Ministry of Community Prosperity

The Ministry of Community Prosperity is one of the four superdepartments of the federal government of Sober Thought, charged with managing economic issues and exercising the federal government's constitutional right to control currency.

There are three Vice Ministries which have various Chief Directorates and Directorates which report to the minister via the appropriate vice minister, plus six Chief Directorates reporting directly to the minister. Because the responsibilities are for the environment, employment and economics, the ministry is sometimes colloquially referred to as the 3Es.

General Directorates

Main article: Denkmark

The minister has the three usual General Directorates for policy, personnel and procurement. Additionally, the GD of Currency is responsible for executing monetary policy by setting interest rates and printing money. The national currency is the Denkmark, indicated by a "Ð," and subdivided into 100 Cents.

Although the interests of various stakeholders in the social market economy are represented throught out the ministry, there are three General Directorates to ensure the minister gets coherent overall advice in these areas. The GD of Labour Affairs represents the waged and non-management salaried workers, the GD of Business Affairs represents salaried management workers and business owners, while the GD of Consumer Affairs represents people who buy products and services made by labour and sold by business.

Vice Ministry of Economics

Economics has three chief directorates. Economic Data is staffed by economists who try to document actual economic performance in the nation, its provinces, its industrial sectors and demographic groups. Then, they take the past performances and try to estimate future economic behaviour. This basic work is then used by the other two chief directorates to fulfill their objectives.

Community Expenditure is staffed by economists and policy specialists who jointly divide the big piece of government spending pie into five, one piece each for the chief ministry and the four ministries. The four ministerial pieces of pie are further subdivided by their respective minister and directed to the three or four vice ministries they are responsible for.

Once the level of spending is set, Community Revenue finds the money to fund the federal budget. The chief directorate is staffed by accountants who try to develop fair and self-policing means of collecting taxes and fees from residents of Sober Thought and international traders. It has directorates for income tax, user fees and customs.

Vice Ministry of Employment

Main article: Sober Thought labour-management relations

In some respects combining the functions of labour relations and corporate affairs, the Vice Ministry for Employment is organised into three chief directorates. Employment Sectors is divided into Manufacturing Sector, Retail Sector, Service Sector and Construction Sector. Each directorate is further divided into to vice directorates, each for resonsible for either management or employee relations. The management vice directorates liase with the General Directorate of Business, and the employee vice directorates the General Directorate of Labour.

Through its three directorates, the Chief Directorate of Employment Relations establishes the legal framework in which proprietors and corporate businesses, and workers and trade unions, relate to one another and society and government as a whole. The Directorate of Employment Standards sets and enforces the rights and obligations of workers and owners in the labour market. The Directorate of Corporate Business oversees incorporation and bankruptcy law for businesses. The Directorate of Organised Labour oversees certification and suspension law for trade unions.

The vice ministry also seconds personnel to help staff overseas trade missions orchestrated by the Vice Ministry of Diplomacy.

Vice Ministry of the Environment

Although the natural environment resists human management of all kinds, this ministry tries to document, preserve and predict natural phenomena. Because human exploitation inherent in economic activity can dramatically change nature, the vice ministry reports here so that economists may measure and consider the costs of ecological degradation in their economic calculations.

The vice ministry has four chief directorates: one each for the three environments devoted to basic and applied research, plus a fourth specifically charged with conservation. The Chief Directorate for the Atmospheric Environment is the most straightforward and smallest, since air recognises no interprovincial or international boundaries. This is where weather forecasting is done.

The Chief Directorate of the Aquatic Environment is only slightly more complicated by the fact that some fresh water environments are self-contained and do not empty into the salt water ocean. Thus, there are two directorates which cooperate when necessary.

The Chief Directorate of the Terrestrial Environment is the largest and most complex in the vice ministry, since there are numerous landforms such as grasslands, hills, mountains, forests, swamps, coastal regions, etc. Instead, a territorial approach was taken, with a directorate each for: Central Province, Hochelaga and Capital Province, Thuvia, the three Northern Provinces and the four Coastal Provinces. These also indirectly sort by landform, since Thuvia is mountainous, Jarvet is flatland, Potato Island is coastal, etc.

The Chief Directorate for Environmental Protection is responsible for drafting and enforcing environmental pollution standards for air, sea and land. So while natural resources are provincial responsibilities, any poorly regulated or destructive extraction techniques employed in one province that have an effect on a neighbouring province or federal waters are prosecuted. As such, there is some coordination with the Chief Directorate of Natural Resources Cooperation.