Economics, part 5

Today we're going to talk about secondary production. These are people who make the basic components of what tertiary producers need out of the raw materials produced by those involved in primary production(gathering). Secondary producers include Smelters, Charcoal makers, Butchers, Tanners, Millers, etc. This is also the first level where you're likely to start seeing large scale guild activity playing a role in the economy(assuming your campaign has them). There's no way for me to make a complete list of secondary producers and write out a full chart of how much of the base product is waste, and just how much the value of what's left increases, because it varied too much between regions(and our time period is too large anyway) and there just isn't enough surviving information on this subject. As such, we're just going to simplify, and take a guess on some of this.

Trade Checks: This is, in effect, a non-weapon proficiency check. For a lot of these professions, there either is no proficiency, or it's lumped in with another NWP. The DM needs to decide how he wants to handle this if he chooses to use this sytem.

Waste: A certain amount of base value is lost in turning one thing into another. In Grain into Gold, they suggest that 30% of grain will be lost in the milling process. To make things simpler for us, I'm going to assume That waste is a factor of the secondary producer's skill. As such I present the chart below

1d10	Successful Trade Check Waste	1d10	Failed Trade Check Waste
1	0.15	1 – 4	0.30
2 – 3	0.20	5 – 7	0.35
4 – 6	0.25	8 – 9	0.40
7 – 10	0.30	10	0.45

New Quality:  The act of secondary production actually increases the value of the remaining product(usually). The chart below shows by how much the value of the base product is altered. On a roll of 10, there's a 50% chance that you get to roll a second time and add the results together(this repeats any time you roll a 10).

Trade Check	1	2	3	4	5	6	7	8	9	10
Passed	+0.10	+0.20	+0.25	+0.30	+0.40	+0.50	+0.60	+0.70	+0.75	+0.80
Failed	+0.05	-0.00	-0.05	-0.10	-0.15	-0.20	-0.25	-0.30	-0.35	-0.40

The Producer's Share: Farmers generally disliked millers as much as they depended on them. Not only is roughly 1/3 of their grain crop disappearing into thin air, but then the guy wants to keep a cut of what's left for himself, thereby becoming a competitor in the flour trade! The following chart can give you the amount of product a secondary producer keeps for himself.

2d4	Producer’s Share
3	0.05
4	0.10
5	0.15
6	0.20
7	0.25
8	0.30

The above is also modified by the following

• Secondary producer has a monopoly on his trade: +0.10
• Secondary producer belongs to a guild: +(0.01 x 1d20)

It should be noted that under feudalism, the vast majority of this secondary product will actually be owned by the fief-holder and not either of the producers(primary/secondary).
 Coming up: Middle-men, Tertiary Producers, Consumers, and the role of governments and guilds.