“Didnt people
in WWII have such food rations and it
is how they started in earnest?”
Everything was rationed during WWII, because everything was in short supply. My parents told me that the big thing for them was gasoline rationing. You got script from the government and used it to get your ration of gasoline because we were shipping much of what our refineries produced overseas to operate our war machinery.
Rationing worked like this. Each person got a book of “stamps” of different colors with letters and numbers on them. You were only allowed to buy so much, say, flour per month. So, this week to buy flour you had to present the right number of “E-7” stamps for your purchase. The number/letter combination would change so you couldn’t save the stamps and make a big purchase.
The clerk was supposed to see you tear the stamps out of your book, which had your name and address on it. You bought the flour with regular money, not the stamps, but you had to have the stamps to get the rationed items.