Economy and trading:

Overview

Economy and Trading in the post apocalyptic California and the bordering regions

Introduction:

Shortly after the nukes in the Great War had finished flying and delivering their deadly payload, the survivors began surviving. Many did not succeed, but even if billions died, many millions survived and made up the core of new societies.

And like any society that came before those people – just like all societies that came after – those people worked to secure their existence. Soon people stopped to just scavenge the ruins of cities and towns for food, clothing and medicine and began producing things again. In the 2270s, after nearly two centuries of rebuilding, a many faceted economy has developed that will now be described further.

What can be produced?

This question might be easier answered by turning it around: what can not be produced?
The former wine-growing region California has good soils again, 200 years after the Great War, and is able to not only feed it’s population: there are even limited amounts of luxury crops being planted, like tobacco or cotton.

Since not everyone has to be a farmer, there are small producing businesses. Smiths, that produce other tools and weapons, besides plows, tailors, that make clothing of all qualities and carpenters that build proper dwellings.

In 2270 there are quiet and safe areas. This peace guarantees an economic boom. The original, most simple produced goods became more complex. By now in fact, the weapons workshops in the Hub, in Junktown and in the Boneyard, the big, industrial centers of the New California Republic,
produce self designed and built firearms. What started as combat knifes that frequently broke, became the Peacemaker, an often sold revolver and ended in the M-13 sniper rifle, that might not fire fully automatic, not even semiautomatic, but instead with an incredible precision.

Especially in the production centers of the NCR we have various commercial sectors (more on that under the heading “where are things produced?”), but in principle the answer is, that nearly everything that was able to be produced before the War, 200 years later can again be produced – maybe only very slowly and in limited numbers, but it’s possible.

The sole exception is electronics. This field, that wasn’t even 200 years old at the time of the Great War, is very difficult to rediscover. There are first, self built computers from after the Great War, but they are clumsy, enormous things with a fraction of the power of the old ones.

What are common resources?

Common resources are especially iron, an easily recyclable metal, that is present en masse in the ruins. Add to that a large amount of brahmin, the two-headed cows of the post apocalyptic wasteland, that are not only used for food production. Furthermore there are numerous woods as well as all the things that can be gotten from the ruins.
Limited is mainly the possibility of refining these first resources. High grade steel, for example, especially stainless steel, is rather rare and mostly found in pre war products. Good leather can be won from brahmin, that can become rather hard by soaking it. The same applies to gecko skins.

California has a lot of forest. The wood is hard and darker than most pre war woods, but it burns and can be used to build houses. Furthermore one can find numerous mines, among them the uranium mine in Broken Hills and the gold mine in Redding, as well as many quarries.

Where do they produce what and where is it transported to?

The following section lists one population center of the post nuclear California after another and what the largest exports of these regions are. Bear in mind, that in many cases, they don’t just sell the finished product, but also some of the needed tools. To use Modoc as an example: not only
alcohol is sold, but also newly built, whole distilleries.

This section also gives first information about the imports to those towns and cities and the trade routes.

Cities and towns outside the New California Republic:

Klamath:

In the small settlement of Klamath there are a few farmers – and many trappers. Accordingly, the traders there sell gecko skins – and since it’s a rough area – a lot of alcohol.

Furthermore there are a lot of wild tribes in the area, that also sell their gecko skins in Klamath. The savages trade their spears, axes, but also special works made of pearl and healing plants for stimpacks and other trade goods of the civilized world, like better axes, tools, fire water and fire
arms.
While not many caravans leave Klamath, some traveling merchants brave the dangerous journey and make good trades at it.

The Den:

The main economic branch of the Den is human despair. Basically, the only barter goods in the town are three things: people, drugs and weapons that the rest of the Wasteland finds so despicable, that no one wants them in their towns or cities.
The trade in slaves flourishes, despite the NCR Rangers, that are of course much further south, which lets every other branch of the economy in the Den flourish. There are casinos and bars – and a lot of jet addled junkies and dealers that sell their poison.
The most important business partner of the Den is New Reno, from which they import drugs and the nearly legendary towns further north, to which they sell most of their slaves.

Redding:

Redding is a typical mining town in which gold is mined. The gold is of course exported everywhere – over circuitous routes. They buy most of the food of the town with it, but Redding produces – driven by the gold profits – more than just bars of gold. Small, chemical workshops flourish in this town, that produce explosives for the mines. And the most favorite past time of the inhabitants is the production of the best whiskey on this side of the Rocky Mountains. Redding buys and sells a lot of mining gear, selling simple items like pickaxes and buying more complicated technical devices.

Modoc:

Modoc, a small, quaint farming town, which without a doubt produces the best corn. With this corn they feed not only people, but also the largest brahmin herds north of Shady Sands. Modoc is the largest exporter of foodstuffs, from corn to meat, as well as whiskey and of course brahmin leather Imported to Modoc are mostly tools, but also weapons for the through and through well armed population.

Gecko:

Gecko, the Ghoul settlement, that sprung up around a nuclear reactor north of Vault-City, has only a few resources to offer for trading. The town is surrounded by a forest, but logging is a great challenge for the physically rather weak Ghouls. On the other hand, the town has a huge scrap yard,
the materials that stood around for the construction of a new nuclear reactor core and a class A workshop in the functioning nuclear reactor.

The Ghouls there let their reactor run on minimal output, which gives them enough electrical power to keep their electric tools running. They produce there, with the experience only a ghoulish master tradesman can have, everything out of those scraps, from the simplest components to complex electronics (the latter only in limited numbers).

Furthermore they buy up empty energy cells, that they recharge and resell.

Imported is – apart from the empty energy cells – especially food and in the last years, due to rising tensions with Vault-City, weapons as well. But also a lot of resources, like metal parts and plastics.

Broken Hills:

Broken Hills is the second largest mining town in post apocalyptic California, only that this town digs for uranium instead of gold ore. As a mixed settlement of Ghouls, Super Mutants and humans, Broken Hills saves a lot of money on radiation protection for it’s miners and gives those savings
directly on to the customers.
They import much in the way of mining tools from Redding and food from Modoc and the New California Republic – to which they also export large parts of the uranium.

New Reno:

New Reno, the largest small town of the world, gets its money less from exporting, and more through tourism. That doesn’t mean, that there are no things they export. Alcohol and drugs are the lesser sins when it comes to exports. Pornography and even snuff movies are shot, the latter being
only available in secret, even in New Reno.
Furthermore one can get everything in New Reno, that is classified as outlawed in any other region.

San Francisco:

San Francisco, the city of the People of the Shi-Huang-Ti (in short, the Shi) has a big, mighty and diverse economy. On the one hand there are minuscule fisheries, on the other hand the large research complex that transforms algae into a fuel.
There is electricity in San Francisco – thanks to the Uranium from Broken Hills – and with which help the Shi produce most everything, similar to the Ghouls in Gecko, taking from the ruins all the resources they need. Producing everything from the best daggers and swords of the Wasteland,
smithed especially for the People’s Guards, but also exported, up to combat armors and complicated electric and electronic devices.
Furthermore San Francisco is a large exporter of mutated, but clean fishes.

Vault-City:

Vault-City, founded by the Dwellers of Vault 8, is a town that has the complete medical equipment of the pre war world available as well as the know-how of the best doctors of the USA, preserved by Vault computers.
From Vault-City one gets the best medical equipment there is, but only to sinfully high prices.

Furthermore, Vault-City sells “raw” chemicals, that have not yet been processed further – again, to very high prices.
Imported are mostly foodstuffs and ammunition for the weapons of the Vault-City Guards.

Cities and towns inside the New California Republic:

Shady Sands:

The capital of the New California Republic never has been a large, industrial city, but has always been a center of agriculture. There and in the vicinity one finds the largest farms and ranches of the Republic. Thanks to nearly a century of security and much experience in cultivation and breeding, there are no better brahmin or horses to be found anywhere.
The farms and ranches produce not just foodstuffs and leather however, but also cotton, tobacco and hemp – the latter, mostly used for the one large industrial branch of the city: the paper industry. Imported are especially the products of the southern towns of the Republic, from restored cars out of Junktown to teeth brushes.

Junktown:

Junktown is not a typical settlement of the Wasteland. Instead of having been built in ruins, it was founded near a scrap yard, that was very early transformed into useful things (and money) by the people of Junktown. In the 2270s Junktown has whole factories in it’s borders, producing a lot of
metal works.

Imported are mostly foodstuffs from Shady Sands.

Hub:

The Hub, the largest city of post apocalyptic California, has always been the most important trading city of the region. While the Hub still is the junction for all southern caravans – and the headquarters of the largest caravan companies – the focus still has shifted slightly. The old Hub was
mostly interested in bringing goods from point A to point B – now, they are building large factories that produce goods that are then sold to points A and B.
This started with small tools like safety shavers, but also typewriters for the growing bureaucracy of the republic and even large, complicated steam engines for other, producing businesses. Even small plastics products are being produced.

Furthermore one of the main exports is the clean (or rather, cleaned in the Hub) water from sources under the city.
Imported into the Hub are – besides raw materials for further production from everywhere – a lot of food to keep the populace alive.

Boneyard:

The Boneyard – the former Los Angeles – has a nearly unlimited supply of steel and iron from the fallen skyscrapers from before the Great War and they know how to use this raw material better than anyone else. Nowhere else there are as many smelters as in the boneyard – or smithies or steam
hammers.
In the Boneyard everything is taken out of the ruins that can be used to create a New World.  Furthermore, like in San Francisco, a lot of fishery is going on as well. In fact, not only enough fish to feed the Boneyard, but to help feed the Hub, too.

Situated in the Boneyard is also the main factory of the Gunrunners and several smaller armament producers, most of whom produce ammunition rather than weapons to fire that ammunition.

Trade routes in the post apocalyptic Wasteland:

In principle, trade between the towns and cities of the Wasteland is rather dangerous. Raiders and slavers keep trying to free the traders of the terrible burden of their goods – and their lives. For this reason, a simple but safe network has formed, that has two points of main junction in California.

The Hub, the largest city of the New California Republic is the southern junction. All caravans and smaller trading groups go to the Hub and move on from there, those with the same destination traveling together.

The same holds true for New Reno in the north. The Families do not hinder the Caravans in the least, since the traveling merchants are one of their most important source of income and they even prevent smaller gangs from causing trouble for the caravans.

Slavery as a branch of the post apocalyptic, Californian, economy:

Despite the continuous struggle of the NCR Rangers against slavery and despite the draconic punishment of all that are involved in that trade (and that they can get their hands on), there are still slavers operating out of the Den, capturing their ‘merchandise’ from the wild tribes and selling
those.

Thanks to the NCR Rangers there are few buyers in southern California. It seems as if the slavers are using new trade routes up north, since the destruction of the Enclave, for sale of most of their merchandise. Their traditional customers, New Reno and Vault-City are still part of their circle of
customers.