[MichaelRo]

>> Friends whose family also worked for the company were sort of privileged as a result.

Well to tell the full story, my father was an employee of the Agricultural Production Cooperative (CAP - Cooperativa Agricola de Productie - in Romanian), the national company who owned the land (forcibly nationalized in the 50s) and grew food. No individual would have been able to afford a private telephone line in the village, there were two of them, one to CAP one to the Post office. While it was possible to go to the post office and pay to make calls, it was more awkward getting them. So we hooked a phone to CAP's line, meaning we shared the calls with it's office, phone rang both at out home and in the office and everytime we made a call, someone in the office could pick up the phone and listen (and we could do the same with them). And of course not every employee of the company was allowed to hook up a personal phone to the company line ;)