Economy

The economy in Galactic Civilizations III is a broad term that encompasses the total wealth, research, and manufacturing inputs and outputs of your empire. The major ways you control your economy are in choosing social (colony improvements) and military (starships) items to produce, and using the Govern window to adjust the economy wheel between research/wealth/manufacturing and social/military production with the  Social/Military slider.

Colonies
see Colonies

Colonies are the basis of all production in Galactic Civilizations III. They generate the wealth, research, and manufacturing that drive your empire forward.

Production
Production refers to the output of a colony. It includes all of the manufacturing, research, and wealth output of the colony.

All colonies generate raw production from their population. Certain buildings, technologies, events, and approval modifiers will increase this raw production output, which is referred to as Total Manufacturing.

The Total Manufacturing of the colony is then divided according to the economy wheel into raw manufacturing points (called Base Manufacturing on the colony tooltip), raw research points (called Base Research on the colony screen tooltip), and raw wealth points (called Income on the colony screen tooltip). The amount of Total Manufacturing in each of these subdivisions of production can be seen on the colony screen by viewing the tooltip for each category.

Finally, bonuses and penalties (such as from buildings, technologies, or events) are applied to each of these 3 categories of production, resulting in the manufacturing, research, and wealth output of the colony.

Note: As of version 1.03, the terms "Total Manufacturing" and "Manufacturing" are two distinct game terms which were have unfortunately been given extremely similar names, leading to some confusion in understanding how production works. The terms are often used interchangeably, contributing further to this confusion.

How Production Works
The raw Total Manufacturing of a colony is equal to the sum of the Total Manufacturing from the population and the Total Manufacturing from "flat bonuses" bonuses, multiplied by the sum of 1 plus the "percentage" bonuses. "Flat bonuses" are for example, Total Manufacturing + 1. For example, a colony capital has a Total Manufacturing bonus of 5; a civilization capital has an additional bonus of 5. A Durantium refinery gives a bonus of 2. "Percentage bonuses" are usually expressed as percentages, such as Total Manufacturing + 10% and include the Approval bonus (which may be positive or negative depending on colony morale). Examples are the addition of the first ring to an economic starbase, which gives a 10% Total Manufacturing bonus to all colonies in range, or the Interstellar Governance technology, which gives a 10% bonus to Total Manufacturing to all colonies. The percentage bonuses are added as a fraction, so that 10% is 0.1 added in, for example.

'''Mt = ( Mp + Mb ) * (1 + A + Mc)

where

Mt = Total Manufacturing

Mp = Total Manufacturing generated by population

Mb = Total Manufacturing generated by bonuses to Total Manufacturing that are a flat addition to production.

Mc = Total Manufacturing generated by bonuses to Total Manufacturing that are a percentage addition to production.

A = Approval modifier for the colony

The Total Manufacturing generated by population is calculated as:

Mp = m * (p ^ e)

where

Mp = Manufacturing generated by the population

p = Colony population (in billions)

m = Population multiplier to production (currently 1.0 as of version 1.02 update)

e = Population exponent to production (currently 1.0 as of version 1.02 update)

The economy wheel then allocates that raw Total Manufacturing to raw manufacturing (called Base Manufacturing on the colony tooltip), raw research (called Base Reearch on the colony tooltip), and raw wealth (called Income on the colony tooltip). These raw numbers are visible in the colony screen by viewing the tooltip for the different production types.

Allocated production is then modified by global effects (like your faction's traits) and local effects (like factories, research labs, and market centers). The complete list of modifiers can also be viewed in the colony screen via the same tooltip.

Lastly, the manufacturing output of the colony is further split between social and military spending by the Military Slider.

Production Example
Say you have 10 billion people on Earth with an approval of 100% (approval modifier of 25%) on that planet. This is your civilization capital, so you get +5 Total Manufacturing from that as well as +5 Total Manufacturing from your colony capital building. The colony's economy wheel is set to 33% manufacturing (split between military and social spending on the military slider as 60% social spending and 40% military spending), and it has two Xeno Factories next to each other for those sweet adjacency bonuses for a total of 70% increased manufacturing. Terrans also get +15% manufacturing for being industrious, for a total of +85% bonus to manufacturing. The manufacturing production of this colony would then look like this, assuming there are no additional total manufacturing bonuses from technologies or other sources:

Tp = 1.0 * (10 ^ 1.0) = 10

Tb = 5 + 5 = 10

Tt = (10 + 10) * (1 + 0.25 + 0) = 25

Base Manufacturing = 25 * 33% = 8.3

Manufacturing output = 8.3 * 1.85 = 15.4 total manufacturing points/turn

Social manufacturing = 15.4 * 0.60 = 9.2 social manufacturing points/turn

Military manufacturing = 15.4 * 0.40 = 6.2 military manufacturing points/turn

Economy Wheel
The economy wheel allocates production between wealth, research, and manufacturing. It can be changed freely at any time with no penalty. Simply open the Govern window and click on your desired production balance.

Coercion
Coercion is a raw production and approval penalty for setting the wheel to overly specialize in favor of one area. As approval factors into raw production Coercion can doubly impact raw production. Coercion kicks in from around 46/47% assigned to either wealth, research or manufacturing and will increase as that percentage rises. At can reach a maximum of 50% at 100% focus on one of these areas.

As the approval penalty is a deduction directly against morale so it is possible to complete negate it by have morale up to 50% or more higher than population. This would offset even the maximum level of coercion and result is no decrease in approval, which would mean no negative changes in raw production from changes in approval.

Global vs Local Economies
You can set an empire-wide production allocation from the main Govern panel, accessed from the main map.

At a planetary level for all races without the Coercive ability, who come with the planetary wheel unlocked by default on all planets, you can assign a "Focus" for production that will grant a 25% boost to that specific area at the expense of the others. This does take a coercion hit and will reduce raw production and morale.

Finer tuning of a planet's economy can be done by building the Bureau of Labor, which will remove the focuses and add the planetary wheel to the planetary govern screen.

You can revert a colony's allocation to your empire-wide policy by checking the appropriate box on its local Govern panel.

Military Slider
The military slider allocates manufacturing between social (colony improvements) and military (starships) construction. You can set global/local policies in the same way as you adjust the economy wheel.

Note that any planet that is currently not sponsoring a shipyard will put all manufacturing points into social spending, regardless of where the military slider is set. The military slider also becomes locked in place, indicating that all points are being sent to social spending.

Approval
see Approval

Approval is how much your people like their current situation. High approval increases resistance, production, growth, and influence, while low approval dampens those values. Approval also affects the total production of the colony, though this is not on the tooltip in the game.

Approval goes up with morale-boosting effects, like colony improvements, technologies, and some trade resources. A planet's approval is equal to its morale score divided by its population (in billions of people).

Tourism
see Tourism

Tourism generates wealth in addition to what your wealth allocation provides. Your tourism income increases with your cultural accomplishments.

Trade
see Trade

Trade also generates wealth in addition to what your wealth allocation provides. To create trade routes, you must research the appropriate technology in order to begin building freighters. You must have an alien trade partner and an available trade license, then send a freighter from one of your planets to one of theirs. You cannot create multiple trade routes between the same two planets, and a trade route works the same no matter which civilization initiated the route.

Starbases
see Starbases

Starbases are critical to any empire's economy, for gathering galactic resources, spreading Influence, and giving straight-up economy boosts to colonies within range.

Resources
see Resources

Galactic Resources
see Galactic Resources

Galactic Resources like Durantium and Antimatter are gathered from nodes on the main map by starbases, and allow you to build powerful special colony improvements and prototype starship components.

Trade Resources
see Trade Resources

Trade Resources are found on colonies, and take up a tile that could otherwise be used for development. However, as the name implies they are valuable in trade and have various benefits to your empire as well. Trade Resources can be destroyed permanently to free up the tile for development.

Shipyards
see Shipyards

Shipyards are where starships are produced. They are sponsored by colonies, often more than one (though a colony can only sponsor one shipyard at a time), and convert military manufacturing into warships, scouts, constructors, and more.