Yamatai Census of YE 46

I read that as no income tax not no taxes at all. I'll get rid of the mentions of a sort of income tax. If Wes says there are no taxes at all, I suppose I'll need to change it further. That said, while taxation is a fascinating subject (like all economic issues it's actually a very ripe area for conflict), it's not really the subject of this thread so the longer question of 'how does Yamatai fund it's self' would need to be asked elsewhere.

Oooweee that's a crusty document. The modern YSE constitution makes no mention of it as if it supercedes it. But considering it is only mentioned regarding the creation of the immigration department, I am not surprised it was missed. Seems like something Wes to determine. Bar that, there is still lot of missing population data missing as highlighted.

Soban said:

while taxation is a fascinating subject (like all economic issues it's actually a very ripe area for conflict), it's not really the subject of this thread

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The wiki article you linked is the subject of this thread, so it’s fine to address its problems. Yamatai doesn’t tax its people. That’s always been a fairly major part of the faction’s culture because it’s a semi-post-scarcity utopia. How do you tax a Neko on the prestige system whose real property was given to them by the government as a land grant? You don’t. It shouldn’t be included as one of the reasons this census exists.

Speaking of another problem, this article suggests that an Imperial Census is some kind of regular thing, when this will have been the first. Previously, “census” data was collected at the system level irregularly (basically the year mentioned on some articles came from whenever it was edited, thats why different systems have different dates but few have the same date).

So it’d probably be better to say this is the first empire-wide census rather than retconning in that it has always been a thing. That’s generally how we do things here. If it’s new it starts the current IC year rather than being retconned in.

demibear said:

Oooweee that's a crusty document. The modern YSE constitution makes no mention of it as if it supercedes it.

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False. The Constitution does not supersede any previously established law unless they are in conflict. Many of Yamatai’s most basic legal norms are from pre-Constitution Senate proposals and still stand today.

This is really starting to move beyond poking at the problems of what this is trying to fix and more something else needs addressed. Thus I will make another thread about taxation/the status of the Basic Laws since the closest thing I can think of in real-life is the Articles of Confederation > US Constitution where something influences but doesn't include since it wasn't mentioned. As for your other point, it could be assumed it could have been a regular thing a government does. It's not exactly "sexy" like flying around in your starship blasting mooks in the name of the Empire.

Since there are a few continuity errors between established lore and what's being added, I'd like to go over this with a fine tooth comb as one of the Co-FMs! I'll update with what I found needing changed in the next two or three days max! I was away from the computer all this week so I am sorry for not being able to jump in to help!

Allright, let's talk about the Bard Cluster. We have old numbers for most of the systems in it, but three are missing population data in my previous post.

Talori 1,500
Ahmar 50,000
Ahrbeg 125,000
Mevar 325,000
Kotori System 6,370,000
Kilnar 9,300,000
Akina System 530,200,000
Murf ???
Tsuyosa ???
Yicuqibu 351,000

I found some planetary data on Yicuqibu I saying that it has a population of 351,000. So I'm putting that as the population.

Murf is a mining system, so I feel like it has a population of somewhere in the tens of millions.

Tsuyosa is the capital of the region and so probably needs a large population probably in the low hundreds of millions.

Bard Cluster is sort of @Miyako area. What do you think Myak?

and @Andrew might have some things to add

Are we just going with stated populations and not increasing them? If so, I'll back off. Zipf's Law also isn't really for population, but there are equations for finding population increase that I'll do for those that should get a population increase.

Sorry for saying I'd help and then not, kind of got caught up in RP.

And nowhere that was attacked would have an increase, unless there was some kind of mass resettlement

If it doesn't tax it's people... does it Indirectly gather money through Tithe from planets and it's up to those planets planetary governments to get the money (through say public works etc etc)? sorry just asking questions now

As for the Census itself... does it only count citizens of the Empire? or all sentient life on the planet/station/what have you?
would it count nomadic/Transient/Temporary races/peoples?

these are also questions I think may need to be answered before a proper census can be done, does it count clones as separate? forks of a Sentient AI that split itself? many questions really especially when it comes to the non-biologic citizens

If people think that the populations haven't changed since they were last documented, that's fine I guess. But right now I want to list all of Yamatai's current planets and their current (YE 46) population.

Taxation in the empire is vague. While the Empire doesn't have a individual income tax, it does tax businesses in both KS and in items. I suspect there is also a voluntary component, but that's not cannon.

The Census is going to count all permanent people, citizen or not. However, that's not a breakdown that I'm doing. The census requests where you have your domicile, which might or might not be where you physically are staying at the moment. For example, Sacre has her domicile on Yamatai (42 Starmount in Tami). However, because she's a soldier she might be assigned to Fort Nozomi on Gashmere and have a residence there where she might spend the majority of her time. Every citizen likely has a domacile. A non-citizen might not have a domacile in Yamatai, in which case they would be accounted by their place of residence. If they don't have a residence, then they would likely not be counted.

That takes care of transient and temporary people. Nomadic people would be counted if they are citizens of Yamatai and they likely have a formal domacile even if they don't have a residence in any specific place.

Clones, AI, and such are dealt with mostly as kinda seprate entities. They follow Yamatai law on the subject for sentiants.

Soban said:

If people think that the populations haven't changed since they were last documented, that's fine I guess. But right now I want to list all of Yamatai's current planets and their current (YE 46) population.

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One of the YSE's biggest in-character challenges has always been the question of how to efficiently spread its people out from Planet Yamatai itself. I do not think any system should get a sudden population increase or backfill because that devalues the previous stories and factional difficulties that were established. The community should be doing some roleplay to create new population centers in desolate systems by way of population transfer rather than retconning stuff in.

I already fear a lot of damage has been done to the lore unchecked through this project, because the Territories of the Yamatai Star Empire page now shows the aggregate population at 55,867,826,708.2 when it wasn't anywhere near that big prior to August 12 (and there's no way to easily check because that page collects numbers from each system's struct, which have been individually edited). It's been irresponsible for someone who isn't one of Yamatai's FMs or core GMs/players to go through and edit all of this because it's going to be an arduous task to go and check that work for approval.

You realize that the Territories of Yamatai page being wildly inaccurate, out of date, and incomplete was part of what started this whole thing right?

raz said:

It's been irresponsible for someone who isn't one of Yamatai's FMs or core GMs/players

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I, Yamatai's faction manager, literally asked him to do this because this information has needed updates for many years and I haven't found time to do it myself. I would appreciate if you stop trying to push Soban out of Yamatai or interfere or with the help he's providing me by constantly questioning his qualifications or intentions at every opportunity. Yes, it's good to make sure it's done right but when you're making it about the person rather than the updates, that's an issue. If you want to update some of the systems because you think you can do it better, then offer to help--but don't sandbag.

All I really need for each system is a brief executive summary of:

- What the population is
- What the trend is (e.g. how's it changing)
- Justification/Explanation (why is it changing)

These things can go in the places' pages People section.

Tax stuff: It's irrevelant. To me, the reason for the census is for senate votes and allocation of resources as well as for recordkeeping and security (e.g. it helps if you know who is where).

Looking at some of the system pages, this would be a great opportunity to convert those articles to the places template.

I agree completely. The places template is designed to make them way better for roleplay use.

A lot will need to have information made up since not every article mentions anything about the local population and culture there, but that is a good thing regardless. I'll work on some this weekend.

demibear said:

A lot will need to have information made up since not every article mentions anything about the local population and culture there

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With only one or two exceptions, that means the system is uninhabited. Saying these places suddenly have always had a population would be a retcon, and that's not necessary.

Ye 30 to the present is like 16 years in character? Plenty of time for things to have changed. That said, I'm not adverse to zero population planets. Personally, I think that if a system has zero population, it probably shouldn't even be on the list. It's arguably too long as it is.