[1] In June 1953, Prime Minister Urho Kekkonen had presented a simultaneous deflationary program, which tried to lower wages, prices and public expenditures to the level of the export industry's profitability.

Finance Minister Juho Niukkanen (Agrarian League) presented an austerity budget to Parliament in September 1953, which proposed cutting all major government expenditures by 15%.

Since Parliament refused to approve the government's planned changes to the state-subsidized apartment buildings' and other residences' construction, Kekkonen resigned in November 1953.

Various right-wingers and Social Democrats preferred early elections to boost their number of deputies, and to prevent Kekkonen from becoming Prime Minister again.

The Central Organisation of Finnish Trade Unions favoured the lowering of living costs, through subsidies, to the start level of the economic stabilization period.