{
 title : "##industry##"
 sound : "fanfare"
 text  : "The real industries in Rome were leadership and power. Very little production occurred in Rome itself, virtually none of it for export. Manufacturing was a low-class enterprise fit only for slaves or poor plebes. Wealthy Romans lived off the rents of their country estates, and taxes raised from the provinces supported most of the capital's economy. Rome's gentry sometimes dabbled in industrial investment, but always through agents.\nTrade was more important, with 150 corporations or guilds and numerous warehousemen and carriers to keep merchandise moving, but even this provided employment for only a fraction of the citizenry.\nThose production centers that did exist were small and relied on primitive technology. With the majority of Romans too poor to afford manufactured goods, producers had little incentive to expand their operations or improve efficiency. When demand for a product increased, Romans simply established more small industries on the traditional model. Most manual labor was performed by slaves, and much production was at the household level."
}