Jack of Harts

One thing that must be understood is that the Socialist Republic of Juneau did not actually abolish all Life Debts when they ended the Life Debt system. Those people who had low Life Debts made up the powerful middle class of Juneau and did have their Life Debts cleared out in favor of a new start. But it was still possible for people to incur new Life Debts for violating the standards of the Social Credit system. The key difference under the new system is that Life Debts were owed to the people, not to the State, since everything the State provided was now free of charge thanks to the wonders of fabricators and unlimited energy.

The development of fabricators fundamentally transformed the Socialist Republic of Juneau. They had long relied on hard labor to grow the food they needed and mine the resources they required, but fabricators made generating life’s necessities far cheaper and safer. Fabricators were also far more reliable than sometimes sick or unhappy laborers, so the leadership of Juneau quickly arranged to obtain as many fabricators as they could from their friendly cousins in Pacifica. They also imported an increasing number of robotic laborers from those same friends, and those twin developments reinvented the very basic structure of life in Juneau. The entire Life Debt system was predicated on the need for some people to plow the fields and work the mines so the best of the people could live in comparative luxury. With robots and machines to replace them, Juneau no longer needed them. So Juneau made a great production of retiring the entire Life Debt system and replacing it with a far more equitable Social Credit system.