Hop you can afford the revives, then.
No mate I had a look into it...
Prosperity grows in 5 different ways...
Player Foot Traffic. The more players that pass through the town and pay the entrance tax the better.
Player Sales/Purchases. When Players buy and sell things through the stores, there is a tax on those amounts, its not much though.
Player Quest Completion. Completing quests boosts Prosperity.
Player Killing Mobs. The more mobs you kill in the towns local area, the more prosperity grows.
Player Investments. As a Mayor you can invest into the towns coffers, the larger the coffers the higher the prosperity.
Prosperity lowers in about 3-4 different ways...
Lack of Funds.
Lack of Player Foot Traffic (and thus Sales/Purchases/Quests)
Lack of Monsters being killed around the area.
JUST because a Town has low prosperity doesn't mean that the Coffers are empty due to Guards, because when an NPC town reaches a point where he is going into the red, he fires the guards themselves. The world isn't all that full of active players so there will be MANY areas where there is no one passing by their little village, thus no one killing, buying, selling and completing quests which means that the area around them loses value and the Prosperity lowers considerably...