Great Wall of China

In 221 BCE the Qin Dynasty started to build the Great Wall of China. The Great Wall is over 5,000 miles long and the longest structure ever. The Qin Dynasty built 1,500-2,500 miles of the wall between 221E. The Han Dynasty continued to build the wall another 4,000 miles from 206 BCE to 221 CE about 400 years. The wall took many workers and long hours to build. The conditions for building the wall weren't the best, it was extremely cold in the winter and hot in the summer (doc F). The workers were also not fed enough food and were over tired. Three main reasons to why the benefits of the Great Wall were not worth it are the deaths, paying Xiongnu to stay out, and taking farmers away.

The first reason the benefits of the wall did not outweigh the costs was all of the deaths. With the conditions the workers were in there multiple ways they died. Some people died of starvation, while others died of extreme weather, and some died from just working on the wall. At least 300,000 people died when working on the wall (doc E). This didn't have to happen because who knows if the Xiongnu could have still raided the Chinese land in that time period. After knowing how many people died in the production of the Great Wall it was not worth it.

The second reason the benefits of the wall did not outweigh cost was taking people away from their families and jobs. To make the wall they had to get people to work on it and they took a lot of farmers. By taking the farms small towns didn't have as much food and their wasn't much food out by the wall for the workers either. If they had taken workers from other occupations then there would be more food for small towns and they could send more the the builders. This is another reason to why the Great Wall of China was not worth building.

The third reason the benefits of the Great Wall did not igh the costs was that the Han gave the Xiongnu supplies to stay out. Starting in 51