Can you ‘live long and prosper’ by learning economics from Star Trek? Or is that ‘highly illogical’?

It might seem worlds away from the Earth we know. But can Star Trek teach us anything about the economics of our own society?

Set in the mid-23rd century, the original Star Trek series told the story of the starship Enterprise. Its crew were led by the human Captain James Kirk and the half-Vulcan Mr Spock.

From post-scarcity societies to hyper-capitalist alien cultures, the now legendary sci-fi franchise the show spawned offers surprisingly rich material for economists and curious minds alike.

As we wind down for the holiday season, let’s take a light-hearted journey into one of pop culture’s most enduring sci-fi universes.

There is macroeconomics in Star Trek, but not as we know it. Scarcity seems much less of an issue in the Star Trek world.

That’s because, within the interstellar government known as The Federation, machines called replicators generate food and other objects. Money is claimed to be no longer used.

Some scholars interpret Star Trek’s relative absence of money in Marxian terms as a step towards a classless society.

There are, however, passing references to “credits”. In one episode, a villain is accused of having used counterfeit currency to purchase a ship.

In another, Kirk describes a pile of diamonds as an “incredible fortune in stones”. It seems even in the 23rd century, money still has some uses.

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