Fu Chen took out some paper and a pen. "All right, let's draft two different proposals.
"The first will follow Cai Zhiyuan's suggestion: we'll put forward a relatively idealistic plan. It probably won't pass, but it will help us further confirm the community's rules.
"And if it does pass, we'll hit the jackpot.
"This proposal is... the community distributes ten thousand minutes—no, one thousand minutes of Visa Time to every community player each day.
"Ten thousand minutes is too much. It exceeds the mandatory 1,440 minutes per day, so it's more likely to fail.
"By comparison, one thousand minutes will have a slightly better chance of passing. If the one-thousand-minute proposal passes, we can keep raising it next time.
"If even the one-thousand-minute proposal can't pass, then clearly, this path is completely unworkable."
He looked up. Seeing that no one objected, he continued writing.
"The second proposal: every day, deduct 3,000 minutes of Visa Time from the three players with the most remaining Visa Time in the community and transfer it to the three players with the least remaining Visa Time."
Li Renshu hurriedly shook her head. "No, no, that won't do.
"It's a little like robbing the rich to help the poor. It might not receive more than half the votes. At the very least, Wang Yongxin definitely won't agree."
Cai Zhiyuan did not seem to care. "What does it matter if Wang Yongxin disagrees? We only need seven votes.
"As long as the five of us reach a consensus, then get any two votes from Uncle Ding, Aunt Su, or someone else outside, this plan can be implemented. We don't need Wang Yongxin's approval."
After saying that, he looked at Fu Chen.
However, Fu Chen fell silent for a moment before crossing out his earlier proposal.
"It's still better to get everyone's agreement if possible. Otherwise, we could create unnecessary rifts."
He looked at Lin Sizhi again. "Lawyer Lin, what do you think?"
Everyone knew that in the previous game, Lin Sizhi and Wang Yongxin had profited the most. If this proposal were implemented, their Visa Time would be redistributed.
Winning Lin Sizhi's agreement was crucial.
Lin Sizhi pondered for a moment. "I also don't think this proposal is appropriate.
"It's not that I begrudge three thousand minutes of Visa Time a day. That isn't a large amount. The main issue is that I don't think this plan benefits unity within the community.
"Put simply, this form of welfare protection is a little too crude."
Fu Chen lowered his head and thought for a moment. "Hmm... perhaps. I really don't have much experience in this area.
"Then... is there a better plan?"
Li Renshu picked up the thread. "What we need to do now is actually redistribute everyone's Visa Time. In other words, taxation.
"To provide welfare protection for the entire community, we first need to collect this portion of Visa Time before we can talk about redistribution.
"And the principle of taxation is to pluck the most feathers while hearing the fewest squawks.
"In other words, it would be best to levy it universally rather than just plucking the top three.
"And the Visa Time we collect should all be used to exchange for food and supplies for redistribution, rather than directly transferring that Visa Time to specific people.
"We're providing basic welfare protection, but we can't encourage freeloading."
Fu Chen thought deeply for a moment, then drew several more lines through his original proposal on the paper. "Yes, that's true."
What Li Renshu said was not difficult to understand. Everyone present was smart, and they quickly grasped her meaning.
Taking Visa Time from the top three and directly giving it to the bottom three was indeed a form of redistribution, but it was too blunt and would easily provoke dissatisfaction.
The top three would certainly be unhappy, because the targeting was too obvious.
Those ranked somewhat higher might also be unhappy, because they could become one of the top three in the future. That would make them hold back in later games, or even deliberately control their Visa Time balances.
Even those ranked somewhat lower, but not among the bottom three, would be dissatisfied.
Their Visa Time was clearly low as well, yet they could not benefit from this rule.
The bottom three would essentially receive something for nothing, which already went beyond the scope of a "minimum guarantee."
Everyone's Visa Time had been earned through hard work, and earning it in the future might even involve risking their lives.
Therefore, an overly direct and crude method of distribution would very likely trigger opposition from the group.
Li Renshu said, "Why don't we do this?
"Let's calculate the approximate Visa Time needed to exchange for everyone's daily necessities.
"For food alone, eighty minutes of Visa Time would be enough.
"For twelve people, that's nine hundred and sixty minutes of Visa Time.
"The total Visa Time we earned from Blood Poker seemed to be... 1,055,500.
"0.1 percent.
"We only need to deduct 0.1 percent of the total Visa Time each day to cover everyone's essential living supplies.
"Of course, considering that Visa Time is naturally consumed over time, as well as the need for a margin of error, there's plenty of room to raise that number."
Li Renshu's calculations were fairly rough, but broadly correct.
The large screen had previously displayed the Visa Time everyone received from Blood Poker, and Li Renshu had made corresponding notes at the time.
Fu Chen suddenly realized something. "Wait. The large screen said earlier that these chips wouldn't turn into everyone's Visa Time until twenty-four hours later.
"Could that be hinting that we can actually change the distribution method within those twenty-four hours?
"How much time is left before the twenty-four hours are up?"
Cai Zhiyuan looked at the wall clock in the room. "A little over an hour."
Fu Chen nodded. "Then we need to hurry."
Li Renshu continued, "We can consider two methods:
"The first is to deduct it according to each person's total Visa Time: deduct 0.1 percent every day, or 3 percent every month.
"The second is to deduct it from the Visa Time earned in each game. Assuming everyone plays at least one game per month, then at the current rate of returns, a fixed deduction of 3 percent or 5 percent from game earnings would be more than enough."
After thinking it over for a moment, the others said, "Then the latter is better."
Although the first plan looked good, it could easily affect everyone's existing spending plans.
If 0.2 percent were deducted every day, or 6 percent every month, then for an individual player, the more he spent before taxes were deducted, the more advantageous it would be.
With the same daily deduction of 0.1 percent, a player with an original balance of one hundred thousand would have one hundred deducted. But if he went on a spending spree the day before and reduced his balance to eighty thousand, only eighty would be deducted.
The difference might seem insignificant, but quite a few of the twelve players were careful with their calculations.
If some players accumulated a massive amount of Visa Time in the future, far beyond what they needed for daily life, they would inevitably use last-minute spending to pay as little tax as possible.
Therefore, this method had certain flaws.
They might not be obvious in the early stages, but they could cause a series of problems later on.
By comparison, deducting 3 percent equally from game earnings after every game was more likely to win the support of most people.
After thinking for a moment, Cai Zhiyuan raised a new question. "However, the calculation that a fixed 3 percent deduction from game earnings can maintain basic living needs is based on a premise: everyone must participate in at least one game every month, and the current rate of returns must be maintained.
"Should we explicitly state that in the rules?
"Suppose some people, not due to force majeure but out of personal laziness, deliberately choose not to participate in games for an entire month. Should we formulate corresponding penalties?"
Li Renshu shook her head. "No.
"Once we create such a rule, it means someone will have to specifically judge the violator's subjective intent. That could easily become a pretext for conflict and intensify contradictions.
"Besides, the welfare policy we're establishing now only solves the problem of food. It doesn't cover the Visa Time naturally consumed every day.
"In other words, no one can survive by relying solely on the welfare policy.
"When their Visa Time is nearly exhausted, everyone will still participate in games and try to earn as much Visa Time as possible. So the situation you're worried about probably won't happen.
"Of course, if we're worried that future games may not maintain this level of returns and want a greater margin of error, we can raise the number to 5 percent or even higher."
After another brief discussion, Fu Chen finally settled on these two proposals.
Before you continue