 5,490 | 1,540 | - | 7,030 | |
| Unoccupied | 86 | 7,740 | 1,941 | - | 9,681 | |
| Whether dependents | ||||||
| Dependents | 454 | 40,860 | 11,227 | 251 | 52,338 | |
| No dependents | 56 | 5,040 | 1,352 | 10 | 6,402 | |
| Time since demobilisation | ||||||
| Under 2 months | 172 | 15,480 | 3,790 | 50 | 19,320 | |
| 2 and under 3 months | 136 | 12,150 | 3,276 | 10 | 15,436 | |
| 3 months and over | 202 | 18,270 | 5,513 | 201 | 23,984 | |
The men had received an average of 111 coupons each and the women an average of 172 coupons.
About a fifth of the men’s and of the women’s coupons were from civilian issues. Very few coupons had been received from hardship or industrial issues.