[Economy] Tax from profits or from cargo

[luk3Z]

As you all know we have Inflation option in the game but tax option is missing (even every city zone could have their own tax values - why not ?).
This is old topic with similar idea: viewtopic.php?f=33&t=45642

Current workaround might be subtracting 20% or 35% tax from the income (if someone really need it as me for example):
Ultimate Cargo Payment Override: viewtopic.php?p=1252107

Default OTTD is initial cargo payment * 2 (default values in £ from the year 1920):
https://wiki.openttd.org/en/Manual/Game ... ment-rates

For tax 20%: initial cargo payment -20% (default values in £ - rounded up):
For Ultimate Cargo Payment Override parameters: initial cargo payment * 2

Temperate climate:
ID00 Passengers: £39 -20% = 31 * 2 = 62
ID01 Coal: £72 -20% = 57 * 2 = 114
ID02 Mail: £55 -20% = 44 * 2 = 88
ID03 Oil: £54 -20% = 43 * 2 = 86
ID04 Livestock: £53 -20% = 42 * 2 = 84
ID05 Goods: £75 -20% = 60 * 2 = 120
ID06 Grain: £58 -20% = 46 * 2 = 92
ID07 Wood: £61 - 20% = 48 *2 = 96
ID08 Iron Ore: £62 - 20% = 49 * 2 = 98
ID09 Steel: £69 -20% = 55 * 2 = 110
ID10 Valuables: £91 -20% = 72 * 2 = 144

Arctic specific :
ID06 Wheat: £58 -20% = 46 * 2 = 92
ID09 Paper: £66 -20% = 52 * 2 = 104
ID10 Gold: £71 -20% = 56 * 2 = 112
ID11 Food: £69 -20% = 55 * 2 = 110

Tropical specific:
ID01 Rubber: £54 -20% = 43 * 2 = 86
ID04 Fruit: £51 -20% = 40 * 2 = 80
ID06 Maize: £53 -20% = 42 * 2 = 84
ID07 Tropical Wood: £97 -20% = 77 * 2 = 154
ID08 Copper Ore: £59 -20% = 47 * 2 = 94
ID09 Water: £57 -20% = 45 * 2 = 90
ID10 Diamonds: £71 -20% = 56 * 2 = 112

For tax 35%: initial cargo payment -35% (default values in £ - rounded up):
For Ultimate Cargo Payment Override parameters: initial cargo payment * 2

Temperate climate:
Passengers: 39 -35% = 25 * 2 = 50
Coal: 72 -35% = 46 * 2 = 92
Mail: 55 -35% = 35 * 2 = 70
Oil: 54 -35% = 35 * 2 = 70
Livestock: 53 -35% = 34 * 2 = 68
Goods: 75 -35% = 48 * 2 = 96
Grain: 58 -35% = 37 * 2 = 74
Wood: 61 -35% = 39 * 2 = 78
Iron Ore: 62 - 20% = 40 * 2 = 80
Steel: 69 -35% = 44 * 2 = 88
Valuables: 91 -35% = 59 * 2 = 118

Arctic specific :
Wheat: £58 -35% = 37 * 2 = 74
Paper: £66 -35% = 42 * 2 = 84
Gold: £71 -35% = 46 * 2 = 92
Food: £69 -35% = 44 * 2 = 88

Tropical specific:
Rubber: £54 -35% = 35 * 2 = 70
Fruit: £51 -35% = 33 * 2 = 66
Maize: £53 -35% = 34 * 2 = 68
Tropical Wood: £97 -35% = 63 * 2 = 126
Copper Ore: £59 -35% = 38 * 2 = 76
Water: £57 -35% = 37 * 2 = 74
Diamonds: £71 -35% = 46 * 2 = 92

Conclusions.
Passengers: default values (initial cargo payment) in £ from the year 1920:
1. default: £ 78
2. -20% tax: £ 62
3. -35% tax: £ 50

History of Tax Rates:
https://bradfordtaxinstitute.com/Free_R ... Rates.aspx
https://www.investopedia.com/articles/t ... -taxes.asp

Tax Act in 1909 (US). This was the first year that corporate taxes were levied:
https://www.thebalance.com/corporate-in ... te-3306024

United Kingdom corporation tax:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_Ki ... ration_tax

How Corporations Are Taxed:
https://www.nolo.com/legal-encyclopedia ... 30157.html
https://prospect.org/economy/time-to-ta ... e-profits/

[Eddi]

i'm not quite sure what that would add to the game...

can't you just imagine tax gets deducted from the payments before it gets added to the books? pretty much all businesses i know internally calculate prices with tax excluded.

what's a gameplay effect other than just displaying more numbers?

[luk3Z]

(...)

what's a gameplay effect other than just displaying more numbers?

More challenging & realistic company simulation.

[Eddi]

taxes isn't just "you earned x from selling train tickets, you have to pay y% of that to the government"

if you have investments and running costs, you actually get negative taxes on those, so in the end both are calculated against each other, and only the final sum is then paid (which actually works both ways. so if your company is running at a loss, you actually get payments from the government)

in the end, if you actually run a company, this is just noise in the calculations. which is why companys don't bother with it, and calculate everything without taxes.

[luk3Z]

Overall idea is to make game more harder and bring less boredom in the later game.
Think of it as like about inflation. It exist, someone may like it & play with it and on the other hand - someone may don't like it & play without it.

[2TallTyler]

Sure, but what you're doing is just reducing the payment for cargo deliveries and pretending the decrease is due to taxes. It's not like inflation at all, since it doesn't change over time. You could get the same effect without mods by increasing the running cost in Settings.

I mentioned this on Discord, but the Villages Is Villages script simulates dividends and corporation tax, with benefits to towns when you pay a lot of corporation tax. Check out the Readme for more details.

[luk3Z]

Sure, but what you're doing is just reducing the payment for cargo deliveries and pretending the decrease is due to taxes. It's not like inflation at all, since it doesn't change over time. You could get the same effect without mods by increasing the running cost in Settings.

I mentioned this on Discord, but the Villages Is Villages script simulates dividends and corporation tax, with benefits to towns when you pay a lot of corporation tax. Check out the Readme for more details.

I mean inflation & tax like a button in the game (for easy turn it on/off) or something normal like in the real life.
Increasing the running cost and buying costs are not enough for me.
Thanks for the info I'll check this "Villages Is Villages" script (really peculiar name anyway). Corporation tax sounds good to me.
I found the thread: viewtopic.php?t=74685
I'll take a look.

[JamesD]

I think the advantage to taxes vs operating costs is that is somewhat of an equalizer (much like in the "real world"). Meaning an experienced player that is making bank with high profits will pay heavy taxes on their profits while a player that is struggling to turn a profit pays littler or no taxes. Depending on the tax rate, this would make it harder for one player to run away with the game once they got ahead.

It might be challenging implementation wise as taxes would need to be calculated quarterly or yearly and they would be based on the operating profit of the entire company (not an individual transaction). We're talking corporate income taxes not sales or VAT tax.

I don't know if something like this exists in 2023 (I'm still searching). I will check out that Villages bit.

[mauried]

If the purpose of taxes is simply to make the game harder to play, then rather than change the economy of the game , its easier to simply play a harder version of the game.
The GRF Industries of the caribean radically changes the games entire economy and makes the game much harder to play, so getting rich is extremely tuff.
Ive been playing this in multiplayer mode now on the same map for about 5 months and it takes a lot of thought and concentration in planning ahead to just make a profit, let alone a big one.
Surviving a recession is really tuff.
Hats off to 2TallTyler for making this as its one of the best addons Ive come across in the game so far.
Im playing it with JGRs patchpack as you really need the conditional order capability it provides.