《People, Plagues, and Prices in the Roman》笔记

Harper, Kyle. "People, plagues, and prices in the Roman world: the evidence from Egypt." The Journal of Economic History 76.3 (2016): 803-839.

-The institutional regime of Roman law and the transportation infrastructure of the Roman Empire lowered transaction costs and facilitated exchange. Trade allowed specialization, fostering what is generally called **Smithian growth**: higher living standards achieved by greater output created by the specialization of labor. The empire also facilitated technological development and diffusion. More machines and other technical improvements allowed what is generally called **Schumpeterian growth**: higher living standards achieved by greater output created by more and better productive technologies. These can be complementary, and both have proponents in the Roman context. In general, it is believed that Smithian growth in the Roman world would have been of limited duration, a one-off benefit from imperial integration. Schumpeterian growth, by contrast, could have been more extended in time but is thought to have been limited in scope (Temin 2013, p. 233).

-The period down to the Antonine pandemic (to AD 165) was characterized by rising real land prices, rents, and above all wages; real wage growth outpaced the other indices and shows that the economy experienced **intensive growth** during this phase of demographic expansion.

-The demographic contraction of the Antonine pandemic (AD 165) induced complex changes, most notably a **decline in real rents**. There were at most **modest wage gains**, less significant than other studies have suggested; for ordinary workers, the benefits of greater scarcity of labor were probably offset by some economic regression from technological losses and/or reduced market activity.

-The Plague of Cyprian (AD 250–270) was marked by a period of extreme variability in all indices; this phase of instability was followed by a century of well-known monetary crisis. In the fourth century, real wheat prices declined, while real rents again started to rise, tracking **population expansion**.

-In the decades leading up to the Justinianic Plague (AD 541), **wheat prices rose significantly**, undermining the consensus that there was a single “late antique” price of wheat. In the same decades, wages and rents seem stagnant or declining. The bubonic plague was correlated with complex effects. Wheat prices fell precipitously and stayed at a low level to the end of the Roman period. Real wages increased, as a factor proportions model would predict. However, land prices and rents also increased, patterns which may reflect the strong influence of non-market forces or the general disequilibria of this period of profound demographic turmoil.

-The basic stability of **nominal wheat prices** down to ~AD 165 is striking. An artaba of wheat cost, on average, 8.1 drachmai in this period, and all prices fall in a band from 5 to 12 drachmai/artaba. In the later second century, in the decades after the Antonine Plague, there was in effect a doubling of nominal prices. Between AD 166 and 249, the mean nominal price of wheat was 17.2 drachmai/artaba, and all prices fell within a range of 12–24 drachmai/artaba. This increase has been noted in a range of commodities besides wheat, adding credence to the data presented here (Rathbone 1997; Temin 2013, pp. 87–88). Wheat prices ~AD 250–275 (n = 13) average 16.6 drachmai/artaba, but vary within a broader band of 12–24 drachmai/ artaba.

-In the prices that can be definitively dated before AD 165, the mean price is 319.3 drachmai/aroura; the 10:90 trimmed mean (n = 20) is 320.5 drachmai/aroura. Contrary to the pattern of nominal wheat prices after the plague, which saw a general doubling, the **land prices** that are securely dated between the Antonine Plague and the end of the drachma (AD 166–296) show a nominal decline from the earlier period; the 10:90 trimmed mean (n = 16) is 294.8 drachmai/aroura.

-I have divided each nominal land price by the real price of wheat within the same time period. These data underscore that, in the decades after the Antonine Plague, arable land **lost value** relative to its primary product.

-**Real wages** rose across the decades leading up to the Antonine Plague, a period of population growth.