Extremely convenient summary, from the first real paragraph of the article:

> As we’ll see, the Roman Empire was never close to an industrial revolution – a great many of the preconditions were missing – but the idea that it might have been on the cusp of being something like a modern economy did once have its day in the scholarship.

(In theory, the HN title should include "(2022)". In practice - how much has the Roman Empire changed since 2022?)