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There are a few ways. Some of them are somewhat exploity, so it is up to you what you consider "fair" - although the game is in early access so the balance is not perfect either.

* Start with higher initial money in difficulty settings
* Enable cheats and give yourself more money
* Build factories and man them with foreign workers. Import raw materials and power, export products. Depending on the good, you can make enough money to recoup expenses and then some. Good ones usually include clothes, steel and oil refineries.
* Take out loans. Usually, interest rates are very low in SR (so long as you don't miss payments). If you're spending the money on anything remotely constructive, you can easily make it back, because many industries in the game can easily provide 20-30% profit margins and similarly good returns on investment. When you borrow money and build with it, this increases your total assets and therefore your loan cap, so you can borrow even more.
* Currency manipulation. There is no currency exchange in SR, but you can convert USD to RUB and vice versa by simply buying from one country and selling to another. This can be goods (aluminum or uranium can move a lot of wealth quickly) or power (can instantly turn on/off). This means that you can convert all your starting USD to RUB, as well as borrowed USD, further increasing funds.
* Avoid overbuilding your residential services. Only build what's necessary to keep your residents working at your factories. Luxuries will have to wait until a solid industrial base is established.
* Be patient and use construction offices, don't pay to finish instantly. Even if you import all resources and use foreign workers, it's much cheaper to build with construction offices than with money.
* Not all production chains are equally profitable. In the beginning, it may be better to import some resources rather than spend money on setting up infrastructure for them. Periodically check your import expenses, and vertically integrate by first producing the most expensive ones locally.
* Use distribution offices for importing goods. Distribution offices, unlike lines, can be set up to import only just enough materials to keep buildings going. This way you are not needlessly paying to fill up warehouses up front, and stretching your money a bit more.