Tax Ceilings Fixed: Production Against Control

We have to open this one with an apology.
A bug in the way congress ideology moves your tax ceilings has been in the game for as long as ideology has applied to them, and it has quietly shaped every tax your country has ever voted.

It is fixed today. The correction is large, it is not symmetric, and Capitalist congresses lose the most.

Read to the end. Nothing is being recalculated right now, but on 25 September it will be.

What Went Wrong

Every country starts from the same place. The base ceiling for all three tax laws is 25%. Congress ideology then pushes that ceiling up or down, according to the share of seats each party holds.

Communism raises it. Per 1% of congress seats it adds +0.5 to the Import Tax ceiling and +0.5 to the VAT and Work Tax ceiling. Capitalism lowers it, per 1% of seats: -1 on Import Tax and -0.75 on VAT and Work Tax.

Here is the bug. Those modifiers were applied as a relative percentage of the 25 base instead of as points on the tax rate. The game computed 25 x (1 + total / 100) where it should have computed 25 + total.

The modifier was shrinking itself. An 80% Communist congress should sit on a 65% ceiling. It has been getting 35%.

What changed:

🧮 The ceiling is now addition. Your ceiling is 25 + the ideology total, instead of 25 x (1 + total / 100). An ideology bonus is percentage points on the tax rate, not a discount on the base.

📊 Three laws use these ceilings. Import Tax, VAT and Work Tax. VAT and Work Tax share one ceiling between them; Import Tax has its own.

🔺 Communism is buffed hard. Both ceilings become 25 + 0.5 x the Communist share of congress. 20% gives 35, 40% gives 45, 50% gives 50, 60% gives 55, 80% gives 65, and 100% gives 75.

🔻 Capitalism is nerfed hard on Import Tax. That ceiling is 25 - 1 x the Capitalist share. 10% gives 15, 20% gives 5, and 25% gives 0. Above 25% it stays at 0. Example: a congress that is one quarter Capitalist can no longer charge any Import Tax at all.

🧾 Capitalism also pushes VAT and Work Tax to zero. That ceiling is 25 - 0.75 x the Capitalist share. 10% gives 18, 20% gives 10, 25% gives 6, 30% gives 3, and 33.34% gives 0.

The same congress, before and after:

Those are ceilings, not rates. A ceiling of 0% means congress cannot pass that tax at all.

We Are Not Resetting Your Taxes

A correction this size, dropped on live countries in the middle of a mandate, would wreck treasury planning that citizens voted for in good faith. We are not doing that.

🛡️ No recalculation runs with this patch. Every country keeps the tax rates its congress already voted, exactly as they are. This protects Capitalist congresses most: under the new maths several of them land straight on a 0% ceiling, and we are not forcing their current rates down to it today.

📜 The new ceilings bind new proposals immediately. A congressman drafting a tax bill today is already limited by the new number. The percentage box in the Propose form uses it from now on.

🗓️ Taxes will be recalculated at the next congress elections. Congress elections run on day 25 of each month, and the next one is 25 September. When the new congress takes office, every country's tax laws are checked against the new ceiling and anything above it is brought down automatically. Plan for it now.

Where to check your own country:

🔍 Your ceiling. Open your country page, go to the Congress tab, press Propose and pick Import Tax, VAT or Work Tax. The hint under the percentage box reads "From 0% to {max}% — the ceiling congress ideology allows." That {max} is your new limit.

🏛️ Your ideology modifiers. Same country page, Political Situation tab, then See bonuses. That opens the Congress & Ideology Bonuses panel.

📋 Your current rates. The Enacted Laws column on the country page shows what your congress actually voted. Hold it next to your new ceiling and you know whether 25 September moves you.

The Panel Numbers Did Not Change. Their Meaning Did

Expect a moment of confusion here. The Congress & Ideology Bonuses panel shows exactly the same figures before and after this patch. Capitalism still reads "-1% Import Tax", and a congress that is one quarter Capitalist still shows a weighted pill of "-25.00%".

What changed is what those figures mean. "-25.00%" used to be read as a relative discount on the 25% base, which left an Import Tax ceiling of 19%. It is now 25 percentage points taken straight off the ceiling, which leaves 0%. Same number on screen, a very different limit underneath it.

Why this matters:

Capitalism and Communism are built to be opposites on a single axis: production against control. Neither is meant to be the better choice, and each is meant to cost you something real.

Capitalism is the production economy. Its regions produce more, its congress taxes less, and the wealth stays with the citizens who earned it. A Capitalist country should be a rich country with a thin treasury, and a state that has to ask rather than take.

Communism is the command economy. Its congress taxes hard, decides what crosses its borders and funds the state on a scale nobody else can reach. It pays for that reach at the workbench, in production its rivals keep and it gives up.

The bug collapsed that choice. Both ideologies were crowded into the same narrow band of ceilings, so neither side ever got the country it voted for. A Communist congress kept the production penalty but could never tax like a Communist congress. A Capitalist congress gave up its tax reach and got a brake far gentler than the design ever promised.

From today the trade is honest. Choose production and you give up the state's reach. Choose control and you pay for it in output. That is the decision your congress is supposed to be making, and now the numbers make it.