Why did it take so long to deal with Silesia?

kzt wrote:

runsforcelery wrote:
[9] In terms of Grayson, it wasn't access to interstellar trade which was so economically transformative. It was access to modern interstellar technology, which it acquired through its alliance with Manticore much more than through general interstellar commerce. This is, in fact, one of the huge pro-Manticore influences in Yeltsin; the Graysons understand what Manticore's tech transfers have meant to themselves and to their children's futures. The Grayson economic boom, however, is largely self-fueled as the constraints on food production are gradually eliminated or at least greatly reduced (courtesy of Skydomes), as industry becomes geometrically more productive (courtesy of those tech transfers and of Manticoran investment), and as the Grayson labor force's purchasing power expands in step. The only real export product Grayson has at the moment are starships — military or commercial — and I believe that one can safely assume that Grayson will become/remain part of the Manticoran shipbuilding industry's network for the foreseeable future. In most other respects, however, Grayson's much more likely to be a net importer in the interstellar economy.

Thanks. Though given that Grayson doesn't have anyone on the other side of a wormhole able to ship in huge pieces of space stations, nor the financial resources to pay for them, things would appear to be not looking very good for poor Grayson's ship building industry these days.

No, but Oyster Bay missed by far the bulk of Grayson's orbital infrastructure . . . including its primary manufacturing base and orbital extraction industries. They killed the Blackbird Yards and the tech types working there; they didn't kill the people and industrial modules which built Blackbird in the first place. In fact, relative to its pre-Oyster Bay industrial capacity, Yeltsin's Star is better off than Manticore in many respects. Still not a good place to be, but better than it sounds like you were thinking.

kzt wrote:

runsforcelery wrote:
[9] In terms of Grayson, it wasn't access to interstellar trade which was so economically transformative. It was access to modern interstellar technology, which it acquired through its alliance with Manticore much more than through general interstellar commerce. This is, in fact, one of the huge pro-Manticore influences in Yeltsin; the Graysons understand what Manticore's tech transfers have meant to themselves and to their children's futures. The Grayson economic boom, however, is largely self-fueled as the constraints on food production are gradually eliminated or at least greatly reduced (courtesy of Skydomes), as industry becomes geometrically more productive (courtesy of those tech transfers and of Manticoran investment), and as the Grayson labor force's purchasing power expands in step. The only real export product Grayson has at the moment are starships — military or commercial — and I believe that one can safely assume that Grayson will become/remain part of the Manticoran shipbuilding industry's network for the foreseeable future. In most other respects, however, Grayson's much more likely to be a net importer in the interstellar economy.

Thanks. Though given that Grayson doesn't have anyone on the other side of a wormhole able to ship in huge pieces of space stations, nor the financial resources to pay for them, things would appear to be not looking very good for poor Grayson's ship building industry these days.

They didn't have anyone shipping in huge pieces of space stations fifteen years ago when they built shipyards, either. And since they are not dependent on trade, their economy is not suffering as much as Manticore's is with the loss of the stations. In fact, their economy is in far better shape now than it was fifteen years ago. Grayson should be able to rebuild shipyards just fine.

runsforcelery wrote:
No, but Oyster Bay missed by far the bulk of Grayson's orbital infrastructure . . . including its primary manufacturing base and orbital extraction industries. They killed the Blackbird Yards and the tech types working there; they didn't kill the people and industrial modules which built Blackbird in the first place. In fact, relative to its pre-Oyster Bay industrial capacity, Yeltsin's Star is better off than Manticore in many respects. Still not a good place to be, but better than it sounds like you were thinking.

Oh, I'd thought they had moved all that stuff out to Blackbird and it all got destroyed.

Thanks.

J6P wrote:Trade is another word for making money off of others work.

For a system to be prosperous, it needs a just and equitable government allowing ideas, freedom, to flourish.

The only caveat is if a system does not have an intrinsic resource and therefore must trade with someone else to obtain the resource. Then and only then does trade have any bearing on a systems prosperity.

Total GDP/capita is not a symbol of prosperity. That is a symbol of wealth to OUTSIDE systems. Internally it means zilch. It is only useful as a tool when comparing to others.

Definitions

Trade is a necessity for having a working economy, and saying trade is a way for making money off of others work is disingenuous. Trade in most cases actually works like a multiplier for boosting local economies that otherwise would stagnate. Whether trade is only done locally or with other systems doesn't really matter, the economy will benefit from it.

A system can be prosperous even though it's a dictatorship, it's just that the wealth usually will be unequally spread through the society. In essence it doesn't really matter what kind of government you have as long as its goal is to increase its prosperity, ie. its citizens standard of living and education, efficient industry and manufacturing etc. Freedom of speech and allowing new ideas has little to do with it although it will generally affect the growth of the economy positively.

Total GDP/capita is a quite good indicator of a systems prosperity since it directly correlates to a systems standard of living, and comparisons doesn't need to be done to outside systems since it's even more important to use it to see where it's headed by comparing it to historical data adjusted for inflation.

kzt wrote:

runsforcelery wrote:
No, but Oyster Bay missed by far the bulk of Grayson's orbital infrastructure . . . including its primary manufacturing base and orbital extraction industries. They killed the Blackbird Yards and the tech types working there; they didn't kill the people and industrial modules which built Blackbird in the first place. In fact, relative to its pre-Oyster Bay industrial capacity, Yeltsin's Star is better off than Manticore in many respects. Still not a good place to be, but better than it sounds like you were thinking.

Oh, I'd thought they had moved all that stuff out to Blackbird and it all got destroyed.

Thanks.

I thought that Grayson was stll assembling ships in open space without the benefit of highly mechanized stations like Hysphasteas. If this is true there should be less infrastructure to rebuild although they might have lost a high percentage of their ship builders.

Don

Weird Harold wrote:

Uroboros wrote:"Possible" does not mean "probable." I cannot imagine it'd be cheaper to transport an entire transport of bulk ore when you have things like asteroid belts right at your doorstep.

Probable or not, there is textev that bulk ore carriers do operate in the Honorverse.

If you don't have enough industry to support an indigenous mining industry, 8 MTons of raw ore once or twice a year might well be far cheaper than starting and stopping local mining.

There is also the probability that places like Grayson have more transuranics and heavy metals than they need but not enough lighter metals, which some other system might have in excess; A route hauling pitchblende in one direction and bauxite in the other would be mutually beneficial for the systems and profitable for the ship owner(s).

Harold, you brought up an important point to remember, namely that not all star systems contain the same quantities and proportions of all the minerals as all others. Some will have more of some elements and less of others, which some of the participants in this discussion seem to have forgotten.

kzt wrote:What 1st world nations have absolutely no ship building industry and a sea coast?. Please name one that hasn't built a ship larger than 150 tons in the last 5 years.

Kzt, you're making some very bold claims, but your logic is seriously flawed.

Just because a country has its own merchant marine registry does not mean that the ships on that registry are built in that country.

There are relatively few shipyards in the world that have the infrastructure and labour pool necessary to build large cargo ships. The companies that own those shipyards then sell their products to the merchant marine lines, which actually conduct trade by sea.

Lastly, you speak of 1st world countries as if they are the only ones with the capacity to build such large ships. I remind you that countries like Brazil, China, India and Indonesia are not 1st world countries, yet have thriving shipbuilding industries of their own.

There are many 1st world countries with coastlines of their own that do not have a single shipyard with the capacity to build large container ships, and then there are some landlocked countries that actually have thriving merchant marines of their own.

n7axw wrote: I thought that Grayson was stll assembling ships in open space without the benefit of highly mechanized stations like Hysphasteas. If this is true there should be less infrastructure to rebuild although they might have lost a high percentage of their ship builders.

Don

assembling is the operative word. You still need the factories to build the graser modules and other heavier parts.

JohnRoth wrote:

Weird Harold wrote:No, the answer to the question is still, "anyone who could make a profit."

Crew costs, fuel costs, maintenance costs, and all of your other objections fall under accounting to "make a profit." Whether a shipper could make more somewhere closer is irrelevant; as long as they make a profit on the longer run, they will make the run.

There is nothing in the stated circumstance to preclude intermediate stops for trade or requiring a certain level of profit, only a logical reason for hauling raw ore 300LY -- the answer is "to make a profit."

That is the basic principle of "Trade" buy cheap in one place, sell high in another, and make a profit. Everything else is mere details.

The devil, as they say, is in the details. What people are trying to tell you is that once you do a reasonably decent economic analysis bulk interstellar trade makes no sense - it's far cheaper to do the resource extraction and so forth locally.

John, I'm with Harold on this one. What you forget is that not all worlds will have the capacity to supply all of their own needs, just as today not all countries can supply all of their own needs. If that were the case, there wouldn't be any need for international trade at all, and we know that is not the case. Some countries today have rather specialised economies and industrial sectors, others are more diversified. The same will be true in the Honorverse - some planetary economies will focus on only a relative handful of major industries, because of local circumstances (such as Montanan beef, for example), which means that they'll have to import all kinds of goods from other worlds.

The mistake you seem to make is to think that all planets in the Honorverse are similar with regards to their local resources, conditions, requirements and socio-political and socio-economic dynamics. We know this isn't true, no more than it isn't true today on Earth.

Well, MWW's post is nicely in depth, but:

He has also stated that moving cargo's in system via counter grav(see pearl several pages back) is actually just as expensive than shipping intrasteller!

Take Grain as an Example:

1) Have to yank the grain out of its gravitational well,
2) Transfer to Hyper capable ship
3) and then ship for weeks/months intrastellerly.
4) Transfer again
5) Enter gravitational well.

He just got done saying shipping via counter grav in system is expensive!

As if a counter grav intersystem grain bulk cargo hauler, couldn't use its counter grav to reach exo altitudes where there is no atmospheric drag(Power/$$$ sucking) and then coast ballistic to its destination without the rig-a-marole of trans shipment 2 EXTRA TIMES and the delay time of weeks/months.

Both scenario shuttles use counter grav. Both use their counter grav the exact same amount. Actually one scenario could use it less as they do not have to go to LEO... One is far faster. One is far cheaper. I will let you sleuth's figure out which scenario is better.

PS. Grass grows everywhere. Any planet that can sustain a population, other than a VERY rare oddball like Grayson, will sustain grain production. Those over populated could have a problem as well. Those who are ecological reserves coulc have a problem as they refuse to provide for themselves and feel entitled to impose their values on someone elses planet so they can feel like they are not harming their own planet. So, sure, in a very rare instances there will be some grain being shipped.