History Main / PostScarcityEconomy

** Something similar is explored somewhat obliquely in the second season: Lieutenant Gordon, known as an ace pilot, decides he wants to be more than just that and applies for command responsibilities. While Commander Greyson's initial reaction could be considered a "wait, ''you'' in command?" reaction, there's the implication that if he goes for command and doesn't do well, it will devalue his personal reputation because he will be going from a "Great Pilot" to a "Below Average Commander".

* ''Series/TheOrville'': The Planetary Union apparently has one, given there is no money anymore, and referring to another planet as "still capitalist" in "Majority Rule". In "New Dimensions", Kelly explicitly attributes this to the invention of MatterReplicator technology (though, as she explains in "Future Unknown", the Union was also societally and economically prepared to accept matter replicators -- giving such technology to a capitalist society would simply cause the rich and powerful to monopolize "access to matter replicators" as a new sort of scarcity to maintain their power). John notes, however, that there are colony worlds that struggle to survive, citing his own home planet as an example. Kelly explains in the penultimate episode of season one that, even though material resources are plentiful, people with skills and the will and connections to use them are not, so the Planetary Union economy largely runs on people's reputations: ''things'' no longer have value, but ''people'' do, in a non-slavery way. Status is earned by what you do, but you can fully dedicate yourself to a practice and be the best you can be, which in turn ''is'' your economic value. The other side of this is explored somewhat obliquely in the second season: Lieutenant Gordon, known as an ace pilot, decides he wants to be more than just that and applies for command responsibilities. While Commander Greyson's initial reaction could be considered a "wait, ''you'' in command?" reaction, there's the implication that if he goes for command and doesn't do well, it will devalue his personal reputation because he will be going from a "Great Pilot" to a "Below Average Commander".

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* ''TabletopGame/{{Warhammer 40000}}''

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* ''Series/TheOrville'': The Planetary Union apparently has one, given there is no money anymore, and referring to another planet as "still capitalist" in "Majority Rule". In "New Dimensions", Kelly explicitly attributes this to the invention of MatterReplicator technology. John notes, however, that there are colony worlds that struggle to survive, citing his own home planet as an example. Kelly explains in the penultimate episode of season one that, even though material resources are plentiful, people with skills and the will and connections to use them are not, so the Planetary Union economy largely runs on people's reputations: ''things'' no longer have value, but ''people'' do, in a non-slavery way. Status is earned by what you do, but you can fully dedicate yourself to a practice and be the best you can be, which in turn ''is'' your economic value. The other side of this is explored somewhat obliquely in the second season: Lieutenant Gordon, known as an ace pilot, decides he wants to be more than just that and applies for command responsibilities. While Commander Greyson's initial reaction could be considered a "wait, ''you'' in command?" reaction, there's the implication that if he goes for command and doesn't do well, it will devalue his personal reputation because he will be going from a "Great Pilot" to a "Below Average Commander".

* The TNG era of Franchise/StarTrek (depicted in ''Series/StarTrekTheNextGeneration'', ''Series/StarTrekDeepSpaceNine'', and ''Series/StarTrekVoyager'') has the Federation as Post Scarcity. It is explictly stated a few times across the various shows that the Federation does not have money, with Picard explains that humans now work to better themselves rather than to accumulate power and worldly possessions. However, this concept is played inconsistently:

* The TNG era of Franchise/StarTrek (depicted in ''Series/StarTrekTheNextGeneration'', ''Series/StarTrekDeepSpaceNine'', and ''Series/StarTrekVoyager'') has the Federation as Post Scarcity. Captain Picard explains that humans now work to better themselves rather than to accumulate power and worldly possessions. This concept is played inconsistently, however, as the Federation still has restaurants and shops on Earth, still has family-run businesses and still conducts trade. It's also worth noting that some Federation citizens (most notably Vaush) do resort to crime, apparently in an effort to buy a standard of living outside the Federation superior to the one enjoyed within the Federation. The franchise never goes into specifics about how any of this works.
** The Klingons seem to still have a monetary economy, and it's shown that they have a preference for eating their food while it's live or uncooked, which replicators cannot do. Economic Careers however are frowned upon and seen more as a necessary evil. Financially ruining a house into dishonor is abhorred.
** Ferengi society is all capitalists all the time and finds little they don't charge. They use latinum as a currency, a substance that cannot be replicated. Given that the Ferengi do trade with the Federation and run businesses in Federation spaces (such as Quark's bar on Deep Space Nine), it seems likely that the Federation and its citizens do buy and sell goods and services with them.
** ''Voyager'' takes place in a part of the galaxy where replicators weren't readily available to the locals, so they often found that offering replicated but otherwise scarce goods could help... but having the damn things was such a game breaker locally that their initial troubles revolved around other aliens wanting them.

* ''Nova Praxis'' manages to couple a post-scarcity reputation economy with corporate feudalism. Nanotech "compilers" enable anyone to subsist on a basic level but the [[MegaCorp Houses]] and their subsidiaries hold patents on most designs or keep them secret. Also, the Rep system is run by the Coalition government which is run by the Houses so they have their corporate Rep scores permanently set [[UpToEleven to 11]] meaning that working for them is one of the fastest means of raising your own Rep.

* ''FanFic/ToTheStars'' has this with Earth, with replicators being commonplace, although there are "allocs" for luxury items like non-synthesized restaurant food or berths on space-going vessels. Averted, however, on the other planets in humanity's empire, which still use a capitalist system. The main character, from Earth, is therefore quite confused when deployed to one of these planets and is bombarded by things called "advertisements". To the fanfic's credit, it's mentioned that the twenty-year-and-still going war is causing resources to be drained faster, resulting in an economic shift back towards a capitalist model. Professions which used to be performed for free pre-war are beginning to ask for donations, and students are re-thinking their career choices when they could previously chase whatever dream they wanted regardless of productivity. This is understandably troubling for many Earthborn who are unused to the idea of scarcity, especially for the basics.

* Creator/StrugatskyBrothers' Literature/NoonUniverse has a classical post-scarcity society which they explicitly called communism. That gave them all kinds of trouble with the authorities, as ''their'' take on what communism should look like (decentralized, technology focused) was radically different from the party line. Similar elements were actually common with most Soviet Sci-Fi (indeed, it was actually ''required'' that writers depict the future as being communist, because the government thought it would [[TheGreatPoliticsMessUp "inevitably"]] be the case) but they fleshed it out to such an extent that it unnerved censors.

* [[https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Creator/MarthaWells Martha Wells']] "[[https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Literature/TheMurderbotDiaries The Murderbot Diaries]]" has a multi-planetary society called "Preservation Alliance" in which everyone is guaranteed everything considered essential to life: food, housing, medical care, education, and access to a futuristic Internet called the 'feed'. In direct contrast is the "Corporation Rim", a region of the galaxy controlled by corporations in which everything is owned by someone and everything has a price.

* ''VideoGame/StarWarsTheOldRepublic'': Zakuul is presented as essentially one of these in ''Knights of the Fallen Empire'': in the HiveCity of the Spire, droids handle most labor and service jobs everywhere but the undercity and the swamps where criminals and rebels are exiled. However, this leaves a lot of Zakuulans who don't serve in the government or military terminally bored. The post-scarcity society starts to break down as a consequence of the war with the Republic and the Sith Empire: in Chapter X, the PlayerCharacter helps an anarchist named Firebrand, [[spoiler:a.k.a. Imperial Agent companion Kaliyo Djannis]], sabotage Overwatch, the organization that runs the Spire's droids. Firebrand was initially helped by rebellious young Zakuulans who thought it was all a fun game, but had a collective HeelRealization after realizing Firebrand was dead serious.

-->-- The several hundred year old AI '''Cindy''' deconstructing this trope, "Webcomic/SchlockMercenary"

* Explicitly averted in ''TabletopGame/StarFinder'', where the dominant economic system is specifically explained to be regulated capitalism and that this is backed by the major god Abadar. Additionally, while there is enough material for basic needs to be easily met in most places, people want better stuff (the bigger gun, better armor, nicer ship, fancier vehicle, cool apartment, latest computer, amazing high-tech necrograft...) and that creates scarcity.

* The TNG era of Franchise/StarTrek (depicted in ''Series/StarTrekTheNextGeneration'', ''Series/StarTrekDeepSpaceNine'', and ''Series/StarTrekVoyager'') has the Federation as Post Scarcity. Captain Picard explains that humans now work to better themselves rather than to accumulate power and worldly possessions. This concept is played inconsistently, however, as the Federation still has restaurants and shops on Earth, still has family-run businesses and still conducts trade. The show never goes into specifics about how this works, or how Federation citizens survive when living in societies that ''do'' still have money.

* The TNG era of Franchise/StarTrek (depicted in ''Series/StarTrekTheNextGeneration'', ''Series/StarTrekDeepSpaceNine'', and ''Series/StarTrekVoyager'') has the Federation as Post Scarcity. This is played inconsistently, as the Federation still has restaurants and shops on Earth, still has family-run businesses and still conducts trade. The show never goes into specifics about how this works, or how Federation citizens survive when living in societies that ''do'' still have money.

* The TNG era of Franchise/StarTrek (depicted in ''Series/StarTrekTheNextGeneration'', ''Series/StarTrekDeepSpaceNine'', and ''Series/StarTrekVoyager'') has the Federation as Post Scarcity. This is played inconsistently as the Federation still has restaurants and shops on Earth, still has family run businesses and still conducts trade. It's been stated that real cooking with real food is always superior to replicated food (though only subtly) and historical scarcity of items still seems to require some monetary transaction.

** Ferengi society however, is all capitalists all the time and finds little they don't charge (want to sit in the waiting room? There's a fee and it's per minute!). Ferengi culture is so oriented to trade and monetary concerns that even the Federation and the Klingons have adopted some of their economy to conduct trade deals with the Ferengi.

** Since replicators can produce nearly anything the Ferengi and nations that trade with them use Latinum, a metal that's liquid at room temperature and can't be replicated, as currency. Usually transported pressed into bars of replicated gold that's [[WorthlessYellowRocks worthless by itself]].

* ''VideoGame/StarWarsTheOldRepublic'': Zakuul is presented as essentially one of these in ''Knights of the Fallen Empire'': in the HiveCity of the Spire, droids handle most labor and service jobs everywhere but the undercity and the swamps where criminals and rebels are exiled. However, this leaves a lot of Zakuulans who don't serve in the government or military terminally bored. The post-scarcity society starts to break down as a consequence of the war with the Republic and the Sith Empire: in Chapter X, the PlayerCharacter helps an anarchist named Firebrand, [[spoiler:a.k.a. Imperial Agent companion Kaliyo Djannis]], sabotage Overwatch, the organization that runs the Spire's droid. Firebrand was initially helped by rebellious young Zakuulans who thought it was all a fun game, but had a collective HeelRealization after realizing Firebrand was dead serious.

-> "Sergeant, I've watched society cross into "post-scarcity" three times now. Each time it happened we discovered a new basic commodity we didn't have enough of."

* ''VideoGame/{{Stellaris}}: an option with the "utopian abundance" civic.

* Discussed in one of ''Literature/TheHistoryOfTheGalaxy'' novels, when humans discover that hostile alien machines possess {{Matter Replicator}}s. One guy says that the technology must never fall into human hands, as it would mean the end of interstellar society, not to mention TheFederation. There would be no need for interaction between planets, and interstellar economy would disappear overnight. There will be no need for common defense either, as each world would be able to produce a fleet in a short time. It would also lead to chaos, as this could allow a planet to wage war on anyone for any reason.

* In ''Webcomic/SchlockMercenary'', [[http://www.schlockmercenary.com/2017-04-21 Cindy,]] a six-hundred year old warship AI, claims she's seen society cross into "post-scarcity" three times and every time people discovered another basic commodity they didn't have enough of. (Funnily enough, one of the "post-scarcity" items is... cookies. Schlock likes to raid the kitchen, and the last ship was able to produce them on demand....)

* People who live in the civilized empires of ''WebOriginal/OrionsArm'' can easily go their entire lives without ever having to work, Archailects can provide anything they need and much of what they want for free. The most common professions are those concerned with raising the next generation, either through parenting or by altering non-sentient species so that they become intelligent enough to join galactic society. The [=NoCoZo=] is the biggest exception, being dominated by a number of {{Mega Corp}}s.
* In the ''Literature/ParaImperium'' verse NanoMachines can produce most commodities, but there's still a monetary economy because four things are still scarce: production of magnetic monopoles used in interstellar travel is a state secret and requires a DysonSphere, entangled particles and telepath pairs used for FTL communication have to be physically transported for decades, novelty is immensely valuable to people who've lived for centuries, and services are always in demand.

* Martha Wells' "[[https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Literature/TheMurderbotDiaries The Murderbot Diaries]]" has a multi-planetary society called "Preservation Alliance" in which everyone is guaranteed everything considered essential to life: food, housing, medical care, education, and access to a futuristic Internet called the 'feed'. In direct contrast is the "Corporation Rim", a region of the galaxy controlled by corporations in which everything is owned by someone and everything has a price.

* Martha Wells' "The Murderbot Diaries" has a multi-planetary society called "Preservation Alliance" in which everyone is guaranteed everything considered essential to life: food, housing, medical care, education, and access to a futuristic Internet called the 'feed'. In direct contrast is the "Corporation Rim", a region of the galaxy controlled by corporations in which everything is owned by someone and everything has a price.

TheSingularity has arrived! Technology has advanced to the point that practically anyone can have practically anything for practically nothing. Often involves {{Nanomachines}} or other forms of MatterReplicator. In other words, AWizardDidIt -- [[MagicFromTechnology with SCIENCE!]] Expect a lot of ArtisticLicensePhysics. Put more charitably, complete automation via advanced AI or similar contrivances.