And the Old Kingdom was able to do it because they had (as cloase as you could get to in their time) a command economy, and lost the capacity for monumental public works as they became less centralized.
People being employed is not in itself a good thing. It would actually be better to run society with less work as then people would have more free time.
That's a fair point, but they did not yet have the capacity to make the entire population literate and educated, which I think is necessary to give people lots of free time. I'm not trying to say anything like dumb workers need to be kept busy or evil ensues, I just mean that people need something to keep them engaged, and they'd get bored of everything in their little village after a while and probably start breaking things or rioting. If they have an education, they can read and write and put on plays or skits and travel and do all sorts of other things to keep themselves engaged.
massive jobs program. Monuments keep so many people employed.
And the Old Kingdom was able to do it because they had (as cloase as you could get to in their time) a command economy, and lost the capacity for monumental public works as they became less centralized.
WTF, Narmer was the first tankie!??!???
I think a lot of economies in antiquity are considered command economies, although I could be wrong.
People being employed is not in itself a good thing. It would actually be better to run society with less work as then people would have more free time.
That's a fair point, but they did not yet have the capacity to make the entire population literate and educated, which I think is necessary to give people lots of free time. I'm not trying to say anything like dumb workers need to be kept busy or evil ensues, I just mean that people need something to keep them engaged, and they'd get bored of everything in their little village after a while and probably start breaking things or rioting. If they have an education, they can read and write and put on plays or skits and travel and do all sorts of other things to keep themselves engaged.
The devil finds work for idle hands.
generally this has been the purpose of sports