There is no constancy on icon placement. In english, the $ goes to the left of the dollar amount, while cm goes to the right of the measurement. whether you are increasing or decreasing those values, the placement of the symbol for the unit is consistant.

But in Endless Space 2 they are all over the place. In your colony overview, and empire income tab, the symbol is to the left of the number, whereas when you are building, or reading tech descriptions, the symbols are on the right. hell, if you cursor over any of your resources in the income tab, while the resource icon itself has the number to the left, the income per turn at the bottom of the popup it is on the right.

in isolation, not too confusing. but when your ships require 6 different resources layed out in a sequence, left or right of the number matters. now that i clued into this i can keep it in mind, but i think consistancy in gui and mechanics are among the most important factors to good game design.