Daming Yuanfu

Chapter 74 Income and Expenditure in the Park ([-])
I have 2000 acres of land under my name, and only [-] acres of it have been included in the yellow book and need to be taxed. Logically speaking, this should be a good thing, but Gao Yushi feels that his situation has suddenly become embarrassing. stand up.

According to his thinking, anyone's property in the world should be taxed unless the law stipulates tax exemption—for example, temporary tax exemption to promote the development of a certain industry.Taxation, in his opinion, should not be considered as exploitation, because it is the necessary basis for the country to maintain normal operation and regulate the macroeconomy.

Taxation should and must be collected from the people and used for the people.In fact, the ancients did not have such an idea, but they always went astray in actual operation.

More than 2000 mu of land is not considered a small property. It is said that this alone can squeeze into the threshold of big landlords, but although Gao Yushi also intends to make money for himself, he does not want to "evade taxes".

According to Zhang Jin's brief introduction, the average yield of these two thousand acres of land is not high, but in fact, in North China at this time, it is not very low, about two hundred If you get these two thousand mu of land, it is equivalent to getting 20 catties of grain every year.

Because the yield per mu in the north is lower than that in the south, the tax standards near Gyeonggi are actually quite low.Especially because the Gyeonggi area is densely populated and the grain output is not high. In order to ensure the food supply in the Gyeonggi area, the imperial court did not implement a whip here, but continued to levy taxes in kind.This tax in kind is very low, and the average tax rate is roughly only one-fortieth of the output on the surface.Even if it is 20 catties, the actual tax payable is only [-] catties of grain per year.

The flour extraction rate of wheat in later generations is very high, but the flour extraction rate of wheat in the Ming Dynasty was relatively low. It is not bad to have a flour extraction rate of 60.00%, so if the five thousand catties of wheat are replaced with flour, it is only three thousand catties about.

What is the price of flour? Gao Wushi had calculated it before when he got the first Zhang’s money. The price of one hundred catties of flour was only one tael of silver, and three thousand catties of flour...but it was equivalent to paying 30 taels of silver. Tax.

Yes, it's only 30 taels of silver.

What is the concept of 30 taels of silver?
The highly pragmatic uncle Zhang Siwei was worried that his nephew would lose face when he came to his other courtyard as the master for the first time, so he gave him 5000 taels directly!

This is 5000 taels!

If the 5000 taels of silver are used to pay taxes for Sanshen Garden and its properties, even if there is no hidden land of one mu of land, if the due taxes are paid in full, they can continue to pay taxes for 160 years!
Daming has kept scholars for 200 years, but the scholars refused to pay such a small tax honestly.Thinking of this, Gao Wushi really felt sad for the Ming court.

Later generations, because of the influence of "Fan Jinzhongju" in "The Scholars", there is a view that in the Ming Dynasty, all the people above the Juren were exempted from tax. In fact, this is wrong, and it is not so exaggerated-at least there was no such saying in the Wanli period.

In fact, Daming has a bottom line of principle, and it has a relatively clear tax-free land quota.

For example, Jinshi can have [-] mu of tax-free land, while the amount of tax-free land for Juren is [-] mu. As for scholar, the tax-free land is [-] mu.

This data has already been known by Gao Pragmatism as soon as he is "sensible" in his life.So he once had a very rough calculation.

The imperial examinations in the Ming Dynasty were held every three years, and about 300 people were admitted each time.On average, almost 100 people are admitted every year. If it is assumed that everyone can live for 25 years after becoming a Jinshi, then under normal circumstances in the Ming Dynasty, there would be [-] living Jinshi in the whole country-this is about [-] people in the whole country. The number of officials above rank, of course, is limited to civil servants.

The situation of juren is a bit more complicated. Larger provinces such as Nanzhili admit 120 to 130 students per subject, while smaller provinces such as Jiangxi admit 90 students per year.Daming has thirteen provinces, and there are about 500 Juren in each department.Counting more, 30 people, then on average there will be [-] Juren per year. If the average life expectancy is [-] years after winning the exam, then there will usually be [-] living Juren in Ming Dynasty.

As for the number of scholars, it is difficult to estimate, but there are usually 2000 people in each township examination. Considering that some of them should not be qualified to participate in the township examination, there should be 5000 people in a province on average.There are about 7 people in the thirteen provinces and other places.

Of course, this estimate is only a very general estimate made by a highly pragmatic individual. The accuracy is definitely not much higher, but it is more or less a reference value.

Then, based on this value, the tax-free land for Jinshi nationwide is about 500 million mu; the tax-free land for Juren is about 600 million mu;

How much is the total tax-free land in the country? 500 million plus 600 million, plus 560 million, the total is only 660 million mu.

How much arable land did the Ming Dynasty have?At least [-] million mu.

The gentry who received tax exemptions for studying accounted for 660 million mu, or 54/[-] of the country's total arable land.

Is this ratio high?Obviously not high, because according to this data, if the gentry did not deliberately evade taxes, this field would not have a serious impact on the economic foundation of the Ming court.This is also a theoretical basis for a well-known scholar surnamed Huang in a famous economic history book to believe that the Ming Dynasty was not "severe land annexation", but that the trouble was that land annexation was not serious.

Looking at the agricultural tax of the Ming Dynasty, the agricultural tax of the Ming Dynasty during the Xuande period was about 700 million shi. Historically, the agricultural tax in the sixth year of Wanli was about 670 million shi. The difference between before and after is not big.

But the problem is that the gentry are not really satisfied with this level of tax exemption, even though they already have a fairly low amount of tax-free land.But maybe it’s really because no one thinks they have too much money, so it’s always good to give less to the court and the emperor—anyway, “Your Majesty is rich all over the world”, why bother to “compete with the people for profit”?
As for the fact that Emperor Longqing wanted to buy a batch of jewelry for the harem when he ascended the throne, but was rejected by the civil officials, that is the way of our civil officials to be ministers-to Jun Yao and Shun!

According to the standards of Yao and Shun, your Majesty, that is the earnest expectation of your ministers. How can you enjoy yourself and buy jewelry for your women?If things go on like this, the country will not be the country, Your Majesty!

As for people like Xu Jie, originally from a poor family background, why did they have so many lands after being an official for decades, but they were picked out by Hai Rui... Uh, well, it's mainly because Hai Rui is ignorant , can't take on the heavy responsibility at all!
And actually?What about paying taxes?
In fact, even if there is no tax exemption, the tax rate of Ming Dynasty itself is already extremely low, and it is only one-thirtieth of the high rate. In terms of percentage, the tax rate is less than 4%, which is the lowest in all dynasties!We must know that before the agricultural tax was exempted in New China, the average agricultural tax rate was 15.5% of the annual output.

But why under such a low tax rate, once the country has problems, such as the Tunguska wild boarskin rebellion in history, the country's finances quickly fell into trouble, and then there were riots among the people?Is it because the common people and bitter people are so precious?

There are indeed many reasons for this, and the additional levy is indeed counted as one.It's just very strange, because the original tax rate was only [-]%, even if it is doubled, it will reach the normal level of the Tang Dynasty, but you have to know that the agricultural level of the Ming Dynasty has improved compared to the Tang Dynasty. Just add a little bit of levy and directly levy the smoke all over the place?

This issue must be clarified for Gao Yushi to carry out reforms in the future. He needs to combine some research materials he saw in his previous life and some of his own thinking with the real situation he is currently encountering.

But he estimates that one of the important reasons must be that the rich and powerful have a lot of hidden land in their hands!

Therefore, as a transmigrator who seriously wants to "save the Ming" through reforms rather than revolution, he really wants to make his hidden fields public, but Zhang Jin just mentioned this idea, and Zhang Jin Give the top back.

(End of this chapter)