OK, fair enough.

But HOW does he pay for it when the UFP doesn't use money? (Unless the Bajorans do...in which case, will their money system be wiped out when they join the UFP?)

Also, do Estate Agents exist in the 24th Century? ("Hello, Mr. Sisko....yes, we have the keys for you. Carpets and curtains included....") :-)

Ch.

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*pretends that makes sense*

Besides, why would Sisko need to purchase land on Bajor anyway?

"Hi, I was wondering if I could build a house here. You might recognize me...Emmisary of the Prophets?"

Right. The Federation is one big benevolent Communist state. No-one uses or needs money, and resources are avaiable in plenty. But what happens when you need resources which are lacking in the area occupied by the UFP? Answer is simple, you buy them from elsewhere. . . result, interstellar trade.

There are a lot of things the UFP makes that others would want to buy, so you have some sort of rudimentary financial market - barter wouldn't really work. So, the Federation has money init's coffers, whichi it doesn't need except to buy things. And that still leaves a lot.

So what do they do? They create one big expense account that their citizens can draw on while abroad. This would feature especially for the Starfleet personnel. Of course, there would in reality be several accounts, but since DS9 is run by Starfleet it would have one, probably overseen by Sisko ultimately. That's why Jake couldn't get any money to buy his dad a baseball card - it wasn't a legitimate expense, and the Captain might have seen it come up on the statement! 8)

However, for a senior Starfleet officer to buy property on an important border planet where the inhabitants regard him as a prophet might be considered OK. . .

Let's say a federation citizen wants to buy a house. They look in the electronic newpaper published by journalists that work basically for free and find a listing of available homes. They visit the homes, and find one they like. They meet, along with other potential "buyers," the current owner of the house. The owner talks with the "buyers," and decides who to "sell" the house to. Buyers iving the current owner things in trade for the house might seem like bribing. Thus, it would happen, but very rarely. The previous owner wouldn;t get any material compensation for giving up their previous home, but they would get the satisfaction of giving someone a place to live, and perhaps start a family in.

This might not happen everywhere. The federtion is a BIG place. There is room for thousands of completely differnt sociteties within the federation. Look atr the diversity of buying a home on Earth today. They migth be built, bought, or shared. Perhaps on Bolia a thousand bolians come together to build one dormitory for their entire community. Perhaps on Andora, young andorans go out into the wilderness to hunt and fend for themsevles and build their own shelter alone. Perhaps on Grazeron, their are no homes at all, and grazerites even today roam their world in herds.

I am possibly getting to the point here, by saying perhaps on Bajor, when someone wants a home, they buy land with money and buy materials and pay people to build a house. All of this buying is not done in trade or moral satisfaction, but with money. Plain old dough, molaa, green stuff. The point of all of this is that the federation is so big that money could be dead in one place and alive in another. After Bajor joins the federation they could still keep their system of money. Overtime, their money could just become useless as reasources became plantiful. Eventually, their money might just disappear. ("OK, that's 2 cents for the parcel of land and 3 cents to pay me to build it...ah, what the heck, i'll just do it for free.")

But this still doesn;t answer the question, "how did sisko buy his parcel of land without money?" Well, maybe someone was paying him. Perhaps starfleet, maybe the federation, possibly the Bajoran government.

I personally think that it was starfleet. They could have payed sisko in those elusive federation credits. Starfleetr perhaps pays all of its starfleet officers, perhaps all the same ammount, just so that they can get by when their in a part of the federation or at a place out of the federation where money is used. Where does starfleet get these credits? Perhaps from the federation government. Lt. Paris stated in "Dark Frontier" that money "went the way of the dinoisaur" in the 22nd century. That would have been near the founding of the federation. Thus, the federation could very well have had set up a money system at its creation. Every year, the federation makes so many credits to make up for the credits that have spilled out of the federation economy through contact with other civilizations. They might send some of these credits to starfleet, to pay the starfleet officers, so that they could get by on places where money was used.

Thus, Sisko was paybed by starflleet and saved up his money to buy a parcel of land on Bajor.

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"How many people does it
take before it becomes
wrong? 6,000? 60,000?
How many people does it
take admiral!?!" -Ambassador
Picard during his command
of the Enterprise-E in the
Ba'ku incident.

Sol has a good point with the Emissary thing, though.

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"I think therefore I'm DANGEROUS!" -MI

Starfleet ppl don't use money cause the usually never need to(they are paid). They are always on a ship that only has ship provided services. They can replicate everything. Ppl on DS9 need latinam which they are paid to go to Quark's, Garak's, ect. These are services not provided by Starfleet.

Ppl outside Starfleet still use money, why would Papa Sisko have a restuarant and why did Picard's brother have the vineyard? Bc they need money to buy the few things they choose not to replicate. The Picard's did not even have a replicator. Ppl still like fresh food; that is why they go to Sisko's Restaurant.

Anyway, starfleet officers must earn a salary of some sort...otherwise how do they afford their drinks @ Quarks? Hmm? *L*

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I drink therefore I am.

-Descartes

My other suggestion from a long-ago thread was that Federation citizens operate on a sort-of credit system - but that's credits for what they do, what contribution they make to society. Making wine, running a restaurant (or a cafe, like in that ep of Voyager where Harry finds himself on Earth) - all these count, as does scientific research. Being in Starfleet probably is judged the higfhest contributions of all, and is rewarded accordingly.

And then, when they need to buy stuff from others, they convert that 'society credit' into others' money. . . maybe.

The "society credit" is rather silly. Contribution to society is its own reward.

------------------
"How many people does it
take before it becomes
wrong? 6,000? 60,000?
How many people does it
take admiral!?!" -Ambassador
Picard during his command
of the Enterprise-E in the
Ba'ku incident.

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Parallax