Economic Rules Overview

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Overview

Each month you will receive an income. This income can either be saved, or spent during the month. Many orders can be submitted at any time. The cost will be deducted when executed. There are some orders allowed only at month end, these will be deducted at that time. Each month maintenance is charged for your programs, buildings, operations, etc. Be sure to leave enough cash on hand at the end of the month.

Unit of Measure

The standard monetary unit of measure is the "MU" or "monetary unit". This is an abstract value and it is not translatable into any real-world monetary system. You cannot say that 1 MU is worth 50,000,000 1930 dollars or anything like that. You can consider it like blue, red, and white chips in a friendly poker game…they do not represent real money but can keep track of who is winning.

GNP and Economic Growth

In the Timelines world nations start in a narrower range of development…this is due to the wars and other past history. European and North American nations do have a small advantage, but it assumed that there was a broader spread of improvements and knowledge in this timeline also.

In Timelines, much of the growth in GNP will come as a result of increasing advancement levels, developing new infrastructure, and increases in trade. GNP growth will reverse if these advancements. levels, and trade are disrupted by war or other factors.

New infrastructure, new economic cooperation, new research, and new advancements will many times lead to a new income item. These items will be on your report with a dollar amount where appropriate. Not all advancments result in income, in fact many will result in increased maintenance costs (particularly social programs and the like).

Players should expect to grow their own GNP through levelling up in various technologies and economic advancement areas. The most growth will occur when a nation reaches a given level in every listed category of economic activity (law, heavy industry, politics, shipping, etc).

In Timelines, unspecified subjective GNP growth or retraction does occur but it should not expected or be taken for granted. Subjective GNP growth is granted by the GM for active and consistent economic role-play play and creativity. Subjective GNP decreases and increases can also occur due to the global or regional economic climate. If all the players in your region forget to submit any orders for a few months, your region could get sick even if you play well. Such a situation might call for negotiations, appeals, diplomatic or economic threats, or even war.

Trade

See main article Trade
Nations can gain additional income by engaging in international trade with player, or non-player nations.

Natural Advantages

Some nations have natural advantages…fertile farm lands, special resources, geographic positioning. Likewise, some have limitations of the opposite sort. It is assumed at the start that your nation is not taking full advantage of these resources. Whether or not they come into play depends on how the players use and develop them.

Economic Advancement

See main article Advancements
Nations can improve their infrastructure to improve their economies by investing in research and economic projects.

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