Daming 1805

Chapter 193

Dashi Kingdom, Quicksand City, Wangfu.

Zhu Jingyuan looked at the telegram sent by Dian Bu, and read the words "the first year of Ankang" several times.

The word Ankang is of course an auspicious word, but it always feels like a "salted fish".

Probably Ankang was originally a common name for a fish.
It may also be that I have heard too many blessings such as "happiness and well-being" in my previous life.

Choosing the title of the year to be Ankang gives people a tendency to not want to struggle, to lie flat, and to enjoy money.

This will definitely reassure the Thai and Western countries.

But the question is, does my father really think so?

As far as the current situation is concerned, in the next few decades, if Daming does not have any additional strategic goals, even if the emperor lies completely flat and sleeps, there will be an unprecedented prosperity.

As long as the father doesn't go in the wrong direction and toss about with excessive force, as long as he does what he should do step by step, he will definitely be a generation of heroes in the end.

But this does not mean that the emperor can really lie flat.

According to the logic of Emperor Shizu, the current state of Daming belongs to the rising tide.

Huge victories and unprecedented colonial development, coupled with a new round of industrialization, will mask all possible problems now.

Even if you make wrong decisions on many things, it is difficult to quickly find out through social feedback.

If there should be a ten percent increase, one mistake could reduce the result by ten percent.

At this time, the relevant personnel can quickly find the abnormality and have to correct it immediately.

If it should have increased by 80.00%, it increased by [-]% because of some error.

The relevant personnel will not be able to find the existence of the error at all, let alone know where it is wrong, and of course it is impossible to really correct it.

These mistakes will be hidden on the reefs and stones under the tide, and will not be revealed until the tide goes out.

When the dividends of victory, colonialism, and industrial revolution are all reduced to a limit, researchers can look back and examine what they did in the past before they can discover the problem.

The most dangerous thing is that by that time, the problem may have expanded to the limit.

It has swelled to such an extent that it has become difficult to really solve it.

You need to be more careful when you are in good times.

Especially the unprecedentedly huge Ming Dynasty.

If you are undecided about something, instead of making a choice rashly, it is better not to make a choice for the time being.

Continue to do nothing.

My father should have this understanding.

Zhu Jingyuan put down the telegram and paid New Year's greetings to his grandfather and parents who were thousands of miles away.

Then he went upstairs with his guards and maids, and looked at the scene outside the courtyard on the tower of the old palace.

The street in front of the old palace is the only street in the old city of Liusha City.

There were not many buildings on both sides of the street, and they were all very dilapidated.

In the past six months, the old houses that were too close to the street have been demolished.

The street was then widened and resurfaced, while several crossing streets were extended on both sides.

With the intersection street as the axis, a large number of three-story townhouses have been built in the surrounding area.

All use a completely unified design of two bedrooms, one living room, one kitchen and one bathroom, with an area of ​​[-] square meters.

The entire Quicksand City is a large construction site, and the same work on different projects can be carried out at staggered times.

So all construction workers will participate in most of the engineering projects.

It's just that the time node of participation is continuously rolling forward.

The number of workers who actually participated in the construction of residential buildings and those who actually participated in the construction of the palace was nearly [-].

Many middle-aged women and half-grown children also help with chores on the construction site.

They are all simple three-story buildings with completely unified standards, and the speed becomes faster and faster after proficiency.

Tens of thousands of workers continued to rush to work, and more than 400 three-story buildings were built in half a year.

Each building has four units, and each unit has six houses, a total of [-] units.

There are more than 3000 immigrants, including workers who have just received orchids, plus the remaining single orchids. These houses are just enough.

The original immigrant families, as well as the workers who just took orchid concubines, live in a single house.

Orchid, who is still single, lives in a room for two and a flat for four.

Immigrants will arrive in the next year, so more houses of the same kind are being built and renovated.

The ownership of these houses belongs to the Wangfu, and the current nature belongs to the low-rent housing provided by the Wangfu.

The monthly rent for each house is only two yuan in silver notes, which is almost one-tenth of the wages of workers.

Workers in these houses can continue to rent them, and the palace will not drive people out.

However, when the number of basic housing meets the demand, the construction team will start to build traditional Ming-style courtyards with closed doors and single courtyards.

These single-family yards were gradually sold to immigrants as their real homes.

Low-rent houses with two bedrooms and one living room continue to be rented out, reserved for young people who have just lived independently and new immigrants who have just arrived in Quicksand City.

Among these a large number of temporary houses, all the first floors facing the street are shops that open to the outside.

More than half of the shops are leased to the "Material Supply Company" of the Royal Consortium.

They can uniformly supply almost all necessary goods for a city.

Grain, meat and eggs, dried fruit, canned food, tobacco, wine, sugar and tea, cloth, ready-made clothing, jewelry, bags, stationery, tools, kitchen utensils, musical instruments, bicycles, motorcycles, cars, guns and ammunition...

Purchasing from the most suitable origin throughout Daming, centralized transportation and maintaining a relatively reasonable price.

This is an enterprise that can realize the monopoly of the department store industry as a matter of course, but it has not completely transformed the industry into the form of a modern department store, but scattered it into a group of shops on a certain street.

Nor does it completely monopolize all department store markets. When they operate in any city, they will actively release some industries suitable for local people to operate, and they will not get involved in end industries that go deep into residential areas.

Therefore, among the remaining shops on both sides of Dashi Old Wangfu Street, Dashi King’s Mansion also directly manages and operates some of them, mainly selling oil and related tools.

Gasoline, kerosene, lubricating oil, oil lamps, candles, fuel stoves, etc., highlight a specialty.

In the end, a small number of shops were leased to individual businessmen who were also immigrants.

Some of them run restaurants, restaurants, teahouses, and snacks, some sell seafood, fruits, vegetables, and snacks, and some are tailors, cobblers, shoemakers, and so on.

The coverage of the operators in the three aspects intersects with each other, basically meeting the living needs of Liusha City, a small city with less than 3 people.

The commodities that should be available in the local small cities of Ming Dynasty are basically available in the street markets here.

Things that are not available in local small towns may also be available here.

After all, Liusha City is the capital of a country, its status is equal to the residence of the chief envoy, and there is also a prince and prince living there, standing on an oil field, and the level of the trade node is very high.

Most of the goods are imported, and the cost is higher than that of Daming.

Fortunately, the income of ordinary workers in the Great Food Country is also high.

Manual workers have 35 silver bills in monthly wages, and skilled craftsmen start directly at [-].

If women are willing to show their faces and work as shop assistants in shops, or children work as handymen in shops and on construction sites, they can also get wages of 15 yuan in silver notes.

Even if the husband and wife are just manual workers and shop assistants, they can still earn 35 silver bills a month.

If the 35 silver bills are directly converted into purchasing power, they are only equivalent to 500 yuan in Zhu Jingyuan's previous life.

But the actual purchasing power of basic living materials far exceeds the 500 yuan in the previous life.

Silver banknotes are directly equivalent to silver dollars, and when the silver dollars were made by Emperor Shizu, their actual value was approximately equivalent to one tael of silver.

The actual silver content of the silver dollar is only 25 grams, but because of its very exquisite craftsmanship, ordinary merchants at that time did not have the ability to imitate.

As a result, the actual value in the market is basically equivalent to 37 grams of one tael of silver.

This allowed rich folks to dig out their hoarded silver to exchange for silver dollars, allowing Emperor Shizu to directly receive a full [-]% of the seigniorage.

At the same time, since the era of Emperor Shizu, Ming continued to industrialize, its productivity continued to increase, and it continued to expand and colonize the outside world, and its resource sources continued to increase.

Productivity growth has basically balanced out inflation, so that in the past 100 years, Ming's currency has not depreciated significantly.

The monthly income of 100 taels of silver bills for workers now can basically be equivalent to the income of 20 taels of silver bills more than [-] years ago, at least the level of the former eight-rank official master.

More than 100 years ago, how much money can buy a piece of ordinary silk, and how much money can buy high-quality silk and satin.

More than 100 years later, before the World War, a few yuan of silver bills can still buy a bolt of fine silk.

The wages of the most ordinary workers have soared from a few dollars a month more than 100 years ago to a few dollars before the World War, which is equivalent to an increase of more than ten times.

In the 34th year of Taiping, when the war really ended, workers' wages doubled again to the level of more than a dozen silver bills, and the craftsmen of Dashi Kingdom reached about [-] silver bills.

However, short-term wages have risen on a large scale, and the resulting inflation has also appeared.

It will have to wait a few more years, when new factories and farms are in full production and new products come to market, before prices fall again.

At that time, the living standards of ordinary people in Ming Dynasty will improve again.

Compared with the currency of later generations, the purchasing power of this era mainly suffers from relatively advanced industrial products, such as bicycles.

Now the bicycle is a very advanced industrial product at this time, with at least three bearings, as well as chains, springs, rubber tires and lubricating oil.

At this time, twenty silver bills were generally needed to buy a bicycle, which is equivalent to 2000 yuan for an ordinary bicycle in later generations.Cars are more expensive.

At this time, the Wangfu Street was bustling with people.

Groups, couples, men and women, walking, watching, chatting on the street...

There are no old people, and the oldest among the immigrants is a middle-aged person in his 40s.

Occasionally there are teens and half-grown children.

But no matter male or female, everyone is cheered and excited.

Most of the people wore silk and satin clothes, which was unthinkable before the Chongzhen Dynasty.

With the improvement of productivity, clothes once only worn by wealthy families have entered the homes of ordinary people.

Of course, most people don't wear them on weekdays.

Because silk is really delicate and easily damaged, it becomes a tool for nobles to show off.

Nowadays, people usually wear them during festivals, banquets and activities.

The daily clothes are mainly made of cotton and wool, and the linen is completely abandoned.

A small number of people without satin clothes are obviously late immigrants.

Now they are also taking their families to plan in the cloth store, considering whether to go directly to the tailor to order a garment, or buy the fabric and go back to make a set by themselves.

If you buy cloth and make your own clothes, two or three yuan silver bills are enough to make a set of fine silk clothes, and finding a tailor is nothing more than extra wages.

There is no pressure on most workers in Dashiguo, and one month's salary is enough to make a set for the whole family.

If it is the people of Xintianfu, they will not hesitate at all, first make a suit, and then buy it when they find something they like.

But the nature of the native people of Ming Dynasty is still accustomed to living frugally.

In fact, no matter the East or the West, the people in the old continent were originally relatively "poor". The countries in Thailand and the West are running out crazily, and the Chinese side is crazily introverted.

After all, it is a piece of land that has been developed for thousands of years.

Natural resources are almost exhausted, and the fertility of farmland is also almost exhausted.

It was not until the discovery of the New World that the poor ghosts of the Old World knew that the land could be so rich and the products could be so rich.

After living in the New World for a long time, it is difficult for people to maintain the habit of frugality.

Because even if it is actively wasted, there will be no shortage of supplies.

Even if you don't farm, go to the beach and river to catch lobsters, go to the grasslands to kill bison, you can still have high protein all year round.

Coolie slaves could eat a few catties of meat and beans every month, and the staple food could also be white rice. Small landlords in the Old World did not have this standard of living.

Now the resources of the New World are in turn nourishing the Old World and improving the living standards of the people in the Old World. However, the Old World is too big to compare with the New World.

When Zhu Jingyuan stood on the upper floor to observe, he also noticed that the common people no longer cut their hair short, and the original short hair group also began to grow their hair.

Of course, it's not that you don't want to cut your hair at all, and it's inconvenient if the crown is too long.

Before the Qing Dynasty, all people had long hair, but they also "cut their hair" at the same time.

The nature of ordinary people's haircuts is similar to that of girls with long hair in later generations.

They mainly repair the length of the hair, and at the same time modify the shape of the beard.

The shaving of hair in the Qing Dynasty is equivalent to letting modern girls collectively shave their bald gourds, otherwise they will be killed.

That must be unacceptable.

Zhu Jingyuan looked at it for a while, then smiled and said to the staff, guards, and maidservants around him:
"It seems that there are no short-haired gangs in the Great Food Kingdom now..."

Niu Jian responded with a smile:
"The granary knows the etiquette, the food and clothing know the honor and disgrace, and the people of the Dashi country have enough food and clothing, so naturally they all take the initiative to learn the etiquette.

"The parents who suffer from body, hair, skin, and skin are not really at the moment of life and death, how could they be willing to be thieves..."

Zhu Jingyuan was still nodding when he heard the first half, but in the second half, he asked rather playfully:
"That is to say, when it's really life-threatening, for example, if someone catches you and says you don't want to keep your hair, you can live if you shave your head, otherwise you will be killed. Should the hair be shaved or shaved?"

Niu Jian was silent for a few seconds, then said quite seriously:

"Little people are struggling to survive. If shaving their hair can save their lives, they will definitely shave their hair, just like the short-haired gang in the past.

"However, a gentleman values ​​righteousness and principle and despises life and death, or he does not hesitate to fight with his life, or he endures it in order to repay later...

"It is common sense in the world to grow a hair crown, and it is unreasonable to threaten to shave one's hair."

Zhu Jingyuan listened and nodded lightly:

"Yeah, ordinary people just want to live a good life, and they don't really care if they shave their heads or not.

"The way of the people is the way. Those who have permanent property have perseverance, and those who do not have permanent property have no perseverance. If you have no perseverance, you will be extravagant to ward off evil, and you will do everything."

(End of this chapter)