Why ever change goverment?

You have to look at the gross income and production of your empire, not the net income. Some of the economic bonuses from advanced governments are indeed reduced by the drop in morale, but you should still be better off in the end. Generally speaking, if your total spending exceeds tax income (not total income), changing to a more advanced governement type tends to reduce your net income since trade and tribute are not increased proportionally.

Perhaps an example will help here. Suppose your empire begins as thus...

Tax Income: 100
Trade: 50
Tribute: 50
Total Income: 200

Production: 150
Leases: 50
Total Spending: 200

Net Income: 0

Now suppose you switch to some super government with a +100% bonus...

Tax Income: 200
Trade: 50
Tribute: 50
Total Income: 300

Production: 300
Leases: 50
Total Spending: 350

Net Income: -50

I guess if I should be more precise...

If (Trade + Tribute) > (Lease + Maintenance + Espionage), then switching to more advanced government will result in decrease in net income

I don't have conclusive proof that government types increase taxes and production in a proportional manner, but that has been my experience so far.

I never look at the net when I change government. I generally manipulate spending to keep the net somewhere between +25 and +100. What I look at is Research (because its the one category that doesn't have a bunch of wierd undocumented (or perhaps more precisely, underdocumented) capacity effects and caps.

Generally my experience has been watching Research go from 1000 a month to 1300 a month with an upgrade from Imperial to Republic, most times this is after adjusting spending so my net goes back to "normal".

Government upgrades are like getting an immediate tricked out Economic Resource Starbase. Even with the current build keeping morale up is easy enough that there should never be a time when you don't upgrade the government.

I ended my last game at Painful difficulty with 90% of my planets on a large map at 100 morale and an approval rating of 89%.

Hrm... to quick to post. I should add (Tax Income) < (Production) as another constraint, even though it should usually be true :notsure:

I agree about research as the measure to watch. In my games I can be running a small surplus when I'm performing any mixture of production and research, but in the late games when I pump my research to max, it'll burn off a multiple of my entire cash horde, which is considerable by then. I use research as a way to watch the overall-ness of my economy, since all those caps and such have been too hard to build spreadsheets around yet.

The main reason to change governments, really, is that part of the production bonuses you get from the higher governments comes for free. Yes, you will have to lower your production slider to break even again, but you'll also find that your planets are producing more overall.

Lol never noticed that my research got better too.. Tought it only improved my economy?

Economy improves Production, taxes and production???

Economy improves taxes. Since you buy research and production, more tax revenue from the economy bonus means more research and production.

I did an analysis once of moving from Republic to Democracy and found as Valamir did. Yes, I have to lower goverment spending % to now break even. However the amount of money going into research, military and social is greater. After that I quit looking at the spending % so much as what are the actual hard numbers that are being spent on the three.

About government.. maybe someone can answer this.

I am playing my 'gee i'm wicked and eyyyvl' game, where I am going to try to bully and war my way to victory. I've decided since my approval rating was fair (around 75 to 80%) that I could up the government to Republic (or whatever the first after Imperial is).

So I do so.. and my BC spend rate went intantly negative. From +18 or so to -75 bc's from the change of government.

I thought 'hmmmm.. ok, perhaps after the election next year, it'll go up'. After all, it is supposed to be a 20% increase in economy.

So I go to the next turn.. win the election (70-some percent voted for me), and check the spend rate again. Still very bad.. -65 or so bc's. Does anyone know why? The negative spend rate would mean (and I didn't look, but I would assume) that I am now taking in less money from taxes, etc. Do less people 'report' taxes when you go republic? I had tax rate at just at 49 or 50%. Trade amount was almost identical (bringing in from 65 to 70 bc in trade at this early-ish point in the game).

Does being 'evil' screw you up? Or is it always this way? I don't recall that dropping so dramatically when I was 'good' or neutral-ish. Does it take several months to level out? Does anyone know why it does this?

Losing money when you win your seat basically very easily, and have a high approval rating is just weird. Most of my planets had decent morale, only a few were in the 60's, and maybe 1 or 2 in the 50's (class 14's from expansions with no soil enhancement built yet).

fleabitfox

You are not losing money. Your production limits are higher in the new government and you're not adjusting your spending pct down to compensate.

Once you adjust your spending pct down to where you have the same income as before the governmental change, you will find that your colonies are still producing more than they were before.

Higher production rates are great because that is what typically constrains the ability of your population to rush-build an improvement or pull an all-nighter and cram for a new tech.

Improved government yields MUCH more higher max PRODUCTION, and less increase in tax income (and none to trade/lease/tribute..).

So usually when you change you can observe improved rates for Mil/Soc/Res, but also drop in net income.

The "solution" is to reduce spend rate. In my games it usually goes down from 100% in Empire to as low as 50-60% in Star Democracy (but maintenance costs are also a cause of the drop, they end up very high).

If you take ZaH example above, you can see that if spending was 100% for 150 prod / Net income 0 befreo the change, you can put it at 80% to have 240 prod / net income +10. You win it all !

Just consider the whole income/spending/prod picture, not just the net income that is the result of all the former.
Go to Economics Crash Course 101 LOL

ah.. duh. Thanks!

fleabitfox

Yeah, you definitely have to look at values on the Income/Expenditures screen and not the slider positions. For instance, I went from around 3000 income to around 3400 when I switched to Star Democracy earlier today, but the net income dropped to a big negative number because my ability to spend increased as well, so the current slider position had me spending far more than I was before.

This can happen in lots of areas. For instance, if you have a turn where you add a lot of production modules to starbases (especially big ones, like +25% phase 3 and such), you'll often have to lower your expenses because your improved production now makes your current slider setting spend far more than it did before.

If you don't raise your production through the various means in GalCiv (better government, production buildings, production starbase modules, etc.) but do raise your economy then you can reach the point where you can't spend enough money vs. your income (i.e. expenditures are at 100% but you still make money). Not only do these improvements add to your power, they also give you room to use that power to its fullest.

There is a certain Zen feeling to the GalCiv economy, once you get it you get it, until then it's 'the sound of one hand clapping'.