The Money Problem

[Mark Sir Link]

Originally Posted by MontyPython

Please elaborate. Capitalism in its true form (doesn't exist currently) allows anyone with the work ethic, talent, and willpower to go as far as they wish. Socialism keeps everyone at the same level, no matter what your goals/talents may be. There's no reason to work hard when you get nothing more for it than someone who only does the bare minimum to survive. But this argument really isn't keeping in line with the thread's actual topic.

As obviously indicated in posts before you, 750,000 is > than 400,000. I can't write it any simpler than that.

One of the most? I'm assuming you're talking about America. America might still be the "most" capitalistic region, however, that's a very very relative term. We've been heading down the path to socialism for a very long time, mostly initiated back with FDR and his "New Deal" shenanigans.

With our current status and what's coming in the future, I classify America as capitalistic in name only.

But once again, this isn't really what this topic is about.

Taxes aren't a good way to remove money. It's not like real life, people might play the game for a while, then stop. Do they still get taxed? That'd be absurd. It'd be great to come back after a long break to an entirely empty bank account. In real life, you don't just take a break (unless you decide welfare is a good route for you). I could keep going, but anyways.

I've never been partial to taxes in a game but there are literally no money drains on Era. The money gained by purchasing a shovel far exceeds the cost of repairing it when it breaks.

The only way Era could hope to get the economy to a stable level is either releasing more (expensive) luxury items that are worth purchasing, or implementing a tax.

If you really insisted upon a tax being put into Era, the only kind that would be acceptable is a static percentage value for everyone. Obviously the richest are still losing the most money, but they're not being punished with a higher rate simply for being successful.

But let's forget taxes, just removing money for the sake of removing money doesn't solve too much. If items like guns had more upkeep costs other than ammo, it'd be a bit more realistic. Would it be annoying to have to pay to repair your gun at times? Absolutely. But taxes would also be annoying. There's that big question of how realistic do we really want a game to be? Where does the realism start ruining the fun? Changes should be made to make the economy more fair overall, but we don't want to sacrifice the fun of the game by making it some demanding, realistic high-upkeep/maintenance simulation.

I still don't see where you're going with this punishment for being successful argument since the fact of the matter is, if you're earning more money, you will retain more money regardless of what you are taxed.

I don't even have to mention that most of the people near the top of the wealth charts have obtained their wealth by fraudulent means, or that the economy is virtually non-existent and wealth has no value because as best I can tell, a majority of the top tier items were either given to friends by staff members or duplicated by bug abuse.

Unless there's a store somewhere selling these high end guns that I'm completely unaware of.

[MontyPython]

Originally Posted by Mark Sir Link

As obviously indicated in posts before you, 750,000 is > than 400,000. I can't write it any simpler than that.


I've never been partial to taxes in a game but there are literally no money drains on Era. The money gained by purchasing a shovel far exceeds the cost of repairing it when it breaks.

The only way Era could hope to get the economy to a stable level is either releasing more (expensive) luxury items that are worth purchasing, or implementing a tax.


I still don't see where you're going with this punishment for being successful argument since the fact of the matter is, if you're earning more money, you will retain more money regardless of what you are taxed.

I don't even have to mention that most of the people near the top of the wealth charts have obtained their wealth by fraudulent means, or that the economy is virtually non-existent and wealth has no value because as best I can tell, a majority of the top tier items were either given to friends by staff members or duplicated by bug abuse.

I never said you wouldn't retain more money, but you're also losing more money than you should be. If you have a fixed percentage tax, the richer person still will lose more money than the poorer. But why you should increase the amount they are taxed simply because they have more money, that makes no sense to me. That is punishment for succeeding. It's a short-sighted, poor way to remove money from an economy. Will it throw you, the rich player, into an immediate economic down-spiral that results in your own demise? Of course not. But will it be a discouraging factor? It should be.

As for the dislike of taxes in games - good, we agree on something. I already said that you could introduce gun repairs/upkeep. That's the biggest problem, really. Once something's released, it never decays or breaks. So it's always at maximum, peak value. The only way to lessen its value is to release more. You could stabilize the economy a bit by having all weapons available from shops at all times. That would ensure the player market doesn't get out of control, but it'd also pretty much kill the player market in general. Whether that's a good or bad thing depends on your own opinion/dealings with the player market.

Yeah, a lot of money/items have been spawned or obtained through fraudulent means. Shouldn't mean we just tolerate it and tax them more heavily. There are some legitimate rich players, they shouldn't have to suffer just because it's assumed that everyone that is rich cheated. And besides, there shouldn't be any kind of spawning/glitch abuse that goes unpunished or unaddressed. Obviously that's something that happens much more frequently because the server's staff is drawn from the player-base. It's getting better, from what I'm seeing. It'll never completely die out, especially on a server like Era....but still.