Commonwealth idea

[Malliki]

It's illegal to move Erbs out of the country at the moment. If that was lifted, perhaps all foreigners would have to register their accounts in Shirekeep? That way, it wouldn't affect Landsraad voting.

[Andreas the Wise]

Wait - clarification:
If we let other nations use and earn erb, are we assuming said erb would count towards votes in their national assembly or only in Shireroth?

[Oroigawa Koreyasu]

I'm very uneasy about unified currencies and economies. They just don't work. It's too easy to break without a bunch of regulations and taxes and whatnot. Too much work...

[Andreas the Wise]

Why not a unified something else, like a Commonwealth games, or unified story telling etc ...

[Oroigawa Koreyasu]

Those are entirely acceptable ideas, but unifying currencies, in Shireroth, implies involving politics in the whole deal, which is entirely unacceptable. Cultural exchange, as this idea seemed to initially imply, seems a very plausible, exciting, and pleasing idea.

[Erik Mortis]

It would be one pool of funds used between member nations, all citizens would have accounts in the central bank. Only those funds in accounts connected to a duchy in Shireroth would count toward the Landsraad votes. If the account is registered to a nation other then SHireroth, they would not be counted.

My account would/is registered to Brookshire, Shireroth. John Bigbute could be registered to MooseLand, MyNation. Thus the funds in his accounts are not counted on the Landsraad Summary Page that would be created.

Nations would still tax their citizens as they please, for the accounts registered to their nations. And it would be up to those nations to enforce their tax laws accordingly, and deal with evasion by their laws.

If I'm a cit of Shireroth and MyNation, then I could in theory have an account registered to either nation, or one for both, to keep my finances in order.

The Landsraad would only count accounts registered to a Duchy in Shireroth. If a non-citizen registers an account, that is a matter for the Judex/MiniTrade. As such, other countries would not be controlling votes in the Landsraad.

1 Central bank/database for many nations. 1 currency, called different things by different nations, but still just known as numbers to the bank, which doesn't care what you call it. It's just funds. No Exchange Rates.

Think of it like the Euro. (we already use the symbol hehe)

Shireroth politics are still separate and individual of other nations.

[Andreas the Wise]

I'm not sure you see my point. If I'm a citizen in many nations, and all give me money to start off, and I choose to move that all to Shireroth, then my voting power is disproportionate here. The problem is compounded if the funds are worth votes in other nations as well (as then I could move funds to wherever I needed to stack a vote). A tax on transferring funds does make this slightly more difficult, but also limits international transactions which is the only point of having a united currency. And even if there was a tax, if funds were worth Votes here and nobody else, I don't doubt that people in the commonwealth who are also Shirithians will park most or all funds here, even if there is a 2% transfer tax or something. If we only have one bank account, then you don't even have the tax option.

[Erik Mortis]

Then this is what we get for binding our money to a vote. I once again have no solution.

The fact remains we need a wider base of people to get a proper economy going. Having other nations join is just one way to get those people. Recruitment is the other.

[Andreas the Wise]

Erik ... you do realise we have nigh on 25 people here, which is a far wider base than any other micronational economy has ....

[Oroigawa Koreyasu]

Shall I do more recruiting, then? Last time I did so it brought in quite a few people (although, only Gil visits regularly anymore, and that's only every once in a while...)

[Andreas the Wise]

Keep those you brought on first ... (I was counting them in the 25)

[Oroigawa Koreyasu]

I'll yell at Gil about them...

[Erik Mortis]

Yes... we need more. 25 people.. of whom how many are active in the economy?

[Jonas]

Batavia had a working economy, but it collapsed partly because there weren't much products (and there weren't much products, because we couldn't sell it to more then 5 people* and you didn't earned much).
If we use a unified bank (which each nation using another name for their currency, so noboddy feels discriminated) there are more people, and a more interesting market.

I'm pro a unified market and bank but then the bank will need some changes. Our current bank has the advantage you can see a list with the bank accounts (with the amount of money) of the bank accounts, you can see the amount of person accounts but to protect the privacy the name isn't noted with the money. Company accounts are on the list with name and the amount of money. I hope that the central bank will make a difference between company and person accounts.
Next to that I hope their is the possibility to integrate our automated stock system that gives the value of the stocks (it isn't needed that every nations has this).


*: We have more active citizens, but not everyone buys and sells things.

[Erik Mortis]

I'm still working on the company stuff.

I just got an idea!

[Jonas]

I'm still working on the company stuff.

I just got an idea!

In the unified bank... could you add a summary where we can see the amount of money the nations have (just like the duchies now)?

[Erik Mortis]

Easy. Basically the same code.

But as it stands, this idea doesn't appear to be wanted. So, I will not be implementing it.

[Jonas]

Easy. Basically the same code.

But as it stands, this idea doesn't appear to be wanted. So, I will not be implementing it.

Idea?


I'm talking with the Batavian people about the economic ideas (unified bank). Most people are worried to lose their currency, I'm trying to persuade them that we still have our currency if we use this system.

The people are interested. There were even some ideas like creating an administrative capital of the commonwealth where Batavian, Bosworthian and Shirerithian borders meet. Batavia could claim a little bit more land and give the area a special status (I think everyone agrees we will not using the same colour on the MCS-map). I'm from the opinion this capital needs to be a symbol and not used as political, cultural,... capital (maybe a place where in times of war the Commonwealth generals can meet each other).

The states that are member of the beginning could have each a special competence. Shireroth has the bank, Batavia is the place where the representatives meet most of the time (but other nations could ask to hold a meeting on their forum too). And if Novatainia wants to work with us, it can have the administrative competence (treaties are archived there, history and culture of all member states are collected there,...).

And we need a head of the commonwealth. This could be the kaiser, with the risk that other member states feel discriminated (grmbl ). Or each month (or each three or two months) changing from president, this man or woman is the head of a member state and each time it's another nations time to play head of the commonwealth.
Another idea, my idea in fact, is that we elect the president each six months. And we chose for a sort of American elections. Every member state can have several candidates, the candidates need to visit each member state to get the support of the people that are living there. These campagnes, because it doesn't happen very often and normally has more candidates then when you use this system in a single nation, bring activity. Next to that we learn to know the candidates of other states and thanks to that we will know more about their nation.
To avoid that one state can chose the president every nation has a number of votes in the elections. Nation A has 3 votes (which is 30%), nation B has 5 votes (50%) and nation C has 2 votes (20%).
Every nation counts the vote for the candidates, after this they make a total. The commonwealth election comité counts the votes of the states together but looks to how much they count (1 vote in nation A isn't the same as one vote in nation B).
I know it's a system that use democracy and is maybe a little bit complicated, but I want to make a coloured map with a summary of the states and which state support who.

[Ari Rahikkala]

Democracy in Shireroth: Just vote no!

*gtfos to sleep

[Andreas the Wise]

Unified currency could work, there are just problems with it in its current system. I could move Novatainia to it if there were a number of other nations that wanted, I just wonder how many that would be in the Commonwealth will want united currency. (besides, Novatainians love their posting money ... I changed a way from a post-based and had to keep in a credit system earnt by posting to keep people happy).

But not democracy. Don't vote in a president.

[Malliki]

This moves too much towards a supra-national system. I think we should keep this treaty based with all the nations essentially equal, without any superstructures. That is a slippery slope towards federalism. Shireroth, Batavia, Novatainia and whatever other nations there are just have a common economy, like a free trade area IRL. No elected or appointed officials are needed. All issues are settled at the minister level or, in the case of more fundamental things, the heads of state.

[Erik Mortis]

The CommonWealth of Benacia! Take...err.. 3? 4?

or Benacian Commonwealth.. whatever. It has historic roots, in that it's been tried before, with moderate success.

We could make a commonwealth with several components, and nations can take or leave those parts as they wish. So you can be in the commonwealth, but don't have to unite with the economy. But can still take part in the.. unified football league.. or.. the cultural exchange programs.. or.. the art appreciation programs.. or .. whatever we make.

But yes. Are we really serious about this all? I'm a little confused where we stand on it. Do we want it, but need to figure out how to deal with the impact on our voting system? And how to distribute the money fairly, and take into account the money people already have? (one time exchange rate)..etc

[Andreas the Wise]

I'm still against unifying currency. Better is to work out a way of trading that allows us to buy things off eachother without giving foreigners control of erb.

I´m much more interested from the history/culture side, which is, I think, what Jacobus originally proposed ...

Right, different tack. Who would be in such a commonwealth? Novatainia and Batavie have expressed interest. Should we find the other nations that either are:
Interested or
Occupy ex-Shirithian land
and go from there?

[Oroigawa Koreyasu]

Toketi owns Lac Glacei, but I'd be wary to put it to them. Don't know how they'll take it...

[Erik Mortis]

That's the thing. They wouldn't be controlling Erb. Any more then we would be controlling their currency.

We'll find a way to make it not interfere with the voting system.

And the bank is already to be able to handle other nations on it. At least the framework. but I can't test it without taking down the current bank. I have to rewrite the table names and some of the field names, which the current version can't deal with.

But yes. We can start with just a commonwealth without the unified currency. But that is one of the things I will be striving for.

[Jacobus Loki]

I'm still not here, but,

I'm all for making the Erb an international currency. There are countries that use the US Dollar, and Panama uses it and calls it the Balboa. There are countries that uses the Euro, but aren't in the E.U..

The best way to make it not interfere with the Landsraad is to scrap the silly "erbs are votes" system. Then it won't matter.

One Duke, One Vote!

[Andreas the Wise]

It´s not too difficult to arrange that non-citizens can still use erb to buy stuff in Shireroth (and vice versa). It just requires one or two money lenders (a private enterprise solution).

Eg. Nicholas wants to commission an image from Scott. He needs 60 erb. I have plenty of erb, and he has plenty of CITRA points. We negotiate and agree a price of 100 CITRA points. He pays me the 100 points, I pay Scott the erb, and Nick gets the image. Essentially, as long as we can advertise on the other forums well enough (yet another business opportunity), finding someone to transfer money between erb and CITRA (at the present time at least, when me, Prodigy, Bayen and Corey all have 2000 + erb and around 50 000 CITRA points) isn´t too hard. It could work similarly in reverse, and also with other economies.

[Malliki]

I thought a point was to not have exchange rates. If 1 Erb = 1 CITRA point, no exchange is needed. The bank treats them the same way. If you have 10 CITRA points, you can transfer them to an account in Shirekeep and have 10 Erb.

[Erik Mortis]

I'm still not entirely convinced there is a unsolvable problem with sharing a currency and having the voting system we have. A simple solution is to ban duel citizenship. Another solution is to just make laws that would prohibit moving money in a way that would cause problems. We have the logs... we'd notice a large enough movement of money to throw off the scales. Just put extradition in the commonwealth charter, and some economic safeguards in the Economy Treaty part of the commonwealth, that said nations would respect this law and that in regard to the economy.

Or... just wait till a problem arises and deal with it. patch the hole and move along.

Right now an account can only be registered to a single country in the next version of the bank. If someone isn't a cit there money isn't counted on the Duchy Summary Page. If some nation moved money into one of our duchies.. well... 1. We have the Kaiser. 2. We have their money. I see no REAL risk. The Kaiser is the ultimate safeguard against outside tampering. He can't be a duel cit. And even if he's not around, we have the Steward. And even if THOSE systems fail.. we have.. other systems to fall back on.. like.. rebellion.

[Andreas the Wise]

I thought a point was to not have exchange rates. If 1 Erb = 1 CITRA point, no exchange is needed. The bank treats them the same way. If you have 10 CITRA points, you can transfer them to an account in Shirekeep and have 10 Erb.

Probably doesn't work. Since everyone's given 50 000 CITRA points on joining and they relate to the size of an army you can upkeep.

Yes, the point of a unified currency is to avoid exchange rates. It has significant voting and fraud faults. The alternative is you don't have set exchange rates - you have people with both currencies who will swap money for you. It creates another industry, and stops erb getting messed up.