Your opinions on inflation in the Empire?

Quite a few of us are aware of the problem. There's more people complaining about inflation than there were 1-2 years ago. Younger members of EMC probably don't see a problem, and those people who enjoy getting loads of rupees everyday off money that was not yet in circulation might see a problem, but choose to ignore it.

Aikar stated somewhere that he wanted to inflate the economy. I'm not sure if he ever intended for the percentage (although when he made that statement the inflation was already really high anyway) to go up as high as it has done, but I don't think that this has gone unchecked and has chosen to be ignored.

I like it because it seems to be more or less about politics and economics, which are things I like (even if I only really understand the basics of economics )

So I looked at the EMC Main Shop and noticed what others were saying about the price of diamonds...

(I am not going to purchase from it, but just wondering...) When you buy from the EMC Main Shop, is there a cap for purchases made there? If not, this should be interesting and EMC Main Shop may need tweaking soon.

Probably not. I make purchases from there all the time because I can't be bothered looking for player shops if I need something quickly. Plus, it lets me ration my 29k rupees easier

Yeah there's no cap, and if it intends to always be higher than the market it's already to the point where it should be increased. On the other hand, if the intent is that diamonds will not rise any further, then raising the shop prices would not help with that.

Also while wandering about, just an idea: what about 'Emerald Ore Block' (not the dropped gem, since that's useless in comparison) for a benchmark/backing to a currency?

It's fairly rare, cannot be duped (to my knowledge) or 'Fortuned' with a pick (the actual Ore Block, not for the gems...), primarily aesthetic and serves really no useful function. (besides its pretty as well)

Diamond fails (custom mobs drop 'em, diamonds can be 'Fortuned', and they are heavily consumed for optimal MC gameplay). Unless maybe... 'Diamond Ore Block' (Silk Touch; not the 3x3 diamonds --> 'Diamond Block').

Well, to me, the most valuable items are the ones that can only be obtained one way which is through work -- this would be all of the ores and then lapis. Iron and gold ingots and diamonds, to me, aren't worth much since you can obtain those multiple ways through farming and such.

This is why when I go mining I always leave my ores unbroken except for lapis which I use to make lapis blocks.

I think you indirectly brought up a good point-Diamond ore prices have jacked up diamond prices, because miners have moved to harvesting the more valuable ores with silk touch, instead of using fortune...

/shop is there to prevent total inflation. If diamonds went for 101r one day and if /shop sold them for 100r people would just shop at /shop since it is cheaper and has infinite stock. That being said, people would have to make prices 100r or below to make sales. If /shop raised prices normal diamond stock prices would raise also. I assume sometime soon diamonds will meet the max price of inflation (99r) and either stay there or begin to deflate.

That baffles me as well ... and I've found this possible explanations:

- there are people who want the supporter status, but are not able to pay for it (in US$) for whatever reason - so they accept to work in-game and pay significantly higher price (in rupees) to get it this way.

- there are people with high amount of rupees that have difficulties using them / buying something, so for them those rupees have low value

- there are people that do not know the value of rupees, they do not check the price and believe that if it is an auction that the price will be about right.

This is not the case, because it would not work, or, in other words it would gradually ruin the economy and the game.

This can never solve the original problem, and that is selling of in-game currency / goods for out-of-game money (cheap!) and therefore draining from the in-game economy and community.

Why?
The market price for diamonds is set through demand and supply relative to other goods.
As soon as this price reaches the /shop price, there is (virtual) mass production of diamonds and the balance in price to other goods is disturbed.
From the viewpoint of the player, what now happens with diamonds is similar to what already happened with iron due to mass production. Diamonds get cheap, relative to other items where the prices continue to rise.

Can this prevent inflation? No.

The prices for other items continue to rise. Players stop selling (accidentally) mined diamonds, because this now enforced market price is far lower than their value when used. No one mines diamonds any more. Same as with iron now - mass producers sell it, but other players not, or only if they don't have any use for it.

When other prices reach the /shop level, the in-game production of and trade with this items stops as well.

This goes on until a new balance is reached, but at that point, the economy is heavily skewed and distorted. The game changes significantly. For a part, it shifts from "survival" towards "creative" and from "mostly natural Minecraft" towards "some strange tweak".

I guess this is not acceptable for most of the players.

This is not the case, because without influence from /shop, the price is set through demand and supply.
Perhaps you mean if the /shop increases the price afterwards?

The inflation is caused by (1) the non-stop influx of new rupees into the economy, and (2) the demand for items rising more rapidly than the economy’s productive capacity. (i.e. more people buying from shops instead of going out mining.)

When EMC is injecting thousands and thousands of new rupees into the economy (sign-in bonuses, voting, people buying game currency, etc) and few people are going out and producing new resources, you will have inflation. This is just how things work.

You're mixing two things here.

One is the increase in prices due to inflation (1) - that is influx of new rupees.

The other is increase in prices due to increased demand (2) and supply shortage.

Increase in price of one item relative to other items does not mean inflation.
Increase in price of most of the goods is usually caused by inflation.

aikar tried to address inflation a while back and the general consensus was to leave it be. this is mostly because the larger shop owners caught hold of the thread and railroaded it into oblivion

Do you mean the Aikars suggestion / question whether to hyperinflate the economy by doubling the free rupees in order to "empty the shops" (really to try to boost sales of supporter subscriptions)? I remember answering then, that full shops are sign of healthy economy, and empty shops are a sign of failure.
Or something else? Link?

that was the thread, but he had more ideas then that and also opened up the floor for suggestions.

That was this thread:
Original Post: http://empireminecraft.com/threads/rebalancing-the-empire-economy-slow-induce.35338/
Aikars conclusion: http://empireminecraft.com/threads/...economy-slow-induce.35338/page-10#post-675100

I think the major point there was if intentional (hyper-) inflation can

• stabilize the economy - no: hyperinflation can only destabilize and ruin economy
• stimulate the economy - small inflation yes, but high inflation does the opposite
• "fix the scale" e.g. by multiplying all the prices by 10 - that is not necessary, if you want to sell iron ingots for 3.4 rupees, you sell 10 ingots for 34 rupees; and multiplying everything by a factor would be redenomination which directly has nothing to do with inflation. (It is normally used to divide everything by potention of 10 so cutting the many zeros, not adding them.)
• empty the shops - yes, hyperinflation does empty the shops, but this is then a failing economy

My initial (full) response then: http://empireminecraft.com/threads/...-economy-slow-induce.35338/page-6#post-674808

No what I am saying is if diamonds (or any other block) continue to rise in price, they would eventually have to stop at or under /shop's prices as the prices of /shop never go up or down and never run out of stock. Some of you guys wanted /shop prices to raise, as actual player shops are getting close. If /shop prices were ever raised it would just give more room for items to inflate.
Example: Diamonds go for 100r each at /shop. That being said if people don't want to lose prices to /shop they would have to make their prices less than 100r (Let X represent player prices: X>100); now that is if /shop's prices don't change, if /shop's prices do change, to let's say 125r per diamond, then that then changes the previous statement for player business against /shop to anything less than 125r (X>125).

This was the case in the past, prices were adjusted.

My opinion is, as described above, that failure to adjust the /shop prices would alter the game in negative way and that majority of the members wouldn't like that.

I don't see inflation as a particularly good or bad thing. With every developing economy it is bound to happen. By printing money, or creating rupees the price goes up, but the value tends to stay the same. As EMC becomes more developed, rupees are added to circulation (from voting, new player bonus, etc.) It isn't really harmful to the economy as long as prices are adjusted accordingly and the rate at which rupees lose value is slow. The only thing we have to fear is fear itself, and of course becoming like 1922 Germany and burning our rupees to keep warm...

It is not slow.
It is way too fast, making prices change on weekly basis.

Prices do get adjusted but as reaction, when the chest is already empty, so you have not got the value for the stuff you have sold as intended, you've got less than that.
The normal reaction is to try to adjust for that, so you increase the prices a bit more in advance.
But this in turn speeds up the rise in prices...

When the value of the currency changes so fast, you try to adjust for that, and this becomes one of the main concerns instead of concentrating on demand and supply. Your concern is to minimize the amount of rupees you hold, and hold only the amount that is necessary for daily business. You also tend to accept higher prices just to get rid of rupees asap.
This is directly destabilizing and damaging the economy.