POP Spending Habits

POP Needs

Before we discuss how the POPs buy goods, we need to define POP needs. POP needs are reflected in the Detailed Population Information screen, visible when you click on a POP. Needs are broken into three categories: Life, Everyday, and Luxury. Each category is further broken down into specific goods needed to satisfy that category. The numbers underneath each good signify one of two things, based upon the color of the number:

Grey number: How much of that good the POP buys each day

Red number: How much of that good the POP wants to, but cannot buy each day

All of the numbers displayed under each good are unweighted and are multiplied by a factor of 10. So, to derive the actual amount of a good that a POP needs, you divide the onscreen indication by 10, then multiply by its relative POP size, which is the size of the POP divided by 100,000.

Example: A 50k Craftsmen POP (relative POP size of 50k / 100k = .5) needs 0.3 * .5 / 10 = .015 units of liquor daily to satisfy its need for liquor. On screen, this will still be indicated as 0.3 units of liquor. If the POP can only afford to buy .01 units of liquor (two thirds of its total need), the on screen indication will be red, and will be 0.1, signifying that 0.1 * .5 / 10 = .005 units of liquor cannot be bought.

This is confusing, but necessary, as there is not enough room to display POP needs to more than one decimal precision on screen. Just try to remember that the numbers under each good are relative, not literal, and that grey numbers are good, red numbers are bad.

The factor of 10 rule also applies to the Domestic needs column on ledger page 12. So, if the total amount of furniture demanded by your POPs is 15 units, your Domestic need value for furniture in the ledger will read as 150 units. This is too bad, as it confuses many players, and leads them to believe that fulfilling their POPs' demands is an impossible task. Alas, it is necessary, or else the Domestic need values for very small nations would always read zero, due to the ledger's penchant for rounding to the nearest tenth.

The rule also applies to the Demand column on ledger page 12. Here it gets even more confusing, because industrial demand (goods imported by nations to fuel their factories) is not divided by ten. So, if you see that Demand for glass is 523, it means that Demand is somewhere between 52.3 and 523, which is quite the spread. In practice, it is probably closer to 52.3, since POP demands usually outweigh industrial demands. But if the Demand for steel is listed as 150, the demand really is 150, since POPs don't buy steel. As a rule of thumb, divide the Demand of each POP-needs good by ten, and you'll get an appoximation of the global demand for that good.

All the onscreen indicators match up with the values in the POP needs files found in db/economy, so the values in the files correspond to how much of each good a given POP of size 100k would buy each day, multiplied by 10.

Example: Looking in db/economy/everyday-need.txt, we find the following entry:

capitalists = 
{
    tobacco = 3
    luxury_clothes = 1
    luxury_furniture = 1
    glass = 3
    coffee = 3
    wine = 3
    paper = 3
}

This means that a 100k capitalist POP requires .3 units each of tobacco, glass, coffee, wine, and paper, as well as .1 units each of luxury clothes and luxury furniture, to satisfy its Everyday Needs each day.

The World Market

Many players have misconceptions about the World Market (WM) that cloud their understanding of POP buying habits. A brief discussion of the workings of the WM is in order.

First off, let's get something clear: World Market stockpiles are not visible in game. This is the biggest misconception players have about the WM. They think that the onscreen Supply indicator denotes the WM stockpile; this is simply not true. The Supply indicator denotes how much of a good is being sold to the WM each day. If nobody is buying that good from the WM, the Supply indicator will effectively denote the daily increase in the WM stockpile. If Demand exceeds Supply, the WM stockpile will drop, and if Supply exceeds Demand, the WM stockpile will increase. (But remember, the actual Demand for POP-needs goods is roughly one tenth of the Demand indicated onscreen.)

Note that the Supply column is distinct from the Production column. As noted above, the Supply is how much of a good is sold to the WM each day, while the Production column is how much of a good is produced globally each day. Since many goods are used as inputs for factories, the Production figure for those goods will naturally be higher than the Supply figure, because the nations producing those goods will utilize a portion of their production as inputs for factories.

Prices on the WM seem to be based only on global Supply and Demand; the size of WM stockpiles don't seem to have any effect. The actual pricing formula remains a mystery, but it appears to be an exponential / logarithmic scaling formula centered on the base price of each good. The base prices are found in db/economy/resource-prices.txt, and reflect what the price of the good would be if Supply = Demand. A demand of zero forces the WM price to £0.50, whilst a very, very large demand would theoretically force the price to £999.

The POP Goods Buying Algorithm

POPs buy their goods from the WM using a straightforward algorithm designed to ensure that they satisfy basic needs first, and only save money when they can't spend any more. It goes something like this:

• STEP 1: Buy Life goods in order, from left to right, as indicated onscreen. If there is not enough income to buy all goods, buy all that can be afforded, then stop. If there is inadequate supply of a good in the WM stockpiles, buy as much of that good as can be bought, and move on to the next good.
• STEP 2: Buy Everyday goods in order, from left to right, as indicated onscreen. If there is not enough income to buy all goods, buy all that can be afforded, then stop. If there is inadequate supply of a good in the WM stockpiles, buy as much of that good as can be bought, and move on to the next good.
• STEP 3: If there is income left over after buying all Life and Everyday goods (except for those that cannot be bought due to insufficient supplies in the WM stockpile), save it.
• STEP 4: When cash reserves total £100, buy Luxury goods in order, from left to right, as indicated onscreen. If there is not enough income to buy all goods, buy all that can be afforded, then stop. If there is inadequate supply of a good in the WM stockpiles, buy as much of that good as can be bought, and move on to the next good. If cash reserves dip below £100, stop buying luxury goods and save money instead.
• STEP 5: If there is income left over after buying all Life, Everyday, and Luxury goods (except for those that cannot be bought due to insufficient supplies in the WM stockpile), and cash reserves are greater than £100, buy state bonds.
• STEP 6: If there is excess income after buying bonds, save it.

Basically, a POP will buy Life goods, then Everyday goods, then Luxury goods, and finally bonds. Luxury goods and bonds won't be bought unless a POP has money in the bank. Goods that can't be bought due to insufficient WM stockpiles are skipped.