In response to the ejection from the ration system under certain employers, some urban workers attempted to switch profession to find another employer that still used ration cards, and industrial enterprises in Leningrad hired twice as many new employees in October than they had done in September, and some businesses had to turn away applicants because no additional ration cards could be handed out. Many rural workers who lost their rations abandoned their state farm jobs (further hurting agricultural output) and migrated to the cities, looking for employment opportunities that promised access to ration cards. On 30 October 1946, the state planning agency Gosplan was ordered to prepare for another wave of ration card eligibility reductions. The unexpected cutbacks in rationing over the course of October devastated the livelihoods of millions of citizens, especially those in the countryside who were not manual laborers, such as foresters, teachers and medical workers, along with unemployed dependants, such as the elderly or the disabled.
