Dismantling Utopia: How Information Ended the Soviet Union

> These memes tend to propagate and mutate through the minds of those who are keen to believe things without evidence.

There is definitely evidence of shoe shortages in the Soviet Union - enough that it's a running joke.

A quick Google turned up this post:

https://www.econlib.org/archives/2009/09/soviet_shoes.html

which cites this book:

https://www.amazon.com/Dismantling-Utopia-Information-Ended-...

I'm not sure if there will be better evidence, given the USSR's propensity to pad their stats.