Some campaigns couldn't give a hoot about economics, in which case this discussion isn't really for you.
But many campaigns go half way, they don't try to replicate a full world economy or anything, but they try to establish some reasonable economics, at least enough so that players can amass and spend their gold, buy services from time to time, etc.
A question that comes up in every edition, how does the economy work when certain spells arive? 5e is no exception, for example...there are two spells in particiular that I think are low enough level that you would see them "a fair amount", and powerful enough to turn an economy upside down. These are certaintly not the only economy killers in the game, but ones that I think are poignant. I am curious how you handle such spells (or other ones) in your campaigns.
1) Plant Growth: If one 5th druid decided to "help the farmers", and enrichs a different area everyday, they could effectively add over 150,000 acres of farmland to a kingdom (the true answer is 183, 468...but inevitably travel time, vacations, etc play in).
Further, its a reasonable thing for several druids to consider, enriching the land is a very drudic thing to do.
So the idea of the poor fuedal farmer barely holding on in 5e campaigns with druids doesn't really hold up. Farmers would be the equivalent of modern agribusiness, with incredible productivity and crop yields.
This also means kingdoms don't follow fuedal population numbers, they should be significantly larger becomes food is more prevalaent.
2) Fabricate: No craftsman in the world can compete with a 7th level wizard....in fact, its easy to ask "why would there even be regular craftsman in such a world?". In 1 day, a 7th level wizard with proficiency can craft two full items in an hour and 20 minutes (needs a short rest for arcane recovery for that second spell). Or if hes feeling lazy, 1 item a day for 10 minutes.
So in a standard business week, that's 5-10 items.
Now for context, by downtime activities, it takes 300 days to make plate mail. In that 300 day period, 1 wizard could make as much plate mail as 600 armor smiths. 600! Just one wizard in a city could make enough armor to stock the stores of his city, and probably every city in the region...hell maybe the whole world!
This means that any kingdom with just 1 loyal decently leveled wizard that wants to help his kingdom, by himself, could equip entire army regiments with plate mail in the span of a year. And that's just 1 wizard, if a kingdom had just 2-3 your entire army could have plate mail. You could argue that wizards are rare, and wizard that have armorsmithing proficiency are rarer still....but it only takes 1 to completely change how the armor economy of a kingdom works.
So fabricate should create an interesting shift compared to normal economics. On the one hand, wizards should put all common crafters out of work. Only if you live in the boonies where there are no wizards would you be able to make a living.
But second, in theory what should happen is....the price of labor is rock bottom, and the price of materials is sky high. Mining should be where the real money is made! When manufacturing becomes trivial, its value decreases. No one would care about the craftsmanship of a jewel (that's just 10 minutes work!), but getting the raw jewel in the first place would be where all of the struggle comes from in theory.
So those are just a few wild thoughts. What do you do in your campaings...do you restrict these spells somehow, incorporate them into your economies, just pretend they aren't a thing...etc.
But many campaigns go half way, they don't try to replicate a full world economy or anything, but they try to establish some reasonable economics, at least enough so that players can amass and spend their gold, buy services from time to time, etc.
A question that comes up in every edition, how does the economy work when certain spells arive? 5e is no exception, for example...there are two spells in particiular that I think are low enough level that you would see them "a fair amount", and powerful enough to turn an economy upside down. These are certaintly not the only economy killers in the game, but ones that I think are poignant. I am curious how you handle such spells (or other ones) in your campaigns.
1) Plant Growth: If one 5th druid decided to "help the farmers", and enrichs a different area everyday, they could effectively add over 150,000 acres of farmland to a kingdom (the true answer is 183, 468...but inevitably travel time, vacations, etc play in).
Further, its a reasonable thing for several druids to consider, enriching the land is a very drudic thing to do.
So the idea of the poor fuedal farmer barely holding on in 5e campaigns with druids doesn't really hold up. Farmers would be the equivalent of modern agribusiness, with incredible productivity and crop yields.
This also means kingdoms don't follow fuedal population numbers, they should be significantly larger becomes food is more prevalaent.
2) Fabricate: No craftsman in the world can compete with a 7th level wizard....in fact, its easy to ask "why would there even be regular craftsman in such a world?". In 1 day, a 7th level wizard with proficiency can craft two full items in an hour and 20 minutes (needs a short rest for arcane recovery for that second spell). Or if hes feeling lazy, 1 item a day for 10 minutes.
So in a standard business week, that's 5-10 items.
Now for context, by downtime activities, it takes 300 days to make plate mail. In that 300 day period, 1 wizard could make as much plate mail as 600 armor smiths. 600! Just one wizard in a city could make enough armor to stock the stores of his city, and probably every city in the region...hell maybe the whole world!
This means that any kingdom with just 1 loyal decently leveled wizard that wants to help his kingdom, by himself, could equip entire army regiments with plate mail in the span of a year. And that's just 1 wizard, if a kingdom had just 2-3 your entire army could have plate mail. You could argue that wizards are rare, and wizard that have armorsmithing proficiency are rarer still....but it only takes 1 to completely change how the armor economy of a kingdom works.
So fabricate should create an interesting shift compared to normal economics. On the one hand, wizards should put all common crafters out of work. Only if you live in the boonies where there are no wizards would you be able to make a living.
But second, in theory what should happen is....the price of labor is rock bottom, and the price of materials is sky high. Mining should be where the real money is made! When manufacturing becomes trivial, its value decreases. No one would care about the craftsmanship of a jewel (that's just 10 minutes work!), but getting the raw jewel in the first place would be where all of the struggle comes from in theory.
So those are just a few wild thoughts. What do you do in your campaings...do you restrict these spells somehow, incorporate them into your economies, just pretend they aren't a thing...etc.