Citizens of Rome and the major cities obtained their basic necessities by trade with the far‐flung corners of the empire, and this helps explain the growth in prosperity, and the devastating collapse the empire suffered when this division of labor fell apart. As taxes increased and inflation made price controls unworkable, the urbanites of the cities started fleeing to empty plots of land where they could at least have a chance of living in self‐sufficiency, where their lack of income spared them having to pay taxes. The intricate civilizational edifice of the Roman Empire and the large
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