The negative modifier would almost certainly include income for some employees. On the other hand, in the era, apprentices, low level journeymen, servants and such often lived with their master, who provided food and lodgings as part of the training of an apprentice, who was rarely paid much, if anything at all. I don't think that it would be a stretch to say that the negative modifier would also include commonly used supplies; oil for lamps, wood/coal for forming the items, melting precious ores and creating items. Then, of course, unless you own a mine and  away to smelt ore, that raw material has to be purchased and so on. You could try to keep actual ledgers to substract expenses from your profits, but who wants to do that? It's far more convenient to simply say that that modifier includes the cost of doing business. It's a moot point, really, but it still exists for a reason and throwing it out because you don't have to pay golims is a little far of a stretch for me. You have to construct them afterall and they're not exactly a low cost item. You could even think of it as depreciation, I suppose on the expense report.<br/><br/>I'm not the GM, and I was just offering my thoughts on the matter. Now that I've done that, i'll drop it now.<br/><br/>The negative modifierwould certainly be indome, as well as other expenses.for some, but the particular era often had apprentices and servants living under the roof of the master, surfs weren't paid so much as allowed to keep a portion of the product, and it would be hard to run a business in the darkk without oil for lamps, candles, torches, etc. It would be equally difficult to produce much of anything with raw materials which, unless you own an iron mind and smelting steel, means that it's being bought. Supplies have to be paid for and so forth. It may be narrowed down to a number of employees, but it's just as likely that the total number also represents that overhead. How else conveniently keep track of expenses without having to run an actual ledger and keep books? Or, we can be even more convenienced and call it pay. The point is mute as what you end up with is profit and no one is really going to try to figure out how muchoil is needed per month to collect firewood and other nesseties..