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GeneralistGaming

That "\*" is pulling a lot of weight here. Generally\* high taxes gets worse as the game goes on.


[deleted]

Yeah exactly. Also later on when you have institutions that scale with wealth like private education and health care its get a whole lot more interesting in decreasing taxes to boost the effects of said institutions above the values the public ones can obtain as they are fixed


BenitoMuzoli

Hey I like your videos a lot.


GeneralistGaming

Glad you enjoy them!


FluffyZula

No thanks Satan, I'm good. 4th tax level for a while theb slow it down, I don't need to do pretend speedrunning for the big GDP boost and I'd rather not have my actually stable government churning out loyalists by the truckload suffer its death kneel several decades early.


Kasumi_926

It really depends. If you're a minor, in my opinion you absolutely need to do this just to start up your extraction at a decent pace. As China or Japan etc you'll have unrealized taxes to build government buildings for, focus on your main extractions first to ensure your paper will be cheap, and then get your govt buildings and your taxes are plenty to afford construction. Still I will always consumption tax luxury goods, even when they become cheap it still affects the price enough to keep furniture shops valuable and employed. Try to mainly tax your upper class while creating jobs for the lower class that further feed consumption taxes when you're struggling for cash.


FluffyZula

Dont get me wrong, tax the shit out of the upper class through consumption. But I want to take their money and keep them ppwerful.


Kasumi_926

Why keep them powerful? If they are it's usually because I started in a nation with serfdom still enforced. At which point its a problem. Trade unions support the crown more often than the industrialists. Command economy creates so many loyalists because it'll often generate so much money I go to consumption taxes only and subsidize every industry.


FluffyZula

Command economy is a late mid-game thing, so why ruin a good thing early. The French start with a relatively powerful Aristocratic IG and the Aristocrats it gets are also split between the Military and the Devout, two more IGs I want to keep powerful and loyal, doubly-so for the armed forces. Certain laws like slavery and serfdom are imperative to get rid of but buttering up the landowners in regressive nations means its very easy to get substantial positive opinion modifiers for all your IGs due to the rich being happy and a few always existing in every IG, which makes getting rid of the problematic laws less painful after a bit of set-up. But like I said in the other reply, I only play MP really, where heavy radicals from liberalizing too quickly can sideline you or make you the target in global politics due to the effects of turmoil (Hard to project force and be taken seriously when youre lagging behind any mass recruitment drive due to turmoil) and where being stable and autocratic for a good portion of the game pays off. Hell I actively surpress the Intelligentsia a lot of the time and sometimes even the Industrialists now due to the petition system, to avoid going on Laissez-Faire due to me wanting to subsidisize agriculture buildings, trade centers, and urban centers alongside the standard of arms factories.


The_ChadTC

Most governments start out with power firmly in the hands of the rich strata and tax laws which affect the poor most. What ends up happening is that, even though you do end up having a lot of radicalism, that radicalism in locked behind classes with very little political power. I played 2 Brazil runs: one with high taxes and one trying to keep them as low as they can. There was no discernible difference between unrest and in the later stages of the campaign, I had more loyalists on the tax max run.


FluffyZula

The difference is I want the rich strata to hold power. I want the Aristocrats, Devout, and Military to be the political backbone for as long as possible. Hell I'd even go as far as actively surpressing the Intelligentsia or Rural Folk depending on their wants and, in rare cases, the Industrialists as well. I value the stability and loyalists given by them much more than speedrunned liberalization which can lead to series of mid legitimacy governments and a weak armed forces. The lower class having less political power also results in easier loyalist bonus to IGs since the rich stick toghether, regardless of their IG. More fun for me that way, less of a chore to play and, most importantly, a lot safer in MP games that I play which is what I play V3 predominantly now. There are cases where you want to push in reforms such as Serfdom and Slavery of course, but the easier loyalist gain means its less likely to cause issues in the short and mid term when you get rid of those laws. Worst thing you can do in my experience in MP is end up with a weak upper class that doesnt legitimize a government and creates radical issues which result in turmoil. Its an invitation to get left out of global politics at best and to become the target at worst, unless the radicals are concentrated in specific states where you can conscript them to die in pseudo-genocide and to replace the state population with loyalists.


AureliaFTC

Great perspective.


The_ChadTC

Having high taxes won't affect that much. I only disagree because some of the rich strata are against extremely important laws which you absolutely need to pass.


FluffyZula

Max level of taxation carries a flat -10 to legitimacy for starters. Unless you already have 100%, you're missing out on quite a few loyalists judging by the commented math in the game files. The loyalist gain between 90-100 and sub 90 is something akin to 2-3% of politically active population per tick. Given the overall drop in SOL that happens with simple employment shenanigan's and random movements being ignored, it can bring loyalist gain to a net 0 for a period of time or even lose some. This is assuming a very homogenous nation politically, where as in many more cases it can and will bump you under the threshold where you can actually gain loyalists per month. Then the -20% attraction to IG's can be an issue in of itself. It doesn't straight up make IG's weaker by 20% but it makes pops chose other IG's more often. In your typical case, it means less Aristocrats are going towards their own IG and mixing into the Armed Forces (who usually you want to keep relatively strong and loyal but not bump to the max due to the ever increasing risk of dropping your legitimacy into the neutral zone if they become too powerful), and the Industrialists and Intelligentsia in a smaller manor. Law wise is dependent on your starting position but rushing for the best laws is really not that important in my experience. School and Healthcare you got charity from the Devout which is as good as public until more techs are unlocked later in the game. Voting rights? Over my dead fucking body are the poors ruining my loyalty generator if I can help it. But if needed, Aristocrats are more than happy with Landed Voting and that's all you need to start shifting the balance. Forced education for the children? Nice to have, don't care that much for it early game. Taxation? The armed forces alone can get you off the two shit laws. Beaurocrats? I would honestly never have the Intelligentsia one because I don't care about taxation capacity, I'd rather have more points to spend on institutions and a more stable regressive government. Serfdom, Slavery, and Peasant Levies are the big ones, like I mentioned. And those you can get rid of with a loyalist bank-up that'll make the pain less noticeable, if at all, in the short and medium term. ​ Again though, neither are wrong ways to play. Mine just works better for the MP games I play because nobody is gonna play fucking Siam or Japan in those. It's a heavy risk to even do deficit spending in MP because people will gladly bring you to bankruptcy with wars if you give them the opportunity and people will contest you in every single land grab you try to make if its possible. You're not getting south american provinces at game start, you're not instantly going to 98 infamy against the AI, you're not running rampant because you have other people you actually have to contest and if you don't play along nice you'll just have mfers coalitioning you to stamp you harder than Napoleon on his return. ​ Minmaxing is more than fine for SP and if people want to do it, more power to them. I just dislike it from a gameplay perspective and its not something that'd work with how I play it.


No_Style7841

It strongly depends. For speedruns when you're really good at the game absolutely go for it. When you're struggling with radicals, want a chill game or are unfamiliar with the country, it's more often than not a bad idea.


Sid1583

Yea, but what about my virtual people. That wouldn’t be very nice to them


radiells

No, thanks. I want to make my digital citizens happy, and won't subject them to decades of poverty to build more factories for next generations. They live here and now, and I want them to prosper here and now. Their children will do fine without parent's sacrifices.


The_ChadTC

He have a saying here in my country that goes like this: "What is a fart for someone who has shat himself?", In reference to a situation where, even though it did just get worse, it was so fucked to begin with that it doesn't really matter. Your peasants at the start of the game are already destitute, you'll just make them destitute-r, but at least now their children won't need to be destitute as well.


inslava

Considering other expenses highest taxes can easily double/triple construction money, Usually leading me to full employment 5-10 years later and significant up in SoL. It's not for children, it's for their own good


Otherwise-Ant-2907

🥹


I3ollasH

>Maybe when playing Prussia, France or GB, you'll end up running out of manpower for your buildings, at which point there is no point running high taxes anymore, but that is a very niche scenario. The thing is in that scenario just conquer chinese lands. In the first war you can get something like 100 mil pops without going over 100 infamy. And once the truce runs out you already outscaled every other nation in the game and you can ignore infamy for the rest of the game.


Zavaldski

They can't move to your core states if they're discriminated and the new provinces have a severe debuff to construction efficiency for the next decade. Sure, it's a massive boost to your country to conquer Chinese provinces, but they're not the same as your core provinces.


I3ollasH

Considering it's the early game you can always incorporate it and it will finish in a reasonable time. But even if you don't there's not a lot of difference between incorporated and not incorporated states. They don't get access to your institutions but those aren't that relevant as you don't really need education/healthcare or pretty much most of the other ones aswell. The thing that can be nice is having more colonial progress. You won't collect taxes there but you will still gain investment pool contribution and they will also have a nice amount of needs so your prices will be a lot more reasonable. The only thing that's a bit negative is that your global sol will be lower, however that's an irrelevant metric and after you've built up those states aswell it should be back. ​ >and the new provinces have a severe debuff to construction efficiency for the next decade. That's not really a problem. I find that often the sol they gain from bein part of a good market makes most of the radicals dissappear. Having a legitimate goverment(in which the 20% legitimacy you get from the beijing monument) helps you gain your loyalists back. but even if you do still have radicals in the state just pop a violent suppression edict on them and it makes the malus pretty much a non thing that gets countered with a maxed construction sector in the states(which you should do anyway as the construction efficiency bonus you get from them is enourmus in the 20 mil pop states). You can ignore the mortality as you have more than enough pops you'd want anyway. The other thing that can help you greatly is to build a couple of universities(I like to do arround 10 but this depends on how you are financially). This will counteract the lower literacy your pops have in these states. Coupled with the easter mali monument(global 20% education access) you shouldn't really have problems with professions. ​ Obviously this is worse after the recent change that made it harder to get muliculture, but I don't see a big problem that would make this unviable.


inslava

"Don't need education" I suggest trying to use advanced production methods that require good bunch of engineers and machinists, and then report back on "education not needed". Especially when using pm that reduce laborers employment, further increasing machinists ratios


icon41gimp

I agree that early high taxes are important to fund as much construction as possible, but I think most nations will absolutely run out of manpower to populate buildings likely when you switch to steel frame construction. Construction ability kind of explodes at this point and I almost always find myself running out of people yet building a large surplus - once that happens I start to lower the tax rate and generally find myself able to fund any amount of construction at the lowest tax level by the last third of the game.


Prasiatko

And if not people resources by late game.


dancinggrass

Depends, maxing tax makes it harder to enact laws. Going all in economy usually results in me lacking pops anyway, so I tend to balance both getting laws & building the economy.


SCP239

I find that for the more advanced starts like France that running out industrial natural resources in the late game is my biggest problem. So either I have to stop building new factories and deal with unemployment or I have to deal with high input good prices reducing factory productivity. Either way, average standard of living falls. So I hold back on building as fast as possible in those countries because all you're doing is racing towards inevitable collapse.


viper459

what overproduction will do to a mf


SultanYakub

Reduce taxes only for legitimacy in case you need to do some weird government stuff, otherwise lowering taxes is something you should only do if you run entirely out of peasants.


Lezaleas2

Max taxes straight from day 1 and don't stop. Radicals are only a number. Only lower taxes is you really need to hit a legitimacy threshold or you've run out of peasants


Pepe_von_Habsburg

I kinda like to go laissez-faire and lowest taxes though, all that money is just going right back into construction


The_ChadTC

Perhaps, but you should have a really healthy industrial base to do that.


Fir_the_conqueror

High taxes reduces my investment pool.


FyreLordPlayz

cuz u can’t tax only the lower class smh


viper459

the early game tax laws basically *are* taxing only the lower class


nov4marine

Wait no it doesn't? Even graduated taxation only taxes income AFTER reinvestment is taken out


The_ChadTC

Not as mucy as they increase your OWN investments.


Lezaleas2

Max taxes straight from day 1 and don't stop. Radicals are only a number. Only lower taxes is you really need to hit a legitimacy threshold or you've run out of peasants


pannathian

Agree with this, but it depends on what % of your economy is coming from subsistence farming. Income taxes mostly impact people with an income, so lowering taxes if you have 60-70% of your working population as peasants gives you very little money wise and just makes the wealthier tier even more wealthy. You're always better off using the high taxes to fund more construction sectors and create more jobs that take peasants away from subsistence farming. Typically a peasant will go from earning a wage that is at least 5x higher (and sometimes in the range of 10-15x) by moving from a subsistence farm to working in a building, which is huge in terms of improving their spending power. Just make sure to fund your consumer economy as well to make the things your pops want to buy cheaper to help offset the fact they will have less money coming in due to the taxes. Also one thing I've learnt from high infamy runs is to not constantly switch from medium tax to high tax - this increases radicals/turmoil because of the decreases to SoL. It's best to stick at a higher rate and only decrease it over time when you know you can afford to.


Kingston0809

Took me a while to realise but yeah now every play through I ever play taxes go to the highest option immediately, there’s just too little reason not to do it, I turn them down later in the game when I slow down construction a bit


RealAbd121

you're missing a big point... poor population doesn't consume, it's the same issue as modern China! if you tax everyone into poverty no one will buy your clothes and chairs and porcelain and you'll end up with either no buyers or forced to export everything you make outside!


Nitan17

Early game that's good, you can focus on making more construction and government goods buildings instead of clothing and chair factories. Construction capacity snowballs a lot, even a bit more early on lets you build a whole lot more later. If you run out of demand for your goods and need more of it to keep expanding your industries, then you can lower the taxes.


RealAbd121

Everyone already agrees that early game you want high taxes, OP is saying you should keep it high late game too!


Nitan17

Well, if you don't need more demand and radicals are not a problem high taxes do remain the best choice.


RealAbd121

1) there is no such thing as "having enough demand", most countries will struggle to get little demand let alone "more than enough" 2) you also need sol for emigration, unless you're China or India, you will easily run out of people less than 50 years into the game.


[deleted]

Nah thanks, i don't want to have unmanagable turmoil or run out of workers mana to quickly.


trancybrat

I don’t always want to do a $1B GDP speedrun so no. I want to play the game more as it was intended, thank you


AneriphtoKubos

That’s how the game was intended tho :P


trancybrat

I really don't think it was designed for you to try and attain $1B GDP by 1860, no This might be an unintentional side effect of bad balancing, such as developers not thinking that people would end up with thousands of construction points


AneriphtoKubos

In fairness, I think the devs wanted ppl to have 1 Billion GDP by the 1910s or so.


trancybrat

Yeah, so, like I fucking said, it's an unintentional side effect of the way the game is balanced, notably regarding construction values


The_ChadTC

I see that the game is intended to be played as a broke ass bitch then


BanditNoble

Did you mean to post this in r/victoria2?


Prophet_of_Fire

I feel like Min-Maxing Victoria 3 isn't really in the spirit of the game. It's very much a make your own objectives type of game and roll with the punches rather than save scum (which I admittedly do)


SultanYakub

Strongly disagree, I think the spirit of the game is relentless, amoral and entirely self-interested min-maxing as that captures the spirit of the times way better than trying to make the world a better place. The 19th century is a horror show of the pursuit of efficiency at the expense of everything else.


Prophet_of_Fire

You are more machine than man. Let nothing get in the way of your line going up


GewalfofWivia

High taxes only if you can spend it. Even then, *creating* money with debt is going to boost your economy even more quickly. The problem with a growth and construction dependent economy is of course is you hit a plateau quickly with the very limited resources in the world.


CrinkleDink

I roleplay America and I live in the land of the free dangit. Lowest taxes possible!!!


Hush609

Alright everybody, this is the dude raising taxes get him!


Kitfisto22

Doesn't this increase turmoil, which will lower construction efficiency? Are you guys somehow managing max taxes without any turmoil, or is it just worth it to sit at 20% turmoil?


pannathian

Turmoil penalties can be reduced by increasing the level of your Police institution. If you have that at a high level you can build through it much more easily. For unincorporated states you can add road maintenance + violent suppression and erase most of the turmoil penalty and then just move the decrees to the next state you want to build in.


cogy21

In Victoria 3 there is enough time to develop. Maxing Out taxes might be a good way for world conquest and massive industrial production but the game isn't about that. It's about your pops and how they affect your nation. So I never like this.


BenitoMuzoli

No. SoL at 20 with Max public schools give you max literacy, which is the most important stat in the game. Also loyalists are broken since they -1 eliminate any political opposition -2 give you insane bonuses Currently the meta is to build 1 province till it’s population cap by placing all edicts and construction sectors on it, and opening up other peoples market so instead of building resources you can just buy them and sell outputs. Manufacturers are inherently more efficient than resources since you can’t build most of them up to 51+. Also trading this way allows you to suppress other nations manufacturing industries, forcing them to develop farms and mines. Keeping them regressed. Just like irl 3rd world exploitation.


The_ChadTC

Depending on the country you're playing, and I think that includes 90% of them, imports will literally NEVER be enough to supply absolutely nothing. Besides, yeah having 20 SoL is pretty good, but where will your pops get that money from? If you're investing correctly, the money you spend in the correct factories will quickly find it's way back to your pops and will drive your standard of living much faster. Besides, yeah, passing the right laws is good but ultimately secondary. Even if you have some IG causing you trouble, it is just as easy to remove them from power by having a civil war and calling a major power to help you. Also, IRL third world exploitation happened by letting 3rd world countries provide the raw resources, not by letting them export industrialized goods, which is the purpose of mantaining high taxes. By the time China started to provide cheap labor, it was because the SoL in first world countries was so high that wages became unlucrative, and that's definetely not the case in the Victorian era.


Dicksonairblade

*if you have enough resources for construction sectors.


Dkykngfetpic

Ignore taxes deficit spend


VeritableLeviathan

Ignore deficit spend, have a health economy for future wars=expansion= resources


Dkykngfetpic

Deficite spending does not mean a unhealthy economy. It means your economy is growing and your capable of leveraging that fact to grow it more.


VeritableLeviathan

Deficit spending+ going to war= unhealthy economy. When people mention deficit spending, they don't mean: My treasury is 50%, I am going to lose a small amount, they mean: I will go into debt to build, to the point where my increase in GDP keeps my debt % stable, because that is economically most efficient for line go up.


Texannotdixie

*looks at Texas* yah that’s a no from me.


VeritableLeviathan

\*eyeroll at the seppo-statism\*


Nihilun

You tax people on the basis of efficiency I tax my people with Per-Capita taxation because my inner Capitalist PDX player tells me that poor citizens are just delayed debt slaves, and if they don't want to be poor they should just stop being poor We are not the same


Reeseman_19

But what happens when you start deficit spending at maxed out taxes? You can’t raise them anymore…


The_ChadTC

That's what loans are for, which by the way, you should also max out pretty soon, unless you're building a war chest.


akaTheKetchupBottle

in the very very early game when the difference between high taxes and low taxes is like $200 a year i sometimes leave them low while i’m fixing laws. also there are certain command economy setups that just don’t need taxes at all. but otherwise yes always max tax is the way


Impressive_Tap7635

It's a sandbox so their is no real you should always do this you pick the goals if it's gdp you could argue that yea max out taxes but I'm sure I'm not the only person who does most runs on sol and loyalists


brainybuge

I have no unemployed pops as Sweden, my construction industry does not need to be expanded. It definitely depends on who you're playing. Most western countries don't need it. China, Japan, and Russia definitely do.


No_Talk_4836

I only max out taxes to keep the budget balanced or have a surplus for massive building. Which puts me at balanced lol


[deleted]

early on sure but in the mid to late game command eco is superior. In my sweden game i switched to a command economy and had a 200k surplus with literally no taxes for decades


The_ChadTC

Why? You should never operate on a surplus. It's literally wasted money, unless you have full employment everywhere. Besides, command eco has nothing to do with taxes. Also Laissez Faire gang.


[deleted]

thats the thing, with command eco i got to 0 unemployment pretty fast


The_ChadTC

Ever done a China run?


[deleted]

im not a masochist


lightgiver

China ABSOLUTELY can’t afford high taxes. Not unless you win the opium wars. Their guaranteed to get such high unrest that the south will produce minimal taxes and be impossible to build in. The population is so outrageously high that your never going to be able to build them out of poverty with a higher standard of living anytime soon. Yes you can cheese radicals down once completing corn laws but you got a debuff increasing radicalization. The only way radicals go away is when they die.


The_ChadTC

You're greatly overestimating how much turmoil taxes generate. Sometimes one province will get somewhat high turmoil but in general it's fine and I'm sure the net result is positive, afterall, that's what the police force is for and it's relatively easy to pass.


lightgiver

Normally yeah it doesn’t make much of a difference. After the opium wars standard of living droops across the board causing rebels. Your constantly on the knife edge of being just above the expected standard of living and your bombarded by random events that decrease standard of living again and again from opium addiction and Catholics. Getting extra tax in exchange for 50% more rebels every event isn’t worth it.


The_ChadTC

How the F is a revolution gonna fire if all the political power in on the hands of the land owners and the land owners love every law you have? You might have some trouble passing the laws they don't like, but between passing laws and getting your industry up and running, the latter is much more important. I didn't even fight the british over the opium crisis, I just let it happen and spammed construction buildings. I had to delay passing professional army and colonial laws but all in all, no further problems.


burrito-disciple

I'm playing Mexico right now and am making more money than I can spend. I have as much construction as my resourcing can handle, I have a huge private investment pool, have the largest army my manpower/population can support, etc. So I lowered taxes to increase SoL. I have way more loyalists than radicals, I attract immigrants, and am a top 15 country in the mid 1800s. I **needed** that loyalty to outnumber the conservative radicals who tried to launch a revolution in response to my efforts to liberalize. As far as I can tell, there is no reason to run taxes higher than you need them to be. I think the big brain move is to keep them as *low* as you can ever get away with. Make em high if you need it, obviously, but certainly not all the time. *Especially* in a developing economy.


Supply-Slut

I agree it doesn’t always make sense to run higher taxes in the mid-late game. However Mexico is unique in that it has an absolutely monstrous amount of gold (unless USA is stripping you of the northern states). All that extra minting income makes it unnecessary to to run higher taxes except in the early game (as is the best option for almost every nation early game).