How should we call our currency ?

[GePap]

I must disagree with our Minister of economics on his coversion rates. Our ministers of demographics (F11) tell us that we have a GNP of 45 million gold and a population of 405,000 citizens in our empire. If each each Lyton is only 1/1728 of one gold, then the average citizen is making 192,000 Lytons a year... how much will a single family home be worth? One million Lytons? talk about inflation!

I propose a more simple conversion rate, so that our citizens understand it and come to use it and love it (ie., lets not ruin this by making it so complex no one will uses Lyton, just keep talking about 'gold' or 'bananas'):

1 Lyton= 1 gold, so that currently, the PCI of our fair empire is 111 Lytons a year: if we figure a 72 hour workweek, with our people working 52 weeks (all this assumes the 365 day year) a year, then the average hourly wage for our fair state is 2.9 Apos an hour, assuming 100 Apos to the Lyton. And what of Lytons and Bananas? I say that a banana should be set at 1 Apo: so that our citizens, in their average day, are getting 35 bananas, certainly enough to feed our populace and maintain a good standard of living.

As for coins, I stand by the decimal system- this damnfangled Bana system can only lead to confusiuon and monatery collapse. Remeber, we are an uneductaed populace, so people need a system based on their fingers!

I stand by the divisions I stated for, and I also still like the nicknames, thought if people want to add new ones, go ahead.

[Spiffor]

Mmmmh, I have to say Gepap has a point. I didn't think about the ineducation of our populace, who'll have to use their fingers to count.
I suppose the decimal system is what we should go for. And Gepap's converion (a banana = 1 Apo) seems fair.
However, should we control the prices of bananas across the empire, with the risk of an underproduction, or should we let prices go as high as they want (with the risk of starvation) ?

OK, so what do you think of :

1 Apo = bronze coin. Easily tradable for a banana.
10 Apos = iron coin. It can feed a family for a day. We should think of a cool name for this. What do you think of a "Poly" (not very original, but it remains consistent)
1 Lyton = gold coin. Used by the wealthy and the State. We can hope for a bigger supply of gold, when we'll exploit gold mines.

I don't think we can afford more pieces for the moment, because we must let the idea spread progressively in the society. More coins will have to be done when we'll master currency more, and when the society will be more used to it.

All coins should be molded in the Ministry of the Economy, by expert coiners. Of course, Apolyton will get coins more rapidly than other cities, but that's the edge of being the capital

Now, we should think of cool symbols to put on our coins. Banana are quite deja-vu, so I'd go for something else.
I'd say Apos get a spear ; Iron coins get a sword. Lytons get a Temple, or an ankh of some sort (something to show our non-military greatness). We could also put the heads of our prez on them (Chrono, Milhouse, Vegeta)

PS : Wait, I just had an idea to call the Iron coin ! What about a "Dankos" (from Dan and MarkG). It's consistent with the Apolyton spirit without being redundant with the 2 other names. What do you think ?

[GePap]

Spiffor- I like

The name Dankos (though hopefully not confused with dank) works well, as a tribute to ancient and now almost forgotten founders (our Remus and Romulus,as it were).

I think we would need a few more denominations of coins thought- what if I wanted to buy 37 bananas? that would be 3 polys and 7 Apos (I still like buggers!), ten coins!

To keep it simple:
1,5,10,25,50 Apo coins. (that way no purchase need more than 9 coins if its under a Lyton.) [like Captain recommeded]
1,2,5,10,20,50,100 Lyton something, coins or bills.

As for what they are made, we have metals yes, but we should also remmeber various other possible materials- stones and shells and so forth. Perhaps a cool idea for high end denominations, now that we control the local dye trade, would be reams of dyed clothing- lets say, 100 Lytons for 20 yards of dyed cloth or something of the sort.

As for imegary of the coins- actually, I don't think the banana should be on any of them, perhaps besides the 1 Apo coin- (so our ignorant peasants remember what it equals). I like the notion of egyptian imagery and of past leaders, but not only presidents (I have heard that the Americans have put men such as thier first economic minister, a fellow called Hamilton, on some of their currency.)

[Jonny]

This is my proposal, a variant on Spiffor's system.

Base Unit = 1 Apo (bronze). Equal to price of banana.

10 Apo = 1 Dankos (iron). Can feed a family for a day. Main coin used in the working/low class.

100 Dankos = 1 silver coin (still needs a name). Would be used primarily by the trading class/middle class/artisans, and for many commercial interests.

100 silver coin = 1 Lyton (gold). Used by the state, the aristocratic class, and in very large commercial interests.

So:
1 Lyton = 100000 Apo.
1 Lyton = 10000 Dankos.
1 silver coin = 1000 Apo.

[Sirotnikov]

What does Dankos mean?

Also, I suggest to consider the fact that people don't have 100 fingers - but rather 10. And that is prone to accidents.

So 7 is a safe number. Almost anyone has 7 fingers by now (500 BC or so).


I suggest this:

1 Apo is a base bronze coin.
7 Apo is a Markos - an iron coin.
49 Apo is 7 Markos is a Dankos - a silver coin.
343 Apo is 49 Markos is 7 Dankos is a Lyton - a gold coin.

(But I agree to use 6 to consider the poorer less educated areas of the jungle)

Note: when nuclear power stations arrive (nosterdamus told me about those) we shall have to account it to the number of of fingers resulting from nuclear radiation - probably between 12 and 17.

[Sirotnikov]

Banknotes (also termed spiffors) should feature the avatars of our presidents or something.

But that comes only with pritning press.

[Aro]

Sirotnikov,
Hi!
What about your Democracy Game web site?

[GhengisFarbâ„¢]

Apparently the discussion was moot, Lyton is the name of currency whether you like it or not.

[Spiffor]

GhengisFarb :
If you have a better idea (which has nothing to do with the banana), feel free to share it. Thinking about the Lyton took roughly 2 minutes, and I was surprised by the support it had : indeed I expected everyone to give his own name suggestion.
I'll set up a poll about this in about 24 hours. Giving a name to our currency will be my last decision as the MoE.
I'd like to point out several people made good points (I didn't invent the Apo, I had no idea on decimal system or not), and I didn't control the whole thing.

[Captain]

something simple is good, decimal system is nice IMO. (okay, so I'm biased because I envision this great parallel economy/stockmarket game and it would be easier to run with a simple currency system).

[GePap]

I think the name Lyton won becuase, first, its simple and catchy , anything with a word lik banana isn't, plus it connects well with our history as members of this site, plus it avoids any controversy of being named after any individual. I think Apo is a simple connection to make if we had Lyton.

I must continue to stand by a decimal system- everyone uses it nowadays- why change what works and what has become ingrained in peoples minds? Any base other than 10 simply will create confusion, which is not worth it.

I am glad the 1 Apo= 1 banana conversion stuck, since it allows us to preempt those that insist on the continued use of bananas.

[Spiffor]

I just went to the demographics page, and I've seen something terrifying :
The annual income per capita is "3" ! Provided it's 3 Lytons, it would mean that people earn less than 1 Apo a day !
How can we imagine managing a great empire if so many people can't even afford their daily banana ? Do we really want to put our population into misery ?
(plus, it is an averaged result, which doesn't take wealth differences into account : this means most of the poor are even more miserable)

For these very reasons, I suggest an Apo = 1/1000th of a Lyton = a banana. This way, even the poorest of our country can continu to feed themselves and their families

New project is :
1 Apo = 1 bronze coin = 1 banana
1 Dankos = 1 iron coin = 10 Apos
1 Lyton = 1 gold coin = 100 Dankos = 1000 Lyton.

What do you think ?

[Captain]

Why not just say that the gold in the game represents 1000 Lytons or something like that?

After all, one citizen head counts as more than just 1 person. It represents thousands.


Then we can keep our 100 apos = 1 Lyton. Or if you like Dankos that much, then 10 000 Apos = 100 Dankos = 1 Lyton.

[Sirotnikov]

Why Dankos? What does it mean?

I suggest Markos as well

[Spiffor]

Captain :
I think a gold icon in game represents several Lytons already. The State gets 50 gold icons total (+19 gpt net result), so it's obvious a mere individual doesn't get 3 gold icons a year. Hence, a gold icon is worth many Lytons (i think 1000 is appropriate)

A citizen get 3 basic units of currency each year. Let's say it's a Lyton. That would mean he gets around 0.82 Apos each day, on a 365 day-per-year basis.
I'm not in love with the "Dankos" (I just had this idea coming out from my head, hope someone will find something better), but we need a very small money unit for the common people to use (the Apos), and a very valuable currency unit we'll use asealthy investors and staesmen.
To avoid too much confusion, I think we'd need an intermediary coin (mayeb called differently than Dankos). Indeed making a 1 Dankos = 10 Apos = 1/100th of Lyton would be a pretty easy conversion for our minds used to 1/100th conversions.

Maybe we could make 100 Apos = 1 Dankos, but we'll have to create way too many coins in this case.

Edit : Sio :
Dankos is a name I came up with, a mix between "Dan" and "Markos". But I admit this idea isn't terrific, so if you have other suggestion, please post them