People in the Song Dynasty were lawless

Chapter 263 Recovery first, then development

After a year of administrative rectification, the second round of the New Deal was officially launched.

This time there was still not much opposition.

the reason is simple.

Do farmers and landowners welcome tax and corvee reductions?

Of course you are welcome.

So farmers and landowners will definitely agree.

Will businessmen welcome reforming business and abolishing the original tax system?

Of course you are welcome.

So businessmen will agree.

Will the local government agree to changes in local and national taxes?

Thumbs up.

In the past, if officials wanted to do something and achieve some political achievements, such as building bridges, paving roads, and constructing water conservancy facilities, there were only two ways.

One is to ask the court for money.

The second is to find local gentry and landlords to raise funds.

Now some of the national tax will be reserved for local governments in proportion and become local taxes. As a result, local governments will have public funds to use, and they will naturally be able to achieve some political achievements.

Moreover, it turns out that officials do not receive wages, but after withholding local taxes, officials can pay wages to officials, thereby promoting the separation of officials from local landlords and gentry, and preventing corruption.

Although it is impossible to eliminate it, it only needs to be significantly reduced. That is a policy that has more advantages than disadvantages. It can also greatly improve the previous situation where the government sued and whoever gave more money won.

Therefore, in the second round of the New Deal, it can be said that all strata of society have become vested interests, and naturally there is no large-scale opposition.

What is slightly controversial is the implementation of new clan laws in the north, which will obviously make many feudal clans dissatisfied.

However, the power of the clans in the north is too weak, which is completely different from that in the south, and the main force of dissatisfaction is the line of the clan's direct sons.

The head of the clan may not necessarily object.

Because this method is actually a bit similar to pushing a favor order. Most of the clan heads prefer young and beautiful concubines to blow pillows. In addition, the concubine is also a son, and the palms and backs of his hands are full of flesh. Naturally, they want to share the favor between the concubine and the concubine. Point property.

Moreover, the imperial decree did not require equal distribution. In the new inheritance law, the legitimate sons would still inherit the main property, while the concubine would receive a much smaller share, in order to appease this dissatisfaction.

Therefore, the clan head did not strongly oppose this decree.

So under this situation, although this clan law still caused some waves, there was not much opposition, and it was barely passed smoothly.

The only one injured was the court.

This year's fiscal revenue is expected to be nearly half less than last year. The fiscal revenue in the first half of last year was more than 60 million guan, and this year it is only 37 million guan, which makes Lu Yijian and others worried.

So after hearing Zhao Jun's words, Lu Yijian said very unhappy: "But if this continues for a long time, the court will eventually suffer losses. If the Liao Kingdom and Xixia take this opportunity to fight, then we will have no money to support the war."

"Treating diseases and saving people, treating diseases and saving people, is the same as governing a country. Lao Lu, you are too focused on immediate interests and ignore long-term development."

Zhao Jun sighed, then stood up, looked around and said, "Let me tell you. I want to ask you what kind of Song Dynasty the Song Dynasty was in the past. Come on, Lao Lu, let me give you this opportunity. Do it well." Let’s talk about it, how was the Song Dynasty in the past?”

"Our Song Dynasty has wise officials and the blessing of our ancestors, so we are naturally strong!"

Lu Yijian shamelessly bowed his hand to Zhao Zhen. He has now learned that although in the Constitutional Yuan, as long as he does not break the law, there is basically no need to worry about being dismissed as prime minister.

But sometimes, even if you wear a lot of clothes, you can never wear anything. It's not a bad thing to flatter Zhao Zhen more.

"Stop talking nonsense."

Zhao Jun rolled his eyes and said: "You have also been the prime minister in the Constitutional Yuan for so many years. Do you want me to bring you the old official documents?"

Li Di agreed: "Yes, chaos continued throughout the Song Dynasty. In the fourth year of Guang Jingyou's reign, there were as many as twenty-seven rebellions. There were Liao and Western Xia invaders outside, and officials were corrupt and incompetent inside. The people were in dire straits. It can be said that Poverty and weakness lead to unrest.”

Lu Yijian smiled sarcastically.

"I just like people like Xiu Gong who love to tell the truth."

Zhao Jun smiled and said: "In fact, everyone knows the matter. In the past, the Song Dynasty was poor and weak, with serious internal and external troubles. It was like a person who was seriously ill. In this case, gentle methods must be used to manage it. If I take strong medicine, I’m afraid I’ll die immediately.”

"Is this a mild approach now? If this continues, the court will have no money to spare."

Lu Yijian shook his head.

Yan Shu pondered, looked at Zhao Jun and said, "Hanlong, do you have any other ideas?"

"There is no other way."

Zhao Jun smiled and said: "It's just that we are in labor pains now, and it will be much better if we slowly get back on track in the future."

Zhao Zhen asked: "Da Sun, tell me."

"It's very simple."

Zhao Jun looked around and said: "The Song Dynasty has been poor and weak for too long. In the past, the localities donated blood to the central government, which caused the local poverty and the court was rich. Now it is time for the court to donate blood to the localities and let the localities recover slowly."

“Under the new agricultural law reform, a large number of exorbitant taxes and miscellaneous taxes have been eliminated, and agricultural taxes have plummeted by half. About 30% of them have been intercepted by local governments as local taxes. Therefore, last summer we had more than 20 million guan in taxes, but this year we only have more than 8 million guan. "

He continued: "In this way, farmers and local government finances in local counties will be a little more comfortable. A large number of people have gone from the edge of starvation to the edge of bankruptcy. In the past, if there was a famine or a bad harvest, they would directly starve to death. . Now we can barely survive with some surplus food. In times of famine, if the court fails to provide disaster relief in time, we may sell our fields and become landless refugees."

“But what does this have to do with sharecroppers?”

Lu Yijian frowned, spread his hands and said, "The most important thing about our Song Dynasty is that there are too many landless refugees."

"What you said is like the classic saying of our later generations - it has nothing to do with my monthly salary of three thousand."

Zhao Jun smiled and said: "It can't be said that it has nothing to do with it. Do you know that according to the statistics of the Audit Bureau, on one side of the Song Dynasty, landlords owned a large amount of land, and the poor had no land to farm. On the other side, there was a large amount of wasteland without land. People cultivate the land, do you know why?”

"Taxes, seeds, farm tools and water."

Lu Yijian said indifferently.

"By the way, in the early stages of any dynasty, people are encouraged to open up wasteland, but in the middle and late dynasties, there is a lot of land that has not been reclaimed. This is the reason."

Zhao Jun pointed out the crux of the problem: "To open up wasteland now, you have to pay a tax before the grain is confiscated. For landless refugees, they are so poor that the only wasteland that can be reclaimed is wasteland with insufficient water resources. There are no agricultural tools, seeds or water sources." The question is, what to use to open up wasteland?”

"So Hanlong's reduction of taxes and lightening of corvee is to first rest with the people, and at the same time, it also allows local officials to have money to build water conservancy facilities and irrigate farmland to facilitate the reclamation of new land in the future?"

Yan Shu understood immediately.

"Correct!"

Zhao Jun snapped his fingers and said: "You can't shout slogans from the country, saying I want to build more water conservancy projects. That's useless. You have to get the local government to take action, and the people below are the executors. So the agricultural tax seems to have been reduced by more than half." , but keep the money in the local area so that the local area can work."

This is what it means. Now for the entire country, people's livelihood must be restored. In order to restore people's livelihood, money must be left for local development, so agricultural taxes have indeed been reduced, but for the Song Dynasty as a whole, it was much healthier.

Although the beneficiaries are farmers and landowners who have land, once the landlords have a good harvest and their taxes are reduced, tenants serve as their means of production. No one wants to have fewer and fewer tenants, leaving their land uncultivated. They may lower the rent for the tenants to make their lives more comfortable, so that others can continue to exploit them. Secondly, after the overall people's livelihood has recovered a little, local governments will have the financial resources to build water conservancy facilities, make full use of water resources such as rivers and lakes, dig and build a large number of canals, and repair rivers, thus encouraging landless people to reclaim wasteland and increase the number of homesteaders. , the number of tenants decreased.

The third and most important point is that pigs need to be fattened before they can be killed. Now we are reducing taxes on farmers and landowners, and in a few years we can formulate new agricultural taxes, continue to reduce taxes on farmers, and increase taxes on landlords.

From a long-term development perspective, the current agricultural tax has indeed become lower. But as long as you persist, the future development will be better.

"What about business tax?"

Lu Yijian asked again: "This year's commercial tax has plummeted so much. I'm afraid this is not in line with your expectations of gradually reducing agricultural taxes and increasing the proportion of commercial taxes."

Zhao Jun shook his head and said: "Wrong, it's exactly right."

"Oh?"

Lu Yijian frowned: "How does it fit in?"

"First of all, after the commercial and tax reform, the business environment will be much more relaxed, which will promote business development."

Zhao Jun said: "Secondly, we are in the early stage of restructuring. Commercial taxes have not been reduced, but have not been collected for the time being. When we get on the right track in the future, we can increase them more and more."

"But there seem to be too many ways to evade taxes, including colluding with the IRS, making false accounts, and colluding with local officials."

Wang Zeng noticed the key point.

Zhao Jun sighed: "That's why we have to set up a tax army to strictly inspect taxes. In the future, the national tax system will be slowly separated from the Ministry of Finance and the Ministry of National Taxation will be established. This department must not only have its own courts, but also its own armed forces, so that Paying taxes will be deeply rooted in the hearts of the people, so that all people in the Song Dynasty will become glorious taxpayers!"

The commercial tax reform only changes the way tax is collected, not reduces it.

For example, if you brought 20 guan of goods on the road, based on the 2000% commercial tax, you would already have to pay guan in taxes before you even started selling.

Including other costs such as labor, travel expenses, food and drink for employees, etc., before the sales funds come back, if you sell 10,000 guan, you must first spend at least 15,000 guan.

But now the court allows you to take this 2000 guan of goods to the place of sale, sell the goods first, and then pay the guan tax.

It seems to be the same thing over and over again, but in fact, for businessmen, what they lack most is not whether there is a market for the goods, nor whether they can open up sales, but whether there is a turnover period for funds.

In the past, when so much cost had already been spent before the goods started to be sold, in order to quickly withdraw funds, even when the market was down, merchants might sell them at low prices, causing losses and leading to bankruptcy.

If the goods cannot be sold now, you can temporarily hoard them and wait until the market situation improves before selling them to avoid bankruptcy.

The two thousand guan saved became working capital.

And under the progressive system, taxes on small-scale trade have been relaxed. For example, if you do a small business with a few dollars, the tax may be very small.

If you make a big business of 100,000 guan and the profit reaches 80,000 guan, then 40,000 guan may have to be used to pay taxes.

It is a matter of grasping the big and letting go of the small, which not only prevents capital exploitation, but also promotes the vigorous development of small-scale trade.

The only drawback is tax evasion.

That's why Zhao Jun wanted to form a tax army. Anyway, the Song Dynasty really had no shortage of people, officials, or soldiers.

Corvettes can be arranged by the local Xiang army and the imperial army, and the tax army can also do this. It can also solve the problem of a large number of soldiers doing nothing every day and just lying in the military camp to receive their salary.

"If you put it this way, taxes will still increase in the future?"

Zhao Zhen asked.

"Yes."

Zhao Jun nodded: "Now we just need to give good medicine to let the patient Da Song get better slowly. After he recovers, we can give strong medicine. But before giving strong medicine, we must first try to maintain the dwindling financial income. To increase revenue and reduce expenditure, this is why I expand foreign trade."

“We are still in the open source stage, what should we do to reduce expenditure?”

Zhao Zhen asked again.

Zhao Jun looked at Lao Fan, who said in a deep voice: "When the country improves and local people's livelihood recovers a little, we can officially start the three redundant matters and the land annexation."

"In order to annex Sanruan and the land, I must first defeat the Xixia and Liao Kingdoms, then expand foreign trade, and allow a large amount of RMB silver to flow in. I must also rectify the government first, then restore the governance of people's livelihood, lighten corvees and reduce taxes, reduce the burden on merchants, and then bring the world to an end." Officials are included in the civil service system."

Zhao Jun sighed and said: "In order to get rid of Da Song's life-saving poison, I have to use other medicines to stop Da Song's breath. After many years of treatment, I can finally remove the cancer. Do you think it will be easy for me? "

This sigh really comes from the heart.

Because whether it is the first stage of administrative reform or the second stage of comprehensive reform, there is only one core idea.

Restoration first, development later.

The administration of officials rectifies the officialdom and improves administrative efficiency.

The second phase of comprehensive reform will promote the development of agriculture, commerce and local affairs at the expense of a large amount of taxes from the court, so that people can survive, businessmen can survive, and local officials can make a difference.

In particular, the Audit Bureau has begun to measure land across the country and inventory hidden properties.

When the imperial court promised to reduce taxes on landowners, local governments were able to clear out a large amount of excess land.

In the future, we can fully implement policies such as returning increased consumption to the public, apportioning farmers into acres, unifying taxes and levies, collecting money based on acres, and increasing tax rates for large landowners and the wealthy class.

This will significantly improve the chaotic agricultural tax system, reduce the burden on the people at the bottom, and alleviate the situation of land annexation.

The next step is to gradually reduce official allowances. The main source of income is monthly salary and performance pay. The number of officials is strictly controlled and unqualified officials are resolutely eliminated, thereby alleviating redundant official expenses.

The next step is to control the court's spending, prevent the waste of public funds, and reduce redundant expenditures.

The last one is the big one.

That is a redundant army.

A major reform of the army was carried out, the old and weak were reduced, and strict inspections were carried out to ensure that the soldiers were paid empty wages and drank the blood of the soldiers.

From now on, military salaries will no longer be distributed by the Ministry of War and military generals, but directly by the treasury, so that every penny will flow into the pockets of soldiers instead of greedy generals.

So to some extent, Phases 1 and 2 are just mild improvements.

Even in the second stage, the court's own interests have to be sacrificed, so that the national treasury, which has been slightly improved, may bottom out in less than two years.

But there is nothing that can be done about it. Just sucking blood from the local area will only cause the center to be strong and the local area to be weak.

When the people revolted, the Song Dynasty court had money and food to suppress the uprising, but it was also true that the country was weak and impoverished.

In such a vicious cycle, the more the suppression is, the more local blood will be sucked, and the more blood is sucked, the more uprising will be needed. If this continues, even if there is no invasion by foreign enemies, the demise of the Song Dynasty will be a matter of time.

In the third stage, this is the real big reform.

The resistance encountered is unimaginable.

If it is not handled properly, the whole country will be destroyed if you are not careful!

　The viewpoints and policies adopted in this book are all derived from relatively successful reforms in real history, such as Zhang Juzheng's reform, Yongzheng's reform, our army's early reforms in the base areas, our country's early reforms, etc. As for Gang Jing, he may mention that the national conditions are different. The Ming and Qing Dynasties and the early period of our country were different from the Song Dynasty. I have also considered it and made slight modifications to suit the national conditions of the Song Dynasty. So if anyone thinks there is a problem, then please question Zhang Juzheng, question Yongzheng, question. Gang Jing retreat, retreat, retreat!

　　

　

(End of this chapter)