Pensions

[Eric.B]

In the quest to make the game harder, I've been thinking about adding pensions into the game. I don't think I've seen a thread about it, so I made one. What are your thoughts? How do you think It should be added?

I have a general Idea how to do it. But I would like your opinions/feedback.

[Frankschtaldt]

This may be an American thing as I honestly have no idea what you're talking about.
In Australia, a pension is something paid by the federal government to someone that has some (usually legitimate) limitation that prevents them from earning an income. Usually old age or a disability.
Companies really have nothing to do with it.

Perhaps if you could give us an idea of what you're thinking and we can suggest changes?

[Sarchez]

Eric don't want us to have nice and shiny things, so he wants to add increased expenses overtime (I think), so we don't have 100's of billions already before WW2 starts.

In Europe, it's normal that the company pays a certain % for your retirement scheme.
This typically comes on top of your wages. (The % differs from company to comany, and can be a part of your salary negotiations.) There is a fixed minimum % though. (Atleast here in DK.)
On top of that, we also have the government pension - paid through taxes, to insure everyone can afford a living. (old/disabled etc.)

I think, that it makes sense, as it would drain some of the profits overtime.
However, since we don't know just how tough the competition gets overtime, it's hard to make a suggestion as to how it should be implemented. Something that seems like a good idea the first 30 years, might be horrible 30 years later.
Atleast the first years, we shouldn't have to deal with it. They're already pretty tight with cashflow as is.

Maybe it should look back 10 years, and take # of associates * fixed percent of the labor costs at the time, as a new expense. that would be a lot of data to keep up with. (Maybe fixed by year or something).
That would give you 10 years to start the company, without having the additional costs, and thereafter the expenses would grow as your company does.

[Eric.B]

This may be an American thing as I honestly have no idea what you're talking about.
In Australia, a pension is something paid by the federal government to someone that has some (usually legitimate) limitation that prevents them from earning an income. Usually old age or a disability.
Companies really have nothing to do with it.

Perhaps if you could give us an idea of what you're thinking and we can suggest changes?

It's actually a developed world thing. In most of the developed world if you work in a trade skill that is represented by a union, that union attempts to get companies to invest in retirement funds or pensions for their members. I know this is true for most European and American manufacturers. It is probably the same for the AMWU as well...

Eric don't want us to have nice and shiny things, so he wants to add increased expenses overtime (I think), so we don't have 100's of billions already before WW2 starts.

In Europe, it's normal that the company pays a certain % for your retirement scheme.
This typically comes on top of your wages. (The % differs from company to comany, and can be a part of your salary negotiations.) There is a fixed minimum % though. (Atleast here in DK.)
On top of that, we also have the government pension - paid through taxes, to insure everyone can afford a living. (old/disabled etc.)

I think, that it makes sense, as it would drain some of the profits overtime.
However, since we don't know just how tough the competition gets overtime, it's hard to make a suggestion as to how it should be implemented. Something that seems like a good idea the first 30 years, might be horrible 30 years later.
Atleast the first years, we shouldn't have to deal with it. They're already pretty tight with cashflow as is.

Maybe it should look back 10 years, and take # of associates * fixed percent of the labor costs at the time, as a new expense. that would be a lot of data to keep up with. (Maybe fixed by year or something).
That would give you 10 years to start the company, without having the additional costs, and thereafter the expenses would grow as your company does.

Actually it'd be more for end game than the start of the game. Following the history of UAW, pensions weren't started until after WW2. They eventually this grew into billions of dollars in liabilities for the big three US auto manufacturers due to poor negotiations and short sightedness.

Hell, GM still owes $71 Billion in pensions even though their marketcap is only $20 billion: http://www.reuters.com/article/2013/09/2...6520130927

I'm thinking this can bring more to unions, negations, lobbying, and if I implement it legal stuff...

[Frankschtaldt]

It's actually a developed world thing. In most of the developed world if you work in a trade skill that is represented by a union, that union attempts to get companies to invest in retirement funds or pensions for their members. I know this is true for most European and American manufacturers. It is probably the same for the AMWU as well...

It's a wording thing. As I said in Australia a pension is a federal government thing. We do have retirement funds but we call them Superannuation though I don't think they work the same as the American ones.

I would say if they are introduced their exact effect should depend on the country your mill is in (and be different for each mill in a different country). In Aus they are government regulated and essentially are just and extra 9% pay that gets put into your retirement fund which for us would simply appear as higher wages for Australian factories. I dare say the European and American ones not only work very different to that but also different to each other.

[Arakash]

I think you could use it if you wanted to, but i dont see it as something which would really add anything beyond another listed expense with no flavor/meaning.

If you did add some new kind of expense, id prefer that it had some sort of interaction with the player, like the legal expenses suggestion i was discussing a few days ago. In that case spending little would have certain amounts of risk involved.

[Eric.B]

It's actually a developed world thing. In most of the developed world if you work in a trade skill that is represented by a union, that union attempts to get companies to invest in retirement funds or pensions for their members. I know this is true for most European and American manufacturers. It is probably the same for the AMWU as well...

It's a wording thing. As I said in Australia a pension is a federal government thing. We do have retirement funds but we call them Superannuation though I don't think they work the same as the American ones.

I would say if they are introduced their exact effect should depend on the country your mill is in (and be different for each mill in a different country). In Aus they are government regulated and essentially are just and extra 9% pay that gets put into your retirement fund which for us would simply appear as higher wages for Australian factories. I dare say the European and American ones not only work very different to that but also different to each other.

We also have a federal government plan. But that doesn't mean that there isn't private ones or that the auto companies don't pay into your state ran system on AMWU's behalf. (If not then AMWU is pretty weak at killing... I mean HELPING workers! *cough*)

[Eric.B]

I think you could use it if you wanted to, but i dont see it as something which would really add anything beyond another listed expense with no flavor/meaning.

If you did add some new kind of expense, id prefer that it had some sort of interaction with the player, like the legal expenses suggestion i was discussing a few days ago. In that case spending little would have certain amounts of risk involved.

I never said anything about it being a fixed rate, it would be influenced by dialogue (much like the current strike system), as well as your investments in other areas such as legalise and lobbying.

It is a realistic expense, almost every large manufacture that I know of deals with something like this. And there is a need for costs increases...

Labor costs are much lower than realistically expected, specially in late game. So it's either give you more real stuff to handle/deal with, or just increase labor costs overall with no control, and no fluff...

[Arakash]

I never said anything about it being a fixed rate, it would be influenced by dialogue (much like the current strike system), as well as your investments in other areas such as legalise and lobbying.

It is a realistic expense, almost every large manufacture that I know of deals with something like this. And there is a need for costs increases...

Labor costs are much lower than realistically expected, specially in late game. So it's either give you more real stuff to handle/deal with, or just increase labor costs overall with no control, and no fluff...

Fair points made.
I think you could make a few changes like the one you've proposed and combine that with general increased wage growth to abstract a lot of the other higher labour costs which you might not have the time to implement in detail.