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Old 08-02-2022, 04:49 PM   #11
Anaraxes
 
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Default Re: Costs in GURPS dollars

If you have a modern price, then GURP$ = USD 2004 = 1.6 USD 2022, per the US Bureau of Labor Statistics inflation calculator, which goes back to 1913 if you have a fairly recent historical setting. Before 1913, dollar values were largely flat back to about 1800 (with a couple of exceptions, like right after the War of 1812 and the American Civil War).

Basic (B27) gives us the $1 = 1 loaf of bread (or equivalent staple) conversion.

Ancestry.com has an online, searchable database of Sears, Roebuck catalogs from 1896 to 1993. They'll show you little snippet images of where your search term appears, which might or not not be helpful, but you have to pay for an account to get full access (along with the other stuff the company provides).

Of course, if your setting is sufficiently different from real/historical Earth, the economy is possibly skewed in all sorts of ways, and in different directions for different types of goods.
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Old 08-02-2022, 07:04 PM   #12
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Default Re: Costs in GURPS dollars

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Originally Posted by maximara View Post
1934: Dell Publishing releases Famous Funnies, the first comic book for the public – cost: 10 cents. (Cliffhangers)
However, ten cents in 1934 is not $0.10 as defined in GURPS 4/e. GURPS 4/e uses 2004 dollars, approximately. Those seventy years made a big difference to the purchasing power of a dollar.
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Old 08-02-2022, 08:47 PM   #13
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Default Re: Costs in GURPS dollars

And really, look: a lot of the GURPS $ conversions in various books -- especially the further back you get -- are fiats. Far too much of what we surmise about pre-17th century pricing comes from estate records, and once you get into the medieval era, the more honest economists freely admit that they're guessing a lot of the time about what coinages are worth and measures weigh.

Beyond that, there's the biggest fiat of all: that even over a particular TL, prices are stable between regions and years. I was a college freshman just 45 years ago next month, and the cost in Boston at McDonalds of a hamburger + small fries + small drink (this being my typical afternoon meal) was 99 cents. It's rather more now. Heck, my grocery store charges nearly 20 times as much for an 18 oz loaf of bread than the Egyptian subsidized prices for a KILO of bread. When I moved out of Boston eleven years ago to a town in the western part of Massachusetts, just ninety miles away, my apartment price nearly HALVED.

So ... ultimately, just set your prices. They're not going to be "wrong" if they're consistent to your setting. And when in doubt, things are going to cost what they cost. If the price you set for an automobile is somehow twice normal, all that means is that my character's less likely to own one.
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Old 08-03-2022, 01:35 AM   #14
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Default Re: Costs in GURPS dollars

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Originally Posted by whswhs View Post
However, ten cents in 1934 is not $0.10 as defined in GURPS 4/e. GURPS 4/e uses 2004 dollars, approximately. Those seventy years made a big difference to the purchasing power of a dollar.
As I mentioned the starting Wealth in Cliffhangers is a paltry $750 and since all the prices in the book are hanging off that you have to a lot of price fiddling to get things to line up. The only books that aren't off the walls are the ones set at TL3

As I mentioned there is a lot of range even within a TL especially the early ones which cover insanely huge amounts of time. The income of 1890 and 1930 way different even though they are both TL6.

Also there is inconstancy with saying GURPS 4/e uses 2004 dollars, approximately. $10,000 in 2004 is $846.03 in 1930 (TL6) but TL8 has $20k as the base which is $1,692.07 in 1930 — that is a huge difference.

Quote:
Originally Posted by RGTraynor View Post
And really, look: a lot of the GURPS $ conversions in various books -- especially the further back you get -- are fiats. Far too much of what we surmise about pre-17th century pricing comes from estate records, and once you get into the medieval era, the more honest economists freely admit that they're guessing a lot of the time about what coinages are worth and measures weigh.

Beyond that, there's the biggest fiat of all: that even over a particular TL, prices are stable between regions and years.
This is something that the Gurpwiki goes into: "Even within the US the cost of living fluctuates wildly. There are places where $20,000 is average wealth and others (such as New York City) where it would be considered struggling or even poor."

"Actual pay at each TL varies within a range bracketed by the typical monthly pay of the previous TL and that of the next TL." (Basic Set p 517)

Personally I prefer Pyramid 3/44: Alternate GURPS II's "Abstract Wealth" as it bypasses all the fiddling with the prices.
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Old 08-03-2022, 06:20 AM   #15
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Originally Posted by maximara View Post
Also there is inconstancy with saying GURPS 4/e uses 2004 dollars, approximately. $10,000 in 2004 is $846.03 in 1930 (TL6) but TL8 has $20k as the base which is $1,692.07 in 1930 — that is a huge difference.
I'm not seeing any inconsistency here. Yes, inflation means that 2004 USD are worth a good deal less than 1930 USD. GURPS $ are roughly scaled to the former rather than the latter. If you buy an M1911, it costs $850 GURPS, regardless of if you're in 1930, 2004, or 2022. Now, that $850 GURPS would roughly correspond to $75 US in 1930, $850 US in 2004, or $1,333 US in 2022.

If you're instead referring to the fact that TL 8 starting wealth is double TL 6's starting wealth... that's the rules working as intended. GURPS works under the assumption that people at higher TL's can afford more stuff than those at lower TL's. Buying an M1911 today represents a lower reduction in income for an average American than buying an M1911 back in 1930 would have. Well, maybe - there are some significant complicating factors in the economics of each time period, as 1930 was in the middle of the Great Depression (and there may have still been some Great War surplus bouncing around) and today's economy is... yeah (and a lot of people are buying up guns and ammunition for a variety of reasons).
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Old 08-03-2022, 07:03 AM   #16
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Default Re: Costs in GURPS dollars

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Originally Posted by Varyon View Post
If you're instead referring to the fact that TL 8 starting wealth is double TL 6's starting wealth... that's the rules working as intended. GURPS works under the assumption that people at higher TL's can afford more stuff than those at lower TL's. Buying an M1911 today represents a lower reduction in income for an average American than buying an M1911 back in 1930 would have. Well, maybe - there are some significant complicating factors in the economics of each time period, as 1930 was in the middle of the Great Depression
The rules even handle these complications. If you want to represent TL6 in the Great Depression, just lower most people's Wealth level. If you want to represent people in the cities having a better lifestyle than people in the country, just lower the Wealth of the people in the country or raise the Wealth of the people in the city. (Figure out which group is living at the standard rate, and change the other one.)
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Old 08-03-2022, 09:06 AM   #17
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Default Re: Costs in GURPS dollars

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Originally Posted by Varyon View Post
I'm not seeing any inconsistency here. Yes, inflation means that 2004 USD are worth a good deal less than 1930 USD. GURPS $ are roughly scaled to the former rather than the latter. If you buy an M1911, it costs $850 GURPS, regardless of if you're in 1930, 2004, or 2022. Now, that $850 GURPS would roughly correspond to $75 US in 1930, $850 US in 2004, or $1,333 US in 2022.

If you're instead referring to the fact that TL 8 starting wealth is double TL 6's starting wealth... that's the rules working as intended.
I think you are miss understanding what I am doing here. I am converting the starting wealth into 2004 US$. For the most part 2004 was TL8 (Medicine TL7) or $20,000 starting wealth.

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Originally Posted by Varyon View Post
GURPS works under the assumption that people at higher TL's can afford more stuff than those at lower TL's.
US$1.00 in 1930 (TL6) is US$11.82 in 2004 (TL8) a 12x increase. But GURPS has $10,000 for TL6 and $20,000 for TL8 which is only 2x or 1/6th what inflation shows. So you are actually able to buy more stuff at lower TLs— the exact opposite of what you say GURPS is trying to do.

Classic GURPS is even more broken in that regard.

Classic Book; Setting Starting Wealth; TL; 4e Starting Wealth

Age of Napoleon; $750; 5; $5,000
Aztecs; $1,000; 2 (Weapons, 1; Spaniards, 4); $750
Cliffhangers; $750; 6; $10,000
Egypt; $500; 2; $750
Greece; $5,000; 1; $500
Japan; $1,000; 3 (Northern wilderness, 1; transport, 2; metallurgy, 4); $1,000 (TL3)
Ice Age; 20 $kins (20 hours work); 0; $250
Imperial Rome; None stated; 2; $750
Old West 2e; $200 ($1000 in mining town); 5-6 $5,000-$10,000
Russia; $1,000; 2 to 4; $750 to $2,000
WWII ; $1,500; 6; $10,000
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Old 08-03-2022, 10:22 AM   #18
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US$1.00 in 1930 (TL6) is US$11.82 in 2004 (TL8) a 12x increase. But GURPS has $10,000 for TL6 and $20,000 for TL8 which is only 2x or 1/6th what inflation shows. So you are actually able to buy more stuff at lower TLs— the exact opposite of what you say GURPS is trying to do.
$1 US in 1930 isn't $1 GURPS. It's roughly $11.82 GURPS. GURPS $ are roughly 2004 USD. If you give an Average Wealth character in 1930 $10,000 GURPS ($846 US in 1930), you're playing things the way GURPS is designed. If you give an Average Wealth character in 1930 $10,000 US, you are not playing things the way GURPS is designed, because you just gave that character roughly $118,200 GURPS - somewhere between Wealthy ($50,000 GURPS, or $4,230 US in 1930) and Very Wealth ($200,000 GURPS, or $16,920 US in 1930).
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Old 08-03-2022, 11:24 AM   #19
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Default Re: Costs in GURPS dollars

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$1 US in 1930 isn't $1 GURPS. It's roughly $11.82 GURPS.
That is what the "US$1.00 in 1930 (TL6) is US$11.82 in 2004 (TL8) a 12x increase." meant. I should have used the more common "$US" as the shorthand for US Dollar.

The thing is TL6 covers from ~1880 to ~1940 where TL7 start appearing though I don't think TL7 really hits its stride until ~1950.

Lets look at 1890 vs 1930 via a CPI Inflation Calculator that goes all the way back to 1635 — "Inflation data from 1634 to 1912 is sourced from a historical study conducted by political science professor Robert Sahr at Oregon State University and from the American Antiquarian Society."

"$10,000 in 1890 is equivalent in purchasing power to about $207,582.42 in 2004, an increase of $197,582.42 over 114 years." and "$10,000 in 1930 is equivalent in purchasing power to about $113,113.77 in 2004, an increase of $103,113.77 over 74 years." ("$" here means "$US" not $GURPS just to clarify)

Even though starting wealth is the same ($GURPS 10,000) as they are both TL6 you can buy more stuff at the beginning of TL6 then when the TL has matured as that starting wealth has nearly been cut in half (42.75%) by inflation.
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Old 08-03-2022, 11:51 AM   #20
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Default Re: Costs in GURPS dollars

Yes, a single static starting Wealth for an entire TL isn't strictly realistic - a typical person in 1975 (near the end of TL 7) probably didn't have only ~70% of the buying power of a typical person in 1985 (near the beginning of TL 8), for example, and as you note someone at the start of TL 6 had much less buying power than someone at the end of that TL. But your posts read as though you were treating GURPS $ as USD in the time period observed - such as your statement that GURPS wasn't properly accounting for the ~12x increase in costs from inflation when going from 1930 to 2004 by giving characters only 2x the funds. GURPS $ are a semi-arbitrary unit of worth that is inflation-proof. Think of them as "credits" if you're getting stuck on the fact they use the same abbreviation as USD. A character with 20,000 GURPS credits would have around $20,000 US in a campaign set in 2014 2004 (it would be around $25,000 US in a campaign set in 2014), around $1,700 US in a campaign set in 1930, around $1,000 US in a campaign set in 1890, around 250 gold pieces (or 5,000 silver pennies, or 20,000 copper farthings, or some mix) in a DF campaign, etc.
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Last edited by Varyon; 08-04-2022 at 07:27 AM. Reason: correcting typo - had 2014 instead of 2004
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