The first thing that comes to mind, which I discussed on another thread; Shared Burden's pretty resource-expensive and makes all work "pay" the same, so I'd love it if residents of empires under the civic didn't have the typical class-stickiness. Given that the whole concept of fully-automated-gay-space-communism is the abolition of class (meaning that class probably doesn't exist in the perspective of people in the empire), it seems very odd that unemployed people would stay unemployed instead of taking lower-strata jobs, given that the job's living standards are the same and that it pretty well flies in the face of "from each according to his abilities, to each according to his needs".
Though trade, and the participation in intergalactic markets, still makes sense (governmental-level trade of resources would still happen with other nonaggressive star nations), it seems very odd that communist planets would abide the presence of megacorporation branch offices, being somewhat against the principle of broadly-equal societies. Would it be possible to create a system where Shared Burden empires don't accept megacorp offices, but could build up a similar office in their own worlds to receive trade benefits?
Lastly, it seems odd that Shared Burden empires are stuck choosing between the eponymous living standard, at .4 goods/pop, and Utopian Abundance, at 1/pop. I'd argue it'd make sense to create a "crunch" standard, with -5% happiness, at .25 upkeep, +5% at .4 upkeep, +10% happiness at .6 upkeep, +15% happiness at .8 upkeep, and +20% happiness at 1.0 upkeep (the current Utopian Abundance). It seems strange that my wealthy Marxist empire can't make a reasonable improvement in living standards within its means without attempting the budget-breaking Utopian Abundance.
Though trade, and the participation in intergalactic markets, still makes sense (governmental-level trade of resources would still happen with other nonaggressive star nations), it seems very odd that communist planets would abide the presence of megacorporation branch offices, being somewhat against the principle of broadly-equal societies. Would it be possible to create a system where Shared Burden empires don't accept megacorp offices, but could build up a similar office in their own worlds to receive trade benefits?
Lastly, it seems odd that Shared Burden empires are stuck choosing between the eponymous living standard, at .4 goods/pop, and Utopian Abundance, at 1/pop. I'd argue it'd make sense to create a "crunch" standard, with -5% happiness, at .25 upkeep, +5% at .4 upkeep, +10% happiness at .6 upkeep, +15% happiness at .8 upkeep, and +20% happiness at 1.0 upkeep (the current Utopian Abundance). It seems strange that my wealthy Marxist empire can't make a reasonable improvement in living standards within its means without attempting the budget-breaking Utopian Abundance.