Query: Balancing the budget?

[Woodcarver]

I'm currently running a big empire with "Limited War" economy and "Savings" plan. Most of my expenditures are research and military grants -- fleet maintenance is a tiny fraction of my empire's (huge) economy.

But the AI always overspends -- the deficit, and the interest payments, are constantly growing.

Why is this? The big expenses are the arbitrary ones -- research and military, which aren't forced in the way that maintenance costs are. Why does the AI continue to overspend? It doesn't seem to be a problem, since everything is going well, but I don't like it (in part, because I don't understand it).

Any ideas?

[Mithyk]

Your 'savings' plan is a direction for the planetary governors, telling them how to manage their planetary funds - has nothing to do with your imperial budget and spending.

[Woodcarver]

Originally posted by Mithyk
Your 'savings' plan is a direction for the planetary governors, telling them how to manage their planetary funds - has nothing to do with your imperial budget and spending.

Ah...so the planetary governors will "save" (and accumulate money) if I give them a directive to save. Will this impinge on their gifts to the empire? This would be consistent with what I see -- choosing "savings", if anything, seems to make my deficits worse.

Still no idea why the AI keeps overspending...

[Mithyk]

I don't think it will damage their gifts to empire, but it will slow your shipbuilding efforts and their planetary development - and their slower economic development means you get less money from them in taxes.

If research and military expenses are the problem, just move over to your grants sliders and reduce them. Grants are optional expenses, divied out to a limited number of planets from the imperial funds for local development, research and shipbuilding.

An old rule of thimb that MoO3 lives by: money given to the federal government then making its way back down to the planets is inefficient and gets lost (a certain percentage of your grant money never finds its way to the folks it is intended for, but disappears into the Pockets of administrators and such) - when the majority of your planets need money to develop, reduce your imperial taxes and don't bother with large grant funds: it is far more efficient to let the local planets keep and use their money than to take it then give it back.

Remember, each government works at a set optimal taxation rate - reducing imperial and system tax will allow the local governors to raise their planetary taxes, keep more money and develop the strength of the local economy - thereby giving your a stronger tax base and a better income in the long-run. Raising imperial taxes and raising grants is useful when you know you have a few low-development planets that need help.

[JosEPh]

Originally posted by Mithyk
... Grants are optional expenses, divied out to a limited number of planets from the imperial funds for local development, research and shipbuilding.

An old rule of thimb that MoO3 lives by: money given to the federal government then making its way back down to the planets is inefficient and gets lost (a certain percentage of your grant money never finds its way to the folks it is intended for, but disappears into the Pockets of administrators and such) - when the majority of your planets need money to develop, reduce your imperial taxes and don't bother with large grant funds: it is far more efficient to let the local planets keep and use their money than to take it then give it back.

Remember, each government works at a set optimal taxation rate - reducing imperial and system tax will allow the local governors to raise their planetary taxes, keep more money and develop the strength of the local economy - thereby giving your a stronger tax base and a better income in the long-run. Raising imperial taxes and raising grants is useful when you know you have a few low-development planets that need help.


So if I have unrest(cause is stated to be High taxes) and the planetary taxes are say 15% but Empire is10% and System is 4%, then its the Emp Taxes that are causing the unrest?

Also when in limited war or greater, Grants should be reduced to not hinder ship and defence productions?

If this is true could it be the cause for 'roy to want to build single grnd units instead of ships? Especially if planets production is 20+k or graeter?

Many ?'s I know, but seems that if true I've been running my Empire econ backwards. And may explain why with 221 planets I can only produce 1 armada a turn. I have most planets in game but am 3rd in techs and 4th in ship #'s out of 7 races. #1 in empire rating but at war with every one(not my chosing either).

[Mithyk]

Originally posted by JosEPh
So if I have unrest(cause is stated to be High taxes) and the planetary taxes are say 15% but Empire is10% and System is 4%, then its the Emp Taxes that are causing the unrest?

Could be either of them or the combined total. Each government type has a maximum imperial tax (thats the combined empire+system taxes being levied), a maximum planetary tax, and a maximum total tax load that the population will endure without getting upset - if any of those exceed the limits for your government type, unrest results.

Generally, despite popular rumor, your planetary Vic is competent at managing his taxes - as you raise imperial taxes, he will lower his planetary taxes, as you lower imperial taxes, he will raise his planetary taxes to make use of the maneuvering room you've given him - and when you manually reduce his planetary taxes, he will slowly raise them again to make use of any room he has within the 'total' allowed. Most of the time taxation issues are your fault - checkthat empire+system tax total, and check the 'total combined' tax limit. The only time I've seen planetary taxes be a legit issue is when the Vic is trying to achieve some goal - when you set his military or planetary development sliders high, he may raise local taxes in an effort to fund the production demands you've placed on his colony.

Take a look at this page on policies management (http://www.mithyk.com/stationprime/mng_empire.htm) I wrote up for Station Prime (I've never updated the site for the 1.25 patch, so some of this info there is a littel dated). Specifically, scroll down to the governments table and check out the listing for your empire's taxation pit - see if you are exceeding any of those limits.


Originally posted by JosEPh
Also when in limited war or greater, Grants should be reduced to not hinder ship and defence productions?

Imperial Taxes should be reduced (which generally requires that you drop your grant allocations if you want to avoid bankruptcy) - that leaves more money on the planets for the planetary governors to use. Remember that the more money they have available, the better they can drive the industry, research and agricultural infrastructure they've built. I use grants specifically when I need to help a few backward colonies - gather the money from across the empire and let it go to the most needy - generally when I want low-development planets to get a boost to their structures or planetary defense buildup quickly.

Originally posted by JosEPh
#1 in empire rating but at war with every one(not my chosing either).

Try installing the two diplomacy mods at moo3mods.com (http://www.moo3mods.com) in the AI mods section of teh downloads - some people say they have no effect, but I can say I'm 300 turns into my current game, all my diplomatic interactions make sense (their attitute matches their words) and the only wars I've been involved in are the ones that my allies have asked me to help them in (err, plus one ithkull empire, but that goes without saying) - plenty of minor border skirmishes with untreatied empires, but great relations once treaties have been established...

[JosEPh]

@Mithyk Thanks for the info-- gonna check it out!:up:

[DeckPrism]

I seem to recall a group in favor of 3% empire taxes, 1% system taxes, and 31% planetary taxes. This totals 35%.

Then there is another group in favor of 50% industry DEAs, 1 gov DEA, mining and farming deas only where they are most beneficial, and the rest research.

I have been doing both to good effect. Oh, and I stay on "balanced" spending.

[Mithyk]

Originally posted by DeckPrism
I seem to recall a group in favor of 3% empire taxes, 1% system taxes, and 31% planetary taxes. This totals 35%.

Again, depends on your government type - you just can't make general taxation rules like that. Some governments top out at 29% planetary taxes or 30% total taxes - go over either of those and unrest begins, go over both and cause yourself all kinds of hell. But the idea this shows, of the vast majority of your taxes going to the planets and taking for your imperial treasury only what you need, is a solid one.

Originally posted by DeckPrism
Then there is another group in favor of 50% industry DEAs, 1 gov DEA, mining and farming deas only where they are most beneficial, and the rest research.

I'm really not sure that could work - industry and research are just infrastructure - buildings and machines - money is required to make that infrastructure operate (produce production points and research points), and Agriculture and Mining facilities are THE single most powerful money generators - though I think recreation is useable as a money-generator now too. Worlds with massive industry and research and no money-generating DEAs to drive them would pretty much just sit and rot, nowhere near peak efficiency.

One government DEA on every world is a good general rule of thumb - although more than one will improve the way all the other DEAs produce - each additional government DEA has a markedly reduced effect when you stack them. The only time I use more than one, as a general rule, is on border worlds - the battle for an invaded planet ends when either all defending units are killed, OR when the last government DEA on the planet is captured - turns those border worlds into decent defensive fortresses.

[DeckPrism]

RE 50% industry, go argue with Beamup here:
http://www.ataricommunity.com/forums/showthread.php?s=&threadid=273336&perpage=30&pagenumber=10
In other words, read it and then see if your position needs reevaluating. It looked conclusive to me.

Fine, say 3% empire, 1% system, and the rest -4% to planetary. Then let Roy adjust as needed. Again, this has been debated in the strategy folder.

[Mithyk]

Originally posted by DeckPrism
RE 50% industry, go argue with Beamup here:
http://www.ataricommunity.com/forums/showthread.php?s=&threadid=273336&perpage=30&pagenumber=10
In other words, read it and then see if your position needs reevaluating. It looked conclusive to me.

I've seen it - great theory, but its doesn't bear playtesting. I started my MoO3 career with a set group of manufacturing worlds (based on my MoOII experience) - development plans and manual designs. Almost identical to what is described in those posts. Manufacturing worlds languish and suffer, despite the well-thought-out theories to the contrary. Obviously information is still missing.

Originally posted by DeckPrism
Fine, say 3% empire, 1% system, and the rest -4% to planetary. Then let Roy adjust as needed. Again, this has been debated in the strategy folder.

Hehe, well, since your VIC is going to adjust his planetary taxes to take advantage of any room you give him anyway, that happens automatically. The best policy is watch your expenses, tax enough to cover them (whether that means 2% or 3% or 10%) and let your Vics keep the rest for their planets - until you need grant cash to boost a few low-development worlds.

[DeckPrism]

@Mithyk
Since you only have a limited number of DEAs, and for every one you have working on mines or farms, it can't also be working on industry, what do you recommend both for different planet types as well as how you use them in your empire?

I thought the main point on the tax was to keep more at the planet avoiding the surcharge of it recirculating through the fed. This then gives the planets a boost which raises the overall amount they send to the fed, even though the % is lower. Consequently, they also need less from the fed since they've kept more. In other words, Roy will adust planetary taxes up to the point that your empire and system taxes let him, but it is better to let him keep more. But I'm realy more interested in your responce to my first pargraph.

[DavidByron]

An old rule of thimb that MoO3 lives by: money given to the federal government then making its way back down to the planets is inefficient

I dispute this rule of thumb. Although a 5% surcharge is mentioned and may even take place, the overall effect of a shift to imperial grants is to increase monies in my limited (but tested) experience... mostly on research grants. I gained about 4% by switching all my research to imperial grants.

It is possible that there is a 5% cut but this is combined with another effect which increases monies by about 9% - to make the net gain.

if I have unrest(cause is stated to be High taxes) and the planetary taxes are say 15% but Empire is10% and System is 4%, then its the Emp Taxes that are causing the unrest?

No, it is the total taxation rate that is used to calculate the unrest total. This number is reduced by the taxation threshold for the governmnet type (which is listed in the government type threads towards the end, and in the Unrest 101 thread wherever it got to).

It's something like 35% tax for most governments. 30% for Hive, 40% for Unification, Constitutional Monarchy is 37% and Republic is 30%. Think that's it....

Go above those listed amounts and you gain 12 unrest points per region per tax %. Push the tax rate further and that rate becomes 20 and then 40 unrest per taxation point. (The oppresometer is a flat 10 unrest per region per level by comparison, piracy is 1 pt per unpoliced region in the *system* per region)

Also when in limited war or greater, Grants should be reduced to not hinder ship and defence productions?

Military grants will increase production (duh) and the others will have no effect. In fact supposedly there is a penalty for not spending enough on the military grant in times of war - but I have not seen it, nor the reduction in delay box time that is suppose to happen with the war economies.

What might reduce production gradually is a high imperial tax rate, because your planetary viceroys will reduce planetary tax (gradually) to get the total taxation for that planet down (or up) to a happy level. That is - unless you uncheck the box that allows them to change the tax rate.

Each government type has a maximum imperial tax (thats the combined empire+system taxes being levied), a maximum planetary tax, and a maximum total tax load that the population will endure without getting upset - if any of those exceed the limits for your government type, unrest results.

The numbers that appear to be limits on system and planetary taxes in the data file are not limits. Only the total taxation (all 3 added together) effects unrest. The other 2 numbers in the data file indicate what percentage to begin the system and planetary taxes at the start of the game (turn 1).

I thought the main point on the tax was to keep more at the planet avoiding the surcharge of it recirculating through the fed

Try this test: start a game and hit "turn". Note down the total amount of cash you get with the preset tax rates (imperial income + homeplanet income - grant money). Then load turn one and increase the imperial tax rate and decrease the others by the same amount. I think you'll see more money, not less.

I have my imperial tax rate at 12% at the moment.

[JosEPh]

I guess I need to clarify--- when I said Grants I didnot mean res.,mil, or unrest; only the bottom slider. For example out of a 350K yearly budget 60-70K in both res. and mil., 20-40K in unrest (depends upon level of unrest because of oppressometer usage to clear pesky spies). But Bottom slider (can't remember it's name--Planets?) set at 140-150K. Empire taxes 10% System 4% planetary is usually in 13- 18% range. Government is Republic Race Evon.

Because of Mithyk's pointing out the Tax Tables to me, Republics total tax = 30. So 2 turns ago adjusted Empire tax to 8% and reduced bottom grant slider to Half what was prior.

One thing even before this that I noticed was that it was generally my more developed planets that recieved grant monies not my underdeveloped or newly settled. This seems to be in contrast to idea put forth about grant(bottom slider) monies. So gentlemen what have I misconstrued or failed to understand. I desparately want to win this Evon 1.2.5 game!

[Hyndis]

I tend to go with about a 5% imperial tax rate, balanced spending, and then 10% on each of the sliders for the main budget, and I get some pretty good results.

Newly settled planets get something like 50k in grants, and their GDP is only like 17, so they really get up and running fast! :eek:

Lately I've taken to stop funding the military budget, which helps save some money since only my major planets ought to produce things, not the little puny ones which are only settled because if I don't grab them, someone else might. And they produce a few testtubes as well.

Also, there is a 5% fee on tax transfers, which is located in the government datafile, so I just do a light tax to help out on research and planetary development on the smaller planets, and then let the big planets fund all projects themselves.

[JosEPh]

I to use Balanced spending, but when I reach about 300K I will switch to Spending till its reduced to about 130K. then I put it back on balanced. It generally starts to increase and when I get back up to that level--rinse and repeat.


Now about the sliders-- they are incremented- is each increment = to 10%? and they also go from green to red. As with the rest of the sliders in the game that use color, green is good & red is bad, yes? So what am getting at is if I keep all Imperial sliders at leading edge of 1st increment , all grants only getting about 10% each. This should increase my overall budget balance considerably. Now how do I use this surplus-- changing to Spending like I'm already doing?

Still taking suggestions and pulling info from these posts. Thanks to all who have posted! More info/suggestions are most welcome, i.e. keep it comin':up:

[Hyndis]

Usually if you just leave the sliders at 10%, along with about a 5-10% imperial tax (depending on how many new planets you want to subsidize), along with balanced spending, you ought to be fine and never need to touch the budget again.

And it seems more like the sliders are a ratio rather than any set percentage, because if I drop a slider, the other areas seem to get more money. Haven't bothered testing this, but again, the game pretty much runs itself. Heck, I can just hit end turn forever and never lose. :rolleyes:

[Specialist290]

BUMP.

Can't lose this little piece of financial advice.

[Smithy]

hrm, the experiences put forth in this thread are exactly the opposite of what i have noticed. when i increase empire taxes and decrease the planetary taxes, i notice an overall *decrease* in PPs/test tubes. thus, i always set my empire tax to 1% after about turn 5 (i let it stay at 5% for a few turns to get in the black) and system to 0%, stupid worthless tax. works great for me, and anytime i've tried switching taxes around -- 10% or so empire, and lower planet taxes -- my production and research numbers are significantly lower. sure, you might be getting a bit more out of your heavy duty planets using the military and grant sliders, but at significant cost to your smaller worlds.

the reason i dont use system tax is cuz usually the planet that gets the system seat is almost always gonna be a production-heavy planet, it doesnt need any help. i'd rather have that money stay on the smaller planets to help them develop/build faster. the 1% empire tax is plenty for the entire game -- it allows me to dump a bit into research/military/grants if i feel the need, and unrest when i jack up the O-meter to kill off spies.

only problem i have is every once in a while Roy will jack up the planet taxes just a little too much when he's really excited about a certain project, BUT that doesnt happen too often and is easily fixed. i find i have a *lot* fewer tax-related unrest problems with a high planet tax because ol' Roy has plenty of cashes for his projects, so its rare for him to exceed the limit.

[MisterPlow]

This is a fine example of the shocking perversion in this game.

If you actually try to be a macromanager, including using significant empire taxes, as the designers intended, you take a big efficiency hit. Because, you know, it's not enough to hand over control to a deranged AI, you also need to pay for the privilege.

The good thing about empire taxes is that you lose less real-life time managing with them. The downside, of course, is the waste. Apparently, before the game was released, they had a thing where the player could only take a certain number of actions per turn, with the rest being handled by the AI. The logic was, the player can only be in so many places at once. Apparently, it was dropped for its wild unpopularity. Go figure.

Now, in principle, maybe it's intriguing to make a game like that. But, damn it, it's a game, and reflecting some sort of bureaucratic reality is far less appealing than the opportunity to have my bugs dig holes all over the galaxy. Anyway, [/rant], I think this tax wastage is a holdover from that whole train of design thought.

[Smithy]

i'm not so sure the 'waste' is a bad thing, or a leftover feature. high empire taxes let you direct more money to a certain area at the cost (in lost AUs from money distribution) of less output in other areas. ie, you can jack up that military slider for more military production. however, if you left the planetary taxes higher instead, you'd get (arbitrary numbers here) 30% higher in development/research at a cost of 20% less production compared to a high military slider.

personally, i think its all about tradeoffs. i sure as heck dont run around to every planet and change the spending sliders, i let roy do that, and he actually does a pretty good job.

i use a ~50/50 industry/research DEA placement, and my fully developed planets are pumping out test tubes and PPs like they are going out of style. roy *seems* to spend AUs efficiently -- if the cost of overdriving the next level of industry is higher than the next level of research, he'll do research. which is just fine by me.

[MisterPlow]

I guess. I didn't mean it was a leftover feature in the accidental sense, but just that it was part of an overall design philosophy that was retained when other things were dropped, and that the waste made more sense when you really couldn't get around it. That is, the whole empire runs on this low-efficiency level except in the few places where you can & do take a personal interest. So, if you as emperor want to adjust things, you basically do it on the finance screen with the empire taxes, because that's the level where you have control.

But, with the ability to micro everything, to me the waste is just a pointless irritation. You already give up efficiency by macroing, just because you can plan better than the AI. If the designers wanted you to macro, then why punish you even more for doing it? Empire taxes could've made macroing great: what's simpler than putting all your planetary income in a big basket and portioning it out to smooth out the overdriving across planets? But, with the waste, it's a really bad idea to do that. Eh, only the designers know for sure, and they're not talking.