Jefferson wrote:

> Andrew Janssen wrote:
> 
> 
>>The Order of Lucia offers free schooling to all children through the age 
>>of 14, and charges fees for children ages 15 to 18.
> 
> 
> Where does the money come from to do this and how does Sedonia manage to 
> maintain significant wealth while doing it?
> 

As far as money goes(the following is a collection of WAGs):

Sedonia has about 20 million people.

We will assume, primus, that 15 million of those are taxpayers.

Secundus, we assume that the government collects, on average, .5 gold 
imperials per taxpayer, 7.5 million imperials per year.

Sedonia mints its gold imperials at the rate of 80 to the pound. 15 
million imperials equals 93,750 pounds of gold.

Officially, gold trades for silver in Sedonia at a rate of 1:16. Tax 
revenues are equivalent to 1.5 million pounds of silver.

Of that 1.5 million pounds, 11,406.25 pounds are spent on the Standing 
Military of 50,000 men, leaving 1,488,593.75 pounds for other 
governmental functions.

Converting everything back into gold imperials:
    * Tax Revenue: 7.5 million gold imperials
    * Military Expenses: 912,500 gold imperials
    * Revenue Remaining: 6,587,500 gold imperials

In actual practice, of course, revenue collection and expense 
disbursements are constant processes. Also, a certain proportion of 
taxes collected from peasants are "in kind" rather than cash. The above 
also ignores:
    * Waste and corruption
    * Fees for permits and licenses
    * Import/export tarriffing
    * Excise taxes on hard liquor
    * Rentals of government-owned land and property
    * Income from governmental monopolies:
       * New Steel
       * The gem mines of Roth Mythysa

Andrew
----------------------------------------------------------------
To unsubscribe, send mail to celandra-off@phoenyx.net.