Maybe it were the difficulties, Jake was facing, when he tried to get the baseball card for this dad that convinced Jake to become a reporter for the Federation News Service to get some credits and/or Latinum.
The No Currency Thing On Earth
- Thread starter Kate Nichols
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Maybe it were the difficulties, Jake was facing, when he tried to get the baseball card for this dad that convinced Jake to become a reporter for the Federation News Service to get some credits and/or Latinum.
It also established that Humans in the Federation are still buying and selling things.
Or, it isn't a "non-scarcity society."
If there's a need for bartering there's a need for money, one follows the other. Just accept that your idea doesn't work.
The idea that there's no more money/currency in the Federation / Earth/ whatever is just plain silly. There is always going to be an economy of some sort, post scarcity or not, and hence some medium of exchange. Money is way too convenient as a universal exchange medium to abolish, ever.
If they wanted to portray an idyllic future, what they should have done, in my eyes, is show/tell that, sure, money still exists, but purely as a tool. The attachment to it (or to any possessions, or to power that comes with money, etc) is gone, since everybody has enough of everything and people have grown beyond the need to acquire for themselves. Which of course still is very unrealistic, but at least it would be marginally less silly.
Abolishing money is like abolishing knives, since killers have been known to kill with them.
If they wanted to portray an idyllic future, what they should have done, in my eyes, is show/tell that, sure, money still exists, but purely as a tool. The attachment to it (or to any possessions, or to power that comes with money, etc) is gone, since everybody has enough of everything and people have grown beyond the need to acquire for themselves. Which of course still is very unrealistic, but at least it would be marginally less silly.
Abolishing money is like abolishing knives, since killers have been known to kill with them.
Are you so sure that Picard wine isn't %100 of the time replicated?
Sure they got vines, but it's years of hard work and waaaaa... aitin' after that to turn those shrubs into a few bottles of hootch.
^ My pet theory ....they convinced themselves that the authentic thing is superior to replicated stuff .... similar to how today people convince themselves that an expensive grocery brand must be superior to a cheap one (which isn't necessarily true) .
It would be implausible to think that in the entire Federation there wouldn't be at a minimum a sizable group of people, by 2019 Earth standards, who could taste the difference between replicated and authentic wines.
Sure.
If they have tasted both.
Plato's Cave.
It's the food snob assholes that assume that there is a difference, but have NEVER had the opportunity to figure out the difference, because real food is so hard to come by.
Also...
Vegetarians today have an abrasive explosively difficult journey trying to re-embrace meat.
Can a 24h century someone in their 20s or thirties eat non-replicated food for the first time, and not poop until they die a couple hours later?
Controlling food is a way of controlling empire.
If they have tasted both.
Plato's Cave.
It's the food snob assholes that assume that there is a difference, but have NEVER had the opportunity to figure out the difference, because real food is so hard to come by.
Also...
Vegetarians today have an abrasive explosively difficult journey trying to re-embrace meat.
Can a 24h century someone in their 20s or thirties eat non-replicated food for the first time, and not poop until they die a couple hours later?
Controlling food is a way of controlling empire.
Depends upon how good exactly the replicated stuff is. If it's a replica down to the molecular level, no-one could possibly taste it, except perhaps for the fact that it would always taste exactly the same. If it's slightly less good, depends upon how wide the gap is.
In any case, the group of snobs pretending to taste subtle differences would be much larger than the group of people who actually can appreciate such differences.
In fact, comparing it to today's situation, I would sooner suspect someone complaining about cheap wines as 'the horrible stuff people pour down their throats and think they drink wine' to be a snob than a true connoisseur. A true wine lover would probably say something more like "you can't expect much for that price, but even in that segment there are better and worse choices, and the better choices have at least some redeeming qualities". Extrapolating that, I would expect someone giving a blanket complaint about how bad replicated stuff tastes to be more of a snob than a true food/wine lover.
After all, if it really were that horrible, no one would ever use replicated stuff.
This is one thing I often wondered about.
It seems likeThe Federation has no currency or money system at all. It's sort of "replicate what you want and its yours" or so.
But on the other hand, there seem to be some strive for latinum, gold or other valuable things here and there.
Like when Chakotay encounter Paris on Voyager after arriving there for the first time:
CHAKOTAY: But you? What did you betray us for? Freedom from prison? Latinum? What was your price this time?
Why should Chakotay mention latinum if there was no need for such things?
The same when crewmebers from different ships visit Quark's for drinking and gambling. Old Quark would never let them drink and gamble for free and what I have seeen, Sisko or any other Federation hotshot have never ordered him to do that. So are the officers handing out bars of gold-pressed latinum to their crewmembers when they visit Quark's, buy a suit at Garak's or visit any other market or trading place in space? Or are federation officers giving them counterfeit money when they come to a planet, like "Here you have some Cardassian leks to enjoy yourself, We have just replicated them for you."
So if there is are no money in the Federation, how does Federation citizens get what they need to use as payment on other planets?
It seems likeThe Federation has no currency or money system at all. It's sort of "replicate what you want and its yours" or so.
But on the other hand, there seem to be some strive for latinum, gold or other valuable things here and there.
Like when Chakotay encounter Paris on Voyager after arriving there for the first time:
CHAKOTAY: But you? What did you betray us for? Freedom from prison? Latinum? What was your price this time?
Why should Chakotay mention latinum if there was no need for such things?
The same when crewmebers from different ships visit Quark's for drinking and gambling. Old Quark would never let them drink and gamble for free and what I have seeen, Sisko or any other Federation hotshot have never ordered him to do that. So are the officers handing out bars of gold-pressed latinum to their crewmembers when they visit Quark's, buy a suit at Garak's or visit any other market or trading place in space? Or are federation officers giving them counterfeit money when they come to a planet, like "Here you have some Cardassian leks to enjoy yourself, We have just replicated them for you."
So if there is are no money in the Federation, how does Federation citizens get what they need to use as payment on other planets?
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To me..
You have a no money system in the federation, but its bassed off of merit in a way.. If your a slacker, wake up, watch tv, eat bon bons, do nothing, then yes, you have your food etc paid for, but your at the bottom of the list for stuff, as in, you may want the malibu house, but your going to get a 53rd floor apartment in the middle of LA because you don't do crap..
Take Picard, his family may have had the vineyard since old times, but say a new person says, hey, I want to grow grapes for wine, he puts in to the Land Commision of some sort for some land, and he's given a house and say 5 acres to see if he likes it and makes wine, if he's good, he gets more acres, if he never brings in a crop, etc, he's kicked off the land.
So I'm thinking a more merit based system, like how an ensign gets a roommate, while a captain gets a vip suite..
With the Sisko resteraunt, i doubt he charges anything, his family may have owned it since olden times, or maybe granddad went to the New Orleans land place and asked if he could have a place to open a resturant.. and if it works, he keeps it, if he poisons everybody who eats there.. then he gets closed down..
now, say you want an orion slave girl for your bedroom, (Who doesn't?) there's a way to translate your work to to some credit system, We have to interact with other civilizations with a currency based system, so there has to be some system of money in the federaton, I mean people still own there own starships! do you just ask for 1?
So to me, If you want to just live, paint etc. your needs will be met, but if you do something that merits more, you get more
You have a no money system in the federation, but its bassed off of merit in a way.. If your a slacker, wake up, watch tv, eat bon bons, do nothing, then yes, you have your food etc paid for, but your at the bottom of the list for stuff, as in, you may want the malibu house, but your going to get a 53rd floor apartment in the middle of LA because you don't do crap..
Take Picard, his family may have had the vineyard since old times, but say a new person says, hey, I want to grow grapes for wine, he puts in to the Land Commision of some sort for some land, and he's given a house and say 5 acres to see if he likes it and makes wine, if he's good, he gets more acres, if he never brings in a crop, etc, he's kicked off the land.
So I'm thinking a more merit based system, like how an ensign gets a roommate, while a captain gets a vip suite..
With the Sisko resteraunt, i doubt he charges anything, his family may have owned it since olden times, or maybe granddad went to the New Orleans land place and asked if he could have a place to open a resturant.. and if it works, he keeps it, if he poisons everybody who eats there.. then he gets closed down..
now, say you want an orion slave girl for your bedroom, (Who doesn't?) there's a way to translate your work to to some credit system, We have to interact with other civilizations with a currency based system, so there has to be some system of money in the federaton, I mean people still own there own starships! do you just ask for 1?
So to me, If you want to just live, paint etc. your needs will be met, but if you do something that merits more, you get more
Let's say when Joseph Sisko opens his restaurant for dinner service, the following people are waiting: the mayor, the woman who runs the power plant, a man who runs a pear orchard in Washington, a woman who researches warp theory at Tulane, a teacher, and a nobody.
According to what we've heard, Mr. Sisko wouldn't care who they were, but for the sake of argument, why would he seat them.
The mayor runs the city where Sisko operates. It includes all the infrastructure, etc. In our society, the mayor wouldn't charge Mr. Sisko every time the street outside his restaurant was cleaned. In this society, the mayor knows that Mr. Sisko provides authentic food. Reciprocally, Mr. Sisko knows that the mayor is providing him services he needs.
The same logic would hold for the plant manager. Ring up her meal: free!
Mr. Sisko doesn't use pears in his cooking, but he recognizes the need for someone who grows pears. Mr. Sisko deals with many people who grow native ingredients--indeed, Mr. Sisko does this himself. Recognizing him as a confrere, he serves the guy his meal, no charge.
Mr. Sisko hates space travel, has only been off world once. Moreover, he doesn't need the technology that will make travel faster or safer. But his son does. So he serves a wonderful dinner to the Tulane professor.
Mr. Sisko is too old for children. But he respects the work they have done for his children, as he was too busy in the restaurant to teach young Ben and the others directly. One teacher, one jambalaya.
Then there's the nobody. Does he work? Mr. Sisko doesn't know. Has he ever used his services? Maybe yes, maybe no. At this point, does it matter to Mr. Sisko? Does he get more benefit out of serving the nobody or turning him away?
These are obviously very primitive forms of economics based on reciprocal exchanges, but they are real--many communities have functioned because of them. Simply put, most communities (1) lacked the resources and infrastructure to operate complex monetary systems and (2) lacked the literacy for recording debts and credits. These communities had to trust that a farmer, for instance, was going to produce a harvest at the end of the season that was going to provide value to them as individuals and as a community in general down the road.
And I am not saying this is the only way that this economics work. It is just a way that they could work--locally, perhaps globally. It depends on the assumptions, which as also part of Star Trek, that there are abundant resources and the humanity has evolved greater trust for one another. The economics is a byproduct of these assumptions. If there is a problem, it really has to be explored from the question of whether or not meeting aliens is going to bring harmony to humanity.
According to what we've heard, Mr. Sisko wouldn't care who they were, but for the sake of argument, why would he seat them.
The mayor runs the city where Sisko operates. It includes all the infrastructure, etc. In our society, the mayor wouldn't charge Mr. Sisko every time the street outside his restaurant was cleaned. In this society, the mayor knows that Mr. Sisko provides authentic food. Reciprocally, Mr. Sisko knows that the mayor is providing him services he needs.
The same logic would hold for the plant manager. Ring up her meal: free!
Mr. Sisko doesn't use pears in his cooking, but he recognizes the need for someone who grows pears. Mr. Sisko deals with many people who grow native ingredients--indeed, Mr. Sisko does this himself. Recognizing him as a confrere, he serves the guy his meal, no charge.
Mr. Sisko hates space travel, has only been off world once. Moreover, he doesn't need the technology that will make travel faster or safer. But his son does. So he serves a wonderful dinner to the Tulane professor.
Mr. Sisko is too old for children. But he respects the work they have done for his children, as he was too busy in the restaurant to teach young Ben and the others directly. One teacher, one jambalaya.
Then there's the nobody. Does he work? Mr. Sisko doesn't know. Has he ever used his services? Maybe yes, maybe no. At this point, does it matter to Mr. Sisko? Does he get more benefit out of serving the nobody or turning him away?
These are obviously very primitive forms of economics based on reciprocal exchanges, but they are real--many communities have functioned because of them. Simply put, most communities (1) lacked the resources and infrastructure to operate complex monetary systems and (2) lacked the literacy for recording debts and credits. These communities had to trust that a farmer, for instance, was going to produce a harvest at the end of the season that was going to provide value to them as individuals and as a community in general down the road.
And I am not saying this is the only way that this economics work. It is just a way that they could work--locally, perhaps globally. It depends on the assumptions, which as also part of Star Trek, that there are abundant resources and the humanity has evolved greater trust for one another. The economics is a byproduct of these assumptions. If there is a problem, it really has to be explored from the question of whether or not meeting aliens is going to bring harmony to humanity.
There it is.
In our society, businesses pay taxes, thereby the streets (hopefully) get cleaned.
Exactly! The city trusts that I will pay my property taxes at the end of the fiscal year, so they clean the street in front of my home.
Hit the nail on the head here. There are shitty replicators that use less energy, but stuff doesn't quite taste right. Then there are the really good replicators, but that steak is always exactly the same, and at some point you are going to start to notice. The only way around this is to have hundreds of patterns of each food item so you get a different one every time. That could be a whole job in itself, make new dishes from scratch to add variety to the replicator.
At the beginning of the modern Trek series (early TNG), the writers conveyed that replicators were miracle inventions that created food and drink that delighted the consumer. Note the line in "The Neutral Zone" where a 20th Century man, who had nothing but the real thing his entire life, declares that a replicated martini is the "best" he ever had.
As the shows wore on, though, the concept crept in that replicators were somehow "less than" real food and replicated food was more often than not inferior. It started out with references to folks like O'Brien's mom and Picard's brother who preferred "real" food and continued on and on through bits like Tom Paris complaining that the replicator "can't even get tomato soup right" or Eddington bitching that the replicators couldn't hold a candle to all the real veggies he grew in his Maquis garden.
He even says he knows it's merely "Replicated protein molecules and textured carbohydrates", even though replicators can literally create any substance down to the molecular level, so the chicken the replicator creates should be just as "real" as anything else on a level far beyond a human's ability to discern it.
So, yeah, it basically became a very lazy and utterly inconsistent way to make a quick joke or to try to give a character a sense of gritty, real-world "authenticity", making them someone who was less impressed by flashy technology and who cultivated real, classical experiences. (In that same Eddington conversation as well as elsewhere in the series, there are references to Sisko growing his own veggies, too.)
The whole no money thing is pretty idiotic IMO. They should have stuck with Credits like the TOS, that made sense, it was simple ... and after all, the show is not really about economic theory. Because of the "no money" edict, they ended up doing a bunch of gymnastics to get around it to make stories make sense. I think Nog's response to Jake about money was pretty perfect in showing the mistake "no money" was
No money in the future was something established from the mouth of James Kirk in The Voyage Home, which was released in 1986, almost a year before TNG first aired in 1987.
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