The Economics of Star Trek

The Economics of Star Trek, or the use of labour notes.

I've often found the utopianism in the various incarnations of the 1960's television series to be not entirely convincing, especially when certain episodes seem to criticise the Counter Culture Movement, pacifism and anarchism. There are also clear canonical contradictions, especially with the introduction of the final spin-off series "Enterprise".

However, lets put these issues to the side and consider the comments of the character Tom Paris regarding the abolition of money in the late 22nd century with the creation on Earth of the New Earth Economy (I'm quoting from memory here) and my own ponderings of how a post-capitalist society could work...and I think it could work very well.

The concept here is a separation between capital and labour, in that labour cannot be exploited to increase capital but individuals are still allowed to own property like houses, starships, restaurants, paintings etc. Things of social value such as housing, healthcare, clothing and equipment such as food replicators are provided by the Earth government or possibly a Federation department such as Starfleet, while a similar arrangement could exist in a greater or lesser degree on other Federation planets. Citizens can obtain these products based on need or by an amount of provided labour to other citizens.

This can be done by the producer (a direct provider of a good or service) and the consumer both keeping a digital record of the amount of labour completed and this being kept centrally as a record of labour notes measured in hours. A citizen can build up labour notes in order to use them to obtain further consumer items or capital.

This also provides the incentive for a businessman such as Joseph Sisko to run, say, a Cajun restaurant. Even though Sisko may not make a profit it is still worth him "hiring" employees and recording the amount of labour they provide. Siko's labour notes would be the hours he opens or the hours he actually spends cooking and serving meals. The customers do not pay for their meals but Sisko makes "money" from having them or, to put it another way, it is still worth having a traditional job even though no wages are ever paid.

This doesn't contradict James Kirk's comments about selling a house or buying a boat.

Federation colonies seem to have public replicators provided by Starfleet for general use, but otherwise their internal affairs are their own.

Notes:
1. Tom Paris (lieutenant, junior grade) is the navigation officer aboard the USS Voyager throughout the series Star Trek: Voyager. He is briefly demoted to ensign for insubordination and was introduced in Star Trek: The Next Generation as a fellow cadet of Wesley Crusher at Starfleet Academy who was expelled after a fatal shuttle manoeuvre during training and although he was called "Nick" at first (for some reason) the "Voyager" character had the same backstory and was played by the same actor.

2. Joseph Sisko is Benjamin Sisko (lieutenant commander, later promoted to captain) 's father and a recurring character in Star Trek: Deep Space Nine.