Is the Federation a "cashless" society or not?

[tomswift2002]

Robert may not have had a replicator... But he sure as ###k had a food synthesizer, which had been around conceivably since 200 years before he started making children, so it was his great grandfathers decision to modernize that much.

If they were also holding out on a synthesizer, that means that they were the weirdo family who was a burden on every one else, since the economy had to bend to keep the Picards alive, as 2 thousand pounds of food per person had to be grown the old fashion way, as well as maybe birthing a limited number of animals for slaughter.

That barely makes sense.

The United Earth probably lied to the Picards.

"Here's a truck load of unsynthesized food, yes, that's right completely unsynthesized food, totally real, it's real food, would I lie to you?"

Similar to how antivaxers should be given free milk by the state.

Special, special, magic milk, that is not full of vaxinated goodness, would i lie to you?

Robert owned a farm.

Maybe he did grow all his own food?

Worf lived on Gault for a while, and it described it as a farming colony (“Heart of Glory”; “Let He Who is without sin”). Plus we also had Omicron Ceti III (“This Side of Paradise”) that was set up as a farming colony. So not everything was synthesized.

But you also have to wonder how there were no revolts if everyone was forced to eat resequenced protein, or as Kirk said in “Charlie X” ‘meatloaf that looks like turkey’.

 

[Guy Gardener]

Worf lived on Gault for a while, and it described it as a farming colony (“Heart of Glory”; “Let He Who is without sin”). Plus we also had Omicron Ceti III (“This Side of Paradise”) that was set up as a farming colony. So not everything was synthesized.

But you also have to wonder how there were no revolts if everyone was forced to eat resequenced protein, or as Kirk said in “Charlie X” ‘meatloaf that looks like turkey’.

Where do you think all that unsequenced protein comes from?

 

[Tallguy]

A thread that makes me think! Joy!

I never considered Robert's resistance to replicators and what that meant about where he got materials from other people. I mean, he has a vineyard, not a farm, right? So how self sufficient can he be?

I suppose one can head-canon (or at least fill in the blanks) that his objection to replicators is simply food prep. Which might only be as far as the writers considered. Where does he get his tools? The parts for his irrigation? Not being super-conversant with how vineyards work, he gets his seed from what he's already grown, right?

Speaking of Family, I also never thought about (in terms of scarcity) why they would be creating a new sub-continent? I think it means that either they need the room (why?) or it's flat out mad scientist stuff. I mean that's pretty straight forward "man was not meant to meddle" territory, isn't it? How many episodes did TNG do where some non-Earth planet unleashed some terror because they were attempting a project on that scale? I can see Disco doing a story like this as an anti-fracking parable.

But again, let's assume they need the room. What does that mean? And how is the living space that they do have distributed?

 

[Christopher]

I mean that's pretty straight forward "man was not meant to meddle" territory, isn't it?

That bromide is the stuff of Luddite, pessimistic fiction. Star Trek generally takes a more optimistic stance toward human innovation and advancement. Its philosophy is based in humanism, the idea that humans can and should achieve whatever they set their minds to. And it's been established in various episodes that terraforming is a proven technology used across the Federation, so they certainly don't have any moral objections to altering planetary geology or climate to create new habitats.

The fact is, humans have been altering the Earth since the earliest days of civilization. Widespread livestock grazing has created many of the world's deserts. Agriculture has transformed entire landscapes. The pre-Columbian Amazon rainforest was largely a cultivated environment with trees and other plants bred to serve human needs, since the climate didn't make conventional agriculture feasible. More recently, our construction of large dams and diversion of vast quantities of water into artificial reservoirs has slightly shifted the Earth's axis through the redistribution of so much mass. Humans have had a vast impact on the Earth already, so it's disingenuous to say we shouldn't. It's just a question of learning to do it responsibly, which is something the Federation's humanity has achieved.

 

[Tallguy]

That bromide is the stuff of Luddite, pessimistic fiction. Star Trek generally takes a more optimistic stance toward human innovation and advancement. Its philosophy is based in humanism, the idea that humans can and should achieve whatever they set their minds to. And it's been established in various episodes that terraforming is a proven technology used across the Federation, so they certainly don't have any moral objections to altering planetary geology or climate to create new habitats.

The fact is, humans have been altering the Earth since the earliest days of civilization. Widespread livestock grazing has created many of the world's deserts. Agriculture has transformed entire landscapes. The pre-Columbian Amazon rainforest was largely a cultivated environment with trees and other plants bred to serve human needs, since the climate didn't make conventional agriculture feasible. More recently, our construction of large dams and diversion of vast quantities of water into artificial reservoirs has slightly shifted the Earth's axis through the redistribution of so much mass. Humans have had a vast impact on the Earth already, so it's disingenuous to say we shouldn't. It's just a question of learning to do it responsibly, which is something the Federation's humanity has achieved.

@Christopher, I pretty much agree with what you said. Star Trek has not always had this point of view.

1) you can't deny that TNG (and I'll assume DS9 and Voyager and ENT?) has done episodes where non-Federation societies have done just this sort of thing and it's gone terribly for various metaphorical reason. "What you call progress I call the rape of the natural world." and that sort of thing.

In this case we can assume it's responsible because Picard is a party to it. Honestly it's one of the more advanced ideas that TNG ever put forward and showed that things are still happening and progressing on Earth. Since I so often go back to Roddenberry's novel of The Motion Picture I will note that we are told how they have already turned the Mediterranean Sea into a very small lake in the name of hydro power. He also notes that much of Earth's infrastructure is underground, something we never saw on TNG. (And certainly will not see on Picard with its monstrous San Fransisco.)

2) (and more pertinent to this thread) Why are they doing it? Just for the science of it? Or does it address a need?

 

[Christopher]

Why are they doing it? Just for the science of it? Or does it address a need?

Picard cited "the potential of exploring a new world on our own planet." But maybe understanding how to manipulate geology like that could be useful for helping other worlds. Consider TAS: "The Ambergris Element" and how they were researching the sinking of Argo's land masses to gain insights that could help prevent a similar disaster on another world. Perhaps the Atlantis Project is an outgrowth of that research.

 

[tomswift2002]

Where do you think all that unsequenced protein comes from?

The toilet.

 

[Kor]

Beverly: What lovely cloth, I'll take the entire bolt. Send it to the Enterprise, and charge it to my account. (heh heh, little does this chump know that we don't use money!)

And then the Enterprise warps away, and the merchant never gets a penny.

Kor

 

[Guy Gardener]

The cloth, the city, and maybe even the bazaar merchant was imaginary, conjoured by the beast living under Fairpoint Station, so who is the real chump?

The toilet.

Poop gets made into boots.

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It seems like a hundred years before Kirk, that they had requequencing technology, but it was for mass items, and not personal use in the comfort of their room.

 

[TheAlmanac]

When it comes to Bashir, at least, it was clear that he attached a social stigma to and thus felt embarrassed by his father's history of working menial jobs--enough to lie about his family background above and beyond what was necessary to conceal his genetic enhancement.

What's less clear is where this sense of stigma came from. If you look at the other DS9 characters around him (plenty of whom are from societies which continue to use money the way we do), none of them expressed anything negative about his parents per se after meeting them, making it seem completely internalised on his part.

I think you're misremembering. Wasn't it more that 1) Richard Bashir always claimed he was about to make it big and never did, and 2) as a result, he was always jumping from job to job?

Right, exactly. As RDM stated in his AOL chats at the time, he intended Richard Bashir to convey the idea that just because the Federation took care of people's material needs doesn't mean everyone is going to be particularly accomplished or successful--but what does that matter in a cashless society, where there wouldn't/shouldn't be traditional class distinctions?

Since we're talking (in part) about how menial workers (or those "always jumping from job to job") are perceived, I was trying to say that it felt like there was a more complicated psychological component to Bashir's feelings beyond the genetic engineering and its coverup--components that seemed out of place (to me) if socioeconomic class distinctions have been eliminated on Earth.

If Bashir were a present-day character, I would say he's experiencing a First-Generation Scholar conflict with his parents, but I'm wondering where that comes from if the text is (at least sometimes) telling us these differences don't exist in his society anymore and (as far as I can see) the other characters around Bashir never express any of the negative judgement about his family background that I would feel it more reasonable for a present-day character to anticipate.

 

[UssGlenn]

It would be rude of the other characters to point out that Bashir's father was never able to achieve "the Federation Dream". But that doesn't mean Bashir can't be embarrassed if he thinks that's what everyone else is thinking. If the American Dream is freedom of unconstrained upward social and economic mobility through your own hard work, then the Federation Dream, eliminating the distraction of putting bread on the table and a roof over your head, is excelling in your chosen field bettering yourself and the rest of humanity.

The side affect of this is the generation of praise and the admiration of your peers. However to the evolved 24th century human comparing your level of accomplishment to that of others is in bad taste. Lots of people probably find a "job" that they are average at, but they enjoy it and stick with it, and are happy. Richard Bashir was never able to find a field to excel in and generate social capital. So his real problem was that he was unhappy with his "accomplishment class" And by jumping around from Job to Job he was signalling psychological need for external validation, via praise derived from accomplishments. And that's not something 24th century humans are supposed to crave.

 

[Guy Gardener]

It would be rude of the other characters to point out that Bashir's father was never able to achieve "the Federation Dream". But that doesn't mean Bashir can't be embarrassed if he thinks that's what everyone else is thinking. If the American Dream is freedom of unconstrained upward social and economic mobility through your own hard work, then the Federation Dream, eliminating the distraction of putting bread on the table and a roof over your head, is excelling in your chosen field bettering yourself and the rest of humanity.

The side affect of this is the generation of praise and the admiration of your peers. However to the evolved 24th century human comparing your level of accomplishment to that of others is in bad taste. Lots of people probably find a "job" that they are average at, but they enjoy it and stick with it, and are happy. Richard Bashir was never able to find a field to excel in and generate social capital. So his real problem was that he was unhappy with his "accomplishment class" And by jumping around from Job to Job he was signalling psychological need for external validation, via praise derived from accomplishments. And that's not something 24th century humans are supposed to crave.

No.

%1 of the Federation has a "real" job.

Having a job is not the Federation dream.

Julian was not dismissive about his father not having a job. Mommy didn't have a job, and she got out of that conversation without a scratch.

1. Richard lied and exaggerated about what his job was, or that he had a job. Julian was tired of listening to a liar lie.

2. Richard lying about his job, because he was ashamed of how much of a loser he is (using a metric that does not really exist in the future), is an allegory for how ashamed Dick was of Jules before his dummy kid was genetically modified, which was murder, the death of personality.

 

[David cgc]

Considering its the 24th century, special needs education would be available for children like Julian, maybe it was and his parents did not like the idea of their son being 'special'. IRL being a 90's TV production show the idea of special needs education was not 'mainstream'.

That's a good point; in the Trek setting, Jules's condition would've been noticed probably before he himself was old enough to remember, and he would've gone into some sort of special needs or IEP situation, so he wouldn't have ever been in the situation where he saw the "normal" kids were well above his level in the classroom at such a tender age. The idea that Richard, especially, would've insisted on Jules going into a typical school fits with his own tendency towards glory-hunting and fabulism, fits with what we saw of him, and that when he saw he'd been mistaken, his solution would be to "fix" Jules rather than admit any fault in himself by letting his son get the kind of help he needed.

It's been a long time since I read it, but Cathedral did have a glimpse of an alternate universe where Jules was never enhanced. IIRC, he was married, and living in some sort of group home. And mirror-Bashir probably wasn't enhanced, but didn't seem helpless.

 

[Tenacity]

And mirror-Bashir probably wasn't enhanced, but didn't seem helpless.

Defective children in the mirror universe would be destroyed in the womb or soon after birth by the state (or by the Bashir's themselves). As many repeated pregnancies as it took to product a normal child, who would be named Julian.

 

[Tim Thomason]

Julian probably fell for his own father's propaganda about how he was. Richard probably saw the five-year-old's crayon drawing of a green house and Kukalaka, and drew his own conclusions. He probably had learned about black market supergenius makers and was just looking for an excuse to send his son off to one, maybe before he even had a son.

So, supergenius son would prove that Richard Bashir was a great man who raised a great human being, and deserves the utmost respect and accolades.

 

[Nyotarules]

Defective children in the mirror universe would be destroyed in the womb or soon after birth by the state (or by the Bashir's themselves). As many repeated pregnancies as it took to product a normal child, who would be named Julian.

The original idea of 'mirror universe' was the characters were the opposite of themselves, except for Spock and Miles O'Brien. Perhaps never enhanced Prime Bashir would have been a 'simple', quiet man but Mirror Bashir was brash, arrogant and violent, as per the novels he lead his troops into an obvious trap and was trashed for it.

 

[Christopher]

The original idea of 'mirror universe' was the characters were the opposite of themselves

Not really. I mean, they had that whole dialogue exchange at the end of "Mirror, Mirror" about how easy it was for Kirk and the others to pretend to be barbarians, because there really wasn't that fundamental a difference between a civilized person and a savage. It never claimed they were absolute opposites; it specifically made the point that they were largely the same.

Keep in mind that the term "Mirror Universe" was never spoken onscreen until Discovery. The title "Mirror, Mirror" is not just about mirrors in general, but refers specifically to the magic mirror from Snow White. In that context, it's not about opposition -- it's about revealing the truth, even when it's not the truth you want to hear about yourself.

So it was never meant to be some cartoonish "everything is backward" universe. It was just a different universe, one with a darker history. In Jerome Bixby's original pitch, it wasn't even an evil universe, just a slightly variant Federation that was losing a war because it never invented phasers, and also Kirk was married. The "pirate Enterprise" idea was probably cribbed from Ellison's original "City on the Edge" script, which showed the barbaric alternative timeline that resulted when Edith lived. So it wasn't that the "Mirror" characters were literal opposites, just that they came from a more savage history and turned out differently as a result.

I mean, everyone's basically the same in most ways. Kirk is the captain, Spock is the first officer, McCoy is a doctor, Scott's an engineer, Sulu's in charge of weapons, Chekov's an ambitious young officer, etc. But those are expressed differently in the darker, more Klingon-like society in which they were raised.

 

[bryce]

I wrote this for recently for a similar question on Quora, but I'll repost it here:


Well, maybe yes…and no. This is what I think:

Okay, there is no “money” (certainly not physical money, which was likely what Kirk was referring too) - nor is there a *need* for money, physical or otherwise, to get by.

But “credits” of some kind do exist, and have been referred to. Doubtless something electronic, like Bitcoin.

Okay, let’s step back. See, we are thinking in terms of the *current* economic paradigm. But Star Trek is 200, 300 and 400 years in the future - current economic systems like capitalism and communism will seem as quaint and outdated - and barbaric - as feudalism is to us today.Trek exists in what is called a “post-scarcity” economy. This is possible because automation and synthesizers and replicators can make anything needed. And in space, resources are far from scarce - raw matter can be found in any asteroid…water…metals…carbon…organic molecules even (forget that old scifi trope about advanced star-traveling alien races needing to conquer Earth for our water and other resources and such, that’s just silly.) You just need robots - that can make more robots - to mine and shape those resources.

So, as a Federation citizen, your *basic* needs are met, you have “free” housing and education and clothing and food and medical care and some travel credit. Federation technology is just so bloody advanced, that this costs virtually nothing for society to provide - and doesn’t benefit society as a whole NOT to provide. (Poverty = social instability.)

But, if, say, you want more…say a nice big house, or your own private spaceship or private asteroid…or you want to buy an expense work of art, or something artisanally made (hand crafted) - such as a bottle of Chateau Picard to enjoy over a dinner at Sisko’s…you would exchange credits for them. (Or your would barter.)

I’ll bet that every Federation citizen also gets some base allotment of credits every so often. A “guaranteed minimum wage” of some sort, like some Democratic presidential candidates are talking about now. (Jake mentioned using up all his “transporter credits” once.) Note: this would “cost” the Federation virtually *nothing* to provide. They are that “wealthy”. Resource wise.

And Starfleet officer very likely earn even more credits for joining Starfleet (but you aren’t going to get *rich* on the job, you aren’t doing it for the money, you are doing it because it’s what you love.)

But like I said, you don’t NEED credits to survive. And if you want credits, well, you create things yourself, to trade for either credits, or something else someone has. Or you work for someone who needs your skills, so you can earn more credits. Credits to get the extra things. (Like handmade food and clothing, instead of just replicated knock-offs.)

It’s very likely that as automation takes over more and more manufacturing jobs…and new technologies like robots and 3D printing and nanotechnology and biotechnology come online, we may have to adopt such a system ourselves. People will still be able to work - and likely many people will choose to; to become artists or artisans or explorers or protectors or doctors or statespersons or to just own their own vineyard….or just to get more stuff. But nobody *has* too.

This system isn’t socialism *or* capitalism…it’s “post scarcity”.

 

[Greg Cox]

At the risk of releasing my inner curmudgeon, I think it misrepresents TOS to dwell too much on how its imaginary economy works. TOS is about exploring the Final Frontier, seeking out new worlds and civilizations, not about life in a "non-scarcity" economy, a term that was never used on TOS. Indeed, the whole "cashless" thing is based on one throwaway gag in the whale movie, so it's hardly an essential aspect of TOS. (Never mind the 24th-century spin-offs; that's a whole other issue.)

I confess: I generally prefer to set my books out on the Final Frontier, outside the Federation, so I don't have to deal with how the economy works back on Earth. Plus, that means I can still have smugglers, prospectors, merchants, traders, pirates, ransoms, treasures and all that fun, colorful stuff.

 

[Tallguy]

Greg you're my hero.