Daming Yuanfu

Chapter 1412 Never lose money, be pragmatic

At the close of the new year, the treasury of the Ministry of Household Affairs has already been in a situation where it can only go out and not go in. No one can believe that Gao Situ can still make money at this time. All the officials in the capital have already done miscellaneous conversions and will start next year. Mental preparation for implementation.

Do you want to blame Gao Shishi?It seems to be no wonder, after all, everyone has a rough idea of ​​how much money the Ministry of Accounting has, and if they can't get it out, they can't get it out.

At least Gao Pragmatism dared to launch the miscellaneous conversion plan to cancel this plan, which is already the first of the 200-year ethos of the Ming Dynasty.Even if it is too late this year, it will definitely be done next year.As for the highly pragmatic financial management ability, don't talk about the school of truth and the neutral school, even if the officials of the school of heart don't admit it, they actually affirm it in their hearts.

However, strange things happen every year, especially this year, and what happened next left them dumbfounded.

Before noon the next day, as soon as Gao Situ, who had just taken the initiative to face the saint, came out of the palace, he announced that this year's miscellaneous conversions will be canceled as originally planned, and will not be offset by rice and wheat.All miscellaneous items are fully converted in silver, and the last salaries of civil and military officials this year will be distributed in fixed proportions of silver, rice wheat, and cloth.

As soon as the news came out, the capital was shocked, and all civil and military officials celebrated and congratulated each other.But after the joy, everyone had to wonder, where did the money come from?
Didn't they all discuss increasing the discount rate of rice and wheat to compensate when they met yesterday?Even the emperor had to take out 30 shi for food storage, why did things change so much in one day?

The emperor's offset and conversion are no longer paid, and the household department seems to be rich suddenly.Why, in just one night, did the household department discover a big golden mountain?
The Ministry of Finance actually discovered a large golden mountain, but the Ministry of Accounting only "had" rather than discovered it, because according to Gao Pragmatic's statement, this golden mountain was discovered by Jinghua.

No one has ever heard of the word trona ore. The officials in the capital only know about trona, and that stuff comes from the soda lake in Tumed.

It turns out that trona actually has ore types?The world is really big, there are all kinds of wonders, and I have learned a lot.

As a result of Gao Yushi's discussion with the emperor, the Ming court priced 25 taels of silver and sold the two "possible production areas" in Tongbai County Anpeng and Wucheng mentioned by Gao Yushi to Jinghua.If it involves the migration of local people and other matters, Jinghua will make appropriate funds and the local government will arrange persuasion.

At this moment, the officials in the capital had nothing to say, but there was one thing that made them wonder: Is this trona mine so valuable?

25 taels of silver, this is no joke.In Tongbai County, the land tax is only more than a thousand taels a year, and only a pitiful 300 taels of silver can be handed over to the household department. Now that only two mining areas have been sold, it can be worth 25 taels?

Ah... If you pay taxes as the price of Narita Fu, it is equivalent to paying more than 200 years!

And according to Gao Yushi, there are not many good fields in the areas that probably need to be relocated-because the alkali content in those places is too high, the efficiency of farming is extremely poor.Moreover, in terms of terrain, Tongbai County is "seven mountains, one water and two fields", and there are not many fields in the first place.

According to the traditional thinking of the Chinese, any place that cannot be farmed is bad land, so this is simply picking up money from bad land!
"Serious loss of state-owned assets" is not what everyone thinks. On the contrary, they doubt whether Jinghua will lose money if it spends huge sums of money to buy these two alkali mines, or how long it will take to pay back.After all, high pragmatism is rich, but you have to consider the rate of return for this thing. If it takes decades to pay back, it seems... not very cost-effective. It can only be said that this wave of high pragmatism is ruined. Home is country.

In fact, Zhu Yijun raised this concern when Gao Yushi met the saint. When he heard about Gao Yushi's intentions, he thought that Gao Yushi was planning to "destroy the family and build the country", and borrowed Jinghua's hand to support this expenditure, without thinking about it at all. Payback, profit, stuff like that.

But in fact, everyone was worried that it was wrong, and Jinghua would not be able to lose money.If any other force engages in these two mines, it may lose money, or it may take a long time to pay back, but Jinghua will not.

As for trona, the folks in Ming Dynasty used more or less, not too little.Before Jinghua came up with soap, the most common use was to eat it—it was necessary to make buns and steamed buns, so it was determined from the eating habits that the north used it more, while the south used it slightly less.

After the soap came out, it was different. Jinghua became another big customer besides the private demand, and it was an extra sales channel for Koujing.But even at this time, the production of soda can keep up—after all, the soda lake can be loaded directly into a car. With the current consumption of Daming, it still cannot threaten the annual production of soda lake itself. .

However, Gao Pragmatism is not worried that the development of trona mines in Henan will lead to excess alkali. In addition to the needs of the Satsuma glass industry in his plan, there are actually many places where alkali can be used.

Trona is an important raw material for daily necessities processing and many chemical industries such as papermaking, textiles, and leather. Jinghua obtained trona from the Central Plains, which not only can produce soaps nearby for central, southern, and southwest regions, but also contributes to the soap industry. Derivatives—For example, it is very simple to develop washing powder. After all, the reason why washing powder has washing effect is strong alkalinity. With trona, these are very convenient.

The textile industry in the south of the Yangtze River is very developed. At present, the alkali used is all alkali. It has to be transported thousands of miles from Tumed to the capital, and then transported to Jiangnan through the Grand Canal, or first sent to Tianjin by land, and then transported to Jiangnan by sea.With the alkali mine in Tongbai County, it will be easy to handle. It will be transported south to the Yangtze River, and then it will go straight down to the south of the Yangtze River.

In a word, with the alkali mines in Tongbai County, almost all the alkali used in the Central Plains and the entire south can come from here, and there is no problem in terms of production. With this amount in the non-industrial era, Tongbai County can dig several A hundred years without a frown.

As for industries such as tanning, they have to be transported to Liaodong, but Gao Yushi is not very interested in this-he thinks that the northern provinces are enough to use alkali, although the cost of transporting Henan alkali to Liaodong is still comparable to that due to water transportation. The alkali is lower, but considering Tumed's special status, this business might as well be handed over to them to ensure that the sales of Tumed's alkali will not decrease due to the relationship between Henan alkali.

After all, Daming's control over Tumed is still mainly based on economic control. If it makes him unprofitable, the relationship between the two parties may be closed. Gao Yushi is not so greedy.

Another way to make money is papermaking.In the papermaking industry, its production is divided into two basic processes: pulping and papermaking.

Pulping is the use of mechanical methods, chemical methods or a combination of the two methods to dissociate plant fiber raw materials into natural pulp or bleached pulp.Finally, paper forming is to combine the pulp fibers suspended in water into paper sheets that meet various requirements through various processes.

Sodium carbonate mainly plays a role in the pulping process in papermaking. For example, in the process of chemical pulping, it is necessary to use soda ash as a buffer to dissolve lignin, so that cellulose is dispersed into pulp.

Daming's paper industry is not bad, but from a highly pragmatic point of view, the quality of paper still needs to be improved.

In the original history, Matteo Ricci and other Europeans came to China. At first, they wondered why the paper in China was so much cheaper than in Europe. Later, after looking at the quality of the paper, they understood, because although the European papermaking technology was passed on from China, but The quality of their paper is very good - because Europeans do not have brushes, the paper used as hard pens must not be the same as Chinese rice paper. They need paper with good texture, so the cost is high.

In addition, the paper used for printing also needs to be of better quality. Only the usual calligraphy works, letter paper, etc. that do not need to be stored for a long time can use softer and thinner paper such as rice paper.

Gaowushi is now aiming at the "high-quality printing paper" segment, because this segment belongs to the "blue water industry", not to mention the fierce competition, the key is that it will not have too much impact on the existing paper industry, which is in line with Jinghua's consistent "Industry leader" rather than "industry gravedigger" positioning.

Moreover, once Jinghua enters, it will definitely strengthen the degree of "mechanized processing", which will also help to improve the overall technical level of Daming's paper industry.

Of course, in the final analysis, these are all for the production of trona not to be wasted, and the real most profitable must be the glass industry.Although Gao Yushi arranges the artistic finishing of glass in Satsuma, it is to take advantage of the obedience of the Shimadzu family and the Japanese, who are quite good at doing delicate work.

As for ordinary glass production with high volume, Gao Pragmatism does not intend to send it to Japan. It is better to leave this work to Henan. There are plenty of limestone mines in Henan, not to mention coal. He does not know how much Pingdingshan is enough for him to dig. Years, fully able to take on the big responsibility.

Not to mention anything else at that time, at least in the window glass industry, the rate of return must be extremely high.The only issue that requires serious consideration is whether the production technology needs to be kept secret.

European glass production technology, or more specifically, glass mirror production technology, has always been highly confidential, and Venetian glass mirrors are the most famous example.

Since ancient times, there has been a famous saying in China that "with copper as a mirror, you can straighten your clothes; with ancient times as a mirror, you can see ups and downs; with people as a mirror, you can know gains and losses".The "mirror" referred to in this sentence refers to the bronze mirror.Of course, the figure reflected by the bronze mirror was dim yellow, so it was impossible to be very clear.

The world's first glass mirror was born in Venice.The Venetian mirror caused a sensation in Europe and became a very fashionable thing. Princes, nobles, rich men and businessmen were all proud of owning a Venetian mirror, and the mirror was immediately worth a hundred times.

Once a French queen got married, and the gift from Venice was a small mirror.It may seem ridiculous now, but at the time it was a very expensive gift - worth 15 francs.

Mirrors at that time were made like this: a piece of tinfoil was placed on top of a piece of glass, and mercury was poured on it.Mercury dissolves tin.A "tin amalgam" is formed, which adheres tightly to the glass and becomes a mirror.Since it takes a full month to coat the entire piece of glass with a uniform layer of tin amalgam, it is indeed troublesome to manufacture, and the high cost is understandable-of course, the premium rate is still extremely high in fact.

In order to ensure that the technology will not leak out, according to the order of the Venice government, all glass factories must be moved to the isolated island of Murano, and foreigners are not allowed to go there.When the mirror industry was booming, there were 40 large factories on the island, and thousands of workers worked in these factories.In France alone, 200 boxes of mirrors are needed every year.

Of course, not only mirrors are made here, but all kinds of precious utensils made of glass are well-known all over the world.For example, the exquisite craftsmanship of Venetian wine glasses and vases is also amazing.It was hard to believe at the time that all those intricate petals, leaves and stems were made of such a fragile material as glass.

The skilled artisans of Murano were greatly respected in Venice, and the title of glassmaker was as honorable as that of nobility.The council that manages the island is elected by the glass artisans themselves, and the police, whom all Venetians fear, have no power to manage the residents of Murano.

The secret of the Venetian mercury glass mirror will not be revealed until 1667, and it is mastered by France, and it is still a "unique skill".This made Gao Wushi feel that he should not have leaked this technology in advance—who doesn’t want to monopolize trade?
Therefore, the highly pragmatic attitude is that the glass manufacturing technology can be spread to the outside world, but the mirror making technology needs to be kept secret, at least for the time being.However, he is not very interested in Venetian mercury glass. After all, mercury is poisonous, and people who have been engaged in the manufacture of mercury glass mirrors for a long time are likely to suffer from mercury poisoning.

Besides, this manufacturing method is too cumbersome and costly. Gao Pragmatic is even worried that if he produces so much mercury, it will make people think that he wants to make alchemy and become immortal... This is too mentally retarded.

So he decided to do it in one step, using the silver-coated glass mirror invented by the German scientist Liebig later, which is the "silver mirror reaction" method introduced in the textbooks of ordinary middle schools in later generations.The production process of this method is relatively simple. It uses a reducing agent to reduce the silver ions of silver nitrate to metallic silver, which is deposited on the glass wall, and then a layer of protective paint is applied to the silver-plated layer, and a bright mirror is produced.

Of course, there are some difficulties. For example, reducing agent and silver nitrate belong to chemical technology. Gao Pragmatic only knows the general principle and has never done it. It will take a while for Jinghua to experiment according to his "technical theory".It will also take time to transfer from the technical stage to the process flow arrangement and so on.

Fortunately, the trona mine in Tongbai County has to be dug underground, which also takes time, and roughly speaking, it should be able to make good use of the time difference.

In the afternoon of the same day, Gao Wushi announced on behalf of Jinghua that the cash was in place-Jinghua’s headquarters is in the capital, and the cash in place only needs to transport the silver from the Jinghua bank to the bank of the household department, and it will be completed in two hours. What is the difficulty? ?
In this way, Wang Xijue's reason for thinking that he could stop Cao Yu from sending troops no longer exists, and the rest depends on whether the emperor wants to really fight or strategically intimidate.
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(End of this chapter)