Hanbo

Chapter 270 Tell a Story (4.2K)

Huo Shan had some plans in mind. In his mind, to deal with them thoroughly, the most important thing was to need a group of capable and passionate officials.

It is used to strike and cut off their local power.

And if you really don't care about everything and strike hard, this is naturally possible, but this method has too many hidden dangers, and you can't get much. It is an act of turning the table.

But if you really plan slowly, the official's needle is not so easy to insert.

What Huo Shan thought was that the big men would take over their influence completely, so that these big households with certain local influence would all become merchants used by Ren Chaotang.

Spit out the land in their hands, and find out the population they hide.

Although this idea is a bit unrealistic, how will you know if you don't try it, and this thing must be done.

Now that the big men are in their heyday, the court can still hold them down, and has the strength to stabilize everything after turning the table.

But if they wait for them to grow up step by step, then any method will be useless.

Huo Shan is already one of the three princes, and in this era, there is basically no distinction between civil and military, so these things are issues that he should consider now.

……

"Uncle, these big households are the moths of the big man, we must start to clean them up, we can't let them go down."

There are three people here today, one himself, one the current emperor, and one future emperor. Huo Shan wanted to make them realize the seriousness of this matter.

Liu Che frowned and thought for a while, then waved his sleeves:
"Come with me."

Liu Che turned around and got into the car, the two quickly followed, and then walked to the Xuanshi Hall. As for Liu Jin, he was taken to class by Xiao Huangmen.

When they came to the Xuanshi Hall and dismissed all the attendants, after the guards were under martial law, Liu Che looked at Huo Shan:
"Zihou, continue talking."

"promise."

Huo Shan thought for a while and said:
"I don't know if my uncle still remembers, when you first came to the throne, how many people did the big man have?"

Liu Che stroked his beard and thought for a while:
"The population at that time should be 300 million in the records, but it should be around 5000 million in reality."

Huo Shan was startled, so many?
"What about now?"

Speaking of this, Liu Che's face became a little ugly.

"Now, after years of wars, famines and floods in various places, and the hiding of big households, the registered population of the court has reached about 3000 million."

Huo Shan immediately shook his head:

"No, the number is wrong."

Liu Ju's eyes lit up, and he asked quickly:

"What's wrong?"

Huo Shan turned his head to look at Liu Ju:

"Although my big man has been fighting for years, we can't kill so many people in wars, not to mention that there are still many surrendered tribes and the population of the newly occupied territories is increasing.

My great-uncle has 28 new county mansions, with new occupations and heavy divisions, but I have doubled the land, which is a fact.

And on this double the land, how could there be no one?
Therefore, even if the population of Dahan is reduced, it will not be reduced by such a large amount.

I estimate that even if the population does not increase, it is impossible for the registered population to lose more than 300 million. "

Huo Shan gasped in his heart, my God, what a serious problem this is!
Liu Ju also realized the seriousness of the matter:
"Where did all these people go?"

Huo Shan thought for a while:
"It's only possible that the big family is hiding it."

Hearing this, Liu Che clenched his fists unconsciously. Although he had some estimates in his mind, the number in his mind was basically around five or six million.

In his opinion, it is normal for the population to be depleted due to years of wars. In his mind, the population hidden by the big households is still stored somewhere. He is not short, and he can get it back in the future.

Therefore, the population lost on the battlefield and other situations is still within an acceptable range in his mind.

But after Huo Shan said this today, he found that the number in his mind did not match the number in Huo Shan's eyes.

In other words, with a population of 300 million less, he thought that the loss of the battlefield and the death of disasters are basically half and half of the hiding of the big family.

But now that Huo Shanyi said that all of them had been hidden by the big family, this situation made him startled.

Liu Che laughed loudly:
"Thief, what a good thief!"

Huo Shan knew what was going on in his heart. Any emperor would be furious when he heard the news, let alone such a domineering person as Liu Che.

As for the data he said, he didn't know whether it was true or not, but if the data Liu Che said was true, he was basically sure.

At the beginning, the whole Dahan had a total population of 5000 million, of which 300 million were registered.

And for the total population of 5000 million, even if the sky collapses and the sea collapses, it is impossible for it to fall below 500 million.

It may still be 5000 million. While the population is decreasing, it is also increasing. Even if it has stagnated for decades, it is impossible to reduce it on a large scale.

Unless there is a major event that threatens the whole country, the population will be halved. This is nonsense, and the hukou halving is more realistic.

However, for the court, there is not much difference between the two. The hidden population cannot generate actual benefits, so it is not counted as population.

And the 300 million on the list dropped to 3000 million, and 300 million was considered a loss, and at least 1000 million was hidden by the big players.

Shocking!
.........

Liu Ju's face was full of shock, he had never been exposed to these before.

"Then why do big households hide their population?"

Liu Che glanced at him, and said angrily:

"Innocent words!"

Huo Shan ignored him, but explained to Liu Ju:

"Humans are greedy.

The big households want more land and need more people to help them cultivate the land, but they don't want to pay taxes, so they naturally need to hide the population. "

"Then why did the people flee from their households? Is this a serious crime?"

Huo Shan glanced at Liu Che, just at this time Liu Che looked over, he pouted:
"Just say what you want!"

Huo Shan bared his teeth and smiled, then turned to Liu Yue and said:

"A great crime is a great crime, but compared with death, compared with other situations, the great crime has not yet fallen into reality, plus they hid later, and the court couldn't find anyone, so it doesn't matter.

As for why they died, why they couldn't live on, and led to selling themselves into slaves, well, let me tell you a story! "

Liu Ju said that he was all ears, and Liu Che also wanted to listen.

"According to legend, there is a family with the surname Zhang. There are six people in the family. The head of the family is named Zhang San. He has a father, a mother, a wife, and children.

The family has a house and [-] acres of land. After paying the taxes every year, I can save a little in addition to the rations. Life is boundless!
But in the village, there was a big family surnamed Li, whose owner was named Li Si. He always wanted to accumulate more land for his family.

But because there is no one to sell the land, it is not easy for him to grab it openly, and there is the government, so the people around have been living in harmony with the Li family.

But one day, the country is going to launch a war against a more powerful country in the north, just because it makes the people's life better, makes the life of future generations better, and washes away the humiliation of the ancestors.

This is a good thing, and the people are also quite supportive!

In the first few years, the country's war consumption still had some accumulated money, but as time went by, it gradually became unable to make ends meet.

But the master of the country knows that this battle cannot be stopped, there must be a winner, one mountain cannot accommodate two tigers, one of them must perish, and the winner can survive better.

Therefore, the owner of the country has adopted a series of means, such as attacking merchants to obtain money and maintain the war.

However, due to some ill-considered reasons, coupled with the fact that this is the first of its kind in history and there is no precedent to follow, it has led to chaos among the people.

In addition, the attention of the court is on the war, so the control over the people is relatively weak.

Moreover, the owner of the country, for the sake of money, also increased some taxes. "

Speaking of this, Huo Shan took a sneak peek at Liu Che, but Liu Che kept staring at him, and said angrily when he saw him:
"go on!"

"Hey, in terms of taxation, because of the ancestral system, the agricultural tax is [-] and [-], which is impossible to increase.

So some other taxes and taxes have been added, but they are still within the affordable range of the people.

Like the previous Zhang family, after a year of farming, although it is not as good as before, basically there is no food left, but it will not starve to death.

But, for the Li family, this opportunity has just come.

Among the four clans of Li, there are people who are officials in prefectures and counties, but the people are ignorant and do not know the situation. They do not understand these complicated taxes, and the court has not actually promulgated them.

Therefore, under the alliance of these people, the meaning of the imperial edict was misinterpreted, and all kinds of exorbitant taxes were paid out, and the people have suffered unspeakably since then!
So gradually, the good impression of the court in the eyes of the people slowly disappeared.

For the Zhang family, the taxes are increasing, and they can be encouraged to support them in the past few years, but later on, the grain output in the field is simply not enough to pay the taxes.

But there is no way, not to pay taxes, that is a serious crime, ranging from hard labor, to relocation, and death.

And he is the pillar of the family, and he must never leave, so he has no choice but to find the Li family, because the Li family has food. "

Hearing this, Liu Che's expression darkened.

"Zhang San found Li Si and wanted to borrow some grain, but Li Si was looking for his land, so naturally he refused to borrow it.

Zhang San had no choice but to listen to the conditions first.

Li Si said two ways, one is to sell, and the other is to bet.

But for the common people, the land is the lifeline, and it must not be sold, so Zhang San mortgaged a hundred acres of land, exchanged some grain, and paid taxes.

The Li family is also very happy, you want to bet better, you can't sell it, you can redeem it later, anyway, it's all good things to say.

So Zhang San is still very grateful to the Li family.

But why the Li family is like this, you should also be able to imagine. "

Liu Che sighed:

"What the Li family wants is the Zhang family's [-] mu of land, and even the people, not the mere [-] mu of land."

"Then why did the Zhang family ask the Li family to borrow food? Can't they borrow from other people?"

Liu Ju couldn't help blurting out the words, but as soon as he said the words, he realized something was wrong. Sure enough, Liu Che and Huo Shan looked at him like fools.

In fact, the Zhang family has nowhere to borrow. Like him, other people can only borrow from the Li family.

Instead of borrowing from the Li family, other Wang families and Sun families are the same.

Crows in the world are generally black. Although this statement is not absolute, it is indeed appropriate to put it here.

Huo Shan continued to say:

"Zhang San still hoped that he could redeem his land, but he was overwhelmed by the increasing tax pressure, and in the next few years, he mortgaged another two hundred mu of land.

And in this year, Zhang's father and Zhang's mother died, but the Zhang family didn't even have the money to buy a coffin, so they could only mortgage the remaining two hundred acres of land and borrow some from the Li family.

Two years later, his wife and daughter were seriously ill, so he had no choice but to start selling the land.

But after selling the mortgaged land, the disease was not cured, and people died.

It wasn't until this moment that Zhang San realized what had happened. He was a smart man, unlike others, and he was still grateful to the Li family in the end.

But at this moment, he had no choice but to look at the hungry and thin son next to him, this was the only blood of his old Zhang family!

Therefore, in order to survive, the father and son could only sell themselves into the Li family as slaves. "

After Huo Shan finished telling a story, the hall was silent for a while.

Huo Shan was thinking in his heart how to appease the enraged Liu Che.

And Liu Ju was thinking about what made all this happen.

war?tax?Big family?Or those officials who are in cahoots with big households?

Maybe there are!
As for Liu Che, in Huo Shan's thoughts, he would pat the table and jump again, but he was unusually calm at the moment, he raised his head and looked at Huo Shan:

"Zihou, what are you going to do?"

Liu Che originally thought that the matter was under his control, but he really did not expect that the matter had become so serious.

But since Huo Shan said that he died, it means he has a solution.

Huo Shan smiled faintly:
"It's simple."

In his view, the matter is serious, but it has not reached the point where there is no way out. This situation happened more than ten years ago, and there has been basically no development in the past few years.

Because the big men have not been short of money in the past few years, they have not exerted any pressure on the lower levels, and the big men dare not let go of their work as before.

"The first step is to reduce taxes.

My big man is not short of money now, and it is time for this tax chaos to end.

Not only does the imperial court have to issue an edict to reduce taxes, but it also has to allocate a team of capable officials to go to various parts of the Han Dynasty for inspection.

And this team of officials needs to be led by a capable person, and also needs to have the right to mobilize soldiers and horses from the county government.

This person needs to have the intention to kill, but he can't kill a lot. If he kills too much, he will easily cause trouble.

Not only do we need to cancel the increase, but we also need to reduce some on the original basis. Only when the tax is subsidized can we proceed to the next step. "

Liu Che thought about it and thought it was okay, so he said:

"Do you have a choice?"

Huo Shan smiled brightly:
"What does my uncle think of my uncle?"

Liu Che shook his head and smiled, then reached out and nodded to Huo Shan:

"He is a good candidate, but does he have the intention to kill?"

"The next focus of the court is on the Western Regions, and we have to guard against the Huns. There is no time to deal with this matter. When the Western Regions come back, my uncle will be there."

Liu Che nodded, and it was temporarily settled:

"After this step, what's the next plan?"

"Although there is a general direction for this, I haven't considered it yet, but no matter what the follow-up plan is, this step must be the foundation.

However, tomorrow I plan to talk about plans from another direction. "

Liu Che narrowed his eyes:
"Is that what you said about the construction of the Qiang land?"

"Yes!"

Liu Che knew that this matter would save the court a lot of effort and free up a lot of hands, but he couldn't imagine that it had anything to do with cracking down on big households.

In his view, although this matter is beneficial to the court, it is also a process of giving money to the big family.

"Tell me in detail."

(End of this chapter)