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[Quiller]

So I recognize that supply and demand are harder to implement than the current system and more processor intensive, but the fact is that too many dwarves don't make enough money to pay rent and wind up getting evicted under the current system.

Here's how it looks to me that the current system is setup.
Nobles, weaponmasters+ and all dwarves with a legendary skill don't pay rent, and can take any unowned item for their own.
Dwarves who make stuff make some amount of money for each item they make
Farmers?  Unknown
Building stuff?  Unknown, but probably on a per construction basis.
Soldiers and Guards?  Seem to get paid pretty well, I'm guessing a salary.
Haulers get paid a small amount for every trip they make.

What this has meant in my fort is that unskilled labor winds up kicked out of rooms, non-legendary craftsdwarves wind up kicked out when there is enough of what they make for the moment, and most rooms are taken up by children, legendaries, and soldiers (who often don't even sleep there) as well as those with steady business (fishers and farmers, etc), many rooms wind up empty.

Obviously one reason that most pay is on a per item basis is that dwarves can have multiple jobs.  Assuming that soldiers get paid per time period it seems possible, though, that salaries can be programmed.

What I would propose, therefore, is that every dwarf with hauling jobs enabled gets paid a stipend, enough to afford a small room with a bed.  Non-legendary dwarves should still get paid for skilled labor, based on item quality when possible, but if they have hauling enabled as well this becomes additional supplemental income.  So a craftdwarf may sometimes have to move to cheaper housing if work is light, but nobody (except soldiers sometimes) has to sleep in the barracks if there are enough cheap rooms and they have at least one haul job enabled.

Oh, and what a cheap room is could be a user settable value, so the player can decide if it is value equivalent to a 2x1 with a bed and a door or a 4x4 with smoothed walls and assorted furniture.

It would obviously be nice if there was a more realistic supply and demand economy at work, but I think even a small tweak like this would make it so that fewer treasurers have to die in a pool of lava and people who don't want to turn off rent don't have scores of homeless while bedrooms lie unused.

[perilisk]

Of course, you could always just use room value to order the rooms from best to worst. Nobles, in order of rank, get the best rooms. Next are legendaries, in order of legendary levels. After that, rank dwarves by ability to pay (and, unlike nobles and legendaries, actually take that payment every season). Dwarf personality would dictate how much they prefer to set aside for their seasonal rent bid (reckless dwarves would spend the money instead of setting it aside, austere dwarves would limit their aspirations regardless of ability to pay); the dwarven economy would dictate how much they can afford to pay.

Rooms don't actually cost anything to maintain, so the only "cost" is the opportunity cost of giving a room to someone when someone else would pay more. This assumes that all dwarves value bedrooms the same way, which is a reasonable abstraction for now. It's the most economically plausible solution. By having people with some minor income go homeless while rooms lie empty, you're actually losing rent.

[irmo]

By having people with some minor income go homeless while rooms lie empty, you're actually losing rent.

Losing rent doesn't really matter, since the dwarves are just being paid in fortress ration points. However, it's not in the fortress's best interest for dwarves to be homeless when there are rooms available.

The idea of ranking rooms by value, ranking dwarves by available rent money, and then pairing them up is a good one.

[perilisk]

By having people with some minor income go homeless while rooms lie empty, you're actually losing rent.

Losing rent doesn't really matter, since the dwarves are just being paid in fortress ration points.

For now, true enough. But once there's more of a delineation between public and private sector, rent/taxes will be necessary for buying things or paying for jobs that dwarves won't individually benefit from (police, military, nobility, cleaning common areas, civic works, etc.)

[Areyar]

Isn't it possible to set salary rates?
I remember seeing a screen with those, haulers got 1 money for a haul, while most others got in the range of 20 per job.

I'm going to up those if possible in my first economy fortress.
Maybe get my dwarves from sleeping in the meetinghalls if they are paid a reasonable salary.
(The nobles keep too much for themselves.)