| From: | Chris Siebenmann <cks@********.UTCS.TORONTO.EDU> |
|---|---|
| Subject: | The economics of Shadowrunning (was Re: Darn!!!!) |
| Date: | Thu, 25 Nov 1993 03:40:59 -0500 |
think about. I too think that a Seattle dripping with studly
Shadowrunners is a bit much, although it could be hard to avoid in a
long-running campaign.
- cks
Article 64211 of rec.games.frp:
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From: earl@***.caltech.edu (Earl A. Hubbell)
Newsgroups: rec.games.frp
Subject: Shadowrun: Economics of Running
Keywords: Shadowrun
Message-ID: <1992Apr14.062428.19783@***.caltech.edu>
Date: 14 Apr 92 06:24:28 GMT
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Corporation Report:
Economics of Independent Illegal Operatives - 'Shadowrunners'.
Abstract: Statistical analyis applied with some wild assumptions
demonstrates 1) Shadowrunners are not generally a significant force
and 2) They are an economic preferred alternative to 'in-house'
operatives, despite general unreliability.
Body of Report:
Seattle of 2050:
Population : 3x10^6 individuals
Corporate affiliated: 1.5x10^6
Below Poverty: 1x10^6
Thus, we see economically independent units compose 5x10^5 individuals.
We rule out the 'Below Poverty Level' population, as any significantly
skilled/cybered/magic unit will be aggressively recruited/have entered
poverty voluntarily/will not be counted in standard census.
>From the UCAS census estimates, we have approximately 1% of the population
having 'significant' cyber-enhancements (so called 'samurai', 'riggers'
or 'deckers') or significant magical enhancement ('physical adepts').
Full mages compose approximately .1% of the population.
Thus, there are approximately 3x10^4 units of significant personal
power in Seattle. Of these units, 3,000 are mages.
Due to aggressive corporate recruiting, it is estimated that only
10% of the 'significant' population may be considered 'independent'.
Thus, we have 3x10^3 significant units, of which 300 are mages.
For obvious reasons, counting this population is difficult, however,
it seems that only approximately 20% of this final group engage
in high-risk operations (the remaining 'independents' belonging
to various 'normal' occupations).
Thus, the 'significant' population available to 'shadowrun' consists
of merely 60 mages, 60 skilled 'deckers', approximately 120 riggers,
120 physical adepts, and 300 samurai (numbers do not add due to some
overlap in categories, and approximation errors).
Given the near-necessity of 'magical cover' on any significant
operation, we see an operating population of approximately 100
'teams' of runners within Seattle, composed from a pool of
approximately 600 'powered' individuals, and approximately
2,000 skilled personnel in various 'support' positions (so-called
'fixers', 'detectives', 'security consultants', 'cannon-fodder'...)
This explains the 'close-knit' nature of an otherwise paranoid
profession - the 'teams' generally know of each other, at least
by reputation, and in the case of mages, almost certainly by
individual. (deckers too). They interact with the same population,
travel in the same circles, need the same information, think the
same way.
Thus, we see that although 'runners' form a relatively large force
on the scale they tend to operate, their disorganized nature tends
to leave them with little real impact on corporate operations.
Part 2: Economics of Corporate/Shadowrunner interaction.
Seattle:
Median Income: 25 kY/year.
This figure is highly unreliable, due to the very visible presence
of 'unreported' money floating throughout many credit networks.
Cash-flow estimations are therefore difficult, and much more approximate
than any other computations.
Total cash available to non-corporate individuals:
approximately 10^10 nY/year. (note - most of this 'income' is in fact
passed back and forth between individuals of little note, or flows
from the UCAS government to the welfare recipients, and is then returned,
allowing the UCAS to claim{digression deleted})
Total cash available to corporate individuals:
approximately 10^11 nY/year (note - due to the 'pyramid' structure of
the society in 2050, most of the money is available to the top 1% of
the population, and is unreported due to various tricks with
corporate holdings, services provided 'gratis', etc...)
Due to the familiar 'money surge' as international financial markets
open and close during the daylight hours, approximately 3x10^9 nY
value flows into and out of Seattle each >day<. This drives a fair
amount of 'high finance', but has little effect on the lives of
'independents'. {digression deleted}
Assuming corporations, for optimum functioning, require the occasional
'bending' of stringent regulations and laws, since 100% law enforcement
has been found to not be cost-effective in 'security maintenance' (see
Lone-Star report #115345: 'Optimization of Law Enforcement by the
Saad-Dine Algorithm'). Assume 99% of all corporate functioning may
be 'above question'. Assume further that plausible deniability may
be established for corporate operatives in 90% of the remaining
cases. This leaves .1% of funds available, indeed, nearly required,
to be spent outside the corporation on 'extra-legal' operations.
>From our previous numbers, we obtain an estimated 10^8nY/year available
in the Seattle area for payment of independent operatives. Given
the estimated population of 10^2 teams, this works out to 10^6 nY/year
income per team - a high-paying income, cut into by the various
individuals in the network being paid for their support services.
(An interesting parallel to income tax may be made here - some
free-market assumptions about 'government by market forces' seem
to be confirmed.)
In practice, there is a strong stratification within runner society-
most exist in an environment of rapid cash-flow, and succeed in
merely a comfortable existence, punctuated by gambling with their
lives. The rare high-success ratio teams are looked upon with
great awe, and keep most of the merely adequate teams 'playing
with the death lottery', and are often assumed to have some
'favor' or 'technique' that they have hit upon, when in reality
most of the difference comes from statistical anomalies (the
familiar 'gamblers paradox' restated).
Note that the total economic force available to the 'runners'
is about a factor of 10 less than the total population of
'independents', and so plays only a minor role in the
economic life of the city (welfare recipients alone exceed
their cash, although most of it is spent on 'necessities').
Appendix: Some interesting breakdowns, and error analysis.
The >total< number of 'runners', seems likely to be accurate to
within 50%. Smaller categories may vary by up to 200% (number
of mages - shamans are especially notorious for not being counted).
With that in mind, however, some interesting secondary data may
be applied to our results:
Adjusted population ratios:
Human: .5 among independents
Ork: .2
Elf: .2
Other .1
(these do not equal 'average' population ratios for Seattle, due to
aggressive recruiting of humans by corporations, however, the
accessability of cyberware to humans seems to be larger, somewhat
balancing this trend).
Adjusted education ratios:
.7 High School or lower
.2 Bachelors or equivalent
.1 PhD or other advanced
(a large population of 'independents' tend to have informal or unusual
educations, if they have them at all, and so are (mis)counted in
the lower population. Surprisingly, a large number of advanced
degrees are present in the independent population.)
Some consequences:
There are approximately 45 samurai/adepts presumed to have PhD's
in various fields - these subjects should probably be interviewed
for a psychological study, so we can identify dangerous trends in
our own employees.
Personal curiosity has led me to independently investigate the
two known dwarf runner physical adepts possessing PhD's. It seems that
they are twin brothers, and interestingly enough, bitter enemies
on the street. {deleted as digression}
- Dr. R. Smith-Nabulsi
Boeing-Mitsuhama Statistics Group 5.
[Dug this out of some corporate's personal files in his headware
memory, when a corporate extraction went wrong and we were forced
to put him on the open market - thought you might find it
amusing - Slash]
[I found a similar Renraku report on 'Corporate Cyberware:
Cash Efficient or Research Boondoggle' - made some interesting
points about cost-optimization within the corporate environment
for cyberware. - Elephant]
--
Earl Hubbell - earl@******.caltech.edu - Opinions solely mine.
"Talet a:r ta:nkandets bo:rjan och slut. Med tanken fo:ddes talet.
Uto:fver talet na:r tanken icke." - Go:sta Mittag-Leffler.
"Number is the beginning and the end of Thought. Number was born with Thought.
Article 64487 of rec.games.frp:
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From: earl@***.caltech.edu (Earl A. Hubbell)
Newsgroups: rec.games.frp
Subject: Re: Shadowrun: Economics of Running
Keywords: Shadowrun
Message-ID: <1992Apr16.053553.1378@***.caltech.edu>
Date: 16 Apr 92 05:35:53 GMT
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ward1@*****.harvard.edu (Lester Ward) writes:
>earl@***.caltech.edu (Earl A. Hubbell) writes:
>[Stuff deleted.]
>I like this kind of analysis. Interesting, and thourough.
Thank you - it seems a lot of people have liked what started
out as just a 'back of the envelope' calculation :-) You bring up some
good points I hadn't considered.
>>>From the UCAS census estimates, we have approximately 1% of the population
>>having 'significant' cyber-enhancements (so called 'samurai', 'riggers'
>>or 'deckers') or significant magical enhancement ('physical adepts').
>This is the weak link in the argument. First off, deckers only need
>a datajack (and maybe some head MPs), but just about all corp empoyees
>have that, so that is not 'significant'. Secondly, 'significant' cyberware
Actually, I was counting 'decks' as the 'significant' factor
for deckers (well, honestly - I was ignoring them nearly completely!).
Decks are heavy expenses, and have to be customized. There might
easily be a much larger pool of deckers wandering around (leading
to corps beefing up security, leading to less profit/decker, leading
to fewer hot deckers being able to afford...anyone want to write
the paper? :-)
I chose the number of nova-hot deckers to be about equal to
the number of mages, for no real reason except to keep it exclusive,
and to have about one decker/team.
>is hideously illegal is most parts of the world. Corps are not likely to
>admit they use it if they don't have to, and freelancers are most likely
>not going to fill out a census form, if they can even be found. In spite
>of the UCAS's best intentions and estimates, 1% is likely to be off by
>at least an order of magnitude.
Really? 10% of the population having 'significant' cyberware?
(wired reflexes, smartguns, etc?) Lone Star must be very worried!
I can see 10% of the population having chip/datajacks, or
other cheap cyberware (maybe I >should< write up that Renraku report!),
but combat ware? Different assumptions, I guess.
>This figure is also completely contra-factual to most capaigns I've seen.
>For the technology involved, cyberware is VERY cheap, and we populate
>our campaign with those who use it, not just as PC's or villians, but
>random stuffing as well.
Different squids for different kids. I agree - most campaigns
I've seen have incredible amounts of cyberware running around.
But I do like the idea of cyberware making a difference - why
are people hiring >these< teams, instead of that cheap poser-gang? If
>everyone< has combat-ware, it stops making for interesting stories.
>I guess your point was partly to inform us that campaigns like this are
>not to reality-based, for lack of a better term. Wakarimasu yo.
Well - not really. Note that from all these runner teams
point of view, the most memorable opposition >are< the few, the elite.
No-one remembers the name of 'Manuel Caballero', security guard #4,
shot by Tex in passing. Everyone remembers Morgan, Aztechnology
internal security, who calmly shot Orchid across a crowded bar while
a magical fight was in progress.
The number of heavily cybered and mages running around >seems<
larger than it is, because they're the ones you remember - all the
times Tex, Orchid, and Fingers get hired to find 'Neko', the corp
exec's wife's cat, and they slip 50 nY to some urchin for it aren't
remembered. The whirling nightmares of betrayal, confusion, and
combat >are< remembered ('If the Stalkers were wiped out by Aztechnology
>yesterday<, who were the mercs who helped us take out the AZ facility
>today< from?').
So in 'reality' there may be only about 100 runner teams,
and about 30,000 total wired - but in 'story' and 'memory' space,
they're the ones who stand out from the backdrop.
If you don't like the statistics - adjust em! I just used
FASA statements from various parts of the sourcebooks, but this
>is< Shadowrun - believe what you read in the corp screamsheets and
get screwed! Maybe the corps and governments >are< covering up
the problem!
I thought it was interesting the way the figures came out.
Even makes for a good campaign background - not neccessarily the
'standard' over-cybered, over-magiced campaign, but certainly a fun
setting. (apologies for personal views on campaigns leaking in.)
>Wordman
--
Earl Hubbell - earl@******.caltech.edu - Opinions solely mine.
"Talet a:r ta:nkandets bo:rjan och slut. Med tanken fo:ddes talet.
Uto:fver talet na:r tanken icke." - Go:sta Mittag-Leffler.
"Number is the beginning and the end of Thought. Number was born with Thought.
