I want to be emperor

Chapter 987: General rectification of officialdom

In Songjiang Prefecture, the most economically developed city in the Chu Empire, many places were brightly lit even at night.

There will be bright orange-yellow gas lamps on the streets, and one gas lamp after another lights up the super city of Songjiang.

However, unlike the gas lights on the streets, the ordinary houses on both sides of the road were still dim.

Especially in some neighborhoods where low-income people live, many houses are dark at night.

Although whale oil is cheaper than candles, it is still relatively expensive for low-income groups. Although many low-income families buy oil lamps, they are reluctant to use them too much. The family washes up early, finishes eating, and then goes to bed. sleep.

If I really can't sleep, I just stare in the dark, but I will never light up the whale oil.

However, in this community, which used to be dark at night, light has gradually appeared in recent days... Dim lights shine through the windows of some houses!
And these lamps are kerosene lamps.

After completing the early stage of oil development, transportation, and the research and development and construction of production lines for refining kerosene, the two major oil companies also began to supply kerosene to the market on a large scale in the spring of Chengshun 45.

These kerosenes were extremely popular as soon as they appeared on the market.

The reason for its popularity is only two words: cheap.

Although the development, transportation and refining of oil require costs, and even many early research and development costs need to be taken into account, in fact, if tax factors are not taken into account, the overall cost is still very low.

The senior officials of the empire considered that they needed to give the domestic large-scale whale industry chain time to respond, so as to avoid directly supplying kerosene to the market on a large scale, which would directly cause a cliff-like decline in the whale industry, which would lead to a large number of people losing their jobs.

At the same time, it is also to levy taxes on the oil industry and obtain sufficient fiscal revenue, so the taxes set for the oil industry are relatively high.

Taxes are levied on multiple aspects of oil extraction, transportation, refining, and sales, and the tax rates are not low.

This has also led to the fact that more than 80.00% of the selling price of kerosene in the market terminal is taxes in various links.

Under the suppression of taxes, the end market price of kerosene is still cheaper than whale oil, but it is not exaggeratedly cheap.

For the time being, the price of kerosene is between 60.00% and [-]% of that of whale oil, depending on the location and transportation costs.

This price is already very attractive in the market. Although kerosene, as a lighting fuel, will have some smell when burning, the price is 20.00% to 40.00% cheaper, which makes kerosene extremely attractive. Big market potential.

When many low- and middle-income families purchase lighting oil, they often choose kerosene after comparison.

There is no need to worry about losing the entire market for whale oil in the short term, because the usage experience of whale oil is better than that of kerosene. At the same time, although the price is a little more expensive than kerosene, it is not too expensive, so the middle and high-income people will still choose to continue to use it. Whale oil.

The Dachu Empire has a large population, and even a partial market share in the mid-to-high-end market is enough for the current whale oil industry to continue to survive without being greatly affected.

At the same time, whales are not only used for lighting. In fact, whale oil is also a very important industrial grease, which can be used in the leather industry, mechanical lubricants, and even in the steelmaking industry.

According to the plan formulated by the imperial industrial and commercial department, the whale industry will be gradually guided to the industrial industry in the future, giving the whale industry a relatively long buffer time.

But in the end, the whale industry will eventually be finished... This is not a problem of oil competition. It is purely about whales as an animal resource. With long-term intensive fishing, the number will decrease sharply. In the future, whales will not be so easy to catch. .

When whales are no longer needed for industry in the future, the empire will even introduce laws to restrict whale fishing.

But that's the future... As for now, the whale industry is still a large-scale industry related to the employment of millions of people. It cannot be given up casually. It can only be slowly guided through various policies.

The future of the whale industry is bleak, but as a new oil industry, it is full of hope.

Kerosene refined from petroleum has been proven to be an excellent lighting fuel, and its low price is also accepted by the market.

In the future, the empire will definitely gradually increase oil extraction, and at the same time, the tax revenue of the oil industry will be close to normal levels. By then, the people of the Chu Empire will truly enjoy a large amount of cheap kerosene to meet their lighting needs.

This time, according to the petroleum industry development plan formulated by the Ministry of Commerce and Industry, the Ministry of Industry and other departments, is expected to not exceed three years.

In the past three years, the Dachu Empire needs to take the two major oil companies as the leaders to improve the oil industry chain... including surveying more oil fields, building oil tankers to transport oil, and making preparations for land transportation, such as building large quantities of oil to transport oil. The train carriages also need to be equipped with a crude oil refining plant, and finally there are sales channels for kerosene.

When all these are done, we can truly supply the market with cheap kerosene on a large scale and allow the public to use cheap kerosene.

In Songjiang Prefecture, there is such a large oil refinery under construction.

This factory was invested and constructed by the Royal Industrial Company. The investment amount is very huge. This is mainly because the petroleum industry is a typical new industry... many related machinery and equipment require new design and development, which has also led to The price of oil refining equipment is relatively high.

In fact, there was a petroleum refining business before, but the scale of petroleum extraction and application was very small before. It mainly refined paraffin, lubricants and other industrial products from petroleum.

Because the scale is small and the output is small, the corresponding products are also typical niche products, and the overall market is very small.

Its oil refining often requires the most basic primitive operations, and there are no large-scale assembly line oil refining plants at all.

This also led to the fact that when the Chu Empire wanted to start its oil industry, it had to do more than just find oil fields and dig out the oil. In fact, it also had to improve a series of oil industry links.

This is true from extraction to transportation to refining.

Royal Petroleum Company's Songjiang Refinery is such a typical product. As the first large-scale refinery in China, its designed annual production capacity has reached 15 tons.

The huge design needs actually put forward very high requirements on the design of the production line and the manufacturing capabilities of the equipment.

However, Royal Petroleum Company is willing to spend money, and at the same time, it also has money... Although they have been spending money but not making any money since its establishment, as a subsidiary of the Royal Assets Division, the Royal Assets Division has mobilized a large amount of funds for use in the company's business development.

So the company is not short of money.

There are also industrial oil companies, who are not short of money, and even have more funds... After all, the official assets managed by the Ministry of Industry are much more than the royal assets, and the two are not even on the same level.

The huge capital investment has also made many domestic machinery manufacturers very welcome to some specially customized equipment orders from these two oil companies.

There are hundreds of manufacturers participating in the equipment required for a series of production lines of the Songjiang Refinery. They will provide a large amount of equipment, including some specially customized equipment for the construction of the plant's production lines.

The cost is high and the construction time is not short. It is expected that it will take two years of construction to achieve basic production capacity.

Before this, Royal Petroleum Company's crude oil refining could only be carried out in some small-scale refineries. Relatively speaking, small-scale refineries were easier to set up. The technical requirements for refineries with an annual output of tens of millions of tons were not the same. It is not too high and the construction period is not long.

It takes a few months to get a lot of them.

The small amount of kerosene sold on the market today comes from these small refineries.

The 45th year of Chengshun was the first year that the Chu Empire started its oil industry.Similarly, this year was also the year when the Chu Empire launched a new round of large-scale anti-corruption operations.

The rectification of officialdom in the Great Chu Empire happened every year and was going on all the time.

And if you want to say that these normalized anti-corruption measures have no effect, that is definitely wrong.

But if you want to say how good the effect is, that's nonsense.

I can only say that if this kind of thing is not done, the situation will be worse, but if it is done, it may not necessarily eliminate all corrupt officials.

It can only be said that the degree of corruption should be controlled within a certain range and some corrupt officials should be dealt with from time to time.

In addition to this kind of regular anti-corruption, Luo Zhixue also has a habit of conducting a major rectification of officialdom every three to five years.

Through this large-scale rectification of officialdom, we will focus on dealing with a group of corrupt officials and rectify the officialdom.

This kind of general rectification of officials is actually the same as ordinary people doing a general cleaning of the house every once in a while. There is no essential difference in nature.

After all, you can't really ban and eliminate things like corrupt officials.

Everyone has greed, and officials in the empire are no exception. At the same time, these officials also have power that can be realized, and as their power increases, they will be corroded by more and more external forces.

In fact, it is difficult for any official to resist this process... he will be dragged into the water to some extent, the only difference is the severity.

Some people go too far and do things not secretly. After their flaws are exposed, they may be targeted by the censor, and then become a stepping stone for the censor to get promoted and make a fortune.

If some are hidden deeper, then it is possible to get through them safely.

Of course, these are limited to ordinary corruption, the impact is not too bad, and will not affect the stability of the empire's rule... If his corruption affects the rule of the empire, he will be targeted by the Internal Affairs Department of the Hanlin Academy.

In short, there are all kinds of people... So Luo Zhixue has never thought about being able to eliminate corruption. This has nothing to do with whether the empire has a perfect system or the like. This involves the most basic problem of human greed.

To put it bluntly, everyone is greedy. If you say you are not greedy, it is because you cannot be greedy...

Furthermore, in essence, the Great Chu Empire was still a traditional centralized monarchy. The entire society followed the traditional official system. Officials had very great power, and with great power, they would naturally be subject to greater restrictions. Much corrosion.

This is inevitable and unavoidable.

Luo Zhixue knew this very well, so he also adopted a tit-for-tat method of regular cleaning...

If you are greedy for yours, I will kill mine... Let's all be well!
The last major rectification of officialdom was in the 40th year of Chengshun. It has been five years since then. According to open and secret investigations by multiple departments, various corruption cases have increased, and at the same time, some bad actors have emerged in society. As a result, some new methods of rent-seeking power have emerged.

At the same time, the empire has developed very rapidly in recent years. The development in the past five years has been faster than that in the entire 30s. The economic aggregate has increased a lot, and the people's income has also increased. While everything looks good, many problems have been exposed.

In this way, Luo Zhixue felt that it was necessary to conduct another general cleaning... to clean up a group of corrupt officials, purify the official atmosphere, and stabilize the foundation of rule.

How can I put it, five years have passed, even if there are no big corrupt officials, a group of officials must be killed so that the people can watch and enjoy the fun, so as to release internal pressure!

Luo Zhixue has always been very proficient in this set of things. He has done it many times in the past forty years, and the results have been particularly good every time.

At least the people still respect him as the emperor.

Therefore, in the spring of Chengshun 45, Luo Zhixue completed a new round of adjustments to the ministers of staff and military affairs, and then began a major rectification of officialdom.

One of the most obvious signs is that he was originally a tax patrol officer, but he transferred to the Inspectorate department midway. He has worked on the front line of anti-corruption for a long time. He served as the director of the Anti-Corruption Department of the Grand Inspectorate and relied on killing countless corrupt officials to climb up the ranks. Xu Longduo, the censor of the right capital of the courtyard, was promoted to the censor of the left capital and became the co-organizing minister.

The Grand Inspectorate is a very special institution. Although rectification of officialdom and anti-corruption are also its main responsibilities, it does not mean that it is the only business. In fact, the scope of business of the Grand Inspectorate is quite wide, including criminal proceedings, prison management, etc. Many judicial powers fall within their purview.

Therefore, not every high-ranking official in the Inspectorate has an anti-corruption background. Some are not even professional censors, but traditional administrative officials.

Xu Longze, who now specializes in anti-corruption work, surpassed other competitors and was successfully promoted to Zuodu Yushi. This is a very obvious political signal.

That means His Majesty must pay attention to anti-corruption work.

Sure enough, half a month later, the Minister of Civil Affairs took office. The newly appointed Minister of the Ministry of Civil Affairs was An Bobiao, who had a background in official administration and had set off a large-scale civil administration storm during his tenure as the governor of Jiangnan Province.

A few days after An Bobiao became the Minister of the Ministry of Civil Affairs, he was ordered to enter the imperial study room as counselor of military affairs and became the Minister of Counselor.

In June of the 45th year of Chengshun, Shen Lixue, the former censor of Dadu and the minister of counselors, was bedridden for a long time due to illness. Xu Longze, who had been promoted to censor of Zuodu for only a few months, was ordered to serve as the censor of Dadu. He entered the imperial study and became the minister of counselors. .

As a result, in the Council of Counselors, the highest power structure of the Great Chu Empire, there was a minister with a background in anti-corruption and a minister with a background in government work.

Just by where these two ministers stood, anyone with a little bit of political sensitivity would know what His Majesty was going to do.

Even if there is no political sensitivity, you can basically see it if you look up the high-level personnel changes before the several administrative rectifications in the past... Because Luo Zhixue was the first to be promoted from the highest-level counselor to the minister of affairs in the past few times. Start by promoting one or two officials who are responsible for governing and anti-corruption to become ministers of staff.

After the top-level personnel changes were completed, Luo Zhixue made certain adjustments to the senior officials at the co-organizing minister level, mainly to make it easier for the two officialdom butchers he promoted to show off their talents!
In this way, the adjustment of the Council's level is basically over. Luo Zhixue no longer needs to worry about the next things. Naturally, there will be two ministers of government and anti-corruption who will lead a group of people under them to start a storm of government rectification. .

Luo Zhixue never had to do anything he needed to do himself, and he didn't even need to worry about the proposal of a major rectification of officialdom.

All he has to do is put the right people in the right positions to realize his intentions... This is the basic quality of a superior person.

The same was true for the rectification of official administration. In early August of the 45th year of Chengshun, Xu Longze first reported the outstanding problems of official administration in several provinces during a separate meeting with the saints, and requested adjustments to the judicial systems of these provinces.

Luo Zhixue played it accurately.

A few days later, An Bobiao, Minister of the Ministry of Civil Affairs, suggested at the staff meeting that regular adjustments should be made to some agencies and key officials in provinces to better meet the development needs of the empire. After a brief discussion among the staff ministers, Luo Zhixue approved it. , and ordered the staff meeting to come up with corresponding solutions.

On August 45, Chengshun 40, the empire made rotation adjustments to eight second-rank officials, fourteen third-rank officials, and more than [-] third-rank officials, including three ministers and five governors.

In addition, Xu Longze, who is in charge of the judiciary, is also gradually adjusting the main persons in charge of the judicial agencies of various provinces. This suddenly allows many smart people and people with high enough status to smell the terrifying atmosphere before the storm!
Sure enough, just half a month later, the director of the Light Industry Department of the Ministry of Industry and Commerce was arrested and imprisoned for huge amounts of corruption. Now he is a third-rank official with real power. If nothing happens, he will be promoted to the second rank and serve as the governor of a province in a short time. Or a minister.

Moreover, the arrest of this third-grade official also involved a large number of people, including many high-ranking second-grade officials.

On October 45rd of the 230th year of Chengshun, Xu Xuan, the former magistrate of Songjiang Prefecture, Chief Envoy of Jiangnan Province, and newly promoted to Zuo Shilang of the Ministry of Ethnic Education, was taken away for investigation. Three days later, he was officially approved for arrest... After the arrest, approximately [-] yuan of illegal income was found. [-] million Chu Yuan.

The Great Chu Empire announced the beginning of a major rectification of officialdom with the dismissal of a second-rank official with real power!
And as many people know, this is just the beginning!
(End of this chapter)