Xinshun 1730

Chapter 1432 The Antidote

Of course, from Liu Yu's point of view, this matter actually has the same meaning in simple terms: how to avoid the large amount of newly added currency in Dashun from flowing to the land?

According to the logic of industrial and agricultural capital, capital flows to land, improves land, and increases production, which is the development of productivity.

However, Dashun's land issue is more of a financial attribute than a means of production attribute.

On the one hand, Dashun’s yield per mu is now the highest in the world, and capital flows to cultivated land. Unless it is a commercial crop, it does not actually have much effect on increasing production.

It must be made clear that when the third and fourth industrial revolutions take place, the purpose of land concentration is because this industrial revolution requires the labor force of hundreds of millions or even billions of people.

But now, Dashun, on the eve of the first industrial revolution, cannot and does not need to consider labor issues.

So, only "pure productivity" issues remain.

Since it is purely a matter of productivity, from the blast furnace iron columbine car in the Han Dynasty to the formation of the Quyuan plow in the Tang Dynasty, and then to the popularization of the two-year three-cooking system in Dashun North China, the actual yield per mu has been unable to be effectively improved. .

In theory, large-scale water conservancy projects can also increase the yield per mu before using fertilizers.

However, as far as the river conditions of Dashun are concerned, to put it bluntly, the Yellow River, Huaihe River, Hongze Lake, Grand Canal... these problems, what capital do you have, can you complete such a project?
There are two understandings of productivity improvement.

One is the increase in per capita production efficiency. The original land requires fewer people, and the "excess" people either go to North America to cultivate wasteland to increase total productivity, or enter factories to increase productivity.

And the other one is Dashun.The factory cannot accommodate so many people, and the cost of reclaiming wasteland in North America is too high, so the increase in productivity can only be reflected in the yield per mu.

But obviously, Dashun's yield per mu has already reached its limit.Unless it is planting cash crops, or grassy land in the Huaihe River, or wasteland in the Northeast Plain, it is basically unrealistic for capital to buy land with the logic of industrial capital to improve land, build water conservancy, and increase yield per mu.

Unless, this capital can be awesome, I can do the Shihang project by myself, the Huaihe waterway project by myself, and the Yellow River channel reconstruction project by myself.

Obviously, if capital can reach this level, it must and can only be the capital of the country.

on the other hand.

With the massive amount of silver flowing into Dashun, in essence, the silver in Dashun is slowly depreciating.

And Dashun's reforms are gradually reducing the problem of "taxes per mu"—mainly Dashun's current industrial and commercial taxes, monopoly profits, foreign trade tariffs, etc., so that Dashun does not need to squeeze agriculture with all its strength—this is also As a result, the land in Dashun has a clear tendency to appreciate.

According to mu tax, it will lead to lower land prices.

In the later generations, when the third was raised and the fifth was planned, some open up wasteland was given to human races for free, and no one wanted it.

Dashun’s propensity to tax taxes per mu—historically one of them—has suppressed the price of land.

But now, because the canal has been abandoned and the Yellow River is about to change its course, and other issues have been resolved one by one, the tendency to pay taxes per mu is obviously decreasing.

The simplest thing is that the Grand Canal is abolished, and the labor labor or service money for maintaining the canal can theoretically be banned.The labor and service money for maintaining the canal can basically be regarded as levied on an acre-by-mu ​​basis.

The combination of these two situations will obviously increase the desire to buy land.

As for itself, land, especially land under private ownership, is the most valuable asset, not one of them.

This is not to say that Dashun is closed and backward.

After John Law finished the matter in France, the whole of France woke up from the frenzy. France also felt that land was the most valuable asset, and none of them even indirectly promoted the development of the Physiocrats.

This is a reality.

Even, it is very market economic thinking.

It has nothing to do with chanting scriptures, ethnicity, closed ignorance, agricultural civilization, marine civilization, or hanging hair.

And this truth, wouldn't the people in Dashun not know?
In "Dream of Red Mansions", Qin Keqing asked Sister Feng to dream, what did she ask Sister Feng to do?

【In my opinion, take advantage of today's wealth and wealth, and place more farms, houses, and acres of land near the ancestral tomb...】

Grange and acres of land are the most valuable assets.rather than something else.

Qin Keqing can clearly distinguish what is wealth, property, gold and silver; what is assets, and what is the best choice for value preservation and hedging.

Dashun used to call Juntian, can it really be Juntian?
Not to mention Dashun, it is the hereditary salt ticket after the reform of the salt administration in the Manchu and Wanli years, don't you recognize it?

Changing the emperor is changing the emperor.

If you don't recognize the title deed, it will be different.

If the emperor is changed, as long as the rules of governance do not change much, the land deeds must be recognized and can be bought and sold.

Why did the Yan-Li School, Liu Yu say that Wang Kunsheng's theory of "only farmers have land" is the pinnacle of the idea of ​​land equalization in the feudal dynasty?
Because the premise of farming and land is that Wang Yuan realizes that the development of industry and commerce cannot be contained.And he himself supports the development of industry and commerce.

Support industrial and commercial development.

However, it cannot solve the merger problem of merchants buying land under private ownership of land.

Therefore, Wang Yuan came up with the idea of ​​strengthening the status system and disallowing merchants to buy land with the help of "scholars, farmers, businessmen and commerce" and the status system of the previous dynasty, that is, the theory that only farmers have land—the farmer here is a status, not a profession.

Of course, in the end, Wang Yuan got stuck on the "doing" issue of "how to make it".

His thinking can only be said to be moderate, and he dare not come to the big ones-increase taxes on private land, reduce taxes on official land, and force farmers to donate all their private land to the court.This stems from the history of the "efficiency" of the gentry in the previous dynasty. However, Wang Yuan's idea is to expand the "efficiency" of the previous dynasty and make the court the only "exemption". The state of serving the gentry, wouldn't it mean that everyone frantically devoted themselves to the court, and completed the nationalization of all the land in a few years?

In short, this idea of ​​"doing" can only be said to be quite naive.

And now the emperor’s thinking about currency reform, small farmers’ problems, too fast accumulation of gold and silver by industry and commerce, merger crisis and other issues, to some extent, was also born out of the idea of ​​​​”only farmers have land”.

In other words, it was born out of the status hierarchy system of "Scholar, Farmer, Industry and Commerce".

After all, men make their own history, but they do not make it as they please, not under conditions of their own choosing, but under conditions directly encountered, given, inherited from the past.The traditions of all dead fathers haunt the minds of the living like nightmares. 】

Or.

This is similar to Liu Yu's ideas and the French Physiocrat Turgot's reform ideas.

In other words, it is feasible to complete the early development of capitalism under the cloak of feudalism.

The French Physiocrats proved this.

Liu Yu's many reforms, the monopoly of overseas trade and the development of road construction and waste water canals also prove this point.

And an idea proposed by the emperor now, it seems, can also be attributed to this one.

Relying on the thick feudal cloak, and the traditions of the dead ancestors who entangled the minds of the living like nightmares, Liu Yu proposed an idea.

"As I said, Wang Xieyan and the family of the common people can't achieve Datong by doing the same thing. But as you said, there should be no problem with the so-called well-off. If the common people and small farmers can use chemical fertilizers and steam engines to pump water, the world will be prosperous. No hunger."

"But I also know that if you do these things, you have to love the area where Qing reformed, so that you can be prosperous."

"However, just like the currency reform I was worried about, the expropriation of small farmers, and the purchase of land by merchants, these problems are really difficult to solve."

"And Ruo Juntian... Although this is the right way, it is indeed the most benevolent government in the world. It's just... Aiqing also knows that this matter cannot be done."

Liu Yu thought, it's because you can't do it, or the Dashun Dynasty can't do it.It doesn't mean it can't be done.

But even though he thought so in his heart, he still praised the emperor for what he said was right and well said.

Then the emperor said: "I read the economic books written by Aiqing, and I thought about Qing's reforms in the past... I was thinking, since I said that Wang Xieyan flew into the homes of the people, he wanted to fly into the homes of [-] million people."

"So, can we fly into the homes of 5000 million and 7000 million people first?"

"Over the years, there has always been a distinction between inside and outside. In Kanto, Songsu, Nanyang and other places, although the six governments are in charge, they are not as good as other places..."

"So, can we strictly control the place of origin, the inside can go outside, but the outside can't go inside."

"With 7000 million people in Shandong and Jiangsu, we will continue to carry out legal reforms, and we will not suppress mergers, so that those who lose their land will flow to Kanto, Fusang, and Nanyang to develop industry and commerce."

"Those who are originally from these places are not allowed to buy land, houses, rent, etc."

"From your point of view, relying on these 7000 to [-] million people, grain from the Southeast Asia, cotton from India, coal from Xuzhou and Taiwan, iron from Zhili from the Kanto, and gold and silver from overseas...can you achieve what you call industrial development?"

"To put it simply, with a population of 7000 to [-] million, and the market of coal, iron, cotton, gold and silver, from Japan to Europe, can it be developed so that steam engines, saltpeter fertilizers, etc., are cheap enough to fly into the homes of ordinary people in the future?"

The emperor said so.

In Liu Yu's ears, after condensing this sentence, it is "do not rely on the domestic market, only rely on overseas markets, can the first industrial revolution be completed with the tens of millions of people in the pre-developed areas?"

If this is a technical problem, then it should be said that this is no problem.

Even if this kind of thing is done... If you have to make an analogy, it seems that it is the fate of slave states and non-slave states, and eventually there will be a war between East and West.

But actually, no.The differences in economic base, economic model, land system, raw material origin, etc. make this analogy absolutely wrong.

Not so much that analogy.

Rather, if things go on like this, it is more likely that the model of "Paris conquered the whole of France" and "one city of Petersburg conquers all of Russia" is more likely.

The problem is, it is impossible for the emperor to understand politics.

In other words, it is impossible for the emperor not to understand the possible problems here.

But the emperor didn't mention it at all, as if it was just a "technical" problem.

This inevitably made Liu Yu a little vigilant.

The emperor glanced at Liu Yu, and said slowly: "Ai Qing thinks, is this feasible? Is it possible?"

"I also know that this matter can treat the symptoms but not the root cause. But I also said that the way is not enough, and I didn't think I could cure the root cause."

"Even, if this matter is not handled properly, it is better to drink poison to quench thirst."

"The reason why I do this is because I am worried that the industry and commerce will accumulate a lot of gold and silver very quickly, and the annexation will be too fast."

"However, doing so is drinking poison to quench thirst. It is equivalent to accelerating the development of industry and commerce and accelerating the process of accumulating gold and silver."

"But I feel that this chemical fertilizer, steam pump, etc. are the antidote after drinking the poisonous poison. As long as the antidote is made before the poisonous poison occurs, then it seems that it is not a bad idea to drink the poisonous wine first."

(End of this chapter)