The size of the economy and the distribution of income in the Roman Empire
Walter Scheidel & Steven J. Friesen (Stanford University and University of Texas)
Princeton/Stanford Working Papers in Classics, January (2009)
Abstract
Different ways of estimating the Gross Domestic Product of the Roman Empire in the second century CE produce convergent results that point to total output and consumption equivalent to 50 million tons of wheat or close to 20 billion sesterces per year. It is estimated that elites (around 1.5 per cent of the imperial population) controlled approximately one-fifth of total income while middling households (perhaps 10 percent of the population) consumed another fifth. These findings shed new light on the scale of economic inequality and the distribution of demand in the Roman world.
As Roman economic historians have moved beyond concepts such as formalism and substantivism that exercised previous generations of scholars, questions of economic growth and performance have increasingly come to the fore.1 Consideration of these issues requires a basic understanding of the probable size of the Roman economy and the distribution of income across its population. This perspective not only encourages us to ask how different segments of the economy – such as the share of output captured by the state or the relative weight of elite wealth – were interrelated and to ponder the overall degree and structure of inequality but also invites and facilitates comparison with other premodern economies. Engagement with such macro-level questions has a short academic pedigree in our field. With the notable exception of the historian- sociologist Keith Hopkins, Roman historians have shied away from addressing the problem of the size of the economy of the empire and effectively ceded this important area of inquiry to a handful of enterprising economists who were not afraid to venture into unfamiliar territory.2 While scholarly interest in inequality has been less rare among students of the Roman world it has seldom spurred attempts at quantitative analysis, and even economists have only very recently begun to extend their analyses of wealth and income distributions into the distant past.
Walter Scheidel & Steven J. Friesen (Stanford University and University of Texas)
Princeton/Stanford Working Papers in Classics, January (2009)
Abstract
Different ways of estimating the Gross Domestic Product of the Roman Empire in the second century CE produce convergent results that point to total output and consumption equivalent to 50 million tons of wheat or close to 20 billion sesterces per year. It is estimated that elites (around 1.5 per cent of the imperial population) controlled approximately one-fifth of total income while middling households (perhaps 10 percent of the population) consumed another fifth. These findings shed new light on the scale of economic inequality and the distribution of demand in the Roman world.
As Roman economic historians have moved beyond concepts such as formalism and substantivism that exercised previous generations of scholars, questions of economic growth and performance have increasingly come to the fore.1 Consideration of these issues requires a basic understanding of the probable size of the Roman economy and the distribution of income across its population. This perspective not only encourages us to ask how different segments of the economy – such as the share of output captured by the state or the relative weight of elite wealth – were interrelated and to ponder the overall degree and structure of inequality but also invites and facilitates comparison with other premodern economies. Engagement with such macro-level questions has a short academic pedigree in our field. With the notable exception of the historian- sociologist Keith Hopkins, Roman historians have shied away from addressing the problem of the size of the economy of the empire and effectively ceded this important area of inquiry to a handful of enterprising economists who were not afraid to venture into unfamiliar territory.2 While scholarly interest in inequality has been less rare among students of the Roman world it has seldom spurred attempts at quantitative analysis, and even economists have only very recently begun to extend their analyses of wealth and income distributions into the distant past.
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