PmWiki | IronLegion / Stuff

"I'll grab my stuff!"
"There is no time. Your sword is enough."

We're not going to try to design an economy for this setting, so this article is mostly OOC.

Equipment in the dust bowl is generally bartered for; old money has been generally used for thermal insulation or reusable notes (dollar bills make for surprisingly good cloth, and are both washable and writable upon), although the custom remains to write IOU's on faded dollar bills to make them "more official" in communities where notes of credit are viable. This extends to official money: a town is likely to use dollar bills that have been signed by the ruler, or one of the ruler's clerks, as valid currency. Unless one is particularly good at forging signatures, trade between towns happens by barter.

A somewhat standardized barter weighting arrangement exists in the form of the Ƀaquet, Anglicized to Ƀak and generally pronounced "Ƀuck" in the Western regions. A bak has no formal backing from any government, but is recognized by the Objectivists and the Legion. This term is derived from "Ƀaquet" ("tub" in French - the Legion's main ironworks is in Louisiana), a currently used receptacle, which contains 10lbs of coal. One Ƀak started off as the equivalent of that much coal in whatever fuel locomotives could be made to take. The Objectivists prefer to deal in gold by weight, with an exchange rate of an ounce of gold per 35 Ƀaks (while they claim it is a standard, Objectivists are always willing to negotiate). As calculated by Catholic monks, one Ƀak is approximately as many calories as that needed in a day for a man and a horse.

While it is possible to express the value of something in Ƀaks, there is no such thing as fixed prices or even carrying money between one community and another -- the number will be very approximate; Legion waystations and Mormon towns have their own scrip -- likewise signed banknotes -- but do not significantly penalize outsiders for showing up with trade goods instead, while Objectivists use gold pellets. Some groups, such as the Amish and Holnists, reject the concept of money entirely. When giving an indicative price to something, assume that one Ƀak is approximately equivalent of your country's "small" bill or coin (dollar, euro, 1000 yen, etc). It should be emphasized that money is only worth anything as far as the issuing lord's guns reach.

Food is scarce, food that is varied even more so; water ranges from free to extremely valuable depending on where one is (although those who have survived so far have developed the antibodies to drink water that we would consider dangerous). The spice trade is a good way to make some money, if you can find buyers.

In general, basic consumables cost about twice as much as they do for us today, while durable goods (tools, clothing, books) are much more expensive (five to ten times). Attrition has destroyed all but the most durable products of civilization, so that which is still around can be expected to be tough and last long -- good news, since mass production has essentially stopped. There is little disposable anything (part of why ammunition is very expensive and spray-n-pray is not a thing). If you are familiar with the immediate post-WW2 period, use it as a guide for what is available as far as technology level goes. Most people have two or three sets of clothing at best, the "good" one used to go to church or to vote if they have the vote at all.