In the early years of the Roman Empire at least, mainland Hellas was already plagued by grave and ever-intensifying economic problems. This was due mainly to the now widespread commercial exploitation of the Mediterranean, and to the availability of imported  wine and olive oil - the two staple items exported by Hellenic cities - that were cheap by comparison with the local product.
The writer of travel accounts Strabo was to describe Arcadia, Messenia and Laconia as areas with a shrinking population, and even in some cases as deserted areas. But this view, formulated always by comparison with the prosperity reigning in Hellenic areas in the Classical and Hellenistic periods, is regarded as excessively gloomy. Archaeological research has shown that while population obviously shrank in rural areas, it increased continuously in towns and cities.

Rome took a direct hand in founding colonies and refounding cities on Hellenic soil; and this undoubtedly boosted local economy. Cases in point are Corinth, where settlers were installed in the days of Julius Caesar, in 44 B.C.); and Patrae, founded by Augustus in 14 A.D.  The same is true of developing Nicopolis (not far from Actium), a city founded by Augustus and settled by people brought in from the surrounding areas. Again, other cities "trailing clouds of glory", Athens for example, were frequently propped up with financial bounties from the emperor, all in the name of their illustrious past. Not that there were no expressions of discontent. These erupted in a fair number of cities, particularly around the turn of the 1st century A.D. We know, for example, that Thessaly was punished for demonstrations of this nature by losing at some point in time its privilege of being a free region.

Generally speaking, the regions of mainland Hellas, in the economic sense always, remained on the edge of things. This was partly because they were of minor strategic importance, so were unable to profit from imperial funding for the maintenance of legions in various provinces. The legions closest to Hellenic territory were stationed in Moesia - to the north and west of Thrace and Macedonia. As for the cities of Asia Minor, they were manifestly in better economic condition than those of Hellas proper. Under Roman rule they adapted themselves more easily to Rome's tax policy, thus facing fewer problematic contingencies. Besides, most Greek aristocrat members of the Roman Senate came from areas in Asia Minor.

It will be argued that, generally speaking, Hellenic cities progressed, and that in certain parts the land passed into the hands of a small number of rich people. Areas far from major conurbations, on the other hand (Euboea, for instance, where the seams of copper were now exhausted), saw a severe shrinkage of the population and a more general atmosphere of decay.