prosperous age

"In that case, let Yu Dayou take full charge of this matter and follow the old rules of Dongfan Island."

After fully listening to the opinions of the three cabinet ministers and the Minister of War Tan Lun, Empress Dowager Chen made the final decision, "When the Emperor meets the King of Sulu, the three of you must accompany him, so as not to lose the dignity of the Ming Dynasty royal family."

After all, the little emperor is not yet an adult, and the empress dowager is worried that he will be looked down upon by others.

You know, Emperor Wanli Zhu Yijun is not only young now, but his leg disease has basically been declared hopeless after years of diagnosis and treatment by imperial doctors.

In other words, when Emperor Wanli met with foreign officials, it would be fine if he sat on the dragon throne, but if he moved around, people would notice that he was limping.

Although most dynasties in Chinese history did not explicitly stipulate that candidates must have not only outstanding literary talent but also outstanding appearance in order to hold imperial examinations, there are actually such requirements.

The only exception is naturally the powerful Tang Dynasty.

In the Tang Dynasty, if one was not good-looking or had a strange appearance, he would most likely fail the imperial examination.

According to the "Election Records" in the "New Book of Tang" of the Tang Dynasty, "There are four methods for selecting people: one is the body, which should be of strong and majestic appearance; two is the speech, which should be eloquent and correct in speech; three is the writing, which should be of beautiful regular script; four is the judgment, which should be of good literary and logical quality."

That is: first, the stature should be tall and strong, with handsome appearance; second, the ability of language expression should be strong, and the ability to speak eloquently should be good; third, the calligraphy should be neat and beautiful; third, the writing should be well-organized and talented.

Among these four assessment criteria, appearance overwhelms other conditions such as eloquence, calligraphy and literary talent, and ranks at the top, which shows the importance of appearance in exam selection.

Luo Yin, a poet in the Tang Dynasty, failed in imperial examinations many times due to his unsatisfactory appearance, which is known in history as "Failing in Ten Examinations".

Wen Tingyun, a poet and lyricist of the same dynasty, failed the imperial examinations many times because of his appearance, and was depressed and frustrated throughout his life.

There is also the Tanhua, the third place in the first class. In fact, the titles of Zhuangyuan, Bangyan and Tanhua, the third place in the first class, only began to appear in the Southern Song Dynasty. Before that, the "Tanhualang" already existed in the Tang Dynasty.

However, at that time, "Tanhua" was not a synonym for the exam ranking, but a special honor.

Since the Tang Dynasty, every list of Jinshi has had a Tanhua envoy, also known as Tanhualang.

The Tanhua Envoy is a young and handsome Jinshi who is responsible for selecting the top scholar at the Qionglin Banquet, picking flowers from various famous gardens, and composing poems to welcome the top scholar, hence the name Tanhua.

At that time, the Tanhualang was not the third place in the first class, but a young, handsome boy.

The tradition was inherited into the Song Dynasty, when Emperor Taizu of Song also stipulated that young and beautiful candidates among the Jinshi candidates be selected as Tanhua envoys, who would pick flowers and present them to the number one scholar at the Qionglin Banquet, hence the name Tanhua.

It was not until the Southern Song Dynasty that the third place in the first class was called Tanhua, and was also called Tanhualang by the people.

It is said that at that time, the third place winner still had to pick flowers in famous gardens and compose poems at the Qionglin Banquet to present to the first place winner.

Of course, such a tradition disappeared in the Ming Dynasty, so not many people knew that the Tanhua had this responsibility.

From this we can see that China has been a founding member of the Appearance Association since ancient times. Although these are only requirements for ministers, the emperor will also be affected to some extent.

Emperor Wanli later followed the example of Emperor Jiajing and did not leave the palace for decades, which was somewhat related to his leg disease.

It was one thing for everyone to know that the emperor had a leg disease, but it was another thing to see it with their own eyes.

Hearing the Queen Mother's words, the four of them nodded in unison.

Just as everyone was about to resign and leave Ciqing Palace to return to the front, Zhang Juzheng suddenly spoke thoughtfully: "There is another matter, which was mentioned by Minister Wang of the Ministry of Revenue yesterday."

"Anything else?"

Empress Dowager Chen asked immediately after hearing this.

The Ministry of Revenue is the purse of the imperial court, and any problems with the purse are no small matter.

The operation of the imperial court and the palace cannot be separated from financial support.

“Previously, the South China Sea Navy planned to capture Dongfan Island and keep all the taxes from the southeast coast.

Later, because of the southwest affairs, the court issued an order to retain all taxes in Yunnan as a precautionary measure. Although the Ministry of Revenue still has surplus silver, considering the construction of the Jiajing Canal and other engineering projects, as well as the military salaries and rewards for the northern border troops, I am afraid that this year the income will not be enough to cover the expenses again.

The little money we had left over from last year seems to be not enough.”

Zhang Juzheng started talking about the results of the Ministry of Revenue's calculation of this year's fiscal budget, which had already predicted that there would be a deficit again this year.

Wang Guoguang knew that what Zhang Juzheng cared about most was actually the Ministry of Revenue. It would be good if the Ministry of Revenue had a surplus, and if there was a deficit, he would definitely find a way to make up for it.

The current Ming Dynasty court is not like the Jiajing Dynasty, which still has the silver in the old treasury to support it.

If there is a shortage of silver now, it means that there will be a lack of money to support somewhere, which will cause problems.

The essence of Zhang Juzheng's implementation of the performance evaluation system was for this purpose.

If the court was still in deficit after implementing the performance evaluation system, Zhang Juzheng would lose face, and more people would inevitably oppose the continued implementation of the performance evaluation system.

So after reaching the conclusion, Wang Guoguang did not dare to delay and informed Zhang Juzheng of the budget results overnight.

At this time, all the people who held power in the Ming Dynasty were present in the Ciqing Palace, and Zhang Juzheng took the opportunity to talk about this matter.

Of course, the reason for the deficit seems to be blamed on the Ministry of War, after all, the bulk of the money is in the Ministry of War’s account.

Wei Guangde's responsibility seems to be not small.

Originally in history, during the early years of the Wanli reign, the Ming Dynasty implemented a policy of defensive counterattack against foreign countries. Whether it was against Liaodong or the southwest, the wars were fought very restrainedly.

In fact, the essence was that Zhang Juzheng did not want to spend money and wanted to make the Ministry of Revenue's account numbers look good so that people would see that his implementation of the performance evaluation system was very effective.

However, in this life, a soul traveled through time from several hundred years later. Under his influence, the Ming Dynasty's foreign policy changed significantly, and there were some things that he, as the prime minister, could not have the final say on.

"How much will the Ministry of Revenue calculate the deficit to be?"

Queen Mother Chen asked.

“If nothing happens in the southwest, the deficit will be around one million taels of silver, mainly due to the investment in the Dongfan Island and South China Sea navy.

The original plan to raise 200,000 taels of silver for shipbuilding for the Denglai Navy, with the Ministry of Works contributing 100,000 taels and the Ministry of Revenue contributing 100,000 taels, is probably difficult to accomplish.”

Zhang Juzheng said with a bow.

"Lord Wei, what do you think about this?"

Zhang Juzheng had already pointed out the difficulties of the Ministry of Revenue, and the next step was to think of ways to deal with them.

Naturally, Wei Guangde was the first to bear the brunt.

After all, a large part of the court's deficit this year was caused by him.

When Wei Guangde heard Zhang Juzheng's story just now, he was actually already thinking of a solution in his mind.

To make up for the deficit, all we have to do is increase revenue and reduce expenditure.

However, the imperial court had a fixed amount of money coming in and out, and with such a limited amount of money coming in, there was no way to cut costs, so the only option was to find ways to increase revenue.

But once it is open source, it is inevitable that it will be attacked by old scholars in the court and some people with ulterior motives for competing with the people for profits.

Wei Guangde thought about it for a while, and finally he could only use that trick to deal with the matter first.

In fact, the economy of the Ming Dynasty is now highly developed. Since the opening of Yuegang Port, industry and commerce in the south of the Yangtze River have been prosperous.

It’s just that the tax system set by Zhu Yuanzhang, the founder of the Ming Dynasty, had problems, which led to the prosperity of the private economy, but the increase in tax revenue for the court was very small.

In addition, local officials also manipulated the situation to maintain stability, and evened out the increased tax revenue. Of course, the tax was still collected, but it was not turned over to the national treasury.

It is understandable that the Ministry of Revenue cannot increase tax revenue.

For example, looms are now produced in large quantities every year and flow overseas through Yuegang.

The weaving workshops in Jiangnan all chose to increase the number of looms. The rule set by Zhu Yuanzhang was to levy taxes based on the number of looms.

No matter how much cloth a weaving workshop produces in a year, there are strict regulations on how much cloth a loom must produce each year, and the imperial court should see some results.

In addition, the same is true for porcelain kilns.

But in fact, the court had not really seen this increased tax revenue at that time.

Wei Guangde knew that Zhang Juzheng actually understood it too, but he just didn't want to intervene.

At the very least, they cannot directly target those people before they make mistakes.

It is impossible for the higher-ups to be unaware of official corruption, but this has been the case throughout every dynasty. They only take action when officials make mistakes, rather than proactively cleaning up the mess.

Commercial tax is the biggest pitfall of the Ming Dynasty. Wei Guangde, being cautious by nature, will naturally not touch it. Let it be left to future generations. Perhaps they will have more wisdom to solve this problem.

Coming from later generations, Wei Guangde naturally also learned some ways to shirk responsibility.

As for the difficult problem at hand, he had made plans for it. In fact, he had had the idea a long time ago.

However, his own interests are somewhat involved in this, so he has been dragging it on. Anyway, it hasn't come to that step yet, so he might as well suffer as little loss as possible.

At this time, Empress Dowager Chen and Empress Dowager Li both looked at him, and Zhang Juzheng, Lu Diaoyang and Tan Lun also looked at him, waiting for him to give an answer.

Wei Guangde stepped forward, bowed to the empress dowager and the emperor, and then said: "In fact, Jiangnan's industry and commerce have recovered very well in recent years. It is no longer as chaotic as it was when the Japanese pirates were rampant."

After hearing Wei Guangde's opening words, the two Empress Dowagers and the young emperor were fine, but Zhang Juzheng, Lu Diaoyang and Tan Lun all changed color.

There were many politicians in the Ming Dynasty, but no one dared to raise commercial taxes. The only one who dared to do so was Wei Zhongxian, who was known as "Nine Thousand Nine Hundred Years Old".

But it cannot be said that his final outcome has nothing to do with this.

The old saying that money makes the world go round is really true.

It is impossible to say that Zhang Juzheng had no understanding of economics at all.

However, he knew that it involved too many people, not only nobles but also local gentry and wealthy families, who were closely connected.

Wei Guangde himself is also a beneficiary.

Otherwise, why is he so keen on doing business? In fact, as long as you have the resources, doing business is definitely much better than buying land and collecting rent.

“Since Yuegang was opened as a port, the trade volume has increased every year, and now the market revenue has reached nearly 200,000 taels of silver.

However, this is still very different from the prediction I made back then, and Prime Minister Zhang should still have an impression of it."

Wei Guangde looked at Zhang Juzheng and said.

Of course Zhang Juzheng knew what Wei Guangde meant. He had boasted at the beginning that if the sea was opened up well, it would be no problem for the court to make a net profit of one million taels of silver a year.

For now, as long as it’s not a business tax, it’s fine.

If the tax is increased on Yuegang, it seems possible.

After all, if it is limited to one place, the local resistance will be much smaller.

At this time, Zhang Juzheng had already breathed a sigh of relief.

In fact, if it wasn't necessary, he didn't want to lose Wei Guangde, a good ally who supported him.

"As far as I know, the cargo shipped out of Yuegang last year was close to six million taels of silver, and I'm afraid it will be even higher this year.

All in all, the revenue from the Maritime Customs this year is likely to exceed 200,000 taels of silver.

But in my opinion, this is still not enough.

Since the barbarians have come from thousands of miles away to engage in trade in our Ming Dynasty, it means that the value of these goods is still huge and can bring them countless wealth.

With such a profit, it is obviously not enough to just collect some of the market revenue.”

When Wei Guangde said this, Lü Diaoyang couldn't wait to ask, "Does Wei Gelao mean to increase the customs duty at Yuegang?"

After hearing what Lu Diaoyang said, Wei Guangde chuckled and shook his head, saying, “The customs duties are customized. Although we collect money from the barbarians, it is really too much. If they bear all the expenses, I am afraid it will cause dissatisfaction among them.

Although it doesn’t matter if they are dissatisfied, it will still be bad if it gets out, saying how greedy and presumptuous our Ming Dynasty is.

What I mean is to establish a Yahang system in Yuegang, and add a 30% tax to all goods entering and leaving Yuegang upon registration."

"Thirty percent?"

Zhang Juzheng was shocked when he heard this. Wei Guangde had said before that Yuegang's annual trade volume was around 6 million taels of silver. Thirty percent of that would be 1.8 million taels of silver.

Combined with the original maritime trade income, Yuegang’s revenue exceeded two million taels of silver.

“Is it too high?”

Zhang Juzheng spoke up and said that he would not talk nonsense about competing with the people for profits, because the things in Yuegang were all for foreign trade and sold to foreigners, and had nothing to do with the people of the Ming Dynasty.

At least he was worried that the taxes would be too high and scare away merchants.

You can't kill the chicken to get the eggs.

He would rather collect less, and an increase of several hundred thousand taels of silver every year is also good, which is better than losing everything.

“The 30% tariff, I guess merchants will initially want the barbarians to bear it, and it will probably have an impact on trade in the short term.

But I think it would be best if this tariff was shared by merchants and barbarians.

Moreover, the goods of our Ming Dynasty are not separated from each other. As long as the other several places strictly control and impose a 30% tariff on all goods exported through the Maritime Customs, there is no need to worry about them bypassing it from other places. "

Wei Guangde was not really afraid that the foreigners would not come. As long as they wanted Ming Dynasty products, they could go to Yuegang or several other customs offices such as Guangzhou.

As long as it is strictly managed, it will be an exclusive business and it will be difficult not to make money.

In fact, a 30% tariff increase is not that much. Compared with the profit of shipping to Europe, which is many times higher, it is still a drop in the bucket.

"This is also the reason why Luzon did not directly expel the Spaniards. We still need their merchants to trade with Ming Dynasty."

Wei Guangde said finally.

In fact, raising taxes in Yuegang was only part of his plan to increase commercial taxes. He just threw it out today to test the reaction of the court and the people.

In Wei Guangde's plan, using the "official tooth system" that had been established in the Ming Dynasty to collect taxes during the circulation of goods was a relatively safe method.

Since Zhu Yuanzhang established the ancestral system of commercial tax, it would be difficult to change it, so he decided to make some adjustments.

I don’t collect taxes during the production stage of goods, but the purpose of production is for circulation, so I collect taxes during the circulation stage, which seems to be the same. (End of this chapter)