Comment by hatthew

This article is interesting, but feels like a bit of a stretch to me, particularly when making assertions as bold as "I suspect the only reason it’s not spelled out is because Tolkien assumed any reader would understand that intuitively." I am not a master of the LotR lore, but my assumption when reading the books years ago was that Tolkien wanted an idyllic utopian society of rural leisure, and didn't necessarily work out a fully realistic plan for how such a society could be sustainable long-term in the real world with real humans. LotR is a fantasy world, and such worlds are filled with fantasies: imaginary things that are unrealistic and don't need to be physically feasible.