There also seems to be a desire by many people to get the "real stuff", especially when it comes to alcohol. Which would make sense, since the replicator might have one small set of vintages programmed in, while potentially every bottle of the real thing can be unique.
True, and with the existence of replicators, the value of 'the genuine article' would go up immensely. I get the sense this would be particularly true of alcohol- already something of a fetish object for certain consumers (and that replicators might not, as a rule, produce alcohol, for medical/safety concerns).
Star Trek is pretty cagey about Federation economics. While its is explicitly stated that money does not exist, the writers do away with this concept whenever they feel restricted by it.
I don't think they do away with it, they just remain purposefully vague about it, the same way they are totally vague about warp speed and how transporters work and how most of the sci-fi elements work. The lack of money IS one of the sci-fi elements, but it's certainly far more 'realistic' than a transporter or holodeck would be.
In Deep Space Nine the Starfleet personal have some source of income. We see them buying things/gambling at Quarks. Dax even tries to borrow money from Worf.
Ron Moore used to joke that Sisko had a 'slush fund' that he paid out to officers so they could interact with the money-using Bajorans/Ferengi, but that's probably the most realistic explanation.
Even on Earth, Sisko's Dad seems genuinely concerned with the amount of business he does. This raises a question of why does he run a restaurant at all if there is no money? Sure he may enjoy cooking but why put in years of long hours if the restaurant is simply a hobby? Why care about its success?
So you're saying if there was no money, and nobody had to do things for other people outside of financial gain, nobody would create anything, or do anything for other people? Have you ever heard of amateur theater?
What motivates people to engage in professions without financial gain?
I hear this all the time in this debate and it shocks me every time. Is this an American thing? Do we have so little faith in the human spirit that we can't think of anything to motivate us outside of money? Even here, today, in the real world, there are people who devote their lives to helping others with no thought of how it earns them money. Is it so unrealistic to think that, if all our material needs were met, we wouldn't find it within ourselves to do the same thing?
The Federation is greatly concerned with mining a large range of minerals; sometimes we're given some throwaway dialogue about how some substance can't be replicated other times the writers simply don't bother.
I'd say it's totally reasonable to think that lots of things can't be replicated (or at least that replicating them is less energy efficient than mining them, or whatever)- latinum, for example, is valuable precisely because it can't be replicated. But in a world without scarcity, so what? So something is valuable, does that mean you need a money-based economy, after everyone's food, water and shelter needs are already taken care of?
Further we are shown that large groups of Federation citizens are motivated to colonize new worlds so that they can engage in farming.
Well that's another resource that can't be replicated- land. But all of the colonists we meet on TNG seem to be explorers, enthusiasts- they don't seem to be in it for the money, they are in it for the adventure. That seems to be the real currency in the Federation- the opportunity to do something interesting and exciting to you.
All of this points to there being limits to what can be achieved with replication and that these gaps are filled by the law of supply and demand and markets as we know them today.
I don't agree with this- in post-scarcity world, the laws of supply and demand would not function as we currently understand them. What metric are you using for value? What would the value of this supposed currency be tied to, when most everything is free? How do you think money is valued today, in our real world? Money primarily exists for trade between individuals- at the larger corporate and governmental levels that you are talking about, the things themselves take on the value- the monetary 'value' is an afterthought, determined by the transaction itself. You need to see through the matrix.
If certain things have a limited supply then they have value and can be traded which would mean the existence of some medium of exchange (money).
I think this is where everyone's imagination breaks down, because we are so used to the world we live in. Limited-supply commodities would be so valuable that, while they might be assigned a value vs. other commodities, it would only be so that resources could be assigned effectively (and the values would change based on whatever commodities they'd be compared to). Trading between individuals would not exist as we understand it, because almost everything that individuals need can be replicated, for free.
Therefore in the case of Sisko's Dad, he would have to receive some form of compensation from his customers to at least cover the cost of his inputs (ingredients, labor etc..) and probably also extract some sort of surplus value (profits).
Everything in the show says that he runs the restaurant because that's what he has chosen to do with his life and that's what he enjoys doing. It IS his life. You *must* know people who do the same, even in our money-obsessed economy. Who choose their passion over profit. Now just extend that philosophy to the whole world... and beyond.
