The lack of sufficient law enforcement personnel promoted lawlessness. People pillaged homes, murdering and raping people. The economy underwent abrupt and extreme inflation. Since it was so difficult (and dangerous) to procure goods through trade and to produce them, the prices of both goods produced locally and those imported from afar skyrocketed. Because of illness and death workers became exceedingly scarce, so even peasants felt the effects of the new rise in wages. The demand for people to work the land was so high that it threatened the manorial holdings. Serfs were no longer tied to one master; if one left the land, another lord would instantly hire them. The lords had to make changes in order to make the situation more profitable for the peasants and so keep them on their land. In general, wages outpaced prices and the standard of living was subsequently raised. The horror of the Black Death had taken on a new victim, the economy.
As a consequence of the beginning of blurring financial distinctions, social distinctions sharpened. The fashions of the nobility became more extravagant in order to emphasize the social standing of the person wearing the clothing. The peasants became slightly more empowered, and revolted when the aristocracy attempted to resist the changes brought about by the plague. The social and economic structure of Europe was drastically and irretrievably changed. Some historians also say that the social changes that followed in the wake of the Black Death fostered individualism and enterprise and increased social and economic mobility "the precursors of capitalism. There were long-lasting changes brought on by necessary shifts in social customs in response to the loss of 1/3 of Europe's population during the Black Death. The plague put the entire structure of society in flux as people lived in very fear for their lives and tried to deal with life in as normal manner as possible while half cities fell all around them.