A Good Landlord in the Tang Dynasty: Emperor Yuan Cong

Chapter 659 Bold
Baiqi rushed to Longqiao to summon Wu Huaiyu back to Chang'an.

The new law has been piloted in Sanyuan. Now all parties are paying attention. Some people say it is good and some are opposed. There is a turmoil for a while, and many people are even impeaching Wu Huaiyu for disrupting the government and harming the people.

The emperor summoned Wu Huaiyu back for questioning.

"The fire will be returned to the public, and the children will be divided into acres?"

After listening to Wu Huaiyu's report, Li Shimin couldn't help but be confused.

"Your Majesty, the biggest reason why subordinate servants in local prefectures and counties are corrupt and harming the people is actually that the imperial court has not given them proper placement. They have no staff and no food. However, it is not enough for the government to run the government just by controlling the subordinate officials. The people have to take turns. It is still not enough to serve as a full-time servant, so every local government office has a large number of supervising servants.
Even the salaries of local officials are relatively low, especially those of civil servants.
These people have the power in their hands, so they will naturally find ways to use various means to corrupt or occupy, prey on the people, and harm the countryside.If the court cannot face them and come up with a good solution, then this situation will never be resolved,"

Li Shimin nodded.

Those ministers in the court only talk about increasing revenue and reducing expenditure. It seems that the fewer officials, the better. But when there are fewer officials, who will do the work?
For a large county with a population of tens of thousands, are a few officials and dozens of servants really enough?
This is impossible. Li Shimin is not the kind of emperor who lives in a deep palace and is ignorant of worldly affairs. He is very aware of the situation below.

"Your Majesty, it turns out that Sanyuan County also has its own public house capital, and it also has a money-grabbing order to lend money and collect interest. This usury has solved many problems of paying for food and work for subordinate servants, and can even give officials a subsidy.

Later, the imperial court canceled the lending of public money, and also took away the capital of the public house. It only issued a subsidy based on the number of officials, but it was only based on the number of officials in the system, and there was no subsidy for those who were not in the system."

"Sanyuan County then apportioned the money to the people. First, it set an amount of 720 guan, and asked the big households in the county to take turns. A batch of [-] households would be assigned, and the money would be changed every three years. Each household would receive [-] guan each year.

But later, he was not satisfied with this, and spread the money to all the other people, more than [-] yuan for all the upper households, ten yuan for the middle households, and five yuan for the lower households. The money was collected more and more, "

Li Shimin's face looked very ugly when he heard this.
"Sanyuan County collected more than 1000 strings in one year, and they dared to take it."

"Your Majesty, it's much more than that. This amount only replaces the original discontinued government money to collect interest on loans. In addition, most of it is consumed by fire.
When the rent was collected and adjusted, the rice was eaten and wasted by birds and mice, which was called bird and mouse consumption. The people were asked to pay an extra two bushels per stone when paying rent.

But at most, it costs one stone plus four buckets.

In fact, most of this expense was divided among the officials and subordinates."

Rat consumption does exist, but it is unlikely to reach [-]%. To put it bluntly, it is just a deliberate act of corruption.

Wu Huaiyu now proposes that Huohu should be returned to the public. First of all, it is necessary to retain the name of Huohu, but it must be included in the official management of the court.

The fire consumption can be set at [-]% or [-]%. The collected fire consumption must be accounted for, and how to use it should also be allocated by the court.

These officials cannot be allowed to divide things privately.

"I suggest that one stone plus two buckets of grain should be consumed for fire. No additional consumption is allowed. Half of the two buckets of grain should be provided to the state and the other half should be retained in the prefecture and county. They should be used exclusively as food for the officials of the prefecture and county yamen."

In fact, it is to increase wages and benefits for officials in the name of food.

Cancel the original apportionment of public money, make a list of all real officials and subordinates in the county, and set an intermediate level of salary and food money for them.
This amount of money for work and food will be spread out among the entire county's acres of land and levied together with the official tax, and no further changes in the apportionment or levy will be allowed in the future.

In this way, the salary income of the non-staff servants is guaranteed, and the official servants within the staff can also get a salary increase. After the fire is returned to the public, the remaining part can be used for the yamen's official office, reception, and canteen funds. Officials receive annual benefits, daily subsidies, etc.

The money that the officials finally received may be less than what they used to get by themselves, but at least the money is now given by the court, and there is no need to worry if it does not violate any laws or regulations.

Formal supervision by the court can also prevent people from being harassed.

"I have another suggestion.
After the new two-tax law, three-thirds of the taxes collected were retained by the prefectures and counties, one portion was given to the central treasury, and the other portion was sent to each branch's envoys and yamen.

The split of finance and taxation allows local states and counties to have some financial power without having to ask the court for funding.In the past, local governments often retained less than two cents, which exacerbated local corruption, which was all caused by poverty.

Now there are three parts of the finance, one part goes directly to the national treasury, and the other part goes to each branch office, Changping warehouse, etc. Once there is a disaster in the local area, it is also convenient for timely allocation and transfer, and even this money can be used in regular operations. Close positions and buy, etc. When the grain price is low, increase the price to buy to ensure the bottom. When the grain price is high, release grain at a low price to stabilize the people.

"Since we have left the fire consumption to the local area and spread the labor and food money into the fields, do we still need to give the local area so many taxes?"

"Your Majesty, there are actually many things that need to be done in the local area, including official salaries, food and salary for subordinate servants, food for the common people working in government offices, annual sacrifice fees, relief for orphans and widows, expenses for post stations, repairing bridges and paving roads, etc. Construction and maintenance of city government schools, etc.
There are also the training of local township warriors, the expenses of government schools and medical schools, and even flood and drought prevention and water conservancy maintenance. In fact, there are too many places to spend money.
If there is no local finance, every time something is done, the yamen will have to apportion money to the people. This kind of apportionment is often accompanied by ride charges. It is obvious that an expenditure requires [-] yuan, but in the end the people may actually bear [-] to [-] yuan. Even more, for example, the imperial court established household registration every three years and collected one penny per household.But when they got down to the lower levels, they collected one penny per mouth. Originally, the court collected it every three years, but the local government collected it every year. Even originally, this amount of money included actual and accounting paper money. As a result, now every year They keep the records and calculate the accounts and then charge extra money. Some places charge one penny per household, while others charge one penny per household."

Nowadays, food prices are so cheap that a bucket of rice only costs a few cents. A family of five or six people used to receive one cent for three years, but now some places charge fifteen, sixty or twenty cents for three years, which is equivalent to four Five measures of wheat.

It is very common to charge for rides in local places. Those local subordinates are eager to collect some extra fees and make money from it.

If a place is too poor, nothing can be done.

Wu Huaiyu proposed that some of the money originally spread on ding should be folded into the land for collection, and the money should be spread on ding into acres.The original chaos in the fire consumption has also been completely rectified. The unified fire consumption is only allowed to be levied at [-]%, and except for rent transfers and free warehouse grain, which can be increased by [-]%, the remaining taxes are not allowed to add fire consumption.
It is even more forbidden to collect fire consumption from fire consumption.
[-]% of the fire consumption must be accounted for and returned to the public, half is retained, and the other half is shipped.

The rent adjustment tax, industrial and commercial tax, etc. are all divided into three parts, one part is retained by the prefecture and county, one part is provided to the court, and one part is provided to each branch government office.

Li Shimin listened very carefully.

Now in Sanyuan County, the grain collection for free warehouses is two liters per mu, and the rent is two liters. One mu is four liters, plus [-]% of the fire consumption, that is four liters and eight, and silk cotton is adjusted. How much will be allocated per mu? "Miyuan has more than [-] acres of land. It is estimated that one acre only costs one penny." "

"A penny is quite a lot. Now it only costs four or five penny for a bucket of rice. One penny can buy two liters of rice." Li Shimin stroked his beard and said, "After all, this acre of land is rented for two liters a year and the free warehouse grain is two liters. , a small amount of two liters, even if a small amount of money does not include the fire consumption, the fire consumption is still eight tons, a total of six liters and eight tons per mu,
We also need to spread out two feet of silk and three-quarters of cotton per acre."

"In the fields in Guanzhong, the yield of fertile land is two to three dou per mu, and the yield of dry land is seven or eight dou per mu. I think this burden can still be borne.
Specifically, we can divide the fields into three grades according to the quality of the fields, and adjust the tax rate to make it as fair as possible."

Li Shimin made some calculations and said, "I think if you follow your current tax rate, the tax the court can collect may be less than before."

"Your Majesty, if a tax exemption of one hundred acres is given to officials, nobles, soldiers, etc., then I believe that the current tax law can increase the tax revenue much more than the previous tax collection based on ten acres."

"You rent two feet of silk and three ounces of cotton for one ding and two stones, plus twenty days of labor. Compared with the six liters of grain per acre and two feet of silk and three ounces of cotton you have now, it is actually a low price.

When the imperial court first formulated the tax by ding, it was actually based on the fact that most people could not afford to be granted a hundred acres of land. This tax rate was generally calculated based on fifty acres of land, or even less. "

Li Shimin felt that one or two stones per acre of land and only a few liters of tax were too low.

The emperor wanted to do too many things, and without financial support, nothing could be done.

Since we are going to carry out comprehensive reforms and implement new policies this time, we must consider everything comprehensively. It is impossible to change things again and again in the future, and we must leave enough room for it.

"Your Majesty, I think it can be revised to four liters per mu tax for upper-class fields, three liters per mu tax for middle-class fields, and two liters per mu tax for lower-class fields, which is more reasonable."

"The yield of the fields is two to three shi per mu. Is four liters a bit low? Can it be six liters?"

"Six liters is too high, you have to leave some room."

"Five liters?"

"It is better to charge four liters for the regular rent first, and the free warehouse grain is three liters for the upper field, two liters for the middle field, and one and a half liters for the lower field.

Four liters of regular rent for Shangtian plus three liters of free warehouse grain, [-]% of the fire consumption, one liter of four, plus two liters of Ding grain, the total amount of grain collected per mu of Shangtian is one dou and four taels. "

"Eight liters in the middle field, six liters in the lower field."

The highest in the upper field, Zhengrent, Yicangliang, Huohuo, and Dingliang, the combined acres are just over a dou, and in the lower field is just over six liters.

"Are the soldiers, officials, and nobles only exempting themselves from a hundred acres?"

"Replying to Your Majesty, I believe that all those who were exempted from school service can enjoy the tax exemption of one hundred acres of land. For example, in the past, nobles and high-ranking officials who enjoyed the merit of living together and were exempted from school service can also enjoy the tax exemption of one hundred acres of land.
If the amount exceeds [-] acres, you still have to pay. In the past, the free grain collection was unavoidable, but now it can be exempted from [-] acres. "

Li Shimin stood up and walked around the hall.

Wu Huaiyu Sanyuan piloted new methods, and the ones proposed now are indeed relatively practical.
The tenants were assigned acres, the fire consumption was returned to the public, and the officials and gentry paid the grain together, while those without land were classified as customers and exempted from local taxes.If one ding of land is less than [-] acres, the land tax will be reduced or exempted on a pro rata basis.

These are indeed huge changes.

As you can imagine, once it is officially implemented, it will be amazing.

The common people benefited, but the landlords paid more rents and taxes the more land they had, but in terms of tax rates, the burden was not heavy.

"Since it is a pilot project, I allow you to try it boldly. Based on your ideas, we can try it out in Sanyuan."

"That Liu Rengui is by your side now to help with this, right?"

"It's your Majesty, yes. He has stopped working for the year and has nothing to do. I asked him to help me. After all, he is the former magistrate of Miyuan County and is familiar with the situation in the county. Moreover, he is indeed very capable."

"This Liu Rengui, a mere ninth-rank county captain, dares to kill my fifth-rank commander with a stick. He is extremely audacious. However, this man is indeed talented. He worked in Ren Huai's office and drafted memorials for Ren Huai. He wrote very well and his literary talent is very insightful. "," the emperor thought for a while, "Since you asked him to help, then I will appoint him as the inspector of the school and the household department, and let him do a good job.

Once this is done, I will be more useful when the time comes. "

"Huaiyu, just go ahead and do it boldly. Don't worry about those buzzing flies. I support you. You're right. You can't do it unless you change. We can't wait for him to develop pus and sores before rushing around."

"If there are those who are dissatisfied with the new law, deal with them if necessary. If necessary, you can just chop down a few of those who don't open their eyes."

Li Shimin hopes to make the pilot project in Sanyuan County a beautiful display model to accumulate experience and demonstrate the effect of the new law.

Whether it was the local tax rate, the household tax rate, the return of fire tax to the public, the sharing of land between households, and the three-quarter financial system, etc., Li Shimin showed rare and strong support.

Whether it is good or bad, you have to try it first to know.

(End of this chapter)