[Freeciv-Dev] Re: more considerations about trade routes

[Per Inge Mathisen <per@xxxxxxxxxxx>]

On Tue, 9 May 2006, Martin Olveyra wrote:
> In the real world, trade is a spontaneous conduct of people. They dont need 
> to be directed by governments in order to trade each other. Instead, the 
> function of government is to obstaculize trade (think in customs, customs 
> duty, protectionism, taxes, etc). When two governments celebrate a free 
> exchange pact, a commercial agree, etc, they are not impelling trade, but 
> they are establishing exceptions to the obstaculizations themself impose.
> So ¿why, instead of leave a system in which we, the players, must act in 
> order to establish trade routes, they instead are created spontaneously 
> unless we obstaculize them? This alternative only takes from us the 
> establishment of the degree of customs duty and of customs control, with the 
> benefits for the government of more tax revenues, at the cost of less trade.
I could nitpick and say that historically this is not entirely accurate, 
as governments have sometimes been quite involved in trade, but the more 
important objection is that what the player (the government) gets in tax 
revenues, and trade, is the same thing.
You could say one is gold, and the other is, say, luxuries, representing 
private wealth, and have a control that would balance between them, but 
then you would merely reinvent the tax settings.
  - Per