Ancient Greece

===Economy===
{{Main|Economy of ancient Greece|Agriculture in ancient Greece|Slavery in ancient Greece}}

At its economic height in the 5th and 4th centuries BC, the free citizenry of [[Classical Greece]] represented perhaps the most prosperous society in the ancient world, some economic historians considering Greece one of the most advanced pre-industrial economies. In terms of wheat, wages reached an estimated 7–12&nbsp;kg daily for an unskilled worker in urban Athens, 2–3 times the 3.75&nbsp;kg of an unskilled rural labourer in Roman Egypt, though Greek farm incomes too were on average lower than those available to urban workers.<ref>W. Schiedel, "Real slave prices and the relative cost of slave labor in the Greco-Roman world", ''Ancient Society'', vol. 35, 2005, p 12.</ref>

While slave conditions varied widely, the institution served to sustain the incomes of the free citizenry: an estimate of economic development drawn from the latter (or derived from urban incomes alone) is therefore likely to overstate the true overall level despite widespread evidence for high living standards.