Meepcraft Economy Overhaul (an attempt from a financial math student)

ekjhgekuie

The definition of inflation you are using is incorrect. Inflation does not come from injecting money into an economy as your post makes it seem. Rather, it occurs when there is a sustained increase in the average price level of an economy over time. Usually, the injection of mountains of cash bids up the prices of goods in the economy, but I would argue that this is not happening on Meepcraft for one essential reason: the market structure of Meepcraft is oligopolistic for the majority of goods. In other words, there are a certain, low number of producers selling homogeneous goods. This means that, for firms to gather more market share and win the competition for profit, they must make their version of the same product more attractive than that of their opponent. What, you say? Make the same product... different? How will a dirt block from Pluto be different from a dirt block from Ekj? How is this seemingly paradoxical outcome achieved? The answer is price competition, which can result in price wars that drive the price of the good significantly lower than its market value. Lowering my price is attractive because it will give me more market share, but this doesn't work out in the long run when every firm partakes in the mutually destructive act of cutting prices as close to zero as possible.

In conclusion, any inflationary pressures would be countered by the incentive to lower prices in the oligopolistic market structure. The only way that prices can be driven up in our economy is if a cartel is formed, which is nearly impossible because of the ability to cheat... see Prisoner's Dilemma. There is no incentive to cooperate in this block-based game.

legendcaleb

The definition of inflation you are using is incorrect. Inflation does not come from injecting money into an economy as your post makes it seem. Rather, it occurs when there is a sustained increase in the average price level of an economy over time. Usually, the injection of mountains of cash bids up the prices of goods in the economy, but I would argue that this is not happening on Meepcraft for one essential reason: the market structure of Meepcraft is oligopolistic for the majority of goods. In other words, there are a certain, low number of producers selling homogeneous goods. This means that, for firms to gather more market share and win the competition for profit, they must make their version of the same product more attractive than that of their opponent. What, you say? Make the same product... different? How will a dirt block from Pluto be different from a dirt block from Ekj? How is this seemingly paradoxical outcome achieved? The answer is price competition, which can result in price wars that drive the price of the good significantly lower than its market value. Lowering my price is attractive because it will give me more market share, but this doesn't work out in the long run when every firm partakes in the mutually destructive act of cutting prices as close to zero as possible.
In conclusion, any inflationary pressures would be countered by the incentive to lower prices in the oligopolistic market structure. The only way that prices can be driven up in our economy is if a cartel is formed, which is nearly impossible because of the ability to cheat... see Prisoner's Dilemma. There is no incentive to cooperate in this block-based game.
~ @ekjhgekuie

This is an incredibly informative post, I don't have the necessary background in economics to properly address what I'm talking about so thank you for commenting. You've made a critical point here, that the only way to fight for market share is to lower price because minecraft goods are inherently homogenous. Because firms are making bushels of cash from the production of their good, it isn't important to them that their good is even a valuable sell, which removes some of the downsides of driving your price to zilch and kind of defeats the purpose of having a player-to-player market if everyone can get most commodities for free. In my opinion, you can't simultaneously pay players for their labor anywhere close to what they're paid now and pay them to sell the goods they produce, it generates too much revenue. A healthy economy should have a relatively decent price point for goods. Like you've said, the only method to compete for market share is a lower price, and there needs to be a disincentive for players to completely drop it so low.

ekjhgekuie

This is an incredibly informative post, I don't have the necessary background in economics to properly address what I'm talking about so thank you for commenting. You've made a critical point here, that the only way to fight for market share is to lower price because minecraft goods are inherently homogenous. Because firms are making bushels of cash from the production of their good, it isn't important to them that their good is even a valuable sell, which removes some of the downsides of driving your price to zilch and kind of defeats the purpose of having a player-to-player market if everyone can get most commodities for free. In my opinion, you can't simultaneously pay players for their labor anywhere close to what they're paid now and pay them to sell the goods they produce, it generates too much revenue. A healthy economy should have a relatively decent price point for goods. Like you've said, the only method to compete for market share is a lower price, and there needs to be a disincentive for players to completely drop it so low.
~ @legendcaleb

I agree. The critical problem is that there are no incentives to hold prices over drop them to get more market share.

One interesting solution could be to create a licensing system for vshop. This would encourage collusion in the form of cartels, and also incentivize specialization. Imagine that, for each item you want to sell on vshop, you have to pay 500k to purchase that item license. Of course, everyone can purchase a license, but it is a real investment, and this investment encourages extreme specialization. Imagine my incredibly optimized beef farm. I would be known as a rich player simply because I created an extremely efficient anti-vegan monument, rather than because I was lazy and just sold random chests of my stuff on vshop. Vshop item licenses would also solve the issue of people using Vshop to store random quantities of items, as they are unlikely to purchase a license for it if it's so expensive. Furthermore, once two players buy a license for beef, they will try to set a beef union price, encouraging an OPEC for nearly every good (without the cheating and selling at lower prices behind your comrades' backs).

Epicdude141

I agree. The critical problem is that there are no incentives to hold prices over drop them to get more market share.
One interesting solution could be to create a licensing system for vshop. This would encourage collusion in the form of cartels, and also incentivize specialization. Imagine that, for each item you want to sell on vshop, you have to pay 500k to purchase that item license. Of course, everyone can purchase a license, but it is a real investment, and this investment encourages extreme specialization. Imagine my incredibly optimized beef farm. I would be known as a rich player simply because I created an extremely efficient anti-vegan monument, rather than because I was lazy and just sold random chests of my stuff on vshop. Vshop item licenses would also solve the issue of people using Vshop to store random quantities of items, as they are unlikely to purchase a license for it if it's so expensive. Furthermore, once two players buy a license for beef, they will try to set a beef union price, encouraging an OPEC for nearly every good (without the cheating and selling at lower prices behind your comrades' backs).
~ @ekjhgekuie

That's actually a really good suggestion holy shit.

Jinkeloid

That's actually a really good suggestion holy ****.
~ @Epicdude141

The fact is, people then would partially or totally give up placing items on vshop and use /tr instead. Therefore it is no need to make such a thing, just remove vshop if you want to stop people from using it as storage.

And also, why are you guys trying to make a simple game so complicated? If you really want to stop inflation/ deflation, just remove jobs and not resetting wild world. Then there would not be so much money or items on the market.

legendcaleb

The fact is, people then would partially or totally give up placing items on vshop and use /tr instead. Therefore it is no need to make such a thing, just remove vshop if you want to stop people from using it as storage.
And also, why are you guys trying to make a simple game so complicated? If you really want to stop inflation/ deflation, just remove jobs and not resetting wild world. Then there would not be so much money or items on the market.
~ @Jinkeloid

You say we're making a simple game more complicated, yet you participate in an already complex plugin. It's not a matter of making something simple, complicated, it's about making something complicated, fairer to players and involve less activities that aren't very engaging

Jinkeloid

You say we're making a simple game more complicated, yet you participate in an already complex plugin. It's not a matter of making something simple, complicated, it's about making something complicated, fairer to players and involve less activities that aren't very engaging
~ @legendcaleb

I mean, the most thing we do in the server is just trades, maybe /dice. Things like quota, increasing tax based on plot numbers are not necessary, more rules more modification we make, less player will Meep have. Remember, people don't like complicated stuff, if you say that I'm already in a complex plugin, then don't make it more complicated.

What would items be inflated/deflated to? 500 meebles for one cooked beef? Then people can just kill a cow by their own; if a netherite ingot's price dropped to 1k each, then people can just choose to keep or sell something else. If everything is too expensive then consider not to reset wild or delay the reset, if prices are too low for all goods, then think about remove jobs' money reward.

Simple questions are solved with simple solutions

legendcaleb

I mean, the most thing we do in the server is just trades, maybe /dice. Things like quota, increasing tax based on plot numbers are not necessary, more rules more modification we make, less player will Meep have. Remember, people don't like complicated stuff, if you say that I'm already in a complex plugin, then don't make it more complicated.
What would items be inflated/deflated to? 500 meebles for one cooked beef? Then people can just kill a cow by their own; if a netherite ingot's price dropped to 1k each, then people can just choose to keep or sell something else. If everything is too expensive then consider not to reset wild or delay the reset, if prices are too low for all goods, then think about remove jobs' money reward.
Simple questions are solved with simple solutions
~ @Jinkeloid

This isn't a simple question? I'm sorry but this is a really rudimentary opinion of yours, I encourage you to reread the thread and form a better alternative than "no complex only simple" when what you're doing isn't even simple in the slightest. Remember, Meepcraft had its most players when the server as "complicated" as you dislike.

Jinkeloid

This isn't a simple question? I'm sorry but this is a really rudimentary opinion of yours, I encourage you to reread the thread and form a better alternative than "no complex only simple" when what you're doing isn't even simple in the slightest. Remember, Meepcraft had its most players when the server as "complicated" as you dislike.
~ @legendcaleb

Meep was popular because we had "admin shop" where people can just mine stuff and sell them to that shop, simple enough? Then we removed it, replacing it by vshop then people start to quit. It was also because we lost so much playable contents that we have so less people right now. And Meep wasn't any more complicated than we are right now, commands and gameplay are basically the same: build town/houses by using resources gathered in /warp wild.

Adrian

AcceptedCompleted

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