Revenue Sources

[Sidney]

Just some raw fodder for folks tweaking at the economics of the game. The stats here are from John Brewer's The Sinew of Power: War, Money and the English State, 1688-1783. Reads a lot better than it sounds BTW. It is an interesting view of the economics and finances of the most commercial and industrial power represented in EU at the peak of it's early modern prowness. Anyways some things to think on:

Growth of Tax Revenues by Source:
Revenues sources are:
Land Tax (annual tax on property)
Excise Tax (Indirect consumption tax on internally produced goods)
Customs (Duties on imported goods)

1690 (all figures in millions of pounds)
Land Tax: 1250
Excise Tax: 750
Customers Tax: 475

1740(all figures in millions of pounds)
Land Tax: 750
Excise Tax: 2500
Customers Tax: 1000

1790 (all figures in millions of pounds)
Land Tax: 2250
Excise Tax: 6750
Customers Tax: 3500

You see the tremdous growth of internal consumption from the growth of the excise taxes really outstripped the importance of the external trade factors.

During this period military spending expenditures (during war) consumed from 61% to 74% of total government revenue and 10-15% of total national income. This figure is instructive of maintenance costs.

The size of the forces deployed by the English:

1689
Navy: 40262 men (actual roster of sailors and marines this is true of all figures)
Army: 76404 men (authorized by Parlimanet but not necessarily in service, this is true of all figures)
1740
Navy: 50313 men
Army: 62373 men
1784
Navy: 82022 men
Army: 108484

Oh well, just thought they might be interesting.

 

[State Machine]

Savant and Cunctator will be interested, though they are looking for pan-European or world wide trends.

It's amusing to think of the massive building the AI does versus history. I think I was just reading about France at the beginning of the Revolution, and it had the (huge) army of 200,000. Compare that to EU.

 

[unmerged(2650)]

Sidney, really interesting. Thanks

So when i was puzzled looking at my game income breakdown (1790) i was not so wrong

Assuming 1D = 1 million pound (poor England ) for a comparison:
Census tax: 614
Production: 834
Trade revenues: 2573
Taxation: 616
Tolls: 717

 

[Sidney]

Originally posted by Cunctator
Sidney, really interesting. Thanks

So when i was puzzled looking at my game income breakdown (1790) i was not so wrong

Assuming 1D = 1 million pound (poor England ) for a comparison:
Census tax: 614
Production: 834
Trade revenues: 2573
Taxation: 616
Tolls: 717

Pretty close if you use production, taxation and tolls as the excise numbers- all of which would be domestic as opposed to international values. The census tax which best equates to the land tax really isn't too far off because that 2250 land tax figure is based off trying to supply the Revoltuionary War whihc was ungodly expensive for the English and the land tax took a huge hike up (they hit the Raise War Taxes button) from a more customary level around 750m pounds.

 

[Savant]

!&*$#@% dial-up modem connection!

My cable modem is still down.

Anyway, yes this is good info to have and the like of what I think we need. We need broader data but this is a good start. England is also somewhat peculiar in that for her I would expect the opposite trend: increasing proportion of income from trade versus infrastructure as the game progresses.

I think my hypothesis about econ development may be accurate for med and eastern euro economies but not for the Atlantic economies. Here, the opposite pattern likely holds. Yet, this should also be reflected in teh RotW COTs - as they appear and as the Atlantic nations colonize the trade effect should be apparent just the same. It is the med and eastern nations that likely drew more income from infrastructure rather than trade as the game went on.

So just the same, adjusting % efficiencies for trade & infrastructure in the manner I described before is probably still accurate for an overall trend as the Atlantic states have those colonies and COTs to draw from to accelerate trade values.

 

[Sidney]

Re: !&*$#@% dial-up modem connection!

Originally posted by Savant
I think my hypothesis about econ development may be accurate for med and eastern euro economies but not for the Atlantic economies. Here, the opposite pattern likely holds. Yet, this should also be reflected in teh RotW COTs - as they appear and as the Atlantic nations colonize the trade effect should be apparent just the same. It is the med and eastern nations that likely drew more income from infrastructure rather than trade as the game went on.

So just the same, adjusting % efficiencies for trade & infrastructure in the manner I described before is probably still accurate for an overall trend as the Atlantic states have those colonies and COTs to draw from to accelerate trade values.

England might have more trade than some but I suspect that since the excise and land tax are really both infrastructure/manufactury based in EU terms that England is not much of an exception. Contrary to the image of England as a commercial power the bulk of her government funds still came from domestic sources all the way through the 18th century and given the numbers in 1690 one suspects that is indicative of the earlier trend.

I have done quite a bit of work on the finacial structures of early modern governments and deeply wish I could find the papers on them now for source sites and figures but here is the nutshell conclusion.

England dervived more money from trade/customs than most other powers but was still primarily depended upon domestic revenues. Other states were even more dependent upon internal taxtaion (Spain had a glory period from 1500-1650 where silver flowed freely but once it slowed down they were back to domestic taxes as well). In particular, France and Spain were tied heavily to direct taxes - the land tax as opposed to customs duties and excise taxes or tolls.

England's biggest adavatge over the other powers was her ability to extract massive amounts of revenue for less burden on the population from its people because of a more effecient adminsitration. The indirect taxes mean that a lot of the burden of running the state fell on those above the level of peasants. France and Spain, by comparision, had to squeeze the bulk of the population much harder to get get less revenue per captia because of inefficies built into the French/Spainish tax system that meant large percentages of the revenue got diverted at lower levels before reaching the royal treasury.

 

[BiB]

What Sidney said. The colonial COTs really need toning down.

I also have quite a few graphics on some of the issues at hand but they're sketchy and dissorted and most of all, not online so quite hard to get them to u.

 

[Savant]

TY Sidney!

England dervived more money from trade/customs than most other powers but was still primarily depended upon domestic revenues. Other states were even more dependent upon internal taxtaion (Spain had a glory period from 1500-1650 where silver flowed freely but once it slowed down they were back to domestic taxes as well). In particular, France and Spain were tied heavily to direct taxes - the land tax as opposed to customs duties and excise taxes or tolls.

Ok, so it's not data but it is the most informed opinion I have so far. Can you tell me also whether in fact we may be correct in presuming that the importance (i.e., the impact) of infrastructure income became increasingly important as a source of revenue (relative to what it was in 1500 say) across this time period to central government functioning?

In making my statements about these comparisons, please know that I mean to compare trade with itself across the tiem period as I do infrastructire with itself over the time period. I am not saying trade had more importance than infrastructure byut rather that trade had more importance at one time relative to what it had at time +1, for example.

In your opinion, which is the most accurate depiction of finance for govt coffers:

1. Both infra and trade grew at the same rate of development during the period.

2. Infra had a larger impact and grew at a faster rate in the first half of the period (until 1650 say) and trade developed and had its larger impact in the latter half of the period.

3. Trade had a larger impact and grew at a faster rate in the first half of the period (until 1650 say) and infra developed and had its larger impact in the latter half of the period.

Recall this is with respect to government income, not general economic activity. Infrastructure would include all domestic production and trade only income from taxes on the sale of domestic or colonial produced goods overseas.

OK, hopefully you answered already. Here is my guess:

That for most Europe (Med and Eastern) trade had its greater impact on government coffers in the first half of the era. I don't mean that trade had MORE effect than infra, but only relative to trades impact in the latter half of the era, trade had more effect in the beginning (I think especially med economies). From your data though, I think it is also possible that the reverse occured in the Atlantic economies. Buit yet, even there the infra had a larger effect on income.

 

[Savant]

My cable modem is rocking!!!

Can I get a link to the graphics Bib?

Do they show the kind of relationship I'm trying to describe?

 

[BiB]

That's just the problem. It are photocopies that are here in my hand, they're not online.

And as I said, they are sketch, bit scattered, but I think there's interesting stuff in there.

 

[Savant]

OK.. so if you look at them

then which answer do they best correspond to: 1,2,3?

Vandelay from the history forum thread suggests the "differential acceleration hypothesis" (see.. I really do science!) is viable from his own reading in the subject of economic of the era.

So BiB, what do your tea leaves say?

 

[BiB]

I'll have another cuppa

 

[unmerged(2833)]

I always felt that trade income is extremely exaggerated in EU, especially colonial one, so I usually cut down all prices (goods.csv, i think) down to 5, colonial goods will still be more expensive, due to demand pattern, and grain still is cheap till building of factories.
This will cut down values of cot to levels where most of income will come from taxes, even more that it should, mayby

 

[Sidney]

Re: TY Sidney!

Originally posted by Savant

In your opinion, which is the most accurate depiction of finance for govt coffers:

1. Both infra and trade grew at the same rate of development during the period.

2. Infra had a larger impact and grew at a faster rate in the first half of the period (until 1650 say) and trade developed and had its larger impact in the latter half of the period.

3. Trade had a larger impact and grew at a faster rate in the first half of the period (until 1650 say) and infra developed and had its larger impact in the latter half of the period.

Only using gov't revenues is tougher. General economic growth was mainly a factor of recovery from the wave of medevioal plagues and the expansion of intra European trade during the early phases. This should mean more customs duties but of course customs revenues proved among the more difficult to both enforce and to work their way into gov't coffers becuase so many local officials took their coin out of the purse (and BTW a level of graft was built into the system and was frankly anticipated).

Here's my general picture of reality:

1. Early on (from 1450-1650) the far largest share of gov't revenues came from a direct tax (usually an annual land tax) in almost all cases. Follwoed by excise/tolls and finally customs duties. The UK figures for 1690 (1250 land, 750 excise, 475 customs) propably respresent a ratio typcial of a commercial power pre-1700 since the UK was (even in 1690) better at extracting indirect revenues. I would have to think the ratio would be even lower for France or Russia. Spain is a mess because of the artificial influx of so much silver from the new world. In some states- smaller German states along the Rhine and in Denmark tolls for river/sound traffic were probably higher.

2. After 1650 trade in general began to accelerate as did the rates of excise taxes. This is due to two factors- first a generally better economic climate that promoted trade and internal production but perhaps more importantly the volume of these indirect taxes grew out of proportion to the rate of trade becuase the strengthening of cnetral gov't in places like France, Brandenburg-Prussia and Russia reduced the shrinkiage in tax revenues as it flowed up the hill (now this in no way implies it was effecient but merely that they went from getting maybe (fake numbers but illustrative) 1% to more like 2% which still doubles your revenue so it looks good).

The English experience where excise and customs actually outstrip the land tax is something I would not think was typcial among other European states but in rleation to the situation in 1492 I would think the ratios would become closer to each other.

In answer to you question I would say that the growth between trade and infrastrcuture is relatively stable throughout the age with both increasing as a ratio to direct taxation from 1650 and on.

In EU terms the biggest probelms with the economic model are:

Trade accounts for far too much governmental revenue. Even among the highly commerical English trade was still a much smaller factor than infrastructure (which I'm using as a gauge of the excise). Too much of the game can turn on the domination of a CoT producing insane cash flows. Trade was sort of like "bonus" money for the English and Dutch that gave them the edge over non-commerical powers like Austria or as the era went on Spain. I would do three things: lower the overall value of trade, lower the cost of placing merchants (else with lower trade avlues why use them) and adjust the research figures downward to reflect the lower trade values.

Colonial CoT always make you too much money. Colonies should increase the value of the mother country CoT's since trade from the colonies is taxed entering into the country and not leaving from the colonies- it makes no sense to tax American goods leaving America for England if you are England. Colonial CoT should draw customs off of the trade entering into them which, despite mercantlists fantasies to the contrary- should be minimal and never covered the cost of operating the colonies. In fact the entire trade mechanism which rates ports based on what is LEAVING them is wrong since it should be based on what is entering them which is more a factor of the relative wealth of an area (which I guess can be abstracted by the trade values but is more accurately a measure of the infrastructure/tax value). No one taxed goods (in any meaningful way) on their way out since that made them relatively more expensive where they were sold since mercantile policy demand high tariff son incoming non-national goods anyways.

I don't know that that answer really helps much.

 

[unmerged(2833)]

Hmmm, is there a way to adjust cost of sending merchants?

 

[Savant]

Yes it helps, though not exactly

the answer I wanted to hear.

So, all in all:

1. trade is overstated

Adjustment of (1) goods.csv and (2) trade.csv can be used to reduce (1) value of COTs and (2) net trade from merchants in this regard.

2. infra effeiciencies vary widely between nations

The infrastructure tech settings can be used to refkect this. Several folks are editing events and this could be included for some nations to boost their infrastructure beyond random and monarch bonuses

The major problem is what you conclude:

Trade accounts for far too much governmental revenue. Even among the highly commerical English trade was still a much smaller factor than infrastructure (which I'm using as a gauge of the excise). Too much of the game can turn on the domination of a CoT producing insane cash flows. Trade was sort of like "bonus" money for the English and Dutch that gave them the edge over non-commerical powers like Austria or as the era went on Spain. I would do three things: lower the overall value of trade, lower the cost of placing merchants (else with lower trade avlues why use them) and adjust the research figures downward to reflect the lower trade values.

That is, I don't know of a way to minimize the benefit of trade without making it a "cost". As you intimated, the issue is the cost of merchants relative to returns in the COTs. The problem Cunctator's original settings had here are going to be revisited if COTs (goods.csv) and trade efficiencies (trade.csv) are set too low.

Also, the need is to maintain a balance such that minors are not disenfranchised 20 years into the game. A pacific minor surrounded by friendly majors should thrive, not face repeated instances of bankruptcy. As it is, trade is essential to minors being viable and less so for majors. Majors can draw on sheer size to capitalize on infra whereas minors require the trade to sustain themselves as viable political entities.

So we may have to "live with" some economic imbalance where trade plays a greater role than it actually did - especially with respect to majors. One alternative is to also lower the starting trade tech levels of majors and have them "catch-up" to minors so that minors enjoy a period of less fierce competition except among themselves.

Other opinions?

 

[Savant]

State -

I'm getting a "run time error" "76" (path not found) when I try to run autosave. I have IE 5.5 with latest updates.

I'll try it on other machines in the meantime.

 

[Savant]

This would be nice

Hmmm, is there a way to adjust cost of sending merchants?

But I don't know of a way to do this. Need to look again at the files as maybe text.csv or 1492.inc has some of this?

 

[Savant]

Text.csv is no good for merchants

But 1492_IGC.inc may be.

Here is a snip from 1492:

## Kalmar -
country = {
tag = SWE
ai = "sweden.ai"
colonialattempts = 0
colonialnation = no
major = no
colonists = 0.000000
cancelledloans = 0
extendedloans = 0
treasury = 500.000000
inflation = 0.000000
merchants = 2.083333

The "merchants =" line may be frequency or cost - unknown. The values range from 0.00000 to 6+. Often, there are decimals like 6.08, suggesting a multiplier? Anyone up to tooling with their merchant setting to see what happens?

 

[State Machine]

Savant

merchants =

I've always assumed that to be a frequency, but never fooled with it.

There is also a "beaurocracy = " tag I've seen in save files.

"run time error" "76" (path not found)

I'll look into this straight away. One thing that is not in the tool is any kind of error checking.