Daming Yuanfu

Chapter 2086 Zhengguoben (Weiyi) "Participating in the grand event" (7K)
In fact, looking at Gao Yushi’s busy past 30 years, he will find that the things he has done after coming to Daming seem to be many and complicated, but in the final analysis, what is the most important thing?
It is not about strengthening the army and expanding borders, not about scientific inventions, about promoting industry and commerce, about introducing Western learning, and not about the imperial examination reform that has not been implemented until now, but about fiscal reform.

Military is the continuation of politics, and politics is the continuation of economics.Therefore, the root of all problems is economic problems. What this dilapidated and leaky Ming Dynasty with serious birth defects lacks most is a systematic economic reform.

Economic reform cannot wait for bottom-up changes, otherwise it will definitely be accompanied by political turmoil, and then military turmoil, which will eventually destroy the entire dynasty and cause a complete reshuffle.However, even so, the turmoil caused by economic problems may not necessarily lead to a new production relationship suitable for the productive forces at that time—that is, a new economic system.

On the contrary, it is more likely that the result of this turmoil is that in the end, the groups that enjoyed too many privileged interests deformedly were destroyed, and then replaced by a new group of privileged groups.

The alternation of Qingming and Ming Dynasty is nothing more than that in essence.

Therefore, bottom-up economic reforms are hopeless. Gao Wu insists on not letting the Chinese civilization lose its blood. The only way to achieve his goals is to lead a top-down economic reform.

The scope of economic reform is larger than that of fiscal reform. It includes at least two parts, official and private, while fiscal reform is basically limited to the official.However, financial reform is a prerequisite for economic reform. After all, if the central finance is already so poor that it can starve rats to death, then any economic reform can only be thought about. .

Looking at Gao Pragmatism’s efforts in financial reform over the years, we can see that his goal is to take every step at a time, take every step firmly, and then arrange the next step.

Why do you have to do this?Because all aspects of the Ming Dynasty are rotten, like a patient who has been ill for a long time, and has no need to replenish.At this time, you give him a dose of strong medicine that seems to be completely correct, but his broken body can't bear it at all. At that time, the result will be nothing more than whether the virus in his body is dead or not. I don't know, but people can definitely die instantly.

At this point, there is a case that Gao Pragmatism has been very vigilant about, and that is the story of Russia's shock therapy after the collapse of the Soviet Union, and it really put itself into shock - and since then, Russia's economy has never really climbed up However, it has completely fallen into deep energy dependence, the economic structure is abnormally deformed, and there is almost no hope for the future.

From Gao Yushi's point of view, the actual situation of the Ming Dynasty is actually far worse than that of Russia after the disintegration of the Soviet Union. After all, Russia has a big killer in its hands. Use a knife to force it to death.

Pulling away, say it again.Even though Gao Wushi has made reforms to the above-mentioned problems, the financial problems of the Ming Dynasty have not been completely resolved here, because there is another more difficult object to deal with, and that is the civil official group.To some extent, the civil service group and the forces behind it may be called the "final boss" on the road to fiscal reform.

"Ge Boss is benevolent and righteous! Although my generation of scholars is willing to be poor, but as Ge Lao said, many of my colleagues are extremely poor after taking office, and I can't even recruit a few aides. Is it reasonable to delay government affairs for nothing? Now that there are [-]% If it is beneficial, it will definitely not cause trouble. It is indeed a good deed in the world!

"Join the grand event together!"

Therefore, Gao Wushi launched a series of reform measures to lift the feudal ban. The measures were mentioned above, so I won’t repeat them here. Start a new life with partial support.

Second, if the Ming Dynasty can borrow money from the whole world like the United States (the harvest of financial hegemony), it may live for a long time!

The civil service group and the interest groups behind it are of course deeply connected, and the relationship between the two parties is intricate, and there is even me in you, and you in me.However, no matter what, since I have a knife in my hand, there must still be gaps to follow. As long as the knife operator has the superb skill of cutting a cow, it can still be cut in many places.

All of a sudden, there was a hustle and bustle in the household department's large meeting hall.

Although in the first few years, the court spent more money than it saved (Note: Refer to the previous article, it is equivalent to a "clan buyout" system, so it was very expensive at the beginning.), but after a few years the court It's much easier, and the annual direct expenditure is about 150 million taels less.

So at this moment, the knife is already in the hands of Gao Yushi, and it is a precious knife that has been carefully forged for 20 years, and no one will doubt its sharpness.

According to the above, it can be explained that the financial bankruptcy of the DPRK is rooted in the expansion of the population and the annexation of land in a long-term peaceful environment. A large number of low-level civilians went bankrupt and were unable to pay taxes. Finances are overwhelmed.But not only the Ming Dynasty, almost all feudal dynasties that have ruled for a long time in China have experienced the dilemma of not being able to collect taxes.

However, at the same time, Gao Pragmatism gave these civil servants a certain degree of "rebate" for the benefits obtained, so that they could also obtain good benefits in the process.

Some people may ask, why is there only 150 million taels less, does this not match the previous clan expenses?
There are two reasons: First, in the Wanli Dynasty, theoretically, the money to be spent on the clan was as high as 1256 million taels per year, but in fact this money could not be spent at all. Send out a very small part, at least one-tenth of it can be sent out.

However, Gao Yushi was still very cautious. He first chose an important but seemingly inconspicuous project, and thus came up with "Shu Yi Lu Shu".

Second, the lifting of the feudal ban does not mean that all clans will be ignored in the future, at least those princes, county kings and their children must continue to support them, but the high pragmatism limits the upper limit of financial support.

However, what Zhu Yuanzhang did not expect was that after more than a dozen generations, his descendants had multiplied to more than 10 people.After the princes of the Ming Dynasty grew up, they could not stay in the capital and had to be enfeoffed. Every time they set up a vassal, they would enclose the best fertile land in the fief, which intensified the land annexation.

Before the high-practice time travel, with the gradual stagnation of the economic development of the United States, its annual fiscal deficit has accounted for 100% of the fiscal deficit of the entire developed country, and the debt balance is equivalent to about [-]% of the GDP.Vandenberg, a professor at the University of Charleston in the country, even said: "The US finances have embarked on a road of no return."

How can ordinary people live?The common people have no way to survive, so how can they afford to pay taxes?The most ridiculous thing is that none of the clan's land is taxed!

Not only China, but also Western countries that have always represented the so-called "advanced system" in modern times have experienced financial difficulties, and this difficulty is the direct cause of the bourgeois revolution in the West.

However, the problem of not being able to collect taxes is actually not unique to Ming Dynasty, but a common occurrence in human history and human society even in modern times.

Therefore, in order to solve the financial problem, there are actually only two ideas: either let the people who are willing to pay taxes become rich, or make the rich people become willing to pay taxes.Of course, it’s best to do both—I want them both!
But having said that, "have everything" is difficult after all.For example, the former, in the final analysis, is to increase the income of the whole people, which is extremely difficult in the agricultural era.Because the productivity lies here, it is impossible for you to achieve "extremely rich material output", and the imperial feudal country obviously did not have the social and ideological basis for comprehensive poverty alleviation projects.

But...Zhu Yijun will never stop him, because Zhu Yijun is well aware of how difficult the court's finances were back then, and he probably wants to see the court's finances completely get rid of that predicament more than Gao Pragmatic.

Zhu Yuanzhang attaches great importance to his relatives, and the hereditary title system he formulated has made sufficient plans for his descendants.Even if Liu Bei is a descendant of King Jing of Zhongshan who has been lost for many generations, Zhu Yuanzhang reserved the title and prepared the corresponding salary.

Daming's finances were to a large extent dragged down by the hundreds of thousands of clans that depended entirely on the support of the state.Although the "feudal aristocrats" represented by the clan and noble groups were weakened at this time, their tax-free privileges were not lost, and at the same time, they devoured Ming's finances in turn.

Only with such support can Gao Pragmatism dare to take a clear stand and go to the civil service group and the interest groups behind it to ask for a redistribution of interests, so that they have to transfer part of their interests to the state treasury to maintain The country is functioning well.

Oh, by the way, here is an interlude: According to Wei Yuan’s "Shengwu Ji", the amount of silver spent on clan salaries in the early Qing Dynasty was as high as 600 million taels. The area is also huge.

Chongzhen's willful behavior made any force in the ruling class unwilling to contribute to taxation. The original emperor's internal funds were managed by eunuchs, and Taicang in the outer court was under the jurisdiction of the household department. Now the eunuchs are restricted by the emperor, and the outer court Killed by the emperor.Then, the fiscal revenue of the Ming Dynasty will naturally end, and then the Ming Dynasty itself will naturally end.

This is why the high-practical financial reform is aimed at lifting the sea embargo and military private ownership at the beginning.

Not much else to say, I will immediately inform my friends in Beijing and China as soon as I get off the ground, so that everyone can publicize the benefits of this policy, and tomorrow I will go to Shushu together to wave the flag for the old man, and I will definitely not miss the important matter of the old man! "

Corresponding to the financial difficulties, the military power of the United States is also shrinking, and it has begun to withdraw troops from the Middle East and Afghanistan.That is to say, the world's first empire, which is not as long as the Ming Dynasty, is already facing the dilemma of financial difficulties and military shrinkage like the Ming Dynasty.

After that, the status of high pragmatism has been stabilized, so when the emperor's needs and his goals match, lifting the feudal ban became the next reform project to promote.

Through the reform of post roads, the Ming Dynasty lost a huge financial burden, not to mention saving tens of thousands of taels of expenses every year, and it also allowed the post stations to provide financial support in turn.Although the absolute amount of this back-feeding is not large, after one advance and one retreat, that is a difference of nearly 10 taels, at least it can be said that it is not without small supplements.

Coupled with the reform of post roads, just these three "offensive and defensive changes", the Ming Dynasty's finances have increased by tens of millions of taels of annual revenue.

Too many vested interests have bankrupted the common people who originally borne most of the taxes, and made the state's financial expenditure grow infinitely.In the original history, why did Ming's finances become so difficult in the Chongzhen period?In addition to being hard-won, Chongzhen's own husband's style is also one of the important reasons.

Based on the addition and subtraction of the two, the final annual direct expenditure saved is more than 150 million taels.

At the same time, the Daming finance had to distribute a large amount of salaries to these clans.Taking the middle period of Jiajing as an example, 400 million shi of rice was donated to the capital every year across the country, but 853 million shi of Lumi was offered to the descendants of the vassals everywhere, which was more than double; only 152 million shi of rice and wheat remained in Shanxi Province, and the imperial clan However, Lumi needs 312 million shi; Henan Province has 84.3 shi of rice and wheat, but the patriarchal Lumi needs 192 million shi.

Collect taxes from wealthy businessmen, collect taxes from gentry, collect taxes from civil servants and ministers who claim that they have nothing to do all day long, but their families have thousands of hectares of fertile land... How could Zhu Yijun not want to!

Most of the final solutions to financial problems in western countries were not to force the rich in their own countries to pay more taxes, but to solve their own financial difficulties through foreign military aggression and colonial expansion, and by expanding the targets of exploitation.

What Gao Yushi wants to obtain is his unmatched prestige in the Ming military system, the great recognition of him from top to bottom in the Ming military system, and even the recognition of the actual controllers of the main military forces of the major "military regions". His cult of personality - so much so that whenever he is highly pragmatic and has instructions, they will subconsciously regard them as the standard and implement them immediately!
In other words, although Gao Yushi has no idea of ​​changing the dynasty, he requires himself to have the great reputation of Sima Yi who responded to every call and kept his promises during the Gaoping Mausoleum Change, so that those who support him dare to support him regardless of everything, and those who oppose him You must be cautious in your words and deeds and dare not express your heart!

In the early Qing Dynasty, like the Ming Dynasty, it relied on the legal tax-exempt "military households" to suppress the "civilian households" that could not be legally tax-exempt.It's just that the "military households" that were legally tax-exempt in the Ming Dynasty were Jinyiwei and the military meritorious group behind Jinyiwei, as well as the military leaders of various guards affiliated to them; the "military households" that were legally tax-free in the Qing Dynasty were the Eight Banners Group and the Han nationality Warlords; as for the gentry in the Ming and Qing dynasties, they were nominally "civilian households" that could not be exempted from taxes.

When the first cut was made, the civil servants and the rich could not really feel the power of this knife, let alone realize that this knife was actually a sharp weapon that could threaten their lives at any time.

Therefore, the financial problem of Ming Dynasty now boils down to the fact that the number of people who can and are willing to pay taxes continues to decrease, and the number of people who can avoid and exempt taxes continues to expand.

On Nine Sides, the area where Ming Dynasty's military power is most concentrated, more than half of the power is directly in the hands of various old subordinates of Gao Pragmatic, and the rest all maintain great respect for him.

Qianlong gradually lost the family property left by Yongzheng, and Jiaqing subsidized part of the financial revenue by copying Heshen's home. However, when Daoguang came to power, the financial difficulties began to patch up the dragon robe-although this move was symbolic. , but forcing him to do this kind of performance art itself also explained the financial difficulties at that time.

As we all know, although the "emerging bourgeoisie" represented by civil servants and literati cannot be completely legally exempted from taxes, they can achieve the purpose of de facto tax exemption through tax evasion, and they can in turn exploit and oppress civilians by assisting the court in collecting taxes, or In turn, assisting civilians in tax evasion to cheat Daming's finances.

Therefore, although there are many reasons for the death of the Ming Dynasty, there is only one most fundamental and critical cause of death: failure to collect taxes.

If the imperial clan is a cancer of Ming Dynasty's finances, then today's civil service group and the interest groups behind it may even be regarded as a cancer of Ming Dynasty.

No one dared.This is when the time has come.

There is clear proof of this: Qi Jiguang only led half of the imperial guards to go south in the past two years. The army has not yet arrived in Yangzhou.
Although Qi Jiguang has retired now, he is living in Beijing as Ning Haibo, but he is still there, and Ma Gui, who succeeded him, has also made great military achievements. Your sword is sharp, but my sword is not bad!"

"Don't worry, Mr. Ge, such a move that has the best of both worlds, how can I wait for others?"

Compared with ancient China, modern China and Western countries have more national debts as a tax supplement to ease the financial crisis.

To defeat a tight line of defense, the most difficult thing is often not to find the first breakthrough point.And as long as you find this point, it's like Pao Ding finds the exact position to cut the knife when cutting the cow.

At this time, it seems that two hypotheses can be drawn: first, if the United States cannot rely on debt to alleviate its financial problems like the Ming Dynasty, then the "Jiashen National Disaster" may have erupted;

So it seems that the three parties, the court, the civil servants, and the rich folks, have reached a certain degree of win-win situation.However, in fact, through this incident, the relationship between the civil servants and the wealthy folks—that is, the people who originally stood behind the civil official clique—was cut in by Gao Wushi.

There is no big killer, that is the limitation of this era, and there is no way to solve it, but we can first raise our military strength to ensure that external threats are reduced to the lowest level.Under this premise, internal reforms can begin.

But at the same time, a large number of low-level clans were often in arrears for a long time due to the financial difficulties of the imperial court, and the ancestral system did not allow them to do other things, resulting in a difficult life.Many of them even deliberately violated the regulations as a last resort, in order to gain a chance to go to Fengyang's "IVP Prison for the Imperial Clan" to eat in prison. This is full of ridicule on both sides.

For example, the method proposed by Gao Yushi this time: Let rich businessmen, gentry and celebrities spend money to buy this "third-class foreign title", which is actually the first step in taxing the civil service group and the interest groups behind it.

Yongzheng's "gentry and gentry pay grain together" was established on the premise of the support of the Eight Banners military group, which is essentially the same as the Wanli Emperor in the original history who relied on eunuchs and Jin Yiwei to collect business taxes and mining taxes from gentry.Behind the eunuchs is the imperial power, and behind the Jinyiwei is the nobles—the Ming version of the "Eight Banners" group.

But the rich often also have power, or can realize power to serve him by spending relatively little money, and then avoid losing more money due to paying taxes.At this time, high pragmatism must prepare two methods.

"Not bad, Zhou Zhenglang (Note: Zhenglang, the common name of the doctor) is very kind. The old man's move is really the rain of nectar for all the officials in the world. Although the lower officials are soft-spoken, they are not willing to be inferior. Tomorrow, it will be attached to the pavilion." Old Jiwei, join us in the grand event!"

When Gao Yushi's knife is successfully completed and starts to continue to push down, they will feel the pain, but at the same time they will find that they are powerless to resist.At the same time, the connection between the two of them has been cut in half by Gao Yushi, and the two sides can no longer restore the intimacy as before.

After more than ten generations, all the best fields in the country have become Huangzhuang and Wangzhuang.For example, during the reign of Chongzhen in the original history, one-half of Henan and one-quarter of Shanxi were all owned by the clan.

In the capital, apart from Jinyiwei and Jingjun who are responsible for the safety of the palace but have little actual combat capability, the center that is really used to "shock the world" is directly under the armed guards. The former commander Qi Jiguang and the current commander Ma Gui, which one is not regarded as his superior? Pragmatically "private"?
Under such conditions, Gao Yushi wants to do something, and there is only one person in the world who can stop him, and that is the king of Zhongxing in the world——Zhu Yijun, the emperor of Wanli.

Anyone who has studied the laws of financial crises will find that financial crises are directly related to economic crises: if the economy does not develop well and a large number of "middle class" go bankrupt, tax revenue will naturally decrease, and financial crises will naturally occur; if the economy develops well, With a substantial increase in the "middle class", tax revenues will naturally increase and fiscal revenue will naturally be abundant.

High pragmatism seems to be aimed at the idea that some wealthy people are willing to spend money to buy a social status, so that they can legally improve their status, which does not violate the interests of others—except for those who have obtained status through imperial examinations civil servants.

However, Ming Dynasty did not have such a big weapon, and it did not have a deterrent force that could ensure that it would die with the enemy. Therefore, in the original history, once the internal conflicts of Ming Dynasty were aroused under the pressure of external conflicts, it eventually led to the subjugation of the country.However, the internal contradictions after the subjugation of the country still cannot be resolved, so the external enemies took the opportunity to eat its last remains.

Therefore, high pragmatism can only consider the second option, which is to make rich people willing to pay taxes.

Is it the grass snake gray line, some things have become traceable?Yes, what is Gao Yushi fighting for all these years?
Is it just to eliminate the hidden dangers of the Ming Dynasty?Is it just to establish personal unparalleled military exploits?Not really.

That being the case, some political means are needed, such as differentiation and disintegration.

As I said just now, the fundamental reason why Yongzheng was able to carry out "gentry and gentry receiving food together" was the support of the Eight Banners military group. In the same way, if Gao Pragmatic wants to successfully promote similar reforms, he must also have the support of the military forces in the Ming court.

Some scholars in later generations have made special calculations, and the basic conclusion is that the royal family of the Qing Dynasty embezzled state assets as high as 2508 million taels of silver every year until the Tongzhi period.Even if you only take half of it, the oppression of the Qing Dynasty is eight times that of the Ming Dynasty.Even if there was a difference in the ruling time between the two dynasties, taking into account the effect of the high-yield crops in the Americas, the Qing Dynasty was far more cruel to the people than the Ming Dynasty.

Of course, like Gao Yushi's secret instructions to Liu Ting, he also upholds the same attitude when it comes to expanding the scope of tax collection: stick in hand, speak softly, and try to avoid using violence, but try to fight for taxation as much as possible. A compromise was reached in tacit understanding.

The result of failing to collect taxes at the end of the Western Han Dynasty was that Wang Mang launched Wang Mang’s restructuring aimed at equalizing land rights, liberating slaves, and over-issuing currency; The court of the Eastern Han Dynasty eliminated the new warlords of the Yellow Turban Army; the result of the uncollected taxes at the end of the Tang Dynasty was that the recovery of Chang'an depended on the mercenaries who were allowed to rob Chang'an as a reward. Separatism is powerless.

The private military industry not only solves many unnecessary waste of raw materials and redundant staff expenses, but also makes the military equipment look brand new after 20 years, and even continues to improve its advanced nature. On the whole, it will save at least one million taels a year. Individual war preparations can even exceed 200 million taels.

Because of this source, later generations will see some "surprising" "strange things": When the European colonial system collapsed, Europe's military power also weakened rapidly.

The most embarrassing thing is that due to the impact of the Jingnan War, although the Ming royal family has the most land and wealth in the country and eats up more than half of the Ming Dynasty's fiscal revenue, except for the emperor's own internal money, other royal family wealth cannot be used. In order to subsidize financial and military expenses, the children of the royal family cannot join the army to fight.

And like the nobles of the Ming Dynasty, the Eight Banners of the Tartar Qing Dynasty also decayed later, and the Tartar Qing Dynasty also experienced a transition from being able to receive taxes to not being able to collect taxes.Even if Yongzheng killed his head and finally came up with "officials and gentry paying food together", but in the Qianlong period, taxes could no longer be collected.

After nearly 30 years of planning and nearly 20 years of fighting, today's high-level pragmatism finally has such confidence.

Just imagine, after the capital was captured by Li Zicheng, more than 7000 million taels of silver were copied out. Even if one tenth of this money could be used for court finances before, could the Ming Dynasty be over so quickly?
The 700 million taels at that time, not to mention giving it to Hong Chengchou who was still working hard for the Ming Dynasty in the early days, or Sun Chuanting who died in the battle, even if you gave it to someone like Zuo Liangyu, he would be able to fight against Li Zicheng. Been playing for a while.

The sea has been open for a long time, and the national treasury has become more and more abundant. The revenue brought to the finance has ranged from a few hundred thousand taels to several million taels. Now the income from customs and land exports has basically reached about 10 million taels a year, which has become the financial revenue of the Ming Dynasty. One of the pillars.

"Since you all have no objection to this, then tomorrow the Japanese cabinet department will personally go to the shuffle and formally propose to the emperor to implement it." Gao Wushi smiled gently, and said with great appeal and temptation: "Once the emperor accepts this policy, not only It is of great benefit to the imperial court's finances, and it is also very beneficial to improving the poverty of the civil and military officials of the Ming Dynasty for 200 years. It is a good deed both public and private. Therefore, I hope you will spread the word and strive to implement this good deed as soon as possible .”

The officials from the Ministry of Officials, the Ministry of Households, the Ministry of War, and the Ministry of Industry are all right, they probably have no shortage of these three melons and two dates, but Langzhong, Yuanwailang, and the principal are quite different. They all cheered and cheered. Shocking.

If it weren't for the high pragmatism and prestige, no one would dare to act foolishly in front of him. Just looking at their current appearance, I'm afraid that each of them would have rushed forward to give him a knock first.
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Thanks to book friends "Cao Mianzi" and "Book Friends 20220326132952039" for their support, thank you!
Thanks for the 10 monthly tickets of the book friend "Haha The Monster is Coming", thank you!

PS: This weekend, I deliberately went home a little early, so this chapter is 7K+, 4K is considered a normal update, and the extra 3K is considered to be a thank you to the Silver League for adding updates, because the main text of this chapter is here, so I don’t deliberately make up 8K.

In addition, I don't seem to be sleepy at the moment, and I will continue to code later, trying to see if I can do another update before the morning.But you have also seen recently that when it is too late, it is easy for me to fall asleep while coding, so I can't guarantee that I will fight for it.

(End of this chapter)