The_Roman_Empire_and_Han_China

The Roman Empire and Han China were both empires that were very large. They both spread across a great amount of land, and incorporated many different groups of people. The differences within the groups of people in each empire and how they thought about money, possessions and responsibility for others helped contribute to the fall of each of these once great civilizations. In both Han China and the Roman Empire there was a great amount of envy over what possessions other people held. The different peoples did not want anyone else in the empire to have more than they did. Everyone wanted to be the elite and have more than anyone else around them. They tended to be very selfish people. In both empires, this selfishness showed in the economies as well. In the Roman Empire, the money was not circulating like it should have been. The people who had money kept it and the people who did not have any money, never got the chance to get it. All wealth remained stagnant. In Han China, the more wealthy people began to look for and find ways to get out of paying taxes. This in turn put the burden of all of the taxes on the poorer people who did not have as much money to work with in the first place. These money issues transferred over in many different ways. In Han China, many farmers could not produce due to financial issues. Many farmers were just too poor to plant crops and yield a harvest. They had land and a climate that would have supported abundant crops, but the lack of financial resources kept many from being able to capitalize on the possibility. In the Roman Empire, on the other hand, many had the financial resources to support a farming industry. Many could and did farm prior to changes in land and climate that made it nearly impossible to produce abundant harvests. There were many factors that made the Roman Empire and Han China fall from the once great and thriving empires that they both were. Looking back through history, we are able to see various factors that affected the empires and caused their ultimate demise. If the people of each empire would have had the ability to see then what we can see now in hind sight, it may have changed history. There is the possibility that the people may have changed the way they did things and the way that they interacted. If there had been less incorporating of different groups of people within the empires and different opinions on how wealth should be handled and shared, then there could have been less people trying to change other peoples’ ways, making the empires less likely to fall.