I'm a big dick

Chapter 109 A whip for the remnants?

Emperor Wanli, who was the most greedy for money, let the Royal Press desperately seek business and do business desperately.

As long as you pay, you can print any book.It is said that even the propaganda materials of Wen Xiangjiao's rebellion were printed by the Royal Press.

People gave money, this professional ethics and business reputation, this muddle-headed review is really quite touching.

Therefore, Zhu Youxiao's "Da Ming Forum" was not troublesome, and even made a small profit.

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The emperor is really diligent, is the emperor going crazy?If you resign, you will be approved, without any overnight stay.

The emperor must be a bit concerned, these resigned officials are all nobles and gentlemen of the Eastern Lin Dynasty, and occasionally they misjudged the wrong person, and that's all.

The emperor is so wise, it's time for our five parties to gain power, and the Donglin party should get out of here!

The upsurge and shock caused by the Li Sancai corruption case, some people are happy and some are worried, some are regretful and some are applauding.

But the emperor's employment was intriguing. He didn't use people from the three or five parties, and they were not from the Imperial Academy. Instead, he promoted Tao Langxian and Li Qiyuan directly from the local governors to the cabinet, which is extremely rare.

Tao Lang doesn't have any party at first, but if it is hard to distinguish, he and Xiong Tingbi have a good relationship, so he can barely be regarded as the Chu party!
Li Qiyuan is really non-party, and most of the time he is a foreign official. He has worked in Henan, Shaanxi, and Nanjing, and he rarely works in the imperial court of the capital.

As for Sun Chengzong, he sympathized with Donglin, but insisted on neutrality; Yuan Keli was the same, although he was strong in character, he was also known for his outspoken advice, but he opposed party disputes.

As for Yuan Shizhen and Lu Shanji, two fourth-rank foreign officials who are proficient in their professions, there is nothing to speculate about.

"There are only five parties in the court, and there are very few non-party or neutral people. If the Holy Majesty wants to abandon party disputes, I am afraid that there are not many people available!"

"Yang Lian, Zuo Guangdou, Fang Zhenru, etc. are not Donglin, they are all given important responsibilities to foreign officials."

"From my point of view, the Holy Majesty does not necessarily abandon Donglin, but rather appreciates honest and honest officials."

"It makes sense, it makes sense. The Holy One hates corruption very much, and punishing Li Sancai is an example."

"The Holy Majesty also hates profiteers. The Tongzhou merchants who were involved with Li Sancai were severely punished for bribery and tax evasion. All of them were severely punished, and they all cried loudly!"

"No business, no rape, emphasis on agriculture and light on business, Fang solidifies the foundation of the country."

In the teahouse, the Gongshi were talking and analyzing.It's about the imperial examination, and it will even affect the success or failure in the officialdom in the future, so I am very concerned.

"Brother Liu." Wen Anzhi took a sip of tea, and asked Liu Lishun who had just put down the newspaper, "Why are you so attentive to Sheng Shangqing's retreat to Huangzhuang?"

Liu Lishun smiled, and said: "I just think that the Holy Majesty's method of clearing and retreating is very profound. I don't know what effect it will have if it is pushed to the whole world?"

After a pause, Liu Lishun sighed and said, "In Henan, most of the land is collected by rich gentry and landlords, and the people who have no land or rent land are very miserable!"

Zhu Youxiao's return to Huangzhuang was based on some methods of later generations, all of which were aimed at landless farmers, and the tax was divided into two systems, which could be paid in kind or in silver.

Farmers in the territory are taxed according to "five points for the people, five points for the official", and the land returns to the farmers after five years.At first glance, the government is really dark and the taxes are really heavy, so it's evenly split.

But there are supplements later, this tax includes Dingyin, Licha, Yaoyao and so on.In other words, the farmers in the territory only need to pay half of the harvest to complete the work, and all other messy and miscellaneous taxes are not collected.

According to the research of later generations, the agricultural tax in the Ming Dynasty was not high, and the highest did not exceed one-tenth of the output of the field, and it may even be only one-twentieth or one-thirtieth.

But why did the peasants live so hard at the end of the Ming Dynasty, until they had to rise up for food?
There are many reasons, the main one being frequent disasters during the Little Ice Age, but man-made disasters cannot be ignored.

For example, this Ding Yin is a poll tax.Whether you have land or not, whether the harvest is good or bad, you can't run away.The larger the family, the heavier the burden.

Especially the peasants, whose income is not high in the first place, and with a large family, the burden can be imagined; as for the wealthy gentry and landlords, the small tax is nothing but a drop in the bucket for them.

Moreover, Ding Yin was an important fiscal revenue, but the Ming court allocated it to local officials.

There is a lot of room for manipulation here. First, local officials can underreport the population and directly embezzle.The other is to accept bribes from the rich to reduce or even eliminate their income, and pass it on to the common people.

Let's talk about the real silver in the whip method implemented by Zhang Juzheng, that is, to convert all taxes into currency.

From the perspective of the course of history, this is of course progressive.However, in the process of implementation, it did not bring convenience and benefits to farmers, nor did it increase income for the country.

For example: Every time the tax deadline comes, in order to pay taxes, farmers have to turn the grain in their hands into money!

And the price of grain in the market will basically fall accordingly, that is, silver is expensive and grain is cheap. Farmers always have to sell a lot of grain to make up for it.Three months later, food prices had almost returned to normal levels.

This is not a normal fluctuation in grain prices, but a joint effort by grain merchants and bureaucrats to drive down prices.

But the country has received a lot of money, so it shouldn't suffer, right?

In fact, if the government uses the tax that farmers sell for [-] shi of grain to make up enough for expenses, the price of grain has probably returned to normal levels, and only [-] shi of grain can be bought in the market.

That's it, the time difference in food prices will increase the burden on farmers, and the government's income will not increase, or even decrease.Only businessmen and bureaucrats involved in it really benefited from it.

Of course, it's not all bad.The loss of food transportation is large, and it is far less convenient than sending silver to the treasury.

But for ordinary people, it is understandable to call one whip as "one whip for the disabled".

Another long-lasting problem brought about by a whip method is the problem of fire consumption.Because it is necessary to pay taxes on silver, it is inevitable that broken silver will be melted and cast, which will inevitably lead to loss.

As a result, fire consumption has become an ingenious means of local accumulation, and it has also been passed on to the common people, becoming a heavy burden.

It is undeniable that Zhang Juzheng's reform is very effective, and the one-whip method also has its advanced nature.

However, Zhu Youxiao's reforms will not be copied and used, but should be preserved and made more advanced.Of course, this is only a small step, which is very experimental and investigative.

First of all, the policy of Huangzhuang’s clearing and retiring contains the meaning of "split Ding into Mu", which means that Dingyin is included in the total tax, so that Dingyin’s income is included in the central finance;
Secondly, the tax was paid in five years, and the land was returned to the peasant households, which also had the shadow of "freeing up the common land" and increased the number of self-cultivating farmers.

Of course, there is also the fact that taxes are determined based on the average of the local five-year harvest, which reduces the room for manipulation by subordinate officials and so on.

(End of this chapter)