At least the new buildings have a "Workforce" rating. Finally population will play a major role!
On the other hand... I'm worried about potential Sim City-style micromanagment on every planet surface. It would rock in a game with 3 planets, but with 100 planets... I already choose gas giants specifically to have fewer planets to micromanage, but physically placing every building on every planet in a 100-star galaxy seems overboard. I wonder if the computer will do that automatically, with the player just queuing them like in SE4. Also, asteroids are still in clumps rather than belts. Combat looks really neat, though