Industralizing Texas

gnurkas said:

So, I decided to try out Texas... after winning the independence war against Mexico with help from the US I thought the most natural way was to let capitalists invest in the nation's industry.

While not new to paradox titles, I'm rather new to this one and I must have overlooked something because the one project my capoitalists started never gets going. It is funded to about £7.9/£1.1k (cement factory) and then the capitalists withdraw their funds, and start over again.

Here is what I've done to encourage industry:
First focus on clergy to get them above 2%.
Focus on bureaucrats to get them over 1%.
Start focusing a lot on education and administration, lowering national stockpile and military spending to basically 0 (to keep my budget in balance)
Then I start focus somewhat on capitalists to get the projects started.
I start lowering taxes for everyone but the poor.
Also I start to focus somewhat on craftsmen as well.
Also I have tariffs on 0%.

I understand the concept of the national bank and that POPs have to get luxury needs up
to invest there, the thing is that most people have their luxury needs partially filled (up to 30% in the middle and lower classes), except for the capitalists who have none of their needs filled (because they aren't doing anything, that is not too strange I guess). Yet the bank is empty even when i have managed to increase my population to 300k.

oh, and by the way Texas has the liberal party in power.

I'd be real grateful for help

Click to expand...

Try to tilt the population towards the reactionary party so that you get to build your own factories.

The deal with your Capitalists is that they are literally a bunch of poor fellows before any industry get's going, they are basically a bunch of unemplyed miserable dudes in top-hats. Factories in Victoria 2 works something like this: It doesn't matter if the state or the capitalist actually build the factory, the Capitalists will own it when it is finished and any profits that the factory makes will go straight into the pockets of the workers at the factory and the Capitalist POP's living in the same province, and the amount of tax you put on the poor strata (craftsmen working in factories), middle strata (Clerks also working there, giving a bonus to production) and rich strata (Capitalists owning and funding the factory) will be what the state ears from the factory. Early on, before any serious industrialization gets going you have 2 issues to deal with that is chained to eachother:

1. Capitalists have little or no money, therefore they can't get any luxury needs and will mostly be a generally poor, angry and miserable bunch. They have so little money in fact that everything goes to their basic needs like clothing, food and the occasional bottle of booze.
2. Factories are expensive, Capitalists earn money trough factories but they do not have the spare cash to build anything in the beginning. It's an evil circle.

I recommend the following:
Get any party that supports interventionism or State capitalism in power early on, this makes sure you can build factories. Get enough money to build a factory and check the trade-tab at the top of the screen, check which goods that are in high demand and also check that the raw-material for that particular ware is avalible. In this case, Cement. Check if demand for cement is high so you will get anything sold if you make that factory and that there actually is Coal on the market so your factory can get that stuff to make cement. Texas will be low on prestige and the countries with highest prestige get's to buy first so don't aim for anything too fancy or hard-to-get stuff. Build the appropriate factory in your state with the most capitalists and wait until it's done. If the factory is successful and makes profit, this will fill the pockets of your capitalists in no time. If the factory is unsuccessful it's better to demolish it and build a new one than subsidize it for too long. If you got some good factories running, making profits you can get a Laizzes-Faire government in power later on, this will make life easier for you capitalists but remember, you as the state can't build factories or help with subsidies if everything goes down the drain, possibly sending you back to the cowboy-era again.

If your capis are earning good money and you don't tax them too harshly they will soon start to mass-build railroads if you have the tech, and then start to seriously build some factories if enough craftsmen and clerks, and demand for the goods of course are around.

Toptip: Later on in the game, when oil and stuff is dicovered Texas will exchange some of it's regional RGO's from cotton/sheep/cattle or whatever it is (don't remember) to Oil, make sure you got a serious bunch of laborers left that can pump up this oil and make use of it. At first, oil won't be worth so much, but just wait until everyone starts using tanks, planes, and heavy ships for their fleets and capitalists and aristocrats want cars and planes to have some fun with, then Fuel will be extremely profitable, sometimes earning so much as between 40 - 60£ per unit!!!! If you get a fuel refinery going and refine that oil you will be stinkin' rich Rockefeller in no time! (If, of course, you are not a puppet or in the sphere of the USA and Mexico, in that case they will get first picks on you oil before even yourself!)

What voting rights do you have? If you have something like Wealth Voting that means only Rich people get to vote, and if you have many capitalists they will vote Liberal. Farmers are usually conservative so basically you need to get more people to vote. Also try to change the upperhouse so that you at first get as many Liberals as possible, enact reforms that will benefit your future voting and then work as hard as you can to get people to be more conservative or Reactionary.

If all else fails, wait until you get a reactionary uprising and let the Reactionary rebels hold the capital for one year, making you into a reactionary presidential dictatorship. Then build lot's of factories per the advice above and then reform your way back into democracy (if you get Liberals in Upper house per Event) or just let something like a Jacobin rebel uprising, making you into a democracry again... or you could stay in power as the dictatorship and taste the sweet fruit of absolute power like i usually do .

Another option, since early industrialization usually isn't all that profitable, is to wait until the Socialist Party becomes available and then work on getting them into power.