Making money is hard!

[nathan]

Does anyone know a good easy way to make money without going into the red? Is their any sort of goods you build to sell to earn easy money without any issue?

[joeball123]

Really depends on what era you're talking about, how much money you have to invest, what your island looks like, and what you already have set up. Primary industry generally has lower setup and overhead costs than secondary industry, but the unit price for most of the raw materials you get from primary industry is significantly lower than that for the intermediate and finished products produced by secondary industry, and you also don't want to be hauling goods clear across the island/archipelago if you can avoid doing so, especially in the Colonial Era. If you don't yet have anything set up or can't really afford to invest in secondary industry and the necessary infrastructure to support it, primary industry tends to be the way to go; otherwise, go for secondary industries for which you're already producing the necessary raw materials.

I would add that tertiary industry (within the game: offices, banks, anything to do with tourism) is more or less 'free money' once you can build it, though the income mechanics for banks and offices are designed to prevent you from basing your entire economy on them while tourism can have issues if you have a rebel problem or aren't playing nice with the era's major powers.

[Hat8]

Originally posted by nathan:

Does anyone know a good easy way to make money without going into the red? Is their any sort of goods you build to sell to earn easy money without any issue?

Go to the trade screen and check the prices. Whatever is the highest value should be prioritised at the start and work your way down.

The value of stuff changes depending on the eras so you should get a varied economy going for each era transition.

[joeball123]

Originally posted by Hat8:

Go to the trade screen and check the prices. Whatever is the highest value should be prioritised at the start and work your way down.

A significant problem with this advice is that the "highest value" products almost always come from secondary industries, which require significantly more capital investment and lead time to begin production than primary industries do. Consider, for example, Rum - you need a Distillery ($9,600, 4 workers at $17/month) and ~2 Sugar Plantations ($1,500, 8 workers @ $7/month), you need to wait for the Plantations to produce sugar before the Distillery can even begin producing Rum, and because the Distillery is going to consume more or less all of the sugar that the Plantations produce you're not going to see any revenue from this setup until the Rum starts flowing down to the Dock. If you just built the Sugar Plantations and exported the sugar, you might not be making as much per unit exported, but you'd start generating revenue much sooner and you'd still have the ten grand or so that the distillery costs available to spend on something else, like more plantations or other primary industries that can likewise start producing revenue more or less as soon as they're built. The more complex the production chain, the greater the capital investment required to get everything set up becomes, and probably also the longer the lead time until the industry actually starts generating revenue as resources might have to make their way through a couple of stages of processing before they become export products.

A second issue with this advice is that a lot of the secondary industries have significant indirect costs in the form of required supporting infrastructure. Cars, for example, are generally a very high-value export once they become available in the Cold War era, but the Vehicle Factory requires power and can only be staffed by workers with a High School or better education, so you definitely need a power plant and probably need a functional school system (although you can avoid the latter requirement by stealing the Registan of Samarkand and might be able to get by on educated immigrants or "rescues" of educated people if you don't have too many other jobs that require High School or better educations) - and if you take the nuclear option for power you'll probably also need a College. Schools and power plants are things that you'll probably want to have, eventually, but they're also fairly expensive (Power Plants and Nuclear Power Plants especially so, as running one not only costs you the plant's upkeep and staff wages but also denies you the revenue you could get by exporting the plant's fuel) and don't directly generate any revenue themselves, so you tend to want to be in a reasonably strong financial position before you get into these industries, especially if whatever you're thinking of setting up is the first thing you're doing that really needs all of this stuff.

[//MX`]

Originally posted by nathan:

Does anyone know a good easy way to make money without going into the red? Is their any sort of goods you build to sell to earn easy money without any issue?

I wouldn't listen to anyone here.
Diversify your jobs, to cover all parts of the market.
And yes, as you progress through eras, older jobs like farms produce less value, and you have to modernize.

Look at everyone writing essays lol.

[Sima | Marco]

Income though economy can be a real grind, depending on how efficient you can produce and sell. When you go capitalist you can squeeze out money from your people. Otherwise converting money from swizz bank account is also possible.

I personally try to make money from every non economy source and sacrifice happiness.

You can also try to make deals with criminal subjects.

[joeball123]

Originally posted by Sima | Marco:

Otherwise converting money from swizz bank account is also possible.
...
You can also try to make deals with criminal subjects.

Swiss money isn't remotely worthwhile if you're playing with Lobbyistico, and considering that criminals aren't part of the general work force while crime siphons money away from the treasury even without Lobbyistico's Corruption mechanic I'm rather dubious of the value of striking shady deals with crime lords to fund the conversion of Swiss money into dollars through the Broker.

[Delle(DK)]

some start strategys.

1). tip one is a little cheat, hold the oil pump in your hand and move it over the map and find the oil location and sell the oil.. This is fast to build and export oil.. exporting oil from 4 oil pumpts can more or less pay all your construction expenses the first few years while building your city so you avoid to loan money in the early game.

2). you can build a coal power plant near the border and import coal.. This will after 1 year result in you being able to earn about 4500 rubler every month or said with other words you can finance the forign workers but you still loose money while building but since importing workers cost like 4500 rubler every month in the game start then that rather fast become expensive, so i think its okay to have an coal power plant that can make that number 0
( one year x 4500 rubler is 50.000 rubler saved every year with this method )

3). This method will earn you allot of money. and it can make a profit every year and finance your city and early start. ( import power )

build 1 silo ( example 800tons ) connect that to 1 fabric -> warehouse with 1 rail -> 2 clothing facotrys.
In the warehouse you will be able to export clothing from, so just park 1 cloverd hull truck and export clothing.
TIP.. start putting 1 clothing factory on pause and focus on filling the fabric and clothing facotry 100% with workers.
You need ALLOT of workers the more workers the better and the faster it work.
Btu this setup will make moneyy.
Be aware that making fabric and clothing require you to supply with 99% clean water, and also to remove allot of sewage water.. The best is to dump the sewage in a river or ocean in early game OR Build a very deep hole and dump it in the hole.

You need a minimum of 1000-1300 people to run your entire city and run the factorys, heating plant ect.

[joeball123]

Originally posted by Delle(DK):

some start strategys.

Advice for Workers and Resources: Soviet Republic does not seem particularly relevant to Tropico 6.

[Emphyrio]

Tourism is the easiest, so long as you don't fall into a rebel death spiral, and missions that start in modern era are trivially easy: build an airport and five or six skyscraper hotels, do a Fantasy Review, some luxury entertainment set to tourists only, and bam, no money problems for the rest of the mission.

Colonial and WW eras are a bit of a grind, buildings don't make much yet and pop is too low to spam them. The pirate cove is essential, it gets you pop and resources to sell or process.

Farms and ranches on normal mode degrade the soil too fast and you need either later era tech or a bunch of farms, ranches and manure spreaders (and pop to staff them) to make their efficiency worthwhile. For jumpstarting in Colonial it might be better and cheaper to let the soil degrade and then do the "move building" option than try to bother with manure or multiculture.

Fisheries and mines, set to drift netting and profit protocol, can make some modest money very early.

Try to construct your island as small hubs where clusters of workplaces are right next to housing and each hub has its own entertainment, grocery, church and clinic. Connect hubs with buses in WW era. This minimizes the time tropicans are away from work.

[joeball123]

Originally posted by Emphyrio:

Farms and ranches on normal mode degrade the soil too fast and you need either later era tech or a bunch of farms, ranches and manure spreaders (and pop to staff them) to make their efficiency worthwhile. For jumpstarting in Colonial it might be better and cheaper to let the soil degrade and then do the "move building" option than try to bother with manure or multiculture.

Pretty much any scenario you choose to play should start you with enough population to staff at least three or four plantations, which is enough to make Multiculture decent unless your initial soil quality is atrocious, and if you want to go down the Monoculture route Manure Spreaders can restore the soil, not just stop further degredation, so relocating plantations is unnecessary unless you want the space for something else.

Also, if you are using Manure Spreaders, Concentrated Spray is very often a better choice than Widespread Spray even if you end up sacrificing a couple of field tiles for the sprayer, as Manure Spreaders on Widespread Spray can't seem to keep pace with soil degradation for more than about one plantation per manure spreader.

Originally posted by Emphyrio:

The pirate cove is essential, it gets you pop and resources to sell or process.

While the Pirate Cove is useful, it isn't even remotely essential, and the 'Loot' raids are pretty mediocre when it comes to supplying a secondary industry while 'Rescue' raids can be problematic for achieving the required percentage of revolutionaries to advance out of the Colonial Era.

[edcote]

Originally posted by Delle(DK):

some start strategys.

1). tip one is a little cheat, hold the oil pump in your hand and move it over the map and find the oil location and sell the oil.. This is fast to build and export oil.. exporting oil from 4 oil pumpts can more or less pay all your construction expenses the first few years while building your city so you avoid to loan money in the early game.

2). you can build a coal power plant near the border and import coal.. This will after 1 year result in you being able to earn about 4500 rubler every month or said with other words you can finance the forign workers but you still loose money while building but since importing workers cost like 4500 rubler every month in the game start then that rather fast become expensive, so i think its okay to have an coal power plant that can make that number 0
( one year x 4500 rubler is 50.000 rubler saved every year with this method )

3). This method will earn you allot of money. and it can make a profit every year and finance your city and early start. ( import power )

build 1 silo ( example 800tons ) connect that to 1 fabric -> warehouse with 1 rail -> 2 clothing facotrys.
In the warehouse you will be able to export clothing from, so just park 1 cloverd hull truck and export clothing.
TIP.. start putting 1 clothing factory on pause and focus on filling the fabric and clothing facotry 100% with workers.
You need ALLOT of workers the more workers the better and the faster it work.
Btu this setup will make moneyy.
Be aware that making fabric and clothing require you to supply with 99% clean water, and also to remove allot of sewage water.. The best is to dump the sewage in a river or ocean in early game OR Build a very deep hole and dump it in the hole.

You need a minimum of 1000-1300 people to run your entire city and run the factorys, heating plant ect.

Wrong game

[longjr97]

Originally posted by edcote:

Wrong game

I thought that too. What game is this advice for?

[joeball123]

Originally posted by longjr97:

Originally posted by edcote:

Wrong game

I thought that too. What game is this advice for?

Workers and Resources: Soviet Republic.

[louem00]

i generally tend to start really early with logs - planks - boats and I get this up and running as soon as i can. This can bring in a fair amount quite early - mid to late game you will need more - a lot more but it will keep you going in the beginning and allow you to expand

[Tsuichoi]

Originally posted by nathan:

Does anyone know a good easy way to make money without going into the red? Is their any sort of goods you build to sell to earn easy money without any issue?

On any map? Assuming you have the land, plantations on multiculture arranged suitably, with the help of the cattle upgrade and manure, can be insanely efficient and don't forget water towers just in case!