In the months before the dissolution of the Soviet Union in December 1991, soon-to-be president Boris Yeltsin began assembling a team of economic reformers led by Yegor Gaidar, then a young reformist economist, and including Anatoly Chubais. The reform team initially considered Swedish social democracy as a model for Russia, but Gaidar opted instead to study Hungary as a template and was influenced by Poland's use of shock therapy. Both Gaidar and Chubais were convinced that despite Russia's uniquely non-capitalist economic history, a market economy could successfully take hold in the country. Following the August 1991 coup d'état attempt, the economic situation in the country dramatically worsened and an acute food shortage emerged. In October, Yeltsin delivered a speech in which he declared that price controls would be lifted on January 1, 1992, over Gaidar's recommendation that no specific date for the freeing of prices be given.