negative production numbers (advanced economy)

[Lützow]

How does it come that I have negative rates for certain products when I deallocate all labor points (put sliders to zero) for every of my provinces? Par example: for Prussia 1805 (1.09 patch) I get -1 iron, -3 timber and so on.

[morganbj]

Well, I assume you mean in the middle set of boxes.  I've never seen any in the top set that I can think of.
 
Those boxes indicate the projected change to the national pool of that resource, given the current settings of all the sliders for that resource.  You're most likely going to see negative numbers in wool and cotton.  If you are converting 12 textiles, you're consuming 48 wool, let's say, to do so.  If you're only producing 42 wool in all of your provinces, you'll see a -6 in the center box for wool.  That means that if you have 56 wool in your pool, you'll have 50 or so, at the beginning of next month.
 
Negative numbers for other resources are much, much smaller, usually -1 or -2, and are much rarer.  The only time I recall seeing them is when I start a new game.  I don't think I've seen them otherwise.  When a new game is started, all the sliders are put at a default position that produces next to nothing except food.  Iron will get 8 or 10%, or something, which nationally produces nothing, or next to nothing.  When production is very low, the vagaries of the system emerge.  I always tell players that the system has so many variables that you NEVER get exactly what you think you'll get, but it will be pretty close.
 
I think what happens is that through all the small adjustments that are made to the actual floating decimal numbers sometimes appear as negative numbers.  But, these are invariably close to zero.  One you get any real production going, they disappear forever.  That's all just my guess.  I've seen all the machinations the numbers go through, so it's easy to see how something like that can happen.
 
But, it could be something else.  I used to think that the Development Advisor screen was factoring in losses due to other things going on, like feudal limits, tax rate, NML, enemy units, etc.  But in the case of feudal limits, I don't think it is.  The other adjustments, it appears, are included in the screen.  When you add up all of the calculated resources using the formulas I've prepared, and compare those to the actual amounts that are found on the advisor screen, they match perfectly, except, of course, for feudal limit reductions.  Those seem to happen at the national level and not necessarily from any single province.  Well, the impact is as if it's done at the national level, anyway.  Now, while the Feudal limit adjustments may not be showing up for the provinces (the top boxes), they may very well be subtracted from the middle boxes which is the national pool change.  I hope that made sense.
 
So, except for wool and cotton, the negative numbers don't tell you much.  Once you get some real production going they should be gone.

[aprezto]

This isn't just the loss to fuedalism is it?
If you look at the economy report you can go to the resource production table, the bottom line is fuedalism, this depends on your fuedalism slider level, the higher the level, the more lost to keep the peasants happy.
 
Certainly Prussia in the 1792 scenario has a loss to fuedalism of 3 (specifically a listing of -3) of each resource - this includes textiles!! (in effect losing you 3x4 wool or cotton). You must overcome this amount to get anything accummulated.
 
I also note that this has impacted other areas. For instance I set up trade with Spain to gain more textiles but made the mistake of asking for both cotton and wool. Since I have no other income in cotton than trade, the amount I managed to get through trade simply went to the peasants... live and learn. In effect, my cotton income went from -3 to 0.

[Mus]

ORIGINAL: Lützow

How does it come that I have negative rates for certain products when I deallocate all labor points (put sliders to zero) for every of my provinces? Par example: for Prussia 1805 (1.09 patch) I get -1 iron, -3 timber and so on.

Nobles like to wear nice clothes, carry swords and other military implements made of iron, sit on furniture made of fine wood, etc.

[aprezto]

Mus, you are right, it'll be the nobles not the peasants. They might steal the food [:D]

[Mus]

BTW the loss is definetely from feudalism, -1 for each level. In the games I have as GB they always have -2 on certain commodities, and GB has a "25" feudal rate (thats 2 levels).

You can see these proportional subtractions from your economy in the detailed economy report tab along the bottom edge of the map after every turn.

[morganbj]

I'll run a test and find out.

[morganbj]

Well, it's conclusive. I set all sliders in Sweden to put all labor in developments and labor production. Sweden has a feudal level of 3. As can be seen there is negative production at -3 for all resources subject to feudalism, except spice. Sweden has 3 colonies that will give her 1 spice, thus explaining the -2 for that resource.

[Lützow]

Thank you all for answering my question. [:)]