beccaelizabeth (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
beccaelizabeth) wrote2018-04-16 11:08 am
beccaelizabeth) wrote2018-04-16 11:08 am
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Okay, so, but how are they rich?
So like Malfoy Manor is based off a national trust property and would be worth £14.5 million according to the radio times. The Malfoys are Rich.
But how did they get rich?
Like, I don't know anything, I just read fic, fic has them owning a house and just... bank vaults. And like, typically vaults need filling? On the regular? Vaults that are not refilled are why most houses end up with the National Trust, there's a whole money goes out problem.
So what resources do the Malfoys have that they're turning into money?
Given their politics they're probably only part of the wizard economy. Like, they're not trading stocks in the City or investing in stuff there, this is all Gringotts and galleons all the way down.
So one thing is land. They appear to have it. We don't know how much. But land turns into money in many and varied ways.
Wizards can't go and live wherever they like. They have Secrecy to worry about. I mean, if they can go rent from muggles then the rest of my logic goes poof, but really, they seem to have their own world in a geographic sense too. They need somewhere to live where they're allowed to do magic. Surrounded by other magic users. So, probably on land owned by wizards.
Way the first the rich get rich in HP, they've got places to rent.
... I dislike them already. Housing crisis, mutter mumble grumble...
Only, actually, yes, increasing housing crisis in wizard world too, their land probably isn't bigger on the inside... oooh, what if their land is bigger on the inside? If they're all living under the hill somewhere the real estate issue gets different. There's books like that, where the Gentlemen have their own lands and they're only tenuously connected to the rest. Anne Bishop's ones need families of the same blood living on land in the regular world to anchor the places, and they get treated like second class citizens and it's all very drama. Seanan McGuire has a more complex relationship to knowes, which are probably alive themselves, but still belong to one family at a time even if lots of people live there. There's probably a bunch more. But, like, even if they're living in the otherworld, there's constraints on who owns it.
... like, not necessarily, but the constraints drive the story, so.
So maybe wizards live places that are bigger on the inside, that would be grand, but they exist on skinny bits of world from the outside, and probably someone owns them inside and out.
There's a steady supply of new wizards - children, obviously, who might inherit a place to live eventually or might need a new one, but also muggleborns, who can't exactly go home if they want to do magic. Harry couldn't over the holidays, yesno? ... I poked the wiki a bit and it says the ministry prohibits magic in front of muggles or in muggle inhabited areas. But also there is only one all wizard village and everywhere else is mixed? So it must define area pretty sharply...
But there's always new people needing to move in, who haven't got galleons and so forth yet, and definitely don't own land in relevant areas. Whoever owns the land could be making bank off renting to muggleborns.
And like I figured yesterday, if wizards have had all the benefits of magic medicine all along, they haven't been having the 20th century population explosion, they had that earlier. So there's a sudden multiplication of muggles going on around them. And probably up to seven times more muggleborn wizards than there were at the time of Dumbledore's birth, or at least three times more. If they all need somewhere to live it's getting crowded. Potentially profitably so, but possibly in housing crisis ways where there isn't enough new housing being built. Maybe because people don't want the new people on their lands. They have nice wizard neighbours already. Nimby. But possibly also the land is needed for something else.
Other ways to get rich: Wizards have to take care and charge of magical beasts and beings. ... it's a bit creepy, in that old school colonial way. And they want to use them for parts.
Wands alone need dragons and unicorns and phoenix to exist. I imagine dragons need quite a bit of space and a whole ecosystem propping them up. Don't know how they'd fit in Britain. Oh ugh, I looked them up and lots of parts of dragons are used in magic. And they're designated as wizard killers impossible to train or domesticate. Ugh. Wonder how self serving that is? Look they're so dangerous they've got to be parts... Er, obviously that's one set of settings as could be tweaked, if you would rather be nice to dragons. Have an adventure where they turn out to be perfectly nice to people who never used them for parts. Hmm, the wiki reckons both that dragon breeding is outlawed and that the ministry controls harvesting dragon parts from only breeds that are overbreeding. Um, if dragons are magically valuable in all their parts, someone is breeding them. That's just humans for you. Still, dragon isn't a great example.
There's lots more wand cores on the wiki than on Pottermore though. It's all very well Olivander saying he'll only use the three best ones, but if they're rare rare rare then that only bottlenecks production and encourages over harvesting.
Still, having a reliable supply of wand parts must make for a steady supply of money.
And plants for potions. And bits of magical beasts for potions. Ugh.
So there's got to be magical nature reserves and probably magical farms. Like, it's not just that the school happens to be next to a forest, the school has useful stuff in that forest.
So anyone that owns a forest or whatever would have money.
But if the parts were common enough that people could go pick them up anywhere, or if there were, well, commons, where the resources were shared, then people wouldn't be rich off those bits. Things are rare, and if they're being turned into money for some families but not others, some things are privately owned.
Possibly not dragons. See ministry control. So that's interesting.
Like, the bits of the conflict that are just about Those People coming over here taking our jobs... well that's just ugh, because prejudice and stupid. Except if you get the setting wrong on a made up world, it might turn out to be true, where a rare resource is already at its limit. Rare makes rich, but then runs out if you're not careful. So if people are multiplying faster than magical plants and beasts and components, that's a bit of a problem.
One that needs to be solved by new farming methods or using a wider range of materials, obviously, not cutting down on people.
But if one old family has land, they can make money through rent, and through the magical plants and beasts and all sorts that might live on that land. For rent you want there to be more people, for the other stuff... only maybe. Either way it might get crowded, or feel crowded compared to a mere century ago.
And the new wizards wouldn't have resources of their own, not from within the existing economy, they'd be all looking to buy their ingredients and wands and so forth but they'd have had to change currencies from pounds first.
If we knew how people were making their money and how their money was doing in the present conditions then we'd know a bunch of motives for them being bastards, and those things would still need sorting out even after everyone has agreed that prejudice is a bad thing.
But like, sorted by growing more and being nicer to growing things, possibly.
Not the way the Dark tried it.
But how did they get rich?
Like, I don't know anything, I just read fic, fic has them owning a house and just... bank vaults. And like, typically vaults need filling? On the regular? Vaults that are not refilled are why most houses end up with the National Trust, there's a whole money goes out problem.
So what resources do the Malfoys have that they're turning into money?
Given their politics they're probably only part of the wizard economy. Like, they're not trading stocks in the City or investing in stuff there, this is all Gringotts and galleons all the way down.
So one thing is land. They appear to have it. We don't know how much. But land turns into money in many and varied ways.
Wizards can't go and live wherever they like. They have Secrecy to worry about. I mean, if they can go rent from muggles then the rest of my logic goes poof, but really, they seem to have their own world in a geographic sense too. They need somewhere to live where they're allowed to do magic. Surrounded by other magic users. So, probably on land owned by wizards.
Way the first the rich get rich in HP, they've got places to rent.
... I dislike them already. Housing crisis, mutter mumble grumble...
Only, actually, yes, increasing housing crisis in wizard world too, their land probably isn't bigger on the inside... oooh, what if their land is bigger on the inside? If they're all living under the hill somewhere the real estate issue gets different. There's books like that, where the Gentlemen have their own lands and they're only tenuously connected to the rest. Anne Bishop's ones need families of the same blood living on land in the regular world to anchor the places, and they get treated like second class citizens and it's all very drama. Seanan McGuire has a more complex relationship to knowes, which are probably alive themselves, but still belong to one family at a time even if lots of people live there. There's probably a bunch more. But, like, even if they're living in the otherworld, there's constraints on who owns it.
... like, not necessarily, but the constraints drive the story, so.
So maybe wizards live places that are bigger on the inside, that would be grand, but they exist on skinny bits of world from the outside, and probably someone owns them inside and out.
There's a steady supply of new wizards - children, obviously, who might inherit a place to live eventually or might need a new one, but also muggleborns, who can't exactly go home if they want to do magic. Harry couldn't over the holidays, yesno? ... I poked the wiki a bit and it says the ministry prohibits magic in front of muggles or in muggle inhabited areas. But also there is only one all wizard village and everywhere else is mixed? So it must define area pretty sharply...
But there's always new people needing to move in, who haven't got galleons and so forth yet, and definitely don't own land in relevant areas. Whoever owns the land could be making bank off renting to muggleborns.
And like I figured yesterday, if wizards have had all the benefits of magic medicine all along, they haven't been having the 20th century population explosion, they had that earlier. So there's a sudden multiplication of muggles going on around them. And probably up to seven times more muggleborn wizards than there were at the time of Dumbledore's birth, or at least three times more. If they all need somewhere to live it's getting crowded. Potentially profitably so, but possibly in housing crisis ways where there isn't enough new housing being built. Maybe because people don't want the new people on their lands. They have nice wizard neighbours already. Nimby. But possibly also the land is needed for something else.
Other ways to get rich: Wizards have to take care and charge of magical beasts and beings. ... it's a bit creepy, in that old school colonial way. And they want to use them for parts.
Wands alone need dragons and unicorns and phoenix to exist. I imagine dragons need quite a bit of space and a whole ecosystem propping them up. Don't know how they'd fit in Britain. Oh ugh, I looked them up and lots of parts of dragons are used in magic. And they're designated as wizard killers impossible to train or domesticate. Ugh. Wonder how self serving that is? Look they're so dangerous they've got to be parts... Er, obviously that's one set of settings as could be tweaked, if you would rather be nice to dragons. Have an adventure where they turn out to be perfectly nice to people who never used them for parts. Hmm, the wiki reckons both that dragon breeding is outlawed and that the ministry controls harvesting dragon parts from only breeds that are overbreeding. Um, if dragons are magically valuable in all their parts, someone is breeding them. That's just humans for you. Still, dragon isn't a great example.
There's lots more wand cores on the wiki than on Pottermore though. It's all very well Olivander saying he'll only use the three best ones, but if they're rare rare rare then that only bottlenecks production and encourages over harvesting.
Still, having a reliable supply of wand parts must make for a steady supply of money.
And plants for potions. And bits of magical beasts for potions. Ugh.
So there's got to be magical nature reserves and probably magical farms. Like, it's not just that the school happens to be next to a forest, the school has useful stuff in that forest.
So anyone that owns a forest or whatever would have money.
But if the parts were common enough that people could go pick them up anywhere, or if there were, well, commons, where the resources were shared, then people wouldn't be rich off those bits. Things are rare, and if they're being turned into money for some families but not others, some things are privately owned.
Possibly not dragons. See ministry control. So that's interesting.
Like, the bits of the conflict that are just about Those People coming over here taking our jobs... well that's just ugh, because prejudice and stupid. Except if you get the setting wrong on a made up world, it might turn out to be true, where a rare resource is already at its limit. Rare makes rich, but then runs out if you're not careful. So if people are multiplying faster than magical plants and beasts and components, that's a bit of a problem.
One that needs to be solved by new farming methods or using a wider range of materials, obviously, not cutting down on people.
But if one old family has land, they can make money through rent, and through the magical plants and beasts and all sorts that might live on that land. For rent you want there to be more people, for the other stuff... only maybe. Either way it might get crowded, or feel crowded compared to a mere century ago.
And the new wizards wouldn't have resources of their own, not from within the existing economy, they'd be all looking to buy their ingredients and wands and so forth but they'd have had to change currencies from pounds first.
If we knew how people were making their money and how their money was doing in the present conditions then we'd know a bunch of motives for them being bastards, and those things would still need sorting out even after everyone has agreed that prejudice is a bad thing.
But like, sorted by growing more and being nicer to growing things, possibly.
Not the way the Dark tried it.