A problem with players saving up money using Independent income - Page 6

wellspring · 05-03-2016, 11:30 AM

Two more modern examples come to mind.

Sometimes, a political candidate will hire himself or his close relatives as employees of the campaign, which pays a salary. Or contractors/vendors to the campaign. Federal level politicians have many expenses that are political but not official, and there's a whole body of regulation about what you can pay with your official budget and what has to be paid by you personally (or your campaign organization). That latter kind of expense requires fund-raising, especially if you're not independently wealthy. You'd be surprised how poor many young Congressmen are; taking a salary from their own campaign is one way to foot all the bills. Sometimes someone who is poor on paper still has their campaign to pick up all the bills (until fairly recently, you could simply pocket this money when you retired from politics).

Some activist groups, especially the ones that are highly political and draw most of their funds from donations from other activist groups, are essentially shells used to support individual activists. Perhaps a reward for loyalty, or financing activism that they ostensibly do on their own time. There was a scandal a few years back when one such group was funneling money to provide living expenses for a radical and convicted former domestic terrorist-- it came to light at trial when he got caught up in still more skullduggery.

The mafia sometimes pays its soldiers through "no-show jobs". Michael Madsen's character in Reservoir Dogs gets walked through this (profanity-laden scene here). He gets both an alibi and way to get seemingly-legitimate income. Companies and politicians sometimes have similar arrangements. I found in wikipedia's article a reference to this being a tradition for Age of Sail British young aristocrats. Officially, they're on a ship's crew, but that's purely for show and to accumulate seniority.

Boards of directors can be funny. Some take their duties very seriously. But some simply take huge salaries, attend a meeting every once in a blue moon, and let their name appear on the corporate masthead. Board memberships are often lucrative sinecures for people with a ton of power, status, and connections, but little actual money.

Emeritus professors sometimes get a deal where they receive office space, graduate assistants, even sometimes a stipend, with few or no expectations in return. Mainly it's so a prestigious name can remain attached to his institution despite having retired.

In fact, sinecures and retirements in place are common for the powerful but not rich. Sometimes it's a way to painlessly eliminate a rival without actually harming him. Sometimes it's a reward for past service or loyalty under pretense of it being an actual job.

wellspring · 05-03-2016, 11:36 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by jason taylor

Oh I'm not objecting to it. I am a great believer in the idea that enlightened incentives are more trustworthy then virtue in organizing a society however much we may praise unselfish motives in an individual. And even in the idea that networking of personal ties is a universal instinct for a reason, and that some forms of nepotism can have good effects. And being to puritanical about it can have bad effects like any other attempt to change human nature hubristically. That did not keep me from being amused.

Ahh, my misunderstanding then. :) And yes I agree.

Much of the indignation I've heard comes from the assumption that profit=bad and therefore non-profit=good. Profit just returns excess income to investors (often ordinary people who own shares of stock). Non-profits retain all that income to reinvest in operations and overhead. Maybe those operations are intrinsically good (though that applies to for-profits as well), or maybe not. Or maybe the money is mostly funneled away as overhead (ie payouts to the employees).

My other examples show that this doesn't just apply to helping family members. Political cronies, activist comrades, criminal accomplices, business associates... all could have these Patron-like organizations providing them with Independent Income with few or no strings attached.

Flyndaran · 05-03-2016, 02:18 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by jason taylor

Oh I'm not objecting to it. I am a great believer in the idea that enlightened incentives are more trustworthy then virtue in organizing a society however much we may praise unselfish motives in an individual. And even in the idea that networking of personal ties is a universal instinct for a reason, and that some forms of nepotism can have good effects. And being to puritanical about it can have bad effects like any other attempt to change human nature hubristically. That did not keep me from being amused.

Humans are inherently adaptable, for good and ill. "Virtue" is usually counter personal interest, so naturally hardship will erode it. Enforcing it, and general fairness, takes numerous checks and balances.
Corruption is as natural as natural selection.

~~evileeyore~~ · 05-03-2016, 07:00 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Anaraxes

Very common among middle-class contractors as well. Adding the layer of an LLC is legally useful beyond just having a tax dodge (which a US LLC on its own doesn't provide anyway).

You haven't paid attention to the Indiana Onshore Tax Shelters have you?

jason taylor · 05-03-2016, 07:26 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Flyndaran

Humans are inherently adaptable, for good and ill. "Virtue" is usually counter personal interest, so naturally hardship will erode it. Enforcing it, and general fairness, takes numerous checks and balances.
Corruption is as natural as natural selection.

Right. There is also the point that what constitutes corruption in the area of patronage is ambiguous as often the most efficient organizations are the ones that are best at networking. One reason Chinese and Jews hacked their way from the bottom to the top in America is that they already knew how to do it right.

Furthermore some kinds of patronage are needed as rule-based bureaucracy cannot take it's place. No government can discover a Mozart.

A clannish concern has employees who know that they won't be arbitrarily downsized, a CEO who knows he won't get an arbitrary strike, a credit rating from mutual support, and a way of efficiently cutting down red tape in internal transfers.

We have spent thousands of years getting rid of a system that has created caste rule and all the rest of it and have an understandable prejudice against it(in other people of course). The problem is knowing when it has become counterproductive and when we should stop going on wolfhunts and start breeding better wolfhounds. The answer to that of course is not allowing people to manipulate bureacracies for the sake of their kin(though some of that will always happen) but having smaller bureaucracies.

I would however disagree that humans are really as adaptable as all that. Some things can only be bent so far before something bad happens. If nothing else something will always come in the other end. When hired warbands went out regiments came in and those were artificial tribes with their own fetishes like what amounts to ancestor veneration, totemism and even low key feuding(well traditional enemies in bar brawls). That worked well but the point is that there is a reason it worked.

Harald387 · 05-05-2016, 10:05 AM

If the problem is 'the PC with Wealth and Independent Income is buying a lot of powerful gear', then start enforcing the Legality Class availability for gear. Getting your hands on a TL9 Battlesuit (LC1) is not just a matter of having $90,000 to throw around - it's available only to armed forces and government agencies, and even then only those with a need to use it. Hand grenades are largely LC2 or LC1. Heavy weapons tend to be LC1, and even rapid-fire personal weapons are LC2. Even a license to use LC3 gear (normally pretty trivial) can be revoked if the PC makes a nuisance of themselves with it.

If they don't have the licenses or relevant organizational memberships (patron, rank, contacts, maybe allies, duty, etc) then you're definitely well within your rights to restrict the availability of that gear, or make it clear that what they have is ILLEGAL and possibly going to attract attention.

Even if they DO have licenses or the relevant organizational memberships to justify the gear, LC2 and LC1 gear is still WATCHED; its uses are meant to be limited.

All of that said, if a PC has wealth, independent income, an officer's rank in the army, a patron within the armed services, and a Duty to the military... you're probably cheating him if you tell him he can't have a battlesuit at least SOME of the time - clearly that's the sort of thing he wants to do!

05-03-2016, 11:30 AM	#51
wellspring Join Date: Apr 2011	Re: A problem with players saving up money using Independent income Two more modern examples come to mind. Sometimes, a political candidate will hire himself or his close relatives as employees of the campaign, which pays a salary. Or contractors/vendors to the campaign. Federal level politicians have many expenses that are political but not official, and there's a whole body of regulation about what you can pay with your official budget and what has to be paid by you personally (or your campaign organization). That latter kind of expense requires fund-raising, especially if you're not independently wealthy. You'd be surprised how poor many young Congressmen are; taking a salary from their own campaign is one way to foot all the bills. Sometimes someone who is poor on paper still has their campaign to pick up all the bills (until fairly recently, you could simply pocket this money when you retired from politics). Some activist groups, especially the ones that are highly political and draw most of their funds from donations from other activist groups, are essentially shells used to support individual activists. Perhaps a reward for loyalty, or financing activism that they ostensibly do on their own time. There was a scandal a few years back when one such group was funneling money to provide living expenses for a radical and convicted former domestic terrorist-- it came to light at trial when he got caught up in still more skullduggery. The mafia sometimes pays its soldiers through "no-show jobs". Michael Madsen's character in Reservoir Dogs gets walked through this (profanity-laden scene here). He gets both an alibi and way to get seemingly-legitimate income. Companies and politicians sometimes have similar arrangements. I found in wikipedia's article a reference to this being a tradition for Age of Sail British young aristocrats. Officially, they're on a ship's crew, but that's purely for show and to accumulate seniority. Boards of directors can be funny. Some take their duties very seriously. But some simply take huge salaries, attend a meeting every once in a blue moon, and let their name appear on the corporate masthead. Board memberships are often lucrative sinecures for people with a ton of power, status, and connections, but little actual money. Emeritus professors sometimes get a deal where they receive office space, graduate assistants, even sometimes a stipend, with few or no expectations in return. Mainly it's so a prestigious name can remain attached to his institution despite having retired. In fact, sinecures and retirements in place are common for the powerful but not rich. Sometimes it's a way to painlessly eliminate a rival without actually harming him. Sometimes it's a reward for past service or loyalty under pretense of it being an actual job.

05-05-2016, 10:05 AM	#56
Harald387 Join Date: Apr 2007 Location: Ottawa, ON, CA	Re: A problem with players saving up money using Independent income If the problem is 'the PC with Wealth and Independent Income is buying a lot of powerful gear', then start enforcing the Legality Class availability for gear. Getting your hands on a TL9 Battlesuit (LC1) is not just a matter of having $90,000 to throw around - it's available only to armed forces and government agencies, and even then only those with a need to use it. Hand grenades are largely LC2 or LC1. Heavy weapons tend to be LC1, and even rapid-fire personal weapons are LC2. Even a license to use LC3 gear (normally pretty trivial) can be revoked if the PC makes a nuisance of themselves with it. If they don't have the licenses or relevant organizational memberships (patron, rank, contacts, maybe allies, duty, etc) then you're definitely well within your rights to restrict the availability of that gear, or make it clear that what they have is ILLEGAL and possibly going to attract attention. Even if they DO have licenses or the relevant organizational memberships to justify the gear, LC2 and LC1 gear is still WATCHED; its uses are meant to be limited. All of that said, if a PC has wealth, independent income, an officer's rank in the army, a patron within the armed services, and a Duty to the military... you're probably cheating him if you tell him he can't have a battlesuit at least SOME of the time - clearly that's the sort of thing he wants to do!