Economical Union

Hello everyone,

As the wages raised to 130 BEF yesterday, I think it's impossible to make profits anymore. And that's the point of having companies, no ? That's why I propose to create an economical union between the 9 people who offer jobs on the markets.
(Jofroi, Ward De Bever, xironn, Fhaemita Malodorous, Manekemaan, shadowukcs, Kabouter Wesley, Archoz and Critically )

I propose to have all the same wages. I thought of something like 100 BEF, that's a fair amount for the employers and the employees to buy food/weapons/etc. etc.

-Critically

I would like to do this. But, remember we have tried this before, some apparently don't have problems with making just no profit or only a little bit of profit. Recently i was forced to put the wages up to 125BEF because WDB raised the wages by 15BEF over night. Which caused me a loss of workers. All of a sudden i was forced to buy WRM and FRM just to keep production going. I'm self sufficient for my production of food and weapons. This was a big investment from my side, which unfortunately will take about 700days to earn back at the current rates for workers.

^ I agree. I'm sorry, but with the wages WDB and jofroi are offering, I'm not going along.

Don't care, I pay my workers with weapons.

It's called a competitive market, and you're gonna have to put up with it as there really isn't a way of stopping it besides several of you dropping out or a babyboom occurring.

I agree with this economical union

Higher wages are good for employee purchase power.
Trying to restrict wages won't work as long as one employer doesn't participate. I see xironn complaining, but he's the only one that prevents me to lower public wages to 110.6 BEF.

Ward De Bever wrote:Trying to restrict wages won't work as long as one employer doesn't participate.

^that.

If you guys all decide to offer 100BEF wages, all someone else has to do is offer 100.01 and they will get 100% of job-seekers with no competition. You guys will then realize that you won't get a single employee if you stay in the union and the whole idea dies within a day of that guy turning up.

The chance that this will last more than a few days is pretty much 0.

Medrolke 2 wrote:

Ward De Bever wrote:Trying to restrict wages won't work as long as one employer doesn't participate.

^that.

If you guys all decide to offer 100BEF wages, all someone else has to do is offer 100.01 and they will get 100% of job-seekers with no competition. You guys will then realize that you won't get a single employee if you stay in the union and the whole idea dies within a day of that guy turning up.

The chance that this will last more than a few days is pretty much 0.

if we can make it the job of the minister of economy to send them a message and try to get them aboard, this could work. The market in eBE isn't big. Far from even. it's always the same ppl offering jobs

If we all set our wages to 100 BEF, every time you open the job market, a random player (from the pool that offers 100 BEF) will appear on top (just like with offers on the MM). Seems fair imo. Let chance decide.

On top of that we make a topic here where player can report violators to the MoE. I'm not saying we can force anyone, but the MoE can have a chat with that person and see if he can step in in our little union here.

shadowukcs wrote:On top of that we make a topic here where player can report violators to the MoE. I'm not saying we can force anyone, but the MoE can have a chat with that person and see if he can step in in our little union here.

Lol: Shadow for MoE (can someone take this serious? i hope i'm not the only one laughing)

count me in!

Ward De Bever wrote:

shadowukcs wrote:On top of that we make a topic here where player can report violators to the MoE. I'm not saying we can force anyone, but the MoE can have a chat with that person and see if he can step in in our little union here.

Lol: Shadow for MoE (can someone take this serious? i hope i'm not the only one laughing)

noty, I was offered the job but I refused.

Besides, it's funny how you consider yourself a minister of economics when all you really are is a national accountant that makes a googlesheet that's only being read properly by you and Jofroi

A wage cartel would work like the Congress gold donations... those who participate will lose money while those who don't will reap free benefits.

Still nobody laughing? I'm flat on the ground meanwhile.

Ward De Bever wrote:A wage cartel would work like the Congress gold donations... those who participate will lose money while those who don't will reap free benefits.

it could work now too. As it is today, the employees market is dominated by 10 players max. Get them all in on this and it works.

Ward De Bever wrote:Still nobody laughing? I'm flat on the ground meanwhile.

glad you're laughing, Ward. I was beginning to wonder if you where capable of it.


Either way, if Ward can put his cynicism away and the rest wants to be in on this, then this can deffo work.

Medrolke 2 wrote:
If you guys all decide to offer 100BEF wages, all someone else has to do is offer 100.01 and they will get 100% of job-seekers with no competition. You guys will then realize that you won't get a single employee if you stay in the union and the whole idea dies within a day of that guy turning up.

The number of people you can take is limited.
You can only have 5 people in your company, so if one person offer 100.01 the damage is still very limited.

I just think it's interesting that IRL, people find it disgusting that the gap between rich and poor is increasing, but here, we get people publicly asking the government to sponsor a program specifically designed to make the rich business owners richer at the expense of the poorer people who rely on their wages.

Also, the markets are connected. If you lower wages, the prices of products will just lower until you are making roughly the same amount of profit that you are making now. The problem isn't simply high wages, it's an over competitive market and a lack of workers. This is an attempt to cure the symptoms, not the problem.

Medrolke 2 wrote:I just think it's interesting that IRL, people find it disgusting that the gap between rich and poor is increasing, but here, we get people publicly asking the government to sponsor a program specifically designed to make the rich business owners richer at the expense of the poorer people who rely on their wages.

Also, the markets are connected. If you lower wages, the prices of products will just lower until you are making roughly the same amount of profit that you are making now. The problem isn't simply high wages, it's an over competitive market and a lack of workers. This is an attempt to cure the symptoms, not the problem.

not really. This isn't a program to make ppl rich. f***, if it was about rich, I'd be saying we should set the wages to 80 BEF or something. No, 100 BEF if a fair price considering the fluctuating markets on WRM (who can be 0,37 and a few hours later 0,46 BEF) to make some small profit and have a chance of earning back your investement.

with the wages that are currently offered, GM's make 1BEF profit per day per employee. You tell me how you are going to pay back a 35G investment that way ?(i did the math, it would take 72 years (!!) before you have a return on investment from a Q5 RM company) ... and actually there are some here who aren't making profit at all in their WRM but use the profit they make from tanks to compensate their loss in WRM.

A simple business owner who doesn't own a Q5 tank company, cannot compete against that.

This isn't about making the rich richer, far from. this is about setting a honest wage that benefits both company manager and employee. 100BEF is such an equilibrium in my opinion.

No matter how you look at it, that is what this does. It increases the profits of the GMs (making the rich richer) and lowers the wages of the workers (making the poor poorer). I'm not saying your in the wrong for doing it, or that it is remotely unfair, I'm just saying that I find it an interesting situation.

The main point of my post was that it "is an attempt to cure the symptoms, not the problem".

The problem is that Belgium is simply too small to sustain the amount of companies we currently have. Therefore, unless some people close down or move, you won't be able to make a decent profit here.

Do like me, find some slaves that you pay 1 BEF. Then u don't have to mind for the others :p.

Anyway, with company manager feature, you get a lot of money when you work for yourself.

And the investment doesn't have to be only for profit, you can decide to open companies and use them generously to help other people. The BCP communes are an example of that.

I'm in favor of the freedom of the product market (maybe not 100% for the MM, but that's another problem). I think that offers and demand rules should lead to an equilibrated market.

EDIT: And I agree with Meldroke: Offers and Demand also apply to the number of workers available on the market.

shadowukcs wrote:Either way, if Ward can put his cynicism away and the rest wants to be in on this, then this can deffo work.

My/our ideology calls for high employee purchasing power... it's our/my own special project, see?

Btw, Shad would make a great MoE: I would laugh even more with him than he laughs with me now

Medrolke 2 wrote:No matter how you look at it, that is what this does. It increases the profits of the GMs (making the rich richer) and lowers the wages of the workers (making the poor poorer). I'm not saying your in the wrong for doing it, or that it is remotely unfair, I'm just saying that I find it an interesting situation.

The main point of my post was that it "is an attempt to cure the symptoms, not the problem".

The problem is that Belgium is simply too small to sustain the amount of companies we currently have. Therefore, unless some people close down or move, you won't be able to make a decent profit here.

you speak of profit, but what profit are you talking about? You can only make profit once you've paid back your investment. Like I said earlier, at the current wages that takes 72 years. So no, these kinds of wages don't make the rich richer.

Ward De Bever wrote:Btw, Shad would make a great MoE: I would laugh even more with him than he laughs with me now

I'd be temped to apply then.

shadowukcs wrote:

Medrolke 2 wrote:No matter how you look at it, that is what this does. It increases the profits of the GMs (making the rich richer) and lowers the wages of the workers (making the poor poorer). I'm not saying your in the wrong for doing it, or that it is remotely unfair, I'm just saying that I find it an interesting situation.

The main point of my post was that it "is an attempt to cure the symptoms, not the problem".

The problem is that Belgium is simply too small to sustain the amount of companies we currently have. Therefore, unless some people close down or move, you won't be able to make a decent profit here.

you speak of profit, but what profit are you talking about? You can only make profit once you've paid back your investment. Like I said earlier, at the current wages that takes 72 years. So no, these kinds of wages don't make the rich richer.

Profit is the amount of money a company makes from selling it's products after it has paid all it's expenses (labour, RMs, Taxes etc.), often referred to as Net Profit. What your talking about is the return on an investment, which is the amount of money you receive from an investment after the amount you originally invested has been paid back.

Medrolke 2 wrote:

shadowukcs wrote:

Medrolke 2 wrote:No matter how you look at it, that is what this does. It increases the profits of the GMs (making the rich richer) and lowers the wages of the workers (making the poor poorer). I'm not saying your in the wrong for doing it, or that it is remotely unfair, I'm just saying that I find it an interesting situation.

The main point of my post was that it "is an attempt to cure the symptoms, not the problem".

The problem is that Belgium is simply too small to sustain the amount of companies we currently have. Therefore, unless some people close down or move, you won't be able to make a decent profit here.

you speak of profit, but what profit are you talking about? You can only make profit once you've paid back your investment. Like I said earlier, at the current wages that takes 72 years. So no, these kinds of wages don't make the rich richer.

Profit is the amount of money a company makes from selling it's products after it has paid all it's expenses (labour, RMs, Taxes etc.), often referred to as Net Profit. What your talking about is the return on an investment, which is the amount of money you receive from an investment after the amount you originally invested has been paid back.

I kno, and unless your ROI hasn't been paid back, you're not *actually* making profit.

Simply the manager-work in a Q5 raws company (cost: 35 gold*750 BEF=26250 BEF) repays the investment in 198 days (350 daily FRM sold at 0.38 BEF=133 BEF/day) ... 198 days is less than seven months, far from 72 years ... and counting on average 4 employees who then bring in 12 BEF/day profit per FRM company, the payback time is 181 days, less than six months. Our calculations differ more than a factor 144

And by the way, you can always sell ur company if it's not a raw, or dismiss it if it's a raw. Actually your investment is already paid back. It's not very liquid, but still.

Jofroi wrote:And by the way, you can always sell ur company if it's not a raw, or dismiss it if it's a raw. Actually your investment is already paid back. It's not very liquid, but still.

you can dismiss for only half the price


and selling anything above Q2 in eBE is nearly impossible.

I do sell Q5 and I used to sell some Q4 also. With food it's pretty easy. Not with weapons.

Jofroi: Shad meant the selling of Q3+ companies I think.

What about the wage cartel? I think wages of 130 BEF are better for employees than 100 BEF wages. I think in favour of the common good, not only the nine or ten managers here present.

Ward De Bever wrote:Jofroi: Shad meant the selling of Q3+ companies I think.

What about the wage cartel? I think wages of 130 BEF are better for employees than 100 BEF wages. I think in favour of the common good, not only the nine or ten managers here present.

at 130 BEF wages you can barely run a profit. This is deffo the case for newer players who often need to pay back a loan for their company as well.

Medrolke 2 wrote:I just think it's interesting that IRL, people find it disgusting that the gap between rich and poor is increasing, but here, we get people publicly asking the government to sponsor a program specifically designed to make the rich business owners richer at the expense of the poorer people who rely on their wages.

I don't agree with this it is even the other way around.
Keeping the wages high keeps the rich becoming richer seeing they are the only ones to have high Q companies and the only one who can offer jobs. There is a small group of people who can offer jobs with their companies and keeping the wages high keeps too many other people from offering jobs on the job market. Lower wages mean that more people can offer jobs and the poorer are also able to make people work for them and make a profit. I know the number of citizens/employees is limited but it still gives the smaller guy a chance.

These high wages are making it impossible for people who are interested in the economical/financial side of the game of running business a chance to do so.

Fhaemita Malodorous wrote:

Medrolke 2 wrote:I just think it's interesting that IRL, people find it disgusting that the gap between rich and poor is increasing, but here, we get people publicly asking the government to sponsor a program specifically designed to make the rich business owners richer at the expense of the poorer people who rely on their wages.

I don't agree with this it is even the other way around.
Keeping the wages high keeps the rich becoming richer seeing they are the only ones to have high Q companies and the only one who can offer jobs. There is a small group of people who can offer jobs with their companies and keeping the wages high keeps too many other people from offering jobs on the job market. Lower wages mean that more people can offer jobs and the poorer are also able to make people work for them and make a profit. I know the number of citizens/employees is limited but it still gives the smaller guy a chance.

These high wages are making it impossible for people who are interested in the economical/financial side of the game of running business a chance to do so.

I learned something from Chutley: to think like a caveman. In this "primitive" view, higher wages make poor employees richer and rich employers poorer. Political choices must be made: ULA and Bever Dams consistently choose for higher wages, since most people prefer a net paycheck of 117 BEF (130 BEF gross) over one of 90 BEF (100 BEF gross).
I'm afraid that putting it to a Congress vote wouldn't help and the Supreme Court would probably declare itself incompetent on the matter.