As you all know I am not currently involved with any micronation, however an economic simulation for micronations has been and is of interest to me. Therefore I wish to put in a few comments – if I may be so permitted.
Some definitions are in order so that all involved will understand the effort to simulate an economy. If you do not like the definitions presented here I suggest that you find others that can be universally accepted among the micronations which are a part of this effort.
Definition: Economy – An economy is the way a country produces, distributes, and consumes its wealth.
Economic decisions are how to produce, distribute and consume.
There are three basic types of economies –
1. Traditional :
People make economic decisions according to custom.
2. Command:
The government usually owns or controls the resources and makes most economic decisions.
3. Market:
Most resources belong to private individuals who make their own economic decisions with the guidance of the market prices.
Many political systems have a blend of these three basic types of economic systems and would therefore be called mixed economies.
Definition: Resources – The basic elements used to produce goods and services.
There are three basic kinds of resources –
1. Human:
This means the people and includes such things as their knowledge, talents, education, skills, abilities, labor and management.
2. Natural:
This means the raw materials that are used by people to produce goods and services. These include such things as minerals, coal, timber, air, water, grass, fish and other food – and the one item that perhaps will be the most important in an economic simulation – time.
3. Capital:
These are the items that are produced by combining human and natural resources. Such things as machinery, factories, tools, infrastructure, buildings etc. are included.
There are three basic questions that must be addressed in any economy.
1. What goods and services should be produced?
2. How should those goods and services be produced?
3. Who should receive those goods and services?
1 – What goods and services should be produced?
In a simulation you will need a method for producing the real life factors that drive an economy.
You will need to set up a method that produces scarcity. Scarcity is the inability to satisfy all of everyone’s wants and needs.
If every person or indeed every micronation had every resource available in the quantity needed the simulation would break down quickly. If every micronation had the human resources needed to develop their natural resources into capital goods there would be no need to have immigration for work purposes.
I therefore suggest the first step is a natural resource map with all the micronations which wish to be involved. There of course can be other nations on the map that are not involved right now and even more micronations added to the map later. The main point in having the map is that all the natural resources must not available in every nation and the map must be respected by all.
There must be a method to add, basically discover, new resources or additional supplies of natural resources.
2 - How should those goods and services be produced?
The issue of territory belonging to or being under the control of individuals or governments is not foreign to micronations. This is basically a property rights issue and for the most part is well recognized in micronations for the simulation of land ownership. The possibility of disputes and lawsuits are a part of the game that can make some of this aspect interesting and fun. There can be the sale and registration of land deeds etc. along with accompany legislation.
The real in-depth aspect of this is the production level. Perhaps there should be a general agreement that only a certain number of hours can be said to produce goods and services. A given individual might be allotted up to a certain number of hours and those hours said to produce a certain quality of goods under given circumstances.
Perhaps the total time allotted is 112 hours per week or perhaps another number. Perhaps those who are elected or serve in a government office must spend a given amount of their work hours in the performance of their government duties at a salary set by legislation.
Perhaps the hours allowed to use their human resource in conjunction with natural resources to produce capital resources for sale is limited by other factors such as a predetermined ability or access to machinery. Perhaps their productivity will be limited by their purchase of food and the quality of their shelter along with the land they own and the natural resources on it according to the natural resource map.
And perhaps the production level can be increased with the purchase of machinery that is produced by yet another person.
The main idea here is that time and ability are resources that must be scarce. If a person has all the time and ability along with the natural resources there is no need to have economic activity with others.
3 - Who should receive those goods and services?
This will be a function of which basic type of economy is set up in each micronation. Each one could set up a different internal type of economy for the production of goods and services and yet there can be inter-micronational trade.
The mechanism for setting this up would be a banking system in each micronation along with a currency exchange mechanism. Everyone here knows who to go to for a foreign exchange method. However, one million units of currency per micronation, IMHO, will soon become too small if the population grows to any size. But I do think one million is a figure that can be worked with for some time yet.
The trick on this part will be to set up yet another aspect of real life economies, that being need. Perhaps there can be a sort of economic race – who has the largest and most government buildings. Who has the largest homes and most paved roads – which micronation has the most luxury items per citizen – set up both a minimum requirement and a record to keep track of which micronation is the most developed based on the overall wealth.
Don’t allow people or micronations to simply declare they own such and such but require a certain amount of raw goods must be produced (mined, harvested, caught) by a certain amount of labor – in order to produce a given capital good.
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Every needed detail is not in the document above but the outline is there. You can reject it or use any part of it you want. You can change any part of it you want.
Austi Scot
austi_scot@hotmail.com
ICQ 94954489
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