Implementation Cost & UBI

Democracy 4
#1

Is it possible for implementation cost to work like canceling a policy? So rather than having a fixed cost, then freedom to choose the policy value 0-1, have a lower implementation cost, and automatically start the policy at 0, and then have to use political capital to increase it? I feel as though this would give a more realistic model for policy making, particularly for things like creeping authoritarianism.

For example, Curfews, it might still have a relatively high implementation cost (say 25), but would start at 0, with the player having to expend further PC as normal if they want to raise it. For nationalisation policies, the default would be the value where they break even, rather than 0.

I also have some problems with the way the UBI policy works currently. Firstly, there are many policies which would be immediately effected by bringing in UBI. Things like Child Benefit, State and Private Pensions, Minimum Wage, would all drop straight away, since they are covered in part by UBI payments. Others, like Unemployment Benefit would be entirely replaced, as the purpose of UBI is to cover basic costs of living. As it stands a player has to manually, individually cancel or change these policies, when in reality they’d all be changed as part of a single overhaul.

This could be partly mitigated by having the cost of some of the policies scaled down with UBI value, but that won’t solve the minimum wage or private pension problem.

#2

I think it depends on whether UBI supplements the currebt welfare state or teplaces it. Some places make a distinction, some don’t.

The UK experimented with a UBI which replaces some current welfare (which could be done without causing harm) and Finland experimented with a supplementary one. Both had positive outcomes.

The US payouts in the bailout packages were a temporary UBI and they were pretty effective too.

I had earlier suggested earlier to lower the lowest value of UBI, to make it more affordable.

I’m not so clear about your implementation point.

#3

The game gives you the option of implementing a UBI, and in turn canceling pensions, unemployment benefits, and reducing the minimum wage to the absolute minimum, if you feel so inclined to do so.

I agree with the idea about implementation scaling costs - to a degree. It should be cheaper, in the long run, to implement a policy to full and then leave it that way, than to implement it at a minimum and scale it up later. It should be more expensive, however, to implement a fully-scaled, “drastic” policy, than to implement one less intensely.

I generally think that more sliders in the game should be eliminated, in favor of fixed point scales like the one used for “abortion”, for anything which is a law and not funding. Funding can be nuanced down to a decimal, but laws make binary distinctions.

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#4

I guess it gives people more flexibility, eh?