How to make money?

[Grotius]

Wow, I had no clue about any of that. Thanks for the information, Maerchen. I may start a new game and build the Interior Council first.

Not to say that my current game is dull! I started about 6 hexes from another major power, on a lifeless world. In previous games, I've been able to beat up on minors or non-aligned, but not so here. From the get-go, I've been fighting a major power. It has much stronger units than the minor regimes. It's been fun, and militarily it's going okay. But my unrest is high, my popularity is low, my treasury leaks 60 credits a turn, and I'm running out of food and water, lol.

[Maerchen]

You are welcome. One has always to take advice with a grain of salt though:

Interior first works very well, but only if you have a bit of a breather; like on your world it would be sort of a waste of time.

I had a short 3 major 1 minor small moon like you described. I went full aggro and made model design the first as I wanted better troops asap and light tanks early on can do wonders. Taking the food and water supply away from the enemy was key.

[PerfectDeath]

Efficiency Drive is huge, though it scales off your admin level but its about 15k to 30k depending on roll for around turn 100+
Until then i was basically selling via trader to cover each turn's expenses.
I'm -700 in the hole each turn rn but can easily make it back. Also some market prices are very inflated now so I can make 2k from selling a turn worth of food.

In some earlier games the income was easy to come by from private economy growth but my last few games were lower pops.

[beyondwudge]

I've found that worker salaries can really empty the coffers early on. You build all these assets, have roaring resource extraction but suddenly a massive deficit.

[JaidBoyer]

Instead of focusing on rapid expansion or just accumulating military power, it could be worth putting more attention on internal stability. Balancing your treasury and resource supplies while also boosting your popularity can help keep unrest in check.On a related note, if you're looking for ways to increase your financial stability while also balancing your in-game priorities, you could explore some side jobs from home. There are plenty of opportunities out there that might help free up some cash flow, especially if you're managing multiple in-game responsibilities.

[Voker57]

If you find yourself suddenly drained of all money, check Theft column in your staff management: often one of your advisors manages to embezzle insane amounts of credits, thus grinding the national economy to halt.

[Returner]

Interesting. I am learning a lot with this post.

Nobody mentioned another alternative though: (edit: in fact, someone did mention it!)

Since I always go meritocracy and interior ministry first, I have access to the stratagem "efficiency drive". When you have a good administration skill you can easily critically execute this card for a 4000 credit boost. You can also obtain this card pretty reliably and easily play it every 3 to 5 turns for 30 PP or so.

In all of my games so far, I kept afloat financially with selling rares, machines and first and foremost efficiency drive.

One must not forget the bonuses from enforcement profile. I always go enforcement, heart and meritocracy. If I am not mistaken, enforcement gives me bonus percentages to tax revenue on top of my efficiency drive.

But yes. My budget cashflow is almost always in the negative.

[JeanleChauve]

The fewer the unemployed (<40%), the more the private wage increases and, therefore, forces you to increase the workers' wages and it's the snake biting its own tail.
Workers, soldiers and leaders spend their wages in the cities where they are and thus increase the private wages. Keep them low.
Do you have recruits? Send them back so that they add to the population and thus increase the number of unemployed.
Do you have several cities? Make settlers in the city with the most unemployed and send them as population to the one with the least.

Too late, the private wage is much too high (+5)? Add +25% sales tax (interior). Are they still earning too much? Buy their big farm: 30K unemployed and watch their wages plummet.
Learn how QOL works: never exceed the max cap. In this case, if you have a government asset of QOL, mothball it.
city level II: do not exceed 50 average for the 4 positions.
city IV: do not exceed 100 average for the 4 positions.

If your workers are max happy, decrease their salary by 1 to be at +1 vis-à-vis the private sector. If you have +50% happiness (government) pay the workers at the same level as the private sector or even -1.
Reduce the worker salary to 4 as soon as they are at 100 happiness, then to 3, etc. The worker salaries should be between 2 and 3 credits around turn 40.

The images below come from a hard game on turn 59 and from the capital (2 cities).

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2.png (87.77 KiB) Viewed 355 times

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[Returner]

So in my current game I was on -350 credits or so per month, which I mitigated with Efficiency Drive.

Interestingly this time, I managed to get a super solid Meritocracy score. It now stands at a completely uncontested 100 value with 0 Autocracy completely unable to reduce it.

Now, ever since my Meritocracy enabled Competent Small Business perk, which gives 2cr/1000 Population, my money problems completely disapeared... in fact I have become absolutely filthy rich with a whopping +3500 cr per turn.

Does this answer your Money question? Does this answer your question if Meritocracy is worthwhile to invest in? By the way, key to maintaining Meritocracy was that I was actually able to significantly reduce Autocracy a few times. So maybe dont focus too much on increasing Meritocracy, but look how to keep Autocracy down.

Meritocracy 100 Prosperity

Meritocracy.jpg (450.45 KiB) Viewed 323 times

[Henoch]

I recommend this video:
https://youtu.be/dMJ04sKrhjM

Or to read manual sections dedicated to money ( version 1.25 from 2023)
Especially:

4.3.7. CREDITS
4.3.8. PRIVATE ECONOMY
5.3.13.5. PRIVATE ECONOMY
5.3.14. TAXATION
5.8.4.18. ADMINISTRATION

In my current game I let private economy grow, I invest public money to support their Next asset foundings or to help them repay the debt. More private assets more jobs more earnings so they can spent more. If they build private assets like dome, scavenging facility or even mine I don't nationalise everything (except trucks or good mines) because they can sell the private food, metal or other resources to traders and earn money which return to you through taxes or even directly via private asset "tax" (visible as money icon on assets).
In early game I don't increase taxes to let the economy grow faster, then I increase it a bit but not too much. In 4.3.7 you can read: "However, keep in mind that the more you Tax your Zones the more you’ll stifle the development of the Private Economy."

I also sell resources but mainly to finance my investments into private sector so I would have profit without it but I want them grow.
Try to go to zone tab, then bottom left section labeled "Private eco." When hovering you can see detailed report about income and expenses of private economy (see screenshot at 4.3.7) it's very helpful.

Governor with good skills and relationship also helps
In 5.8.4.18 you can read:
The Admin Skill also allows more Private Credits to be earned in the
Hidden Economy (if roll>70) and more Private Credits to be earned by
Private Assets (if roll>100)

I'm still learning this game I didn't know about the Meritocracy cards, I have to check it.

I hope it helps