Massive budget spikes?

[Prés. Kermit]

Is this a game mechanic? It is making it really difficult to handle the economy. Every 15 days or so the budget surplus will drop dramatically and I can't find a reason for it to do that. It means that I have to either bump up taxes regularly or continue cutting expenditure. Is this a game mechanic or a glitch?

[LEPANUS]

It's something to do with the Eco cap I'm sure. Some hosts don't raise the resource drop number, so when your economy gets large enough it automatically drops it. The solution is to raise the resource drop.

[Prés. Kermit]

Originally posted by Windows NT:

It's something to do with the Eco cap I'm sure. Some hosts don't raise the resource drop number, so when your economy gets large enough it automatically drops it. The solution is to raise the resource drop.

Are you sure? I'm only doing single player.

[Semper Shy]

Don't really know how the economy works myself but if I had to take a swing at it, I'd wager it has to do with the market demand. My guess is your country might be rich in some particular recourses that become desired at opportune times while on the otherhand, you are lacking in other types hence causing you to lose your income when your main recourses are no longer needed in the world market.

Have also tried looking at your inflation? High levels will also increase your government spendings.

[LEPANUS]

Originally posted by Ghost:

Originally posted by Windows NT:

It's something to do with the Eco cap I'm sure. Some hosts don't raise the resource drop number, so when your economy gets large enough it automatically drops it. The solution is to raise the resource drop.

Are you sure? I'm only doing single player.

Well, you can change your settings to raise the resource drop.

[Awstrd]

I find budget spikes are normal when playing as one of the poorer countries, as they typically seem to occur because the amount of foreign aid you recieves can go up or down quite a bit depending on how rich you are and how much rich countries spend on foreign aid. Also, if an important trading partner has the economic boom random event, it temporarily gives you a big boost in revenue that will later vanish when the boom wears off. I find that once I am playing a rich country, the budget spikes disappear.

However, if your income is steadily decreasing and you have to continually raise taxes and lower expenditures, you are doing something wrong in terms of managing the economy.

Are you raising taxes on your resources? Heavily taxing your resources will actually reduce their production over time, and the lower production will in turn reduce your tax income, putting your economy in a death spiral.

If you cut spending on things like infrastructure, education, and telecom, that will slowly make your country poorer and lower its tax income over the long term.

While it is true that low interst will raise your expenditures, it also raises your revenues, so low interest rates are a good idea.

Generally speaking, a simple and easy to manage any economy is this:

- Set taxes on all resources to 0 and make sure they are set to private, not government. (Also, legalize the drug resource).
- Join as many economic partnerships as you can with other countries.
- Raise income taxes to about 75%
- Set interest rate to 0
- Pay off your debt and stay out of debt
- Slowly increase infrastructure spending until it is maxed
- Slowly increase telecom spending until it is maxed
- Slowly increase education spending until it is maxed
- If you can afford it, put money in tourism
- increae produciton of your resources until you have a green balance for all resources.

That strat will work for most countries. For multiparty democracies, you can temporarily bump up spending around election time so you have enough approval to win an election, or you can just switch to a different political system for awhile. If you follow this strat, you should find that the budget spikes will eventually disappear.

Hope this helps :D

[Prés. Kermit]

Originally posted by Awstrd:

I find budget spikes are normal when playing as one of the poorer countries, as they typically seem to occur because the amount of foreign aid you recieves can go up or down quite a bit depending on how rich you are and how much rich countries spend on foreign aid. Also, if an important trading partner has the economic boom random event, it temporarily gives you a big boost in revenue that will later vanish when the boom wears off. I find that once I am playing a rich country, the budget spikes disappear.

However, if your income is steadily decreasing and you have to continually raise taxes and lower expenditures, you are doing something wrong in terms of managing the economy.

Are you raising taxes on your resources? Heavily taxing your resources will actually reduce their production over time, and the lower production will in turn reduce your tax income, putting your economy in a death spiral.

If you cut spending on things like infrastructure, education, and telecom, that will slowly make your country poorer and lower its tax income over the long term.

While it is true that low interst will raise your expenditures, it also raises your revenues, so low interest rates are a good idea.

Generally speaking, a simple and easy to manage any economy is this:

- Set taxes on all resources to 0 and make sure they are set to private, not government. (Also, legalize the drug resource).
- Join as many economic partnerships as you can with other countries.
- Raise income taxes to about 75%
- Set interest rate to 0
- Pay off your debt and stay out of debt
- Slowly increase infrastructure spending until it is maxed
- Slowly increase telecom spending until it is maxed
- Slowly increase education spending until it is maxed
- If you can afford it, put money in tourism
- increae produciton of your resources until you have a green balance for all resources.

That strat will work for most countries. For multiparty democracies, you can temporarily bump up spending around election time so you have enough approval to win an election, or you can just switch to a different political system for awhile. If you follow this strat, you should find that the budget spikes will eventually disappear.

Hope this helps :D

Thank you, this is great advice! I'll test this right now