ABSTRACT
A society's economy comprises its structures of production, exchange, and consumption and is a crucial component of the wellbeing or malaise of its people. Thus, problems in an economy will loom large in the process of slow collapse. This chapter examines how the bureaucracy of the empire increased in complexity, crossing a privatization threshold to where its agents functioned chiefly to enrich themselves. It explores how the Church became an alternate society and economy, which diverted resources toward itself in a further form of privatization, contributing to the collapse of the imperial system. The Roman Empire was a tributary empire that depended on taxation of an agricultural rural economy. The Classic Maya economy had largely self-sufficient households and communities, but rulers and elites needed resources and labor from commoners for their building programs and support of palaces.
