Consumer Goods

[Prezyan]

We have food, of course, but a nation doesn't solely run on food. We also have power plants, whether that be oil, coal, nuclear, or wind, which one could argue is also a consumer good. So we now have two consumer goods: food and energy. I personally think that a nation should run off more than purely food and energy.

For example, if a nation produced gasoline, is it logical to assume that 100% of all gasoline produced would go directly to the government? Assuming that all improvements aren't all government owned, and even if it was, wouldn't some of that gasoline go towards the general population? Perhaps for heating or for cars? Also steel, wouldn't some of that steel go towards building construction?

So what I'm suggesting is that portions of daily manufacturing goods (I'm thinking gasoline and steel) be used up in the same fashion food is used up, not at the same rate but at a rate which would accurately reflect how a nation would use those resources. Thereby making larger nations with more cities and higher population have to "sacrifice" some of their production for the maintenance of their population. 

The idea behind this is to decrease the sheer tonnage of manufactured goods larger nations can pump out. 

[Zygon]

Interestingly enough, Well spoken. I look forward to seeing how world wide Consumer Goods will evolve into.

Edited November 9, 2017 by Zygon

[Dubayoo]

+1

This might actually give the politics of the game more value which is something the game could use from the sore lack of war.

[Charlie Traveler]

Why would the government be providing daily operating resources to the private sector? I always assumed that we only have access to government-owned improvements, consequently making all the resources produced government-owned resources.

[Bortwald]

You can look at the daily production as it is allready the portion that the gov takes.

[Rache Olderen]

17 hours ago, Dubayoo said:

+1

This might actually give the politics of the game more value which is something the game could use from the sore lack of war.

Care to elaborate how this would give the politics more political value? I am having a bit of a hard time seeing it.

[Dubayoo]

3 hours ago, Rache Olderen said:

Care to elaborate how this would give the politics more political value? I am having a bit of a hard time seeing it.

People could argue over long-term versus short-term development more directly. The more CG a country runs on, the more long-term development.  If CG becomes a traded resource, it could also spark trade-wars where people debate over pricing and declare wars on those making their lives difficult.  As it is, trade wars never ever happen because of the abundance of industrial goods on the market that elites don't really care about since they'll be there one way or another.

[Rache Olderen]

1 hour ago, Dubayoo said:

People could argue over long-term versus short-term development more directly. The more CG a country runs on, the more long-term development.  If CG becomes a traded resource, it could also spark trade-wars where people debate over pricing and declare wars on those making their lives difficult.  As it is, trade wars never ever happen because of the abundance of industrial goods on the market that elites don't really care about since they'll be there one way or another.

As the last resource war that had happened was Arrgh and co. rolling Phoenix and (I believe) GPA when we plunged the world into famine during a world war I do see your point. It would be interesting, especially in a post global war situation when you are trying to get your nations functional again.

Edited November 10, 2017 by Rache Olderen

[Alex]

How about the option to convert existing resources into consumer goods? Each resource could have its own corresponding "consumer good" and nations would have the ability to convert their resources into that consumer good directly and receive cash for their resource.

There could be a simple linear demand function for each of these consumer goods. For simplicity's sake going forward, let's presume we're talking about one specific resource, but this would apply to all. So a linear demand function that determines the price when converting to goods, like Y = AB, where B is the demand that shifts, and A is a different constant affixed to each type of good (corresponding to the value of its raw resource).

Each turn the demand could increase by some random amount, and everything resources are converted to goods and solve the demand would be decreased by some amount. There would need to be some limits in place on the amount of goods you could convert per day perhaps to limit and discourage scripting.

This would introduce some fluctuations into market prices, and it would also offer a new avenue to make money: watch the market for discrepancies between raw resources and their respective consumer goods to make a profit. It would also serve to create more demand for resources, which could help control inflation.