 Upon his release, Ryutin was assigned work in as an economist for an electrical production unit.In the interim, the Soviet economy had gone from bad to worse.The grain shortage of 1928 had given way to complete disorganization of agriculture by the ill-conceived collectivization campaign of 1929-30, which — exacerbated by drought — had ultimately resulted in a massive famine in the Ukraine, Kazakhstan and parts of southern Russia in 1932 and 1933.