The measures put in place to prevent player cheating ("jobbery") have become annoying for the some of the players who don't cheat. What I am talking about is the price ceilings for selling goods based on Indicative Prices.
I would understand if the game were to prevent the sale of products costing, say, millions of dollars because it is an obvious attempt to transfer money. However, very often the market forces dictate a price for goods which is outside of the allowable limit. The limit, 30xIP for base goods and 300xIP for quality goods, gets prohibitively restrictive around the lower 30xIP boundary.
For example, I manufacture thermoelements of quality 1.00, and try to sell them for only just above the prime cost - even to my own company - which is about $2,200. The raw materials come from Independant Supplier, as there are no other suppliers, and I make all the metals myself. Production cost is as low as possible. However, I cannot save this price, because it's jobbery! The indicative price is an absurd $50.00. I can't even buy one Bauxite for that much. The maximum I can sell them is $1,500, which doesn't even break even on raw materials, let alone manufacturing.
Another example is Paper - due to the timber crisis on Mary, the only paper available costs a rediculous $400.00 on the market. The maximum I can sell it is $21, and the indicative price is $0.70.
At this rate, it's impossible to sell some quality 1.00 goods on the market at a profit, it's necessary to first buy some higher quality goods and set the price, then change to lower quality goods to get around the regulation. However this is a bit rediculous. Some of the indicative prices for, say, agricultural products are reasonable and much more in line with actual market prices. Please, admins, change this rule so that the free market can function again! It's stifling! Restrictive price ceilings are not something I would expect to find in a free-market economic game.
|
I don't think that's intended to be working *g* But I agree that indicative prices become annoying in some instances, because they do not reflect the real value for many goods. 
