I miss the old versions that had trade guilds. The guild leaders would meet with your manager and demand that jobs be created for their workers, and things like this. There were not any punishments if job quotas were not met, but guild members would get unhappy thoughts if they did not have enough work. It was possible to have tantrums.
Also, dwarfs could open up stores (you built them like a trade depot, but you could not control what kind of store it would be) and buy and sell things.
Unfortunately this had the effect of a lot of claimed/owned junk piling up in rooms and in corridors, but I thought it was still fun.
It didn't really interact with export restrictions, but it gave you a way to distribute the random things nobles would mandate.
I'm not sure if soldiers had to purchase their weapons and armor, I think you could still issue them what you pleased and they would wear it. I know champions other and legendaries were immune to the economy system and could just take what they pleased, but regular soldiers might have had to pay for things.
Nobles always came back then, but you did have a choice of keeping things egalitarian for the working classes, or starting up the economy by minting coins. This would then make the dwarfs get paid for their jobs, and charge them rent for their rooms based on quality and such.
I hope the economy comes back sometime soon, but it will probably be a year or two at a minimum.