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Chapter 235: Tax reform that has made a difference in the past and the present

In comparison, the emperors of various dynasties were more interested in the military aircraft department.

After all, the Military Aircraft Department is known as the pinnacle of monarchical centralization, which is a temptation that every emperor cannot resist.

But as far as ordinary people in various dynasties are concerned, what they are most concerned about is dividing the land into acres.

The Qing Dynasty Emperor Yongzheng's work as a tenant has been mentioned before, but it did not go into great depth.

Despite this, the common people of all dynasties still remember the idea of ​​sharing the land with a small family, and they have been thinking about it to this day.

After all, the poll tax was abolished, and this alone made the people of all dynasties excited.

They hope that the anchor can explain in detail the relevant content of sharing a small family into a mu, so that after listening to it, the current emperor might be able to sympathize with them and follow Yongzheng's policy of sharing a small family into a mu.

Similarly, some ambitious emperors from various dynasties also looked forward to the anchor's talk about how to share the family's existence.

Because they deeply understand that apportionment of land into acres is of great significance to the country and can completely solve the stubborn problem of land annexation.

After learning from the anchor the root cause of the failure of the reform, he learned from the experience and formulated a series of reform policies that were more suitable for the current environment.

Among the many reform policies, the most critical one to solve the current predicament of the Song Dynasty was the Green Seeds Law.

"As for the poor people, even the place where they live is borrowed, but there are relatively more corvees."

After Su Chen introduced the situation of the Military Aircraft Department, he went on to talk about another policy of Yongzheng that has been famous for a long time - dividing the whole family into acres.

"But for the rich, it has no impact at all."

Wang Anshi: The reform policy is currently advancing well, and I am confident that the reform will be a great success.

Officials from various periods of the Ming Dynasty looked a little unhappy, and secretly blamed the anchor for being nosy.

"This has created a very extreme phenomenon."

This was done by him to make up for the policy loopholes in the previous Green Seed Law, and to improve it by learning from Zhang Juzheng's Whip Law.

Among various policies, the most important one is the optimized version of the Green Seeds Law.

As long as the Green Seed Law can be a great success, then his series of reforms will be more than half successful, and the Song Dynasty can also come back to life.

"After all, there's only so much work. If you don't do it, others will share more."

"For example, many of the reform policies promoted by Yongzheng achieved great success and single-handedly consolidated the foundation of the Qing Dynasty."

“Among them, the famous policy of sharing the land with the land has completely changed the taxation system in ancient China that lasted for more than 2,000 years.

"The implementation of the Dingyin system itself has big problems."

"There is also a fatal flaw, which is that it is too maneuverable."

"All Ding Yin is collected and used by local officials, which will breed a series of corruption behaviors."

"Local officials during the Ming Dynasty were actually very happy."

"But the Ming Dynasty court regarded this important income as a confused account and allocated it to local officials arbitrarily."

"Whether it's the Young Crops Law or the Whip Law, they are both good governance strategies that benefit the country and the people."

"As for wealthy families, that small amount of tax is actually a drop in the bucket for them."

"It is a pity that the implementation of these policies encountered great opposition from the gentry class, and inevitably led to the end of people and the cessation of government, which is regrettable for countless people."

“When it comes to reformers in the feudal era, the first things that many people think of are Wang Anshi and Zhang Juzheng.”

"The so-called Ding Yin is a tax collected based on population."

He might be able to learn a thing or two from it and make the Green Seed Law more perfect, so that he would be more certain of the success of the reform.

"That is to say, rich people have a lot of land, but they have less land."

"It can be seen that if top-down reforms want to achieve results, they must have the guarantee of power. Therefore, successful reforms in the feudal era were mostly implemented by the emperor himself."

“A collusion agreement was reached between local officials and the wealthy, and in the end it was the ordinary poor people who suffered. This is a major event that intensifies social conflicts.”

"Because taxes are paid based on population, if those poor families have more children, the burden will be huge."

"But over time, the poor will not be able to survive at all."

"First of all, Ding Yin must be corrupt. After all, he doesn't have to hand it over to the court."

"Because they have more tax revenue at their disposal, such as Ding Yin, local officials in the Ming Dynasty did not need to submit it to the court."

Now comes Yongzheng's policy of sharing the land with the land, claiming to completely change the tax system that has lasted for more than two thousand years.

"Dingyin is an important financial revenue, and local officials are very fond of it."

As for the optimized version of the Young Seedlings Law currently being implemented across the country, everything is going on in a good place.

"To put it simply, whoever has a larger population will have to pay a relatively larger head tax."

"Such a huge gap between rich and poor will only cause one phenomenon, that is, the poor can no longer survive and will rebel against the rich."

"Secondly, the rich can reduce or even eliminate their family's corvee through connections, while the poor's corvee will increase relatively."

Thinking of this, he concentrated his attention and listened more carefully to the anchor's next words.

“For a moment, it’s hard to see the drawbacks of this.”

"Before understanding the policy of sharing land from one person to another, we need to understand the tax situation faced by the people at that time."

If they weren't afraid that the anchor would block them, they would really like to send a barrage of barrages to greet the anchor.

The collection of poll tax is a tacit secret among these officials. Now the anchor has revealed it in public. This is completely causing trouble for them.

If the current emperor notices the poll tax and forcibly returns the poll tax to the imperial treasury, then their good days will be over.

The salaries of officials in the Ming Dynasty were appallingly low, and the salaries below the imperial court were only enough to feed and clothe a family.

The poll tax finally collected can subsidize the family. If the current emperor listens to the anchor and asks them to pay the poll tax, then they will really go to drink the northwest wind.

"This matter was not effectively resolved throughout the Ming Dynasty. Until the demise of the Ming Dynasty, local officials were still collecting poll taxes."

"In the early days of the founding of the Qing Dynasty, they immediately realized the seriousness of this matter."

"However, Emperor Shunzhi had not yet unified the whole country at that time. He only made certain reform policies in some areas."

"Especially Dorgon saw the considerable amount of Ding Yin and considered it an important income for the court."

"So Dorgon, in the name of Emperor Shunzhi, issued an order to return the head tax to the imperial court."

"Emperor Kangxi has long been aware of the seriousness of this matter. He knew that the poll tax itself was unreasonable."

“But the interest groups involved in the poll tax are too powerful.”

"Especially since Kangxi was at war with Wu Sangui at the time, the outcome of the eight-year war was unpredictable."

"Even if Kangxi is determined to make reforms, he must wait until he wins this battle."

"There are two reasons that need to be considered. First, if the poll tax is completely abolished, local officials at all levels will have no money to make money, and it is unknown who they will turn to."

"The second poll tax had been completely nationalized in name, so it was a very important item in Kangxi's military expenditure."

"Eight years later, when Kangxi completely defeated Wu Sangui, he finally remembered the incident again."

Kangxi: The reform of the poll tax is not that easy, but fortunately, Lao Si helped me fulfill my long-cherished wish.

He clearly understood the dangers of officials imposing poll taxes, which was one of the reasons for the demise of the Ming Dynasty.

With this unreasonable head tax, Ming officials drove the people to a dead end, which eventually led to an uprising among the people across the country.

However, although he wanted to solve the harm of the poll tax, he was faced with many difficulties and was unable to do so.

After all, too many people are eyeing the poll tax, and the Qing Dynasty has just been established and is not yet stable. If he takes the risk of going to war, it is likely that the good situation of the Qing Dynasty will be ruined.

Because of this, even though he knew that the poll tax was detrimental to the Qing Dynasty, he had to be cautious.

The persistent problem of the poll tax has been around for a long time and will not be solved in a short while. It will require the efforts of several generations.

But what pleased him was that Lao Si, whom he had always been optimistic about, finally successfully solved the head tax crisis and made the Qing Dynasty stable.

“As time went on, the disadvantages of the poll tax were exposed again.”

"In the later period of Kangxi's rule, the problems of land annexation, concealment of household registration and refugees reappeared."

"After learning the fate of the Ming Dynasty's demise, Kangxi was very sensitive to the issue of land annexation."

"But he couldn't find a way to remove the poll tax for a while, so he could only adopt buffer strategies."

"In the fifty-first year of Kangxi's reign, Kangxi shouted a shocking slogan: never increase the number of gifts."

"It doesn't mean that taxes will never be increased, but that for the head tax, the number of people collected will always be levied according to the standards of the 50th year of Kangxi's reign."

"No matter how many children are born after the 50th year of Kangxi's reign, there will be no additional poll tax."

"The people are very happy now. Although they still have to pay the poll tax, it is relatively relaxed. Many people are willing to have a second child."

"However, we need to face a very serious problem, that is, never increasing taxes has not completely solved the head tax issue, and we have encountered many difficulties during the implementation process."

"Because there are interests in it, even Kangxi didn't dare to touch it easily."

"In the fifty-second year of Kangxi, the imperial censor read through the Ming Dynasty classics and found Zhang Juzheng's strategy of dividing the family into an equal share and dedicated it to Kangxi."

"The latter saw Long Yan Dayue and thought it was a good strategy to save the situation."

"However, the old Kangxi liked to play it safe when it came to governing the country, so he just ordered the trial implementation of the policy of dividing one person into one mu in Guangdong and Sichuan to see the effects."

When the common people of all dynasties heard the words "never add a gift", their hearts skipped a beat, and they all showed envious expressions.

Although it does not mean that taxes will never be increased, the poll tax will never be increased, which still makes people in all dynasties envious.

There are two heavy tax burdens on their people, one is the food tax, and the other is the poll tax.

The food tax is easier to say. After all, it is linked to the land harvest. If the harvest is small, the food tax will be low.

However, the poll tax was compulsorily levied, but there was no reduction. The number of male members in the family would be levied as much as the poll tax.

When the food harvest was bad, the mandatory poll tax became the last straw for them.

If their current emperor could also enact a policy of never increasing taxes, they would probably laugh out of their dreams.

But they don't know if the current emperor will change. At this moment, they can only envy the people of the Qing Dynasty who have less tax burden.

For the common people of all dynasties whose current emperor is a wise king, they believe that the current emperor will definitely not remain indifferent.

"The poll tax still exists, and it is a permanent burden on the people."

"When Yong Zheng was the prince, he had already seen the clues to the matter."

"But he had no power at the time. In order to compete for the throne, he didn't even dare to mention it casually."

"Because of the reform, it will offend many people. Even Kangxi did not dare to offend people. As the prince at that time, Yongzheng chose Mingzhe to protect himself. It was naturally the most appropriate."

"Although Kangxi was a heroic leader, he also had his own weakness, which was that he was too kind to his subordinates. As a result, these subordinates became domineering and corrupt officials in the local area."

"Their network of relationships is inextricably linked, which results in unclear relationships between them and local officials in various places."

"And local officials directly control the collection standards of the poll tax."

"After Emperor Yongzheng came to power, he didn't care about the worldly affairs."

"The dingyin system must be abolished, and the reform of dividing every ding into an acre must be implemented across the country. No one can stop this."

"To put it in the simplest terms, the so-called apportionment of the head tax into the fields is to spread the poll tax equally among the fields."

"From then on, the imperial court only looked at the number of fields in taxation. In essence, it abolished the poll tax in disguise."

“In the feudal era, farmers were the main force paying taxes.”

"Since the Han Dynasty, the imperial court's taxes on farmers have been mainly divided into two categories, namely land tax and head tax."

"The so-called land tax is easy to understand. It is levied based on a family's land harvest."

“Given that land harvests were the only source of wealth for farmers, land taxes were similar to income taxes in later generations.”

"The so-called poll tax is levied based on the number of adult men in a family and has nothing to do with the family's income."

"For example, the head tax in the Han Dynasty was 120 yuan per person per year. The poor and the rich were treated equally. The total number only depended on the number of males in the family."

"The benefits of dividing the land into acres are obvious. In the past, taxes were collected based on head and land respectively, but now taxes are uniformly collected based on land." "How much land the family owns will be worth the head tax. No matter how large the population is, there will only be a corresponding tax." The people who own the land need to pay taxes.”

"Families with no land or very little land basically do not need to pay taxes. This is an unprecedented and great event for the people across the country."

"This is like collecting taxes based on the size of the property. How many properties are on your head will be taxed."

“If you don’t own a property or only have one, then you don’t have to pay taxes.”

Liu Che: If you look at it this way, the policy of sharing every household has indeed greatly reduced the burden on the people.

The head tax of the common people is divided equally into the land tax. People with more land will pay more taxes.

He had to admire Yongzheng who came up with this policy, and even more admired Yongzheng's determination to implement this policy.

The policy of apportioning one person to one acre seems simple. It just cancels the poll tax, but it is extremely difficult to implement it in practice.

The reason is also very simple. The people with the most land in the world are the powerful landlords.

If he implements the policy of sharing land from one person to another in the Han Dynasty, he will indeed be welcomed by the common people, but it will inevitably lead to a counterattack from powerful landlords all over the world.

If there were one or two powerful landlords, he wouldn't worry, they could easily solve it.

But if it were to confront the entire powerful landlord group, even he would have to think twice before acting.

From the perspective of the country and the people, there are naturally many benefits to implementing the policy of sharing the land from one person to another, and even he was moved by it.

But now the Han Dynasty is facing external enemies, and its first task is to destroy the Xiongnu.

Only by wiping out the Xiongnu first could he, with his overwhelming power, be able to free up his hands to promote the implementation of the system of rural landownership throughout the country.

"Yongzheng's original intention to change the tax system was to reduce the burden on the people and at the same time bring more revenue to the country."

"The reason why Yongzheng chose to implement the policy of apportioning one person to one mu is because the head tax is very unfair and even undermines national development."

"The essence of national taxation is the transfer of wealth. It should be linked to income and family property. People with more wealth should bear more taxes, so that society can operate stably."

"The poll tax obviously violates this purpose, and therefore it has gradually become a chronic disease of society."

"The collapse of ancient dynasties was mostly due to uneven distribution of wealth and serious land annexation."

"The reason why these problems are difficult to completely solve, the poll tax is definitely the core reason."

"It stands to reason that land is the foundation of farmers, and they will not sell their land if possible."

"But farmers depend on the weather for food. In a year of great disaster, it is easy for them to lose their harvest."

"With almost no income, taxation is the key to crushing them."

“Land tax is linked to income, so in disaster years, it can be ignored.”

"But the poll tax must be paid every year, and it is imposed by the court."

"Many farmers could not afford the poll tax and had no choice but to sell the land they depended on for survival. In the end, they were completely bankrupt or even died of cold and starvation."

"In his early years, Yongzheng was assigned by Kangxi to inspect various parts of the country, and he had a deep understanding of the sufferings of the people."

"The idea of ​​abolishing the Ding tax has long been ingrained in his mind, so after he succeeded to the throne and became emperor, he immediately began to implement the policy of dividing the Ding tax into the Mu."

Yongzheng: Hearing is false, seeing is believing. It was precisely because I witnessed the suffering of the people with my own eyes that I forcibly implemented the idea of ​​sharing the land with the family as soon as I ascended the throne.

When his father appointed him to inspect disasters across the country, he was heartbroken to see the horrific scenes.

It was also at that time that he deeply understood that the common people were tortured by heavy taxes.

At the same time, he also saw an angry scene. When the people were in serious disaster, the lives of the gentry were really extravagant and wasteful.

The huge gap between the rich and the poor alarmed him. If it was not solved, the Qing Dynasty might follow in the footsteps of the Ming Dynasty.

So from that time on, he secretly made up his mind that when he came to power, he would forcefully implement apportionment across the country to reduce the burden on the people.

"The policy of dividing the land into an equal share of land was promoted throughout the country by the Yongzheng Dynasty, so many people think it was the latter's initiative, but this is not the case."

"This policy that benefits people's livelihood comes from another famous reformer, that is Zhang Juzheng, the first minister of the Ming Dynasty."

"The latter introduced many auxiliary policies when implementing the one-whip law, including the idea of ​​dividing the land into an area."

"It is a pity that with the death of Zhang Juzheng, all his reforms quickly died out, and such a policy with great resistance such as dividing the land between small households and rural households cannot be retained."

"After Yongzheng ascended the throne, he issued an edict to the whole country, announcing that from now on, all provinces will implement the system of dividing land into acres, without any mistakes."

"At this point, the poll tax that has troubled Chinese farmers for more than two thousand years has finally been completely buried."

"The implementation of the idea of ​​dividing households into acres met with a lot of resistance. Even with Yongzheng's iron-fisted determination to protect the system, it took nearly fifty years to complete it."

"It can be said that the implementation of the system of sharing the land with the land embodies the efforts of three generations of the Qing Dynasty."

"Although Kangxi and Qianlong also contributed a little, historians of later generations still attribute the implementation of the diviction of land to households and households to Yongzheng."

"Because Yongzheng played a decisive role in the promotion and implementation of this policy and made far more efforts than his father and son."

"As soon as it was proposed, the government met with a lot of resistance from the imperial court. These problems were basically solved by Yongzheng."

"The first stop for its nationwide implementation was Zhili, an important area in Gyeonggi Province at that time. If there were problems here, the policy would probably be aborted."

"The gentry and landlords in Zhili are quite powerful and have been fighting openly and covertly."

"For this reason, Yongzheng sent his confidants to carry out the work."

“With the latter’s conscientiousness and Yongzheng’s iron-fisted escort, the policy of dividing every land into an acre was successfully implemented here.”

"After the great success of the system of "sharing small households into acres of land" in Zhili, the opposition voices in the DPRK and China gradually subsided, and only then did Yongzheng implement it one by one throughout the country.

Zhang Juzheng: It’s really ironic. One of my whipping techniques was originally designed to deal with the crisis encountered by the Ming Dynasty, but I didn’t expect that it was eventually carried forward by the Qing emperor.

This is a bit ironic when you think about it. The Ming Dynasty was full of crises. With the support of the young emperor, he implemented a whipping method, and one of the whipping methods included sharing the land.

But in the end, there was still too much resistance. It was okay when he was alive, but once he died, he would end up with the end of his power.

The Qing Dynasty, which overthrew the Ming Dynasty, also encountered the crisis of land annexation.

However, Emperor Yongzheng used strong methods to remove all obstacles, and finally allowed Zanding Rumu to take root in the Qing Dynasty, completely solving the crisis of land annexation and national subjugation.

His main focus now is on a whipping technique, and he can't take too much into account.

Now that the whip law is being implemented smoothly across the country, what he needs to focus on is how to avoid the tragedy of people dying and the government dying.

Fortunately, he and the little emperor are getting along well at this stage, and he is constantly influencing the little emperor with warmth.

He was confident that after his death, the grown-up little emperor could inherit his mantle and continue to promote a whipping method.

"Reform is never easy to accomplish. It is bound to be accompanied by losses for vested interests, who will fight tooth and nail to oppose it."

"The idea of ​​dividing a small family into an entire household promoted by Yongzheng is indeed a rare and good strategy for ordinary people, which can greatly reduce their burden."

"But it was terrible news for the gentry landowners."

"In the past, the poll tax was collected on adult males, and the bulk of the tax was basically borne by the common people."

"But after the system reform, the collection of poll tax was linked to the land area."

"More than 80% of the land in the Qing Dynasty was in the hands of the nobles and gentry. They had to bear more taxes. It was equivalent to the rich paying taxes for the poor. Naturally they were very dissatisfied."

"Furthermore, while Yongzheng was implementing the policy of dividing the land into acres, he also added the new policy of paying grain to the gentry as one body and returning fire expenses to the public."

“The unified payment of food by the gentry has abolished the privileges that scholars have relied on for thousands of years and brought them to collapse.”

"The return of fire consumption to the public eliminated the gray income of the yamen and reduced the exploitation of the people by officials."

"These old interest groups quickly united and decided to hinder the promotion of the New Deal and let Yongzheng's reforms completely die out."

"The problems are concentrated in the Jiangsu and Zhejiang areas. On the one hand, this is because this is the headquarters of the Gentry Group and has huge room for operation."

"On the other hand, after all, Jiangsu and Zhejiang are far away from the capital. Many people think that the sky is high and the emperor is far away, so they naturally become more courageous."

“After the policy of allotment of land per share was implemented in Jiangsu and Zhejiang, people protested in many places.”

"Facing the storm of public opinion, the governor of Zhejiang was frightened. He even petitioned the court, hoping to suspend the system."

"However, how could a strong-armed man like Yongzheng back down? He decisively sent his right-hand man Li Wei to Zhejiang to take control of the situation."

"With the privilege granted by Yongzheng himself, Li Wei started to promote the idea of ​​divvying up small households into acres after arriving in Zhejiang."

"The gentry continued to organize protest rallies but with little effect. This is because Li Wei showed no mercy and suppressed any protests with force."

"These arrogant old forces have no way to deal with the powerful Li Wei. They can only watch helplessly as he comprehensively promotes the shareholding system in Jiangsu and Zhejiang."

"Why does Yongzheng have such a bad reputation? Because he offended too many people, and the ones he offended were those who controlled the most social resources."

"In order to vent their grievances, the gentry and landlords tried their best to discredit Yongzheng and compiled many false rumors about him."

"These people even portrayed Yongzheng as a patricide and continued to spread these scandals among the people."

"However, their clown tricks only fooled the world for a short time. Now in the hearts of most people, Yongzheng is recognized as the best monarch of the Qing Dynasty."

The people of the Qing Dynasty felt very ashamed and felt sorry for Emperor Yongzheng.

Due to the influence of those scholars, they also believed the scandals about Emperor Yongzheng.

After all, those rumors were told by the scholarly masters, and they could not tell whether they were true or false, so they had no choice but to follow the rhythm of the scholarly masters.

Now after listening to what the anchor said, they discovered that those scholars had sinister intentions.

Emperor Yongzheng clearly lightened the burden on the common people, but he was slandered by those scholars, causing the common people to follow suit and not distinguish between right and wrong.

While they despised those scholars, they felt a deep respect for Emperor Yongzheng in their hearts.

"Yongzheng successively launched three policies: sharing the land with farmers, paying grain to the gentry as a whole, and returning fire to the public, and achieved very significant results."

"With his efforts, the shaky situation of the Qing Dynasty in the last years of Kangxi was completely changed, and the foundation of rule was firmly consolidated."

“The implementation of the policy of sharing the land with the land has effectively reduced the burden on the people and played a very obvious role in promoting the population recovery of the Qing Dynasty.”

"The social population of the Qing Dynasty increased rapidly from 1661 million in 1913 to 1790 million in 3."

“Although there were other policies that contributed to this period, the implementation of allocating small units into acres was the most critical link.”

"Because the Ding tax has been completely abolished, people can have children with confidence, and the situation of concealing household registration has also been greatly improved."

"Just imagine, no matter how many sons they have this time, as long as their family does not increase their land, the taxes they have to pay will always be fixed. So who wouldn't want to have more children?"

"These children can go to work when they grow up. After they earn money, they can buy property. Even if property taxes increase by then, it won't matter."

"After the implementation of the policy of dividing one person into one acre, it is indeed a great joy."

"At the same time, because of the implementation of the system of dividing land into acres, the land annexation problem in the Qing Dynasty has been effectively controlled for a long time."

"The gentry's enthusiasm for buying land has been greatly reduced. After all, the more they buy, the higher the taxation will be."

"Furthermore, after the promotion of the policy of apportioning one person to another, there was no drop in taxes that ministers were worried about. On the contrary, the Qing Dynasty's treasury revenue doubled and soared."

"At the beginning of Yongzheng's accession to the throne, the Qing Dynasty's treasury only had more than 800 million taels of silver, and the court was severely constrained in its work."

"By the end of Yongzheng's reign, in less than ten years, the national treasury's silver reserves had soared to more than 6000 million taels. The results of the reform exceeded everyone's expectations."

"It can be said that it was precisely because Yongzheng accumulated such a rich net worth that the Qing Dynasty had the so-called prosperous age of Kangxi and Qianlong."

"Otherwise, according to Qianlong's prodigal style of massive construction and extravagance, the Qing Dynasty might not even survive the 19th century."

When the emperors of various dynasties heard the two key numbers, they couldn't help but trembled and were shocked in their hearts.

They know that sharing the land can greatly reduce the burden on the people and bring considerable benefits to the court.

But they never expected that they still underestimated the power of sharing the land.

It was precisely because of the implementation of the policy that the Qing Dynasty's population surged to over 300 million, and the silver reserves in the imperial treasury soared to 60 million taels of silver.

As emperors, they know what these two numbers mean.

Whether a dynasty is strong depends on its population and finances.

Now that Yongzheng has proven the power of dividing a small family into an entire family, as emperors, they are naturally not to be left behind.

At this moment, the emperors of various dynasties were already brewing in their minds the idea of ​​​​implementing the idea of ​​​​dividing a small family into an entire family throughout the country.

(End of this chapter)