With Christmas coming and a hint of snow in the air it is time to think about going someplace warmer with perhaps just a little more daylight. However, before I do that I will of course give you one last developer diary. Today we are going to talk about how we changed production and created unemployment.
Let’s start with the workforce in factories. We have rethought how they work. Craftsmen are your workforce and increase both inputs and outputs of a factory. Clerks are your administrators; they use their skills to increase the outputs a factory uses. Capitalists in a state use their skills to decrease inputs. Thus, a balance of POP types is far more important. Having lots of Capitalists is good but only if you have the Craftsmen to take advantage of this.
We have also made several changes to how the economy works. Firstly, as we have already mentioned, POPs get money based on what they do. Thus, workers in a factory get paid based on the profits from the factory. The factory earns profits, which, in true socialist fashion, are divided up amongst the workers and Capitalists in the state (based on a formula we are currently tweaking and balancing.) A consequence of this is that if a factory is not earning much money the workers will not be well paid, and moving somewhere else (or becoming something else) will seem more attractive. This will simultaneously reduce supply of a good and, if their new job pays better, increase demand. This will push up prices, making the factory more profitable, which makes the remaining workers happier to remain there. The same thing applies for RGOs if technology makes grain farms more efficient, increasing production. Then supply increases while demand does not, which pushes down prices. Thus the workers earn less and start to think about moving elsewhere.
We have also changed how factories acquire their inputs. In the old Victoria the state bought the input goods for the factory; well, now no longer. Instead now the factory buys and pays for them itself. If it does not have enough money to buy the inputs for its workforce, it starts to fire workers, creating unemployment. We felt this was a worthwhile change for two reasons: firstly because outside a command economy, the government didn’t buy all the inputs for the factories; it was up to the factories. However, we also feel that this fits a command economy much better as well. Stalin did not sit there and tell people we need to buy more coal and iron to increase our steel production, he just said increase steel production. So we get the same effect here, in a command economy you build the factories and the state machine then takes care of the rest.
In a non free market economy you also have the option to subsidise factories to keep them working even if they are losing money, although to be more exact, under a command economy you get the option to not subsidise factories. You also have the option to set a priority for a factory in the state. This influences which factories POPs will work in. A higher priority factory in a state is more likely to pick up workers when they become available than a low priority one. This gives you a way of influencing how your economy runs without having to go into the nitty gritty of everyday management. We also feel that taking this macro economic approach is actually far closer to the reality of economic management in the era than a more micro one.
Next we have factory maintenance costs. In old Victoria these were paid by the crime fighting slider, in Victoria 2 they are paid for by the factory. The factory also pays for its maintenance in goods. To keep a factory in a tip top working condition it needs Cement (at the moment) or the building starts to deteriorate and production efficiency drops. This adds a fixed cost to factories' production, which feeds into the unemployment model we mentioned above. It also has another neat effect: we have created a year round demand for Cement, thus we no longer need to put in any artificial purchases of Cement, because people will always want to buy it.
Eventually things could get so dire that a factory cannot stay open; then it shuts down (unless subsidised) and is closed. A sad day to be sure, but these things happen.
Well, that wraps it up for the year. Here is a random screenshot because it is Christmas time.
Let’s start with the workforce in factories. We have rethought how they work. Craftsmen are your workforce and increase both inputs and outputs of a factory. Clerks are your administrators; they use their skills to increase the outputs a factory uses. Capitalists in a state use their skills to decrease inputs. Thus, a balance of POP types is far more important. Having lots of Capitalists is good but only if you have the Craftsmen to take advantage of this.
We have also made several changes to how the economy works. Firstly, as we have already mentioned, POPs get money based on what they do. Thus, workers in a factory get paid based on the profits from the factory. The factory earns profits, which, in true socialist fashion, are divided up amongst the workers and Capitalists in the state (based on a formula we are currently tweaking and balancing.) A consequence of this is that if a factory is not earning much money the workers will not be well paid, and moving somewhere else (or becoming something else) will seem more attractive. This will simultaneously reduce supply of a good and, if their new job pays better, increase demand. This will push up prices, making the factory more profitable, which makes the remaining workers happier to remain there. The same thing applies for RGOs if technology makes grain farms more efficient, increasing production. Then supply increases while demand does not, which pushes down prices. Thus the workers earn less and start to think about moving elsewhere.
We have also changed how factories acquire their inputs. In the old Victoria the state bought the input goods for the factory; well, now no longer. Instead now the factory buys and pays for them itself. If it does not have enough money to buy the inputs for its workforce, it starts to fire workers, creating unemployment. We felt this was a worthwhile change for two reasons: firstly because outside a command economy, the government didn’t buy all the inputs for the factories; it was up to the factories. However, we also feel that this fits a command economy much better as well. Stalin did not sit there and tell people we need to buy more coal and iron to increase our steel production, he just said increase steel production. So we get the same effect here, in a command economy you build the factories and the state machine then takes care of the rest.
In a non free market economy you also have the option to subsidise factories to keep them working even if they are losing money, although to be more exact, under a command economy you get the option to not subsidise factories. You also have the option to set a priority for a factory in the state. This influences which factories POPs will work in. A higher priority factory in a state is more likely to pick up workers when they become available than a low priority one. This gives you a way of influencing how your economy runs without having to go into the nitty gritty of everyday management. We also feel that taking this macro economic approach is actually far closer to the reality of economic management in the era than a more micro one.
Next we have factory maintenance costs. In old Victoria these were paid by the crime fighting slider, in Victoria 2 they are paid for by the factory. The factory also pays for its maintenance in goods. To keep a factory in a tip top working condition it needs Cement (at the moment) or the building starts to deteriorate and production efficiency drops. This adds a fixed cost to factories' production, which feeds into the unemployment model we mentioned above. It also has another neat effect: we have created a year round demand for Cement, thus we no longer need to put in any artificial purchases of Cement, because people will always want to buy it.
Eventually things could get so dire that a factory cannot stay open; then it shuts down (unless subsidised) and is closed. A sad day to be sure, but these things happen.
Well, that wraps it up for the year. Here is a random screenshot because it is Christmas time.
