Star Wars Economy

[The Original Nex]

On the subject of the 10k. Han seemed to come up with that price after he found out he might be dodging Imperials. So how much would a non Imperial dodging transport have cost? If Han doubled the price, then 5K? Based on that number out of my ass, which isn't that unreasonable, how much would fuel have to cost then. Less then the 5K or it wouldn't be worth it.

I got the idea that Han used avoiding "Imperial entanglements" as an excuse to charge such a high price, when it was really that expensive so he could repay his debt in full to Jabba. Regardless, it doesn't change your speculation on how much an actual charter may cost.

[Terralthra]

Where are you getting the 100k from? I don't remember ever seeing a figure for Han. Leia as Bousch, was asking 50k for Chewie and Jabba had a fit.

Landing on Tatooine, Fett was confronted by a squad of stormtroopers that tried to arrest him, but he killed them all rather than be further delayed. Arriving at Jabba's Palace, Bib Fortuna directed him to enter via the side entrance, secretly guarded by a krayt dragon, with the hope Fett might die. However he defeated the dragon and ushered Fortuna in at gunpoint to present Solo to the Hutt. Jabba was so pleased that he could display the captured Solo that he paid 250,000 credits for him, rather than the original 100,000 credit bounty. This was in addition to the hefty bounty the Empire had already paid him. He further requested Fett remain at the Palace, suggesting it would be worth his while if Solo's companions came searching for him.

source

[Isolder74]

Bousch ASKED for 50,000. When brought in Jabba says to Bousch that he will gladly pay the bounty of 25,000 for the capture of Chewbacca.

It is obvious by the reaction that Jabba was not happy with the idea of paying that much for Chewie.

[Havok]

Bousch ASKED for 50,000. When brought in Jabba says to Bousch that he will gladly pay the bounty of 25,000 for the capture of Chewbacca.

It is obvious by the reaction that Jabba was not happy with the idea of paying that much for Chewie.

Is this directed towards me? 'Cause that is exactly what I said.

[Isolder74]

No it was not. It was an attempt at clarification.

[Connor MacLeod]

By the time of Endor, Han's status and situation has changed in a number of ways:

- Han is a very well-known/public figure by now, and some very powerful people have been after him (IE Darth Vader.) That fact alone will work to push up his worth in terms of bounty hunting - Jabba would naturally be expected to pay more to have him.

- Han has been evading Jabba's bounty for about 4-5 years now. Jabba cannot possibly be happy with such a well known criminal evading his retributionf or so long (it makes Jabba look weaker and it sets a bad precedent for others who owe him.) so naturally he would be willing to pay more to get the guy between TESB/ROTJ than he might have during ANH - TESB. Add to the fact Han had been evading/killing Bounty Hunters during his time with the rebels....

WRT to Luke's comments regarding the cost of passage to Alderaan, bear in mind that what "ship" can mean and Luke's idea of a "ship" can vary quite a bit. We don't know quite about the quality/condition of such a vessel or its capabilities. It may very well be the SW equivalent of buying a really really cheap car (or a used one. This is Tattooine after all, I doubt they get very much in the way of "cutting edge")

[Baal]

I'm fairly certain that the price on his head has less to do with the value of the cargo itself than it does with the situation involved. Illegal cargo not lost but dumped, organized crime kingpin, etc. I think the whole death mark for losing cargo and not paying it back promptly has much more to do with Han Solo's life being cheap as far as Jabba's concerned.

Consider that it's economical for Boba Fett to chase Solo across many systems, then haul him back across several more, including several skirmishes with other bounty hunters, for only 100k credits. He ended up getting paid more, but he was told 100k up front.

While a very poor source I remember WEG once creating a sum total of what Solo owed Jabba. It amounted to over 300,000 credits. 15,000 of that was the actual lost cargo. Interest was about twice that amount. Close to 100,000 was the cost of hiring FEtt to go after Solo. (Yes Jabba was going to make Solo pay for Fett).

[Broomstick]

Still, granting a slave a large apartment would be unusual on Earth.

Actually, in ancient Rome slaves could own property, other slaves, and some were better off materially than some of the poor free people.

[PainRack]

From what I know Han was trying to give Jabba his money, but was robbed himself on the way to Tattooine.

No it is obvious that he still had it in ESB. He was trying to leave Hoth with the intention of paying Jabba.

The Marvel comics establish that he got robbed by pirates and pissed off Jabba when he tried to collect(Although Jabba was a different species then).
Arguably, if it wasn't for the bounty hunters at Ord mantell, he might never have got around to paying off Jabba.

[Havok]

I'm fairly certain that the price on his head has less to do with the value of the cargo itself than it does with the situation involved. Illegal cargo not lost but dumped, organized crime kingpin, etc. I think the whole death mark for losing cargo and not paying it back promptly has much more to do with Han Solo's life being cheap as far as Jabba's concerned.

Consider that it's economical for Boba Fett to chase Solo across many systems, then haul him back across several more, including several skirmishes with other bounty hunters, for only 100k credits. He ended up getting paid more, but he was told 100k up front.

While a very poor source I remember WEG once creating a sum total of what Solo owed Jabba. It amounted to over 300,000 credits. 15,000 of that was the actual lost cargo. Interest was about twice that amount. Close to 100,000 was the cost of hiring FEtt to go after Solo. (Yes Jabba was going to make Solo pay for Fett).

Aside from it being WEG numbers, that wouldn't jive with the movies.
Han gives the impression when he is talking to Chewie that the 17,000 is a crazy price to pay ("17,000! These guys must really be desperate!") for his transportation services and that it would "really save my neck".

Also when he is talking to Jabba in the docking bay, the payback amount gets jacked up 15% and Han still seems like he can swing it with the 17,000. Granted, he may have some of the pay back amount already, but I doubt if it was as high as the WEG numbers, and he already accumulated most of the 300,000, he would be stressing about getting the last 17.

[AirshipFanboy]

Another question is - what is the Galactic government's role in the econonomy? Are members of the Republic/Empire allowed to levy tariffs? Does the government hand out subsidies? Does it (at least in theory) supervise any welfare system? Does it mandate labor laws?

[PainRack]

Another question is - what is the Galactic government's role in the econonomy? Are members of the Republic/Empire allowed to levy tariffs? Does the government hand out subsidies? Does it (at least in theory) supervise any welfare system? Does it mandate labor laws?

The Galactic Republic "could", but it couldn't. The taxation of trade routes as well as knowledge probably shows that free trade, or at least, free trade on an interstellar basis is commonly practised.

Alternately, we also learn that the Empire has moved to nationalise most corporations, except for big fish like Kuat and Sienar. Biggs statement that the Empire would nationalise Owen Lars farm as well as the threat of nationalising the Bespin operation suggest this is something extremely common..... Note also that the alternative given to nationalisation in TESB was joining with the Mining guild. Its arguable that the Galactic Empire is a facist AND a communist state:D

[darthscott]

Though I haven’t read every bit of Star Wars material out there, I see the Empire being an authoritarian empire, but I just do not see them being socialists or communists.

To me there seems to be plenty of independent companies in operation during the Imperial era. I do remember reading that the Empire put advisors on the boards of a few companies, but I have always thought of that as a measure to insure that the Rebels do not get any support or supplies and that theye were not actually taking control of the company. As far as nationalization goes, I could swear that I remember reading in one of those Republic Holonet articles in the Insider (the one with the Grand Army article I think) that that after the Clone Wars the Separatists property was given over to human run companies like TaggeCo. instead of direct government control. Maybe something else has come out since then that says something different, but I thought that is what I read. Plus didn’t the Emperor greatly expand the Corporate Sector Authority during his reign. I just think the Emperor would have lost a lot of support quickly from the wealthy and nobles of the Core worlds if nationalization was rampant. Also I think it would be pretty difficult of a task to interfere with all trade on a galactic scale, so I am sure a great deal of free trade occurred no matter who was in power.

Lastly, though his statement almost sounds more feudal than socialistic to me, how do we know that Biggs statement is not Rebel recruitment propaganda? We hear a lot about the Empire twisting the truth and I am sure the Rebels were not immune to the same phenomena in order to gain support for their cause. Just a thought.

[Isolder74]

The Nationalization of the Small fish to benifit the big fish sounds very Nazish to tell you the truth. If you were big, and loyal to Hitler then your company got left intact if not the government nationalized it and handed it over to one of Hitler's pet companies.

Just a thought.

[PainRack]

Though I haven’t read every bit of Star Wars material out there, I see the Empire being an authoritarian empire, but I just do not see them being socialists or communists.

To me there seems to be plenty of independent companies in operation during the Imperial era. I do remember reading that the Empire put advisors on the boards of a few companies, but I have always thought of that as a measure to insure that the Rebels do not get any support or supplies and that theye were not actually taking control of the company. As far as nationalization goes, I could swear that I remember reading in one of those Republic Holonet articles in the Insider (the one with the Grand Army article I think) that that after the Clone Wars the Separatists property was given over to human run companies like TaggeCo. instead of direct government control. Maybe something else has come out since then that says something different, but I thought that is what I read. Plus didn’t the Emperor greatly expand the Corporate Sector Authority during his reign. I just think the Emperor would have lost a lot of support quickly from the wealthy and nobles of the Core worlds if nationalization was rampant. Also I think it would be pretty difficult of a task to interfere with all trade on a galactic scale, so I am sure a great deal of free trade occurred no matter who was in power.

Lastly, though his statement almost sounds more feudal than socialistic to me, how do we know that Biggs statement is not Rebel recruitment propaganda? We hear a lot about the Empire twisting the truth and I am sure the Rebels were not immune to the same phenomena in order to gain support for their cause. Just a thought.

We do see other examples of nationalisation though, such as Incom nationalisation and IIRC, there are other examples of confisication of wealth and property so as to sustain the war effort. There's also the dismantling of Duros ownership of their shipyard and the Yevethan shipyards were under direct Imperial control producing warships.

I admit that to call the Empire communist is a tad exaggerated, but it seems that the government definitely has no qualms about creating massive government oversight, ownership and monitoring of activities. Definitely a facist state though.

[Ender]

Bump

Interestingly, this is the very topic I spent most of the cruise considering. How can one make a large scale economy work. Looking at the evidence and the restrictions the technology puts on it, post scarcity won't work in this scenario. But mercantilism seems to work and seems to be the most accurate model for the galactic economy (though it fails a a few point due to sheer scale). International trade is unchangeable because the galaxy is an autarky – it would require another galactic scale trading partner to exist for international/galactic trade to change. The World/Galactic Economy is also largely unchanging. The population is fairly steady and with the galaxy fully explored the resource value of unclaimed or unexploited resources could have been calculated and factored into models of the galactic economy just as unexploited regions like the poles have been in some models of the world economy. If nothing else they could be a latent value like intellectual property is. Mercantile doctrine would also mesh with what we see – Adam Smith's criticism that the system gears itself with the manufacturers and merchants working against the consumers (which comes to the fore in the Clone Wars), and mercantilist's view the economy as a zero sum game, which without incoming resources, it would be. The megacorporations have monopolies on certain things and abuse them and have quite explicitly have letter patents – that's how the Trade Federation is able to have a seat in the senate. And the inevitable result of price fixing and quotas is a robust black market, which we see is so large it can support an entire region of space on its own and propel its leader to the 3rd most powerful position in the galaxy. The presence of tarrifs results in high demands for smugglers and will reap massive gains for the polities that implement them at the expense of those that don't, which would again help explain why the Core worlds were so much more prosperous then the Rim worlds (an area described as the free trade zone in Cloak of Deception). And the economic oppression of the lower class that was a corner stone of mercantilism is again key in Star Wars – the Rim territories are getting completely screwed and it is hard to top droids and slaves when it comes to oppression. The Star Wars economy is definitely and old school style mercantile system.

Also, I figured out that the Munns take their name from Thomas Mun, who was one of the creators of the mercantile system.

Also, consider the point of view in The Phantom Menace – by imposing a series of tarrifs across the free trade zones that fed directly into the Republic's coffers, it would cripple the economies out there even worse (fueling dissent against the Republic), take money from the Merchant Powers (fueling dissent against the Republic), and provide the Republic with a massive amount of money (which Palpatine would later use to fund his war) and proposing to invest it in the Rim territories. The investment didn't happen because of the corruption charges (ousting the previous Chancellor) which halted reform movements, raising unrest because the promised aid never came (unrest that Dooku then raised into secession).

The resource and technology level relative to the population ought to make for a post-scarcity society, really.

Not at all. You are forgetting scale. A post-scarcity society is not possible on any scale greater then planetary unless Babbage builds your computers for you. In a post-scarcity society, the basic currency is information. Yet for there to be trade there has to be a difference in information supplies (if you have it all you don't need it). And for that you need encryption so that the information only goes from the sender to the recipient and not to everyone along the way so that your currency/information does not change in value. In fact currency itself IRL can be thought of as encrypted IOUs – they are made in a specific way so they cannot be copied or have their value changed and the message the contain is that they are worth an agreed upon amount of goods/services. Moving on, to run an economy like anything close to what we know, you a secure way to pass messages either through some kind of hard line that cannot be tapped, or robust encryption. We know that the hard lines are not the case – only message pods appear to be completely secure as they have self destruct mechanisms in them. Innumerable stories and plots revolve around messages being intercepted or illicit use of the Holonet or what have you. In fact both the CIS and the Empire had to move to make FTL communications exclusively theirs to prevent interception and allow secure channels. So that leaves encryption. Which is where the computers come into play. Their computers routinely demonstrate them to be so far beyond ours that it isn't funny. Astromechs can run at upwards of 10^25 calculations per second as has been previously demonstrated here. On top of that there is quantum computers ready as of the shelf in SW, not to mention more bizarre things like tachyonic processors that may use closed timelike curves for all we know. Hell, Ghent broke IKLO (one of the codes the Empire used for the freaking Death Star) while he was still in school. The only absolutely secure method would be a one time pad, but then you get into coordinating constant new one time pads for every bank, exchange, stock market, etc for every market on every planet in millions of systems and having no one get their hands on an unauthorized copy.

So lack of a solid encryption makes most of what we know today moot.

Incidentally, if they tried to go post scarcity at some point and the obvious happened, it would help explain help explain why the society was stagnant.

Still, any member state's individual ability to fabricate needed goods from raw material cannot be excessively difficult given the arbitrary on-site fabrication capability witnessed in the DS2.

True, and when individual members who had the infrastructure in place to do so decided to cease trading and communicating with the rest of the galaxy and instead go turtle for the rest of the war we saw similar results. However the abundance of fortress worlds also corresponds with the expected results of a complete cessation of trade – massive recessions and inflation. Labyrinth of Evil mentions that Palpatine had managed to finally get the economy to recover from the major recession the war caused, and the Warlord period during the GCW caused a similar recession after the fall of Balmorra. In TTT we see the Republic scrambling to re-establish trade and see the Imperial credit crashing in value.

For example, considering the sophistication, cheapness and abundance of droids, there is no economical reason that could justify the existence of slavery as an institution of some importance in the GFFA. Cultural bias against droids could explain it partially and the desire to own other sentient being for prestige (Jabba's dancing girls, for example) might explain another part, but by all indications slaves play a role that is not entirely insignificant in the galactic economy, which is quite baffling.

Publis has a good essay on this. It is mainly a nobility and pride thing. Any Bubba on the streets can buy a nanny droid, but few can afford a slave. Plus their economic system is geared towards economic oppression.

Also, as Illuminatus Primus has pointed, their technology should allow them to have a post-scarcity economy. And this definitely doesn't appear to be the case. They have a galaxy worth of resources to draw from, but for some reason they still have a capitalist economy.

Technically, they don't. When you get to this scale you really have to stretch the terms to make them work, almost to the point where it is meaningless. There are communists, socialists, merchantalists, free-marketers, planned economies, and all kinds of other stuff among the various planets, systems, sectors, regions, and territories. Most of the member states of the galaxy have a market economy, but the Galactic Republic/Empire/Republic/Alliance is an autarky with an overall mercantile system internally. When you have no one to trade with everything has to be generated internally.

Interstellar trade is extremely important for galactic economy and they trade even with things as basic as foodstuffs (whereas in post-scarcity we should find primarily transference of technology and/or information).

Foodstuffs are, for lack of a better term, a luxury item. The Death Star Sourcebook, the original Essential Guide to Droids, the Rebel Duology in the NJO, and the Imperial Sourcebook all talk about machines that bulk produce some kind or food mix that the underclass eat. Real food is reserved for middle class and up on the city worlds. Which, when you consider the scale, should be enough to support that kind of trade.

Hell, in Star Wars there are entire worlds that build their economy around agrarian exports, when every single system should be self-sufficient (excluding the ecumenopolis, perhaps) at least in this regard.

Yes, but the ecumenopoli are the homes of the bulk of the population. That is how the pure agrarian systems survive. It is niche marketing on a grand scale, Shatterpoint had a planet home to a plant that produced some luxury tea that the upper class drank. It sounds absurd that hundreds of thousands of people could base their livelihood around selling this but consider how big the coffee market is, and extrapolate it to cover a few hundred trillion people.

It really doesn't make a lot of sense. The potential for post-scarcity is there, but something (either cultural inertia, political or economical interests) have been preventing galactic economy from advancing into the next stage for several thousand years.

Well there is the fact that information as a currency in a stagnant civilization means there will be next to no churn.

Sad and hard truth is that no one really thought about the economics of SW.

Indeed, and WotC manages to make it worse.

Take for instance the Trade Federation. Their most valuable secrets are their knowledge of the galaxy and the hyperspace routes. Apparently they know all the connections, thus make the most money. Yet we are talking about a galaxy wherein using a engine that can cross it in a matter of days...at most. So routes may make it faster, but what goods are needed there, now, not within the next hour? Implication of knowing routes must either mean some rare out of the way planet surrounded by unholy shit that makes the route need to be perfect or people really do not grasp if you can cross a galaxy in hours to days, time because a secondary issue versus a special product.

Well, Secrets of Naboo states they have bases in most systems so apparently they get most money from controlling ports and taxing all the goods that go through there so they see a profit in things they don't haul. Also, the setup of the galaxy suggests that hard currency or valuables themselves must be hauled around from place to place. In that case getting there fast would confer a significant advantage as the capital would see faster turnaround. This is somewhat confirmed by the existence of Star Galleons, the armed Lucrehulks, and other heavily armed transports, and explicitly confirmed in Cloak of Deception where they are hauling a massive shipment of valuable metal. Additionally, the Alliance paid Han in boxes that appear to contain some kind of metal as well. The Illustrated Guide to Star Wars talks about the massive value of an asteroid made of platinum group metals, the A New Hope novelization talks about durinfire gems, and Shadow of the Empire has Luke wishing he tripped over a mountain of platinum so he could afford something. Clearly bullion is still critical, because on a galactic scale shiny metals should be about as valuable as carbon.

It explains a bit as to why governments would give letter patents to the corporation to represent them – if they do their imports are likely taxed less, and the capital arrives faster. It also explains the economic value of piracy. Nothing like stealing cold hard cash.

A good look of even more weirdness if Publius' materials on the Corporate Sector, their relation to the New Order, and how much money it all comes out to be.

Indeed. It is very sad that the only time WEG ever used “quadrillions” to describe anything in SW it was in a scenario that using it actually hurt them.

Why is everyone assuming that fuel is cheap? It could very well be that the cost of producing hypermatter fuel is prohibitive enough to explain why a one-way freighter trip could approach the cost of a small starship. It could explain a lot of other questions too.

Because if it isn't then the system doesn't work. Think about shipping costs here. The cost of transportation a product across space is dependent upon only a few points - the cost of building, maintaining, and operating transport ships; time; and the energy required for transportation. The prevalence of small private starships shows the cost of building, maintaining, and operating the ship will be negligible. Han had no formal education prior to attending the academy yet he was completing repairs on starhips with no problem (never mind how cheap repair droids are), a ton of characters flying them as children (e.g. Wedge), and if a teenage farmboy can buy a ship they clearly don't cost much. Time is also negligible as starships can cross the galaxy in about a day, so with few exceptions I don't think you will see much variation here. So energy is the real expense when it comes to shipping in this scenario, which we would get by coupling the drive power and time. In practice this would be demonstrated as the cost to transport X tons per unit distance would be the power of the drive divided by the mass transported, divided by the velocity of the drive multiplied by the cost of energy. Or:

{[(P/(Mt*V)]*C}*Ms*D = $

Where P is power (watts), Mt is the total mass the ship can haul (kg), V is velocity (m/s), C is cost of energy ($ per Mw-hr), Ms is mass being shipped, and D is the distance being traveled. Now try plug and play with the prices of various goods and the mass of their raw materials. If C isn't very low then everyone out there is running in the red. And that is just moving the raw matter around – start factoring in the costs of labor, the cost of preassembled products (eg processors for the main computer) and C needs to be trivial. And while a high C may make sense as to why Han was in debt, when you start looking at successful enterprises like KDY and Sienar it becomes illogical as all fuck.

I'm a little tired of all the "post-scarcity" economy talk. Wake up: America has effectively been a post-scarcity economy for the last 50 years; has this transformed it into some sort of Marxist utopia? Nope, people simply start competing over how absurdly far above scarcity they will try to vault themselves.

You do realize that Anthony Gibbons openly admits he is misusing the term “post-scarcity” when he talks about the modern economy, right? America is only post-scarcity in the same sense that sunscreen is nanotech or salt is NGE.

[Illuminatus Primus]

Good stuff. You back? How long? We have some threads your math might be best suited for.

[phongn]

I'm not so certain that secure communications are as difficult as Ender notes. Yes, ILKO was broken by Rebel cryptographers in a unusually short period of time, but it sounded like the Empire had tried a new cipher scheme for their new project and probably screwed it up.

The existence and apparently widespread use of credit chips implies strong encryption is available and robust. There should be extreme pressure from both "blackhat" and "whitehat" cryptologists to break the algorithms defending the galactic currencies yet most sources seem to indicate the protection systems (including encryption) remain secure.

As for computing power: that's pretty much the easiest technique to defend against in encryption and should be a relative non-issue in a society this stagnant. Assuming a strong algorithm, a brute-force attack on any key should be totally infeasible.

[Ender]

I'm not so certain that secure communications are as difficult as Ender notes. Yes, ILKO was broken by Rebel cryptographers in a unusually short period of time, but it sounded like the Empire had tried a new cipher scheme for their new project and probably screwed it up.

No, the context was that Ghent had done something quite impressive, as it took the dedicated effort of the top cryptographers of the alliance a while to do what he did on his own.

The existence and apparently widespread use of credit chips implies strong encryption is available and robust.

Nonsense, money does not imply that. They had coins in the roman era. Whether they were on the bullion standard or not combined with the presence or absence of some kind of interplanetary wiring system would. It appears that they were on such a standard, to the point where it was important to ship the ingots from place to place (the government controlling the supply of bullion being a staple of mercantilism). And there is no indication of wire transfers across interplanetary means.

There should be extreme pressure from both "blackhat" and "whitehat" cryptologists to break the algorithms defending the galactic currencies yet most sources seem to indicate the protection systems (including encryption) remain secure.

We have zero evidence of such wire transfers taking place. The only transfer we know of is in TTT, the details of which are never given, and was an event designed to stand out and stink to high hell as criminal so that it would split the factions in the Republic. Weighing against that we have all other times they pay them of in bullion or hard currency. If transfers were so simple, why not have the Alliance simply use its back channels to transfer Han's payment to Jabba for him? They are sufficient to avoid being picked up by Imperial Intelligence, defeating the organized crime department should be simplicity in and of itself.

As for computing power: that's pretty much the easiest technique to defend against in encryption and should be a relative non-issue in a society this stagnant. Assuming a strong algorithm, a brute-force attack on any key should be totally infeasible.

So we assume that they can build an arbitrarily strong algorithm, but not that they can simplify it? We assume that there is some limit that they cannot get beyond, rather then accepting that a society that goes FTL, slings around mass-energy the size of stars and triggers novas at will, has figured out if P=NP complete or not? We assume that despite the fact we are closing on quantum computers that will require us shifting to quantum key encryption to safeguard it from decryption, that their quantum computers cannot do the same, just because it is convenient for us to do so? We figure that banking codes are immensely hard, yet the codes protecting access to the construction of strategic superweapons can be bypassed by space monkeys? That they will put more effort into safeguarding a wire transfer, so no one can crack it and direct wealth at will, then the Master Control Signal which a single astromech broke in minutes and started playing with Wold Devestators like they were legos?

Yeah, I don't think so. Trends in computing now are going to require us to overhaul our security systems. These guys might have closed timelike curve processors, depending on how you read them talking about tachyonic computers. Even if it isn't brute force, every indication is that their own tech cuts through their encryption like a hot knife through butter.

[Illuminatus Primus]

Am I wrong, or wasn't R2 able to control the World Devestators because he had the access code thanks to Luke?

[phongn]

No, the context was that Ghent had done something quite impressive, as it took the dedicated effort of the top cryptographers of the alliance a while to do what he did on his own.

I don't deny Ghent's gifts. But I do find it absurd to think that it implies that "all SW crypto is weak" versus the idea that "ILKO had exploitable flaws. "

Nonsense, money does not imply that. They had coins in the roman era. Whether they were on the bullion standard or not combined with the presence or absence of some kind of interplanetary wiring system would. It appears that they were on such a standard, to the point where it was important to ship the ingots from place to place (the government controlling the supply of bullion being a staple of mercantilism). And there is no indication of wire transfers across interplanetary means.

I wasn't referring to physical currency but rather these things. Is the system invincible? No, if the article is correct, it is not. But it is said to be robust and secure.

Weighing against that we have all other times they pay them of in bullion or hard currency. If transfers were so simple, why not have the Alliance simply use its back channels to transfer Han's payment to Jabba for him? They are sufficient to avoid being picked up by Imperial Intelligence, defeating the organized crime department should be simplicity in and of itself.

Do we know if currency transfers are secure against government eavesdropping (which may be in the system by design)? The Alliance may have good reason to be worried about that, or Han may simply want the assurance of physical material to pay Jabba off, rather than an ephemeral computer record.

So we assume that they can build an arbitrarily strong algorithm, but not that they can simplify it? We assume that there is some limit that they cannot get beyond, rather then accepting that a society that goes FTL, slings around mass-energy the size of stars and triggers novas at will, has figured out if P=NP complete or not?

They might well figure out that P < NP instead. Hell, the problem might even be undecidable.

We assume that despite the fact we are closing on quantum computers that will require us shifting to quantum key encryption to safeguard it from decryption, that their quantum computers cannot do the same, just because it is convenient for us to do so?

The advent of quantum computers does not break all algorithms. Yes, it breaks the fundamental structure of existing public-key infrastructure (e.g. RSA) but it doesn't break things like symmetric-key systems.

We figure that banking codes are immensely hard, yet the codes protecting access to the construction of strategic superweapons can be bypassed by space monkeys?

My argument was that ILKO was a new and novel code with an unintentional weakness not discovered. It was supposed to be absolutely secure and someone fucked up. Issues like this can and do happen.

That they will put more effort into safeguarding a wire transfer, so no one can crack it and direct wealth at will, then the Master Control Signal which a single astromech broke in minutes and started playing with Wold Devestators like they were legos?

As IP noted, Luke gave gave R2-D2 the keys to the kingdom. That hardly compares.

Yeah, I don't think so. Trends in computing now are going to require us to overhaul our security systems.

Absolutely. In general, the strength of encryption isn't the problem, however.

These guys might have closed timelike curve processors, depending on how you read them talking about tachyonic computers. Even if it isn't brute force, every indication is that their own tech cuts through their encryption like a hot knife through butter.

I've always read it in terms of algorithmic weaknesses in the ciphersystem.

[Illuminatus Primus]

I don't think true bullion-based systems are credible in a galactic society and economy. The EU is weak and I'm not willing to listen to platinum claims of bullion when film-canon-mandated industrial scales and mining shows that those bullion systems would not be credible. We have no idea what Han had in those cases.

I'm really interested in how central banking works, do they endeavor to keep long-term inflation at zero? And are GDP figures and output level fixed to maintain long-term sustainable equilibrium?

[Ender]

I don't deny Ghent's gifts. But I do find it absurd to think that it implies that "all SW crypto is weak" versus the idea that "ILKO had exploitable flaws. "

It is but one example. I can think of a number of them - R2 as the uberhacker is a trope common in the series.

I wasn't referring to physical currency but rather these things. Is the system invincible? No, if the article is correct, it is not. But it is said to be robust and secure.

It also specifically states it is planetary in basis. On planets it is a whole different ball game - there quantum keys work, you have fixed stations, and it is easier to track. We already know planetary systems of commerce range from communism to planned economies to free market libertarianism to capitalism. But on a galactic scale it appears to be mercantilism. We see them shipping around chunks of precious metal that has no value beyond being valued. Why do that? Hell, given how common platinum group metals are, why would they even be valuable?

Do we know if currency transfers are secure against government eavesdropping (which may be in the system by design)?

So the government can eavesdrop to find out a smuggler paid off a crime lord, but the same government eavesdropping can't detect the funds flowing to support a rebellion?

The Alliance may have good reason to be worried about that, or Han may simply want the assurance of physical material to pay Jabba off, rather than an ephemeral computer record.

So your justification for this is to ignore the other examples and claim it is because Han wanted a receipt?

They might well figure out that P < NP instead. Hell, the problem might even be undecidable.

I'm pretty sure that the truth of P vs NP problems is a position that only Kurneko or Surlethe are qualified to take. I know I'm not, my only point is that we are getting closer to an answer, and if there is one they are likely to know it. Given the fact that we expect competence and the low levels of computer security we see against their own tech in the series I am inclined to believe that P=NP (in-universe at least), because if that is not the case I would expect a higher performance.

The advent of quantum computers does not break all algorithms. Yes, it breaks the fundamental structure of existing public-key infrastructure (e.g. RSA) but it doesn't break things like symmetric-key systems.

Ok, looking back I see I posted an earlier draft where I didn't cover this topic. Yes, symmetric-key encryptions and onetime pads will not be broken by a quantum computer. We can thus presume that they are still in play. In fact, I suspect that this is what messenger drones are in part used for - to move the pads from place to place. At the very least there will be a market for conventional shipping for them. But on a market wide scale they don't work. One time pads are one time because prolonged use means someone can see the pad. So you need to change them routinely. Now think about the logistics of that - every major market in every city on every planet and every spacestation in every sector of the galaxy needs to shift over to a new one time pad, all at the same time. that is n(n-1)/2 copies. Even if we assume that every system has only one communication channel that is still 1.3*10^15 copies of the one time pad or shared key that have to be distributed every time we change over. And you need to assure security for that, make sure no one sees the key who will be tempted to use it to enrich themselves, sell it, steal it, etc. An you need to do this every time you switch over. How often will that be?
On a galactic scale that is simply not practical.

My argument was that ILKO was a new and novel code with an unintentional weakness not discovered. It was supposed to be absolutely secure and someone fucked up. Issues like this can and do happen.

A claim I am not aware of any evidence for, and if was the case would make his claim of breaking it unimpressive as it was a weak code. Which is against the scene. Further, going back to ILKO in no way rebutts this point - Durga's little space monkeys broke in to the NR computers and stole the Death Star plans.

We are talking about something literally so easy a monkey can do it.

You keep going back to ILKO at the expense of all the times we've seen ther crypto get shit on. Ulic Qel Droma took out the entire freaking Republic Navy in one stroke by hacking their comms and navigations signals to make them all crash into each other. These guys have weak computer securiy. Now is i because they are incompetent? Or is it because there is a technological reason behind it.

As IP noted, Luke gave gave R2-D2 the keys to the kingdom. That hardly compares.

No, he gave him some codes. It is explicitly states that R2 created a new code that let him have the world devastators do whatever he wanted. So R2 was provided with a series of encrypted commands and was able to, from that, formulate a new encoded message that directed something different.

Man, that is exactly what code breaking is, isn't it? A series of transmissions intercepted, analyzed, and the encryption scheme is determined? Yeah, that is exactly how you break a code. ANd we saw Luke give him the earlier commands. He had at most a few hours to do this.

Absolutely. In general, the strength of encryption isn't the problem, however.

Ok, I'm no cryptographer. I presumed that the encryption strength was the problem because everything I had read on the topic said so. If that was all wrong, what is the problem?

I've always read it in terms of algorithmic weaknesses in the ciphersystem.

So they have these algorithmic weaknesses in their high importance WMD national security codes, but not on your credit card? "Palpatine let people hack the system to amuse himself" is a stronger argument then that - we know the guy was a dick.

[Ender]

I don't think true bullion-based systems are credible in a galactic society and economy. The EU is weak and I'm not willing to listen to platinum claims of bullion when film-canon-mandated industrial scales and mining shows that those bullion systems would not be credible. We have no idea what Han had in those cases.

Even if we ignore Han, we have all the other EU cases, and I am not willing to throw them out. It is foolish, but it is what the evidence is, and we are to harmonize the evidence rather then discard what we don't like. Mercantilism isn't a perfect fit, but it does match most of what we see, particularly when you look at the trade set up described in the prequel novels.

I'm really interested in how central banking works, do they endeavor to keep long-term inflation at zero? And are GDP figures and output level fixed to maintain long-term sustainable equilibrium?

I will say this for the system - if you set a known value for all the resources, put yourself on a material standard defined by those resources, and do not expand your resource pool, you will have no net inflation.

[Illuminatus Primus]

A claim I am not aware of any evidence for, and if was the case would make his claim of breaking it unimpressive as it was a weak code. Which is against the scene. Further, going back to ILKO in no way rebutts this point - Durga's little space monkeys broke in to the NR computers and stole the Death Star plans.

We are talking about something literally so easy a monkey can do it.

In this case we ALREADY KNOW they are incompetent. Their physical security is so lax that spacious air ducts run from diplomatic audience halls directly with no barriers into extreme high-security computer access. Here we know they are incompetent. So why bother we general claims of invulnerability? Just leave it at ridiculous incompetence.

You keep going back to ILKO at the expense of all the times we've seen ther crypto get shit on. Ulic Qel Droma took out the entire freaking Republic Navy in one stroke by hacking their comms and navigations signals to make them all crash into each other. These guys have weak computer securiy. Now is i because they are incompetent? Or is it because there is a technological reason behind it.

Again, if this was a general failure, why wouldn't this be a predominant combat tactic? Because there must be a specific window of opportunity at some point caused by incompetence. Since we must already rely on incompetence to explain this partially, why invoke such no limit claims of vulnerability? Again, incompetence can explain everything and Occam likes this.

Mercantilism still won't explain BULLION in of itself, its simply too common and the requisite materials required to extract and artificially add to the bullion supply for your own benefit is too great and those abilities are too broadly available to control easily. I'm willing to except very difficult to break security over the idea they have perfect control of all possible economic actor and all possible equipment capable of breaking the system.

No, he gave him some codes. It is explicitly states that R2 created a new code that let him have the world devastators do whatever he wanted. So R2 was provided with a series of encrypted commands and was able to, from that, formulate a new encoded message that directed something different.

Man, that is exactly what code breaking is, isn't it? A series of transmissions intercepted, analyzed, and the encryption scheme is determined? Yeah, that is exactly how you break a code. ANd we saw Luke give him the earlier commands. He had at most a few hours to do this.

That's stretching the intended meaning. I think what was being said was Luke gave R2 the encryption key itself and some basic commands, and then he developed a new command using the same key. If it was pure analysis, then mere interception would've done the trick and any R2 unit. The plot makes no sense unless Luke giving R2 the key is the crucial solution. The basic point is a single incident where someone left the door open from inside the security is totally different than security being vulnerable to penetration in general from any external point of attack.

Its much more plausible the events in DE and other EU is exaggerated, and any R2 cannot break any encryption than somehow they have absolute control of mining equipment and/or platinum is impossibly rare.

I don't know about you guys, but here I am yet again wishing I could throttle some authors for writing themselves into a hole and then using a really cheap and stupid sci-fi trope as a deus ex machina to get out, without respect for the consequences and implications. :sigh: