>Ok, let's try some back of the envelope calculations here. (Now
Oh, let's not... *sigh*
>that I'm home and have my books :-) All right. Now, think about
>an operation to transplant healthy tissue into replace cancerous
>tissue. Major surgery? In my opinion, yes. Major surgery in
>Traveller costs 1000 Cr X 1D. So an average of 3000 Cr (MT
>Player's Manual).
>
>Let's do something weird and say that on Pallique the surgery is so
>common that it cost as much as a minor operation, Ok? So: 500 Cr
>X 1D. About 1500 Cr average. Wow! No price gouging the
>prisoners!
Nope, more like 300 Cr a pop. Pallique as I run it (note that the
scenario was designed for my campaign, and was originally only
intended for Rob Dean, and if I had known what a headache it would be
explaining my reasoning in terms of the idiotic rules for medical
treatment I never would have posted it to the TML) has very cheap
medicine, primarily because the allowable failure rate is so high.
So cut your number by five.
>Now, if 20 operations are about right for an 'old timer' lets guess
Nope, that's a rare maximum. In 60 years, most people don't need
more than three or four. Say four. That's one per 15 years. Cut
your number by five again.
>. Let's say an additional 200 Cr per person goes
>to cancer preventative treatment (It'll save money to prevent
>rather than operate).
Try 50. The primary aid of the high TL is in keeping things cheap.
So that's not 2.1 TCr a year, but more like 80 GCr a year, prefectly
manageable by a population that sacrifices most of its income to taxes
(what makes you think that these people don't pay taxes?) and generates
huge income directly into the coffers of Mora and Trin (and indirectly
to Regina, Deneb, and Capital). This may be a lowball number, but the
order of magnitude is about right. Again, this is for MY campaign,
and I had described the world for informational purposes only....
>With that much money floating around, I'd bet some shrewd megacorp
>business types with hand computers and pocket protectors are gonna
>want in on this business. How do they get in? Well, import in the
>high tech medical stuff and sell it off. The higher the technology
>it is, the more efficient it is, therefore the greater profit for
>the twerps with the pocket protectors.
Not allowed. The Trinni and Moran governments restrict trade and
access to Pallique itself, and are not shy about blowing up smugglers.
(Part of the reason Pallique is Amber is because many shrewd business
types with hand computers and pocket protectors who don't study their
system history carefuly enough end up as expanding clouds of photons
without ever seeing their prospective clients.)
This isn't a profitable, workable system to the economic types out
there. Neither was the Soviet Union under Stalin, but it didn't
collapse in a puff of logic. And unlike Stalinist Russia, Pallique
is condoned and accepted by its neighbors and has no need for a
large defense outlay... at least it didn't before the Aslan came
along. |->
- --
mike metlay * atomic city * box 81175 pgh pa 15217-0675 * [email removed]
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I'll survive. Indeed I will. But boy will I ever be confused. (s. kellogg)