One of the concepts that originated in Europe in the Medieval Era, was the idea of 'private property'. People began to fed and graze their animals much more on their own fields. As time went by, people realized that their animals would constantly walk away from their fields. They also noticed that they were harmed by other animals or even people from outside, so they started building fences to protect their properties. This evolved into private property today, which is one of the main driving forces behind capitalism in our society.
Another important concept was coinage. Let's first remember how during the Roman Empire era, there was a coinage system, however, once the Roman Empire fell, people returned to a barter system. A barter system consists basically of exchanging goods or services directly instead of using a value constant such as a gold coin. When the kingdoms such as France, Spain, or England started to emerge, they started using coins as a more reliable way to collect taxation. Kings started to implement coin for trade, and the coinage system was established again. Nowadays, we've evolved this practice into a consistent system that is taking the next step forward: Virtual currency.
However, one of the most evident shifts that we can notice today are the laws of supply of demand and force of labor. Almost every company in the world has to run down their production based on these laws. In the medieval times, the Black Plague killed almost 40% of the population in Europe. This caused the servants to be treated with better rights since they discovered how easy it was to just go and serve someone else if they were not treated 'fairly'. In today's economy, when workers are scarce, companies offer higher incentives to keep them. In a similar way, when products are scarce they cost a lot more.
Hope this helps. Happy holidays!
