[zoshi]

Ships, planets, space, etc. are scarce and owned by various actors. The Federation is an interplanetary government made of sovereign member states, many of which do trade and use money. Even without the use of trade, there must be systems for determining who controls what.

[robotbikes]

This discussion makes me wish that I had borrowed the book Trekonomics from my friend when he offered to loan it to me. - https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trekonomics