In regards to the Imperial Roman MIC

[Robert Vermaat]

Ah, I thought I was being quite specific! In any case, I am curious as to how the Roman MIC "worked". Before you say anything of it being vague, allow me to expound on that specifically. I am curious, that because I know that the annual Roman Iron production was a bit over 80,000 tonnes in some periods of the Empire, and that as the post-Marian army was professional (and Government supplied), where did all that iron go to?

Can we even attempt such an answer without proper documentation? But then I’m no expert in industrial production of the empire, so perhaps we do have research on this.
My only objection would be to the use of the term ‘MIC’. So much of the production of arms & armour (during the Principate for instance) was in the hands of private producers, one can wonder if there even was such a thing. When during the Dominate and afterwards the production of military material was becoming centralized this may have been more on the minds of the officials. How many of the iron production was state-owned I can’t say.

Though in campaign I'd suspect that the rate of production would increase to compensate for the replenishment of troops that are being recruited,

No doubt, but whether as a result of planning or as a result of demand?

If you looked at the seed-yield ratio, even compensating for the less energy dense grain that the Romans grew, the Romans grew about the same amount of calories as the Chinese grew in their hay day, and my speculation was that if the Romans had not fell, and if Europe had not forgotten the advancements in agriculture that the Romans developed, perhaps the post-Roman civilizations could of been as populated as China in the modern day, as China's sustaining use of advanced agriculture is one of the few reasons attributed to their massive population.

Sure, Agricultural yield facilitates population growth, but the one does not logically result in the other. In fact it seems that the population was already declining around that time.

Btw: how can we be sure of the seed-yield ratio of the Roman empire during the 4th century?