Every segment of the working population of Altopascio – the leaseholders, the village artisans and laborers, and the peasant sharecroppers – was indebted and unable to meet its obligations to the landlord. Accounts exist for the years between 1759 and 1765 that allow us to quantify the debt actually formed during those years by the average debtor in each group. The average of 103 leaseholders became indebted to the landlord for 14 scudi, the average of 10 artisan/laborers for 5 scudi, while 39 peasant households formed an average debt of 82 scudi, nearly six times the indebtedness of the average small farmer. The mezzadri of the grand duke were the most indebted of a poor and debt-ridden society.

On a purely individual basis a number of variables determined the amount of peasant indebtedness. The farms that composed the estate were not of equal size or quality. A larger and more fertile farm was naturally better suited to sustain a given peasant family than one that was small and less fertile. In line with this observation, those few peasant families of Altopascio who were not indebted at the end of the eighteenth century resided on the larger and more fertile farms carved out of land that had been reclaimed not long before. Size and quality were still not the only determinants because even peasants on good plots could and did become indebted.

The demographic composition of the family was another factor that influenced indebtedness.