Need economic help

Igor · Post by **Igor** » May 15 2005

Ok, this game is REALLY hard. I don't understand anything. No matter what i do, my per capita income keeps decreasing, even though i'm reducing unemployment and expanding industry. I'm playing as unified France in the demo. At the start of the game the unemployment was 7%, so i started building industries and slowly drafting people in to the army. It has now been a few months and the unemployment is down to about 6.2%. Inflations has remained at about 2.9%. However, my per capita income has fallen by more than $1,000 since the start of the game! It just keeps going down! Also, France has a debt of about $1 trillion, to add to my worries. How the hell do i turn this around? How do i get my economy into gear and increase my per capita, reduce my debt, and generally make things better? I already have the treasury minister set to prioritize employment, per capita income increases, business growth and a few more which i forget, but as i said my per capita keeps going down. I need to know EXACTLY what to do to turn everything around, so a step by step tutorial would be nice. Thanks.

BigStone · Post by **BigStone** » May 15 2005

Take a look at your tax....

Cheers

Little_Poon · Post by **Little_Poon** » May 15 2005

hmm also Id look at your supplies vs demand. If you need to import a lot of expensive raw materials and goods its going to cost you big $$$. I usually aim at making myself somewhat self sufficient if possible, and then try to make trade treatise for the rest.

Hope that helps.

aegisx · Post by **aegisx** » May 15 2005

How do you know what 'expensive is'?

Post by **BattleGoat** » May 15 2005

Compare your cost to build a unit of a commodity to the price it is available for on the World Market. Quite often you'll find it's cheaper to import than make at home...

Ideally you should try for an Unemployment of about 3-5 percent, so maybe build more industries (but look at your costs first).

Igor · Post by **Igor** » May 15 2005

Ok, i've been building industries to the point of having TONS of unused resources/goods due to the massive industrial capacity. But STILL, my un-employment refuses to go down! I can't even afford to build anymore factories due to my budget being maxed out with maintenance costs. Is there even some way too see the exact total number of workers your country has, and how many jobs in total are avaliable, so you can get a general idea of how many more jobs you need to create? Also, can you see how many jobs a certain industry provides BEFORE you build it, so you don't build a lot of expensive ones that don't create that many jobs anyway?

Igor · Post by **Igor** » May 16 2005

BUMP

I'd really appreciate some help with this as i am currently stumped...

Legend · Post by **Legend** » May 16 2005

I'll ask George to answer this one for you in better detail.

Post by **George Geczy** » May 17 2005

There probably isn't a single answer here... to start with, unemployment below 7% is generally acceptable, though there is still a bit of room for growth (once you hit 3% it really gets to a point where you are very close to 'full employment' and the result is your costs will start to rise due to high labor costs).

In the various maps there are some economies that are, by design, "hot", and some that are a bit, ummm, "cooler". The cooler economies will generally be declining as you start the scenario, and this fits one of those cases.

As long as you can stabilize your treasury and keep approval from dipping too far below 30%, you don't really have a huge issue. Build up new facilities gradually so you don't drive yourself bankrupt in an industry building spree.

Also focus on industries that provide good export opportunities - check the market and make sure you can make money on what you produce.

There sometimes isn't a single answer, and you have to try various approaches. Maybe the conservative style of low taxes will work. Or maybe the liberal style of higner social spending and subsidies is what is needed. Try ministers of different political leanings and see if things change. But don't expect economic shifts overnight, it often takes weeks or even months to see changes take hold.

And if all else fails, sometimes a nice war can be good for the economy

-- George.

Igor · Post by **Igor** » May 17 2005

How can i see what is profitable to export, and what the global demand for that good is? Also, how can i see how much of my surplus actually gets bought so that i don't overproduce and end up with a huge unsold stockpile?

Legend · Post by **Legend** » May 17 2005

Igor wrote:How can i see what is profitable to export, and what the global demand for that good is? Also, how can i see how much of my surplus actually gets bought so that i don't overproduce and end up with a huge unsold stockpile?

In sub-world scenarios the amount for sale on the market every day is the demand from the World Market. This isn't a global demand so you can think of this demand being regionalized by the World Market. In fact prices can plummet or soar in one area depending on what trade happens in that scenario.

As for what is getting bought there is a daily trade summary button from panel one in production, looks like a pie chart, and from here in panel two there is a button at the bottom with actual dollar amounts of sales / purchases from the last day. This panel is an indicator panel but the best way to not over produce is to set production to demand...or set to capacity and set "surplus sales" to on with auto pricing... If you do the last suggestion keep checking to make sure you are selling every few days (or even daily) and not stock piling up too much.

Igor · Post by **Igor** » May 17 2005

Ok, now i have another question. I've managed to get unemployment into check, and it has decreased down to about 2.5 percent. But now i have another problem. My inflation is out of control. It is at 18 percent, so now i have the opposite problem. Earlier, i couldn't create enough jobs, so my unemployment was really high and my inflation went down so much that it became deflation. So then i created enough jobs and got my unemployment down, but now my inflation won't go down. And now that i have so many jobs, my unemployment doesn't seem to stop going down either... i've tried a number of things including increasing taxes and increasing prices for domestically sold goods, and that got the inflation to go down, but it also started wrecking my per capita income, thus causing me to lose all the per capita income gains i had made and leaving me back at square one! I know how to grow the per capita income now, but now i don't know how to decrease the accompanying inflation without ALSO decreasing the per capita income! It seems that no matter what i do, i'm screwed! This game needs some kind slider that lets you set how many people you want to be employed at any time if you have too many jobs. So for example, if your unemployment goes down to like 1 %, you should be able to have some people fired so that it goes back up again and decreases inflation.

Failing that, i would apreciate someone telling me how to decrease the inflation without decreasing per capita income.

samba14 · Post by **samba14** » May 17 2005

Igor wrote: Failing that, i would apreciate someone telling me how to decrease the inflation without decreasing per capita income.

Short answer: Reduce military spending

Long Answer including how to best manage the economy:
Well, I think I have mastered the economy. I would encourage others to verify and confirm what I have done. To understand how to manage it, one must first understand the main product the economy was built upon, and that is, for war (the military).

It seems that most of the scenarios and territories start with huge armies, deficits and debt. Maybe it is this way to coincide with the story (it makes sense). In any case, here is the details how I kept my treasury at over $15,000 then stomp my enemies playing the Southwest U.S. scenario as Arizona:

I first immediately replaced my cabinet with those specializing in the field (i.e. Treasury with someone with high economy IQ). I then issues the following orders: State department to trade for profit, treasury to minimize taxation, and fight inflation, Interior to concentrate on domestic approval and tech level.

I took control over the defense department and lowered the troops pay and maintenance budget. Then I ordered them to stop building units and missiles and ordered them to concentrate on "quality" rather than "quantity".

I then started scraping bases (not airfields) and scrapping 50% of all outdated battalions including air land and sea.

Took a look at my production demands and built the appropriate number of facilities SLOWLY.

Once my economy took off, inflation soared and unemployment dropped. Once I got over $15,000 in the treasury, I told the defense department to start auto building units and missiles occasionally turning off auto build to let the treasury increase again. Before I knew it, I was stock filled with modern units, tons of money and a pretty good approval rating.

I hope this helps and would like someone to verify this. It works for me.

samba14 · Post by **samba14** » May 17 2005

One more thing......I would like to mention that inflation went as high as 18% before dropping back down to a comfortable 5%. Unemployment throughout was between 2.8% and 5.1% finally settling at 3% at the end.

Igor · Post by **Igor** » May 18 2005

Well, i'm currently at war with North Korea (playing as South Korea), and i really don't have any choice regarding military spending. Besides, i've suffered more than 2 million casualties so far, so that probably helps keep unemployment down too. I hope i'll have a long period of peace after i conquer the north so that i can build my economy.