I find it interesting how in every single video game that involves fostering a population, it's up to you to make sure everyone is housed. Too logical and efficient for billionaires, I guess.
What I love about those video games is that they teach us very clearly that a command economy leads to prosperity (unless you suck as a player I guess), but then billionaires tell us no, free market capitalism and trickle-down are the way we have to go.
Funny, because it taught me that that task in reality is impossible, given real nations can't load an old save file to fix their fuck ups in a simulation far, far simpler than reality.
Of course you could certainly argue that one person wouldn't be in charge of doing literally everything.
I understand your take but it is not really hard to grab the basic mechanics and make a thriving city in any game.
The basic mechanics are universal.
What throws off the managing part is "enemies", "natural disasters" and other excitment mechanics.
A managed economy could happen and would be highly efficient, especially because running a nation is a collective endeavour. Individuals fail but groups have memory.
A managed economy could happen and would be highly efficient, especially because running a nation is a collective endeavour. Individuals fail but groups have memory.
Yeah. Imagine how prosperous the United States would be if the current administration was running it as a managed economy.
The constitution itself allows for a very small group of individuals to control the entire country, from the first moment it was written.
It was never truly reviewed to allow a proper redistribution of voting power throughout all the states and it still allows for indirect election of the most powerful state figure, where it should instead by directly elected by popular vote.
The gerrymandering, the filibusting, two chambers system, common law system, etc.
The american government was never created to be a proper one; it was an emulation of the english system but even more botched.
The document itself should have been thrown in the trash and a new one written, the moment the civil war broke. And again it should had been trashed when the market crash happened.
Cities are not functionally free market. You could have control of layout, zoning, regulations, infrastructure design and allocation, tax incentives, etc.
Not sure how well this would model a real city where the "freehand" is guided by countless individual decisions.
I've had similar thoughts about the auction house in World of Warcraft. Since the game caps the amount of gold you can have at a small fraction of the overall economy, no one person can buy everything and then jack up the prices.
The had to set rent to 0 in Cities Skylines abd completely remove the economy in Dwarf Fortress, otherwise the player would be confused why they would build enough vacant luxury condos to house everyone, while more and more of the population went homeless.
I mean, the moral is that free markets are a fiction when primary accumulation is illegal.
I can't simply claim a vacant property at the clearance rate. I need to bargain with a landlord at a cartel price. And thanks to public-private collusion, we routinely tax, trade, and subsidize properties at three entirely different figures.
Every economy is a command economy. The question you have to ask is who is in control.
Might be wrong, but I think in Cities Skylines all you're doing is zoning the city, and it's up to the people to build houses and live (or have their house burn down)