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Chapter 149 Chongzhen: The demise of the Ming Dynasty has little to do with me?

Zhu Zhanqian also began to think.

There are different opinions about who died in the Ming Dynasty.

If you want him to see it, Zhu Zhanqian just wants to say that instead of saying that Daming died because of other things, such as natural disasters, man-made disasters, stupid emperors, or party struggles, it is better to say that the demise of Daming is actually due to finances!

The root of all problems is finances.

Because of the distorted and chaotic finances, the three great mountains were nourished and strengthened, and in the end the Ming Dynasty was crushed alive, and finally in the Chongzhen Dynasty, it was completely destroyed!

And these three mountains are: first, the sea ban policy; second, the Donglin Party; third, the defeat of the three major battles.

The first is the sea ban.

The Ming Dynasty established a sea ban to prohibit commercial trade, but the sea ban of the Ming Dynasty was not completely isolated from the world like the later alien dynasties. What the Ming Dynasty prohibited was merchants from going overseas to do business, and what was open was the tribute trade.

That is to say, the Ming Dynasty only allowed tribute, but not trade. Whatever good things the countries have, they can pay tribute to the Ming Dynasty to nourish the Ming Dynasty.

In fact, in Zhu Zhanqian's view, although it is not good for economic development, at least it will not derail Ming Dynasty from the world, and thus fall behind and be beaten.

"From Lao Zhu's eyes, I'm not sure whether he can see the pros and cons of the sea ban, but people like Zhu Biao and Li Shanchang can definitely see it. But the result has not changed. Perhaps the biggest factor is the relationship with Japanese pirates." related."

Thinking about it, Zhu Zhanqian glanced at Lao Zhu.

As the troubles of Japanese pirates intensify, the sea ban becomes stricter!
This state lasted until the Longqing period, when it began to be opened, and it was called the Longqing switch in history. At that time, the Daming banknotes were basically completely abolished.

Gold and silver have become hard currency!

The cancellation of the sea ban increased Daming's income and gave birth to another evil organization, the Donglin Party.

Except for a few who have died in battle and can be counted as individuals, almost all of them are villains!

These silverfish fight for everything, power, profit, and land. They really have no king, no father, no country, no home, a group of scum that has been damaged from the bone marrow to the skin.

It is because of this group of people that Ming Dynasty hardly collects tariffs and commercial taxes!
As a result, the Ming court clearly opened the sea ban and allowed merchants to trade, but in the end they had no money at all.

Otherwise, the huge pressure brought by the feudal king's expenses can be relieved a lot.

There are so many capable ministers in the Ming Dynasty, no one will see the disadvantages of not collecting tariffs and commercial taxes, but once someone says to collect tariffs and commercial taxes, officials from the coastal department will jump out and object. The high-sounding reason is that the country does not cooperate with the people. Compete for profit.

civil?What is Min?
In their eyes, the people refer to the coastal gentry behind the Donglin Party!

These gentry clans, in the sea trade and commerce, made a lot of money, so naturally they refused to allow the court to levy taxes.

The officials of Ming Dynasty were selected through imperial examinations!

The southern coastal areas are economically developed, with a large base of scholars and high standards. In the unified imperial examination, it can be said that they have taken advantage from the beginning!
For a long time, the number of people in the south of the Yangtze River has been crushing the north for a long time. Therefore, most of the time, national policies are controlled by the southern faction.

Well, this group of people is also known as the Donglin Party!

As a result, tariffs cannot be collected, and commercial taxes cannot be collected.

Where should Ming's finances come from?It goes without saying, land tax!

However, even so, the land tax was still cut by these civil servants and the Donglin Party!

why?Because officials and gentlemen don't pay taxes! ! !

That is to say, the officials and scholars in the middle school are not taxed on the land!

For the Ming Dynasty, nothing could be seen at the beginning of the Ming Dynasty, but as the time of the dynasty grew, this financial black hole became a problem!
In addition, the emperors in the later period were also wonderful.

One by one spent money lavishly, and the emperor's own small coffers were not enough.

The emperor's internal funds mainly come from Huangzhuang and Huangdian.

It can produce several 10 taels a year. In the Wanli Dynasty, in order to spend money, the bastard Wanli even sent eunuchs to merge land into Huangzhuang, merge shops into Huangdian, and also open mines and collect mining taxes.

In this way, officials below began to follow suit.

Local officials can't control land mergers. In order to complete the calculation, they can only find a way on the remaining self-cultivating farmers!
Land tax for self-cultivating farmers!

As a result, the burden on self-cultivating farmers has become increasingly serious.

However, as the saying goes, there are policies above and countermeasures below.

Just because the gentry and gentry do not need to pay taxes, the self-cultivating farmers voluntarily "contribute" their land to the officials and gentry!

Although these self-governing farmers are unwilling, there is no way!
Due to the huge tax burden in the later period, they had to contribute their land!
A circular ecological system in which the owner farmers and the gentry conspired to divide the government's tax revenue was born. In Zhu Zhanqian's view, this system is simply a cancer among cancers, the deadly one!
In this way, the imperial court can neither collect commercial taxes and customs duties, nor can it collect taxes from officials and gentry families, in order to pay for the ever-increasing military expenditures!
Then Wanli's brain was pumped, and he began to levy three new taxes one after another: 1. Liao's payment, 2. Suppression's payment, and 3. Lian's payment, which is what later generations called the three rates.

Then entered the Little Ice Age, which led to a sharp decrease in farming harvests in the north, superimposed land annexation, and an increase in the three rates. In the later period, the three rates directly reached several times the talent, which directly led to the bankruptcy of a large number of self-cultivating farmers.

All these situations were caused by the Ming court itself!

Leaving aside his standpoint, from an objective point of view, Zhu Zhanqian just wants to say two sentences:
1. Oh, Intuit, you deserve it!
2. Ma De, rubbish Ming Dynasty, no matter whether the people live or die, you deserve your fucking death!

Ahem, of course, Zhu Zhanqian can't say these things now, he is also a member of the royal family, so he must always keep his position in mind!
But this kind of problem will never happen again.

This kind of land merger is not unique to the Ming Dynasty, because officials and gentry have not paid taxes since ancient times.

The final result is that the court's tax sources have dropped sharply.

Fiscal revenue has also dropped drastically, and this financial black hole was not resolved by the five elders of the Xianming cabinet until some time ago!
And this policy is called "Officials and gentry pay food in one body". As soon as this policy came out, it was directly praised by scholars all over the world, and people can wake up from their dreams with laughter.

why?Paying taxes to a certain extent is considered a contribution!
When the contribution accumulates to a certain level, it will be transformed into merit, which means that you will get the immortal law!
In this way, the financial black hole of Ming Dynasty will naturally be solved.

Of course, there are also policies that benefit the country and the people, such as "spreading into the mu" and "returning fire consumption to the public" proposed by his father Zhu Gaochi, all of which have made Xianming's development flourish.

Financial and land issues have appeared since the beginning. These are some problems that should have existed. From the beginning of Lao Zhu himself, the problems have been left over.

After that, it was Daming's system of raising "pigs".

This thing originated from Lao Zhu, and its glory is greater than that of the old man!

The vassal king can't leave the fief, can't do politics, it's like raising pigs, because there's nothing to do, just eat, drink, scatter, and have children.

Children still have titles, and titles are also given salary according to the system, manors, fields, etc. Therefore, there will be more and more descendants in the later period.

It directly caused the national finances, which were already in the cold winter, to become even worse, and the burden became more and more serious. Almost all financial expenditures were given to vassal princes and officials, and they were almost ignored by the people.

In the early days, it was fine, with few descendants and a small financial burden. By the end of Ming Dynasty, the number of descendants was huge, and it collapsed directly.

In the 21 years of the Jiajing period alone, the royal family's expenditure can be said to have accounted for more than half of the country's fiscal expenditure.

In the late Wanli period, there was a deficit every year!
In the end, there is only a large-scale reduction in expenditure, and then the abolition of various court infrastructures.

Don't abolish the most useless, only abolish the least right to speak!

Then when there was no money, they would start arrears of military pay. For the two generations of Tianqi and Chongzhen, arrears of military pay became the norm!
It directly led to the weak momentum of the army, and incidents of frontier army fighting for salary appeared one after another!
Liaodong military affairs began to fall into disrepair. It can be said that everyone in the Ming Dynasty watched a barbaric tribe of a foreign race develop, grow, and grow stronger.

During this period, there was no action!

After the military expenses were in arrears, the officials' salaries began to be in arrears!
The wages of officials in the past dynasties were the lowest, and by the end of the Ming Dynasty, there was no minimum wage.

If Lao Zhu doesn't bear this calamity, who will bear it?Isn't this a good start for him?

Then officials don't have salaries, so they naturally don't work, or they can find ways to make money by themselves, what should they do?Do bad things, collude with the enemy and betray the country!
Corruption is rife, and bureaucrats at all levels are like wolves and tigers, greedy for all kinds of money.

For the little military pay that Chongzhen begged his grandpa to sue his grandma for frugality, he would be exploited layer after layer before leaving the capital, and his skin would be peeled off!

In the later period of Chongzhen, the mountains and rivers were exhausted, and all parties and parties defaulted, and then even the salary of the vassal king began to default!

The clan vassals who had no income started to make troubles, shot, killed and looted, and the order of the entire Ming Dynasty collapsed directly!
In the end, due to financial problems, the three major battles of the Sarhu War, the Songjin War, and the current Tongguan War failed!
The death knell was sounded for the complete subjugation of Ming Dynasty.

And all these, in the end, there are still two words: finance!
Because of this, Zhu Zhanqian believes that all kinds of social chaos in the late Ming Dynasty, rebellion, corruption, etc., which finally led to the downfall of the Ming Dynasty, were all due to financial reasons.

So where does the source of finance come from?Old Zhu!

These thoughts flashed through Zhu Zhanqian's mind, and the atmosphere on the deck was still a little weird.

Especially looking at Lao Zhu's expression of making good use of the old man, Zhu Zhanqian blushed for him. Lao Zhu's achievements are naturally unprecedented.

But when it comes to political achievements and contributions to Ming Dynasty, there are almost none. Instead, a lot of problems are left over, and these problems have become ancestral etiquette.

"Tsk, I don't know what kind of expression Lao Zhu will have when he realizes that he is the source of all problems one day." Zhu Zhan was thinking, and suddenly looked forward to that day.

But he didn't intend to say it out.

As a result, Xianming has developed now, driving the great Ming of the heavens, and these problems will no longer appear.

Secondly, as a junior, I offended others for no reason.

The main reason is that it is still meaningless. Don’t do meaningless things. If you do it, it will be thankless and make yourself feel guilty.

Is there nothing wrong with me?Chongzhen looked at Taizong, Shizong, and Wuzong, feeling very surprised.

To be honest, he thought Taizu Taizong would blame him, but after hearing what Taizu said, the demise of Ming Dynasty had little to do with him?

"Boom!"

At this moment, the warship suddenly roared, and the speed slowed down, and everyone immediately came back to their senses.

"Ancestors, we have arrived at Tongguan!" At this moment, Chongzhen, who was feeling all kinds of uncomfortable, hurriedly opened his mouth to help everyone.

Hearing Chongzhen's words, everyone including the old man couldn't help but breathe a sigh of relief.

At the same time, Tongguan is the place where troops are stationed.

Sun Chuanting, dressed in armor and with a long sword on his waist, stood outside the barracks fighting, looking at the soldiers below, with unbearable expression in his eyes.

These soldiers, today's battle, do not know how many people will come back.

For this battle, to be honest, he didn't have any confidence in his heart.

We can only rely on this last stand.

"What's that!?" Suddenly at this moment, there was an exclamation from the crowd.

When everyone followed closely, they felt that the top of their heads went dark.

When everyone looked up, everyone including Sun Chuanting was dumbfounded.

Looking in horror at the terrifying big ship floating in the sky.

The ship actually went to the sky? !

"..."

(End of this chapter)