At the end of Qin, I became a son of the plane

Chapter 551: Metric System and Crisis
January, the thirty-second year of the Han calendar.

At the beginning of the year, the Han Dynasty announced the solar calendar after more than ten years of research and preparation.

Now the Han Dynasty's influence spreads across three continents. The original lunar calendar is only suitable for guiding agricultural production in Shenzhou. The other two continents have begun to formulate calendars according to their own climates, and the solar calendar serves as the Gregorian calendar to unify the time zones of the three continents.

Along with the solar calendar, the Han Dynasty's metric system was also announced. This standard was formulated by Xu Fan, from the standard weight units of grams, kilograms to tons, to the length units of centimeters, decimeters, meters, kilometers, and the area units of square centimeters, square decimeters, square meters, etc., all of which were metric units of later generations. Of course, the old system units were not completely abolished but coexisted, and the official measurement units were mainly based on the metric system.

After this set of units was announced, Xu Fanzhong's eyes were filled with tears. He finally didn't have to calculate how many tons 1 shi was, how long three feet was, and how many grams 12 liang were.

Of course, the reform of the metric system may be recorded in the history books of later generations, and scholars may even publish books to study it.

But it did not have much impact on the Han people at that time. Everyone lived and worked as usual, but those who used scales and rulers would use metric units.

There will also be a Gregorian calendar and a lunar calendar on the wall calendar. Children in Dahan will find that their birthdays keep changing, and the chances of having a big meal with their parents will become less.

Xu Fan did not choose a good time to promote the metric system. This year is definitely a time of disaster for the Han Dynasty.

In April, earthquakes occurred in Qi and Chu, and landslides occurred on 5 peaks of Mount Tai. The earthquake triggered a small tsunami, which submerged the Han coast along the Linzi County line. Thousands of people were missing or killed, tens of thousands of houses were damaged, five salt fields and three docks along the coast were submerged, and hundreds of thousands of people were affected. The losses caused by the tsunami were immeasurable.

The Prime Minister of the Han Dynasty, Li Shang, was stationed in Chang'an City and ordered Ao Cang to allocate supplies for disaster relief. The fake prime minister Yang Xiong personally went to Linzi City, and the fake prime minister Zheng Qu went to Hengshan County to provide relief to the victims.

It can be said that the focus of the Han Dynasty this year was all on this disaster. Fortunately, the Han Dynasty was still in the rising period of the empire, and the treasury was full of food and grass. The two false prime ministers were also experienced old officials. Even if there were termites, the two prime ministers killed the chicken to scare the monkeys. They directly cleaned up the granary system of the two counties and frightened the Han officials of the two counties. The Han Dynasty responded to the disaster properly and did not let the disaster continue to expand.

This made Xu Fan breathe a sigh of relief. The Han Dynasty had not seen such a big disaster for many years. But as long as the Han officials were not too corrupt, it would be easy for the Han Dynasty, which had already stepped half a foot into industrialization, to deal with such disasters.

But for the Han Dynasty, such natural disasters are easy to overcome, but the economic crisis caused by overcapacity is not so easy to overcome.

Since last year, the imperial court has been warning about overcapacity in the steel industry, but everyone has been dazzled by the steel industry's decades of golden development and has been indifferent to the warnings. The steel industry has been booming for decades, so how could a crisis break out? In many people's minds, the steel industry is still the iron-clad banker. The court is going to build tens of thousands of miles of railways, and with iron laid on the roads, how could the steel be unsalable? This is because the imperial court does not want them to make money.

Therefore, Dahan still added 12 new steel mills within a year, and all of them were large steel mills with blast furnaces capable of producing 20 jin of energy. This directly increased Dahan's steel production capacity by tons. This increased number, excluding Dahan, would still account for more than half of the world's production capacity at that time.

However, the consequences of increasing production capacity in this way are extremely serious. Starting from April this year, the directors of steel mills in various industrial counties of Dahan have discovered a headache: steel products that have been selling well for decades have become difficult to sell starting this year.

In the past, merchants who wanted to buy steel from their steel plant lived in the inns around the steel plant. They had to pay tea money to the gatekeepers of the steel plant, give red envelopes to the managers along the way, pay tea money to the warehouse managers, and pay labor wages to the transporters. As long as any process was not done correctly, even if you paid to buy steel, you would have to wait, and it would easily take you half a year or even a year.

Steel is an asset-intensive commodity. If the delivery is delayed for half a year or a year, the interest alone will be enough to make these merchants feel heartbroken. Therefore, although these steel merchants are the gods of customers, they also have to please various departments of the steel mills along the way.

But this year the steel mills have become deserted. The number of merchants buying steel has decreased, and the long queues of transport outside the steel mills have become sparse. The amount of steel sold can no longer keep up with their production speed, and the steel in their warehouses is piling up higher and higher.

Normally, Xiao Song and Xiao Jia would invite them to dinner at this time, but now they were unwilling to come. The steel plant, which had always been a gold mine, became disliked by merchants in a very short time.

The sluggish sales led to a decrease in turnover, but the steel mill's expenses did not decrease. Although the giant blast furnace is an inexhaustible gold mine, it is also a beast that devours gold. A blast furnace with a capacity of one million catties needs to consume 300 million catties of high-quality coke and nearly 200 million catties of iron ore. The raw material investment this time is several million dollars.

Once a blast furnace is ignited, it cannot be extinguished. Steel mills need to continuously purchase raw materials such as iron ore, coal, limestone, etc., and expenses such as craftsmen's salaries cannot be reduced.

Revenues are falling but expenses cannot be reduced. This has caused the steel industry, which has been making money for decades, to be in a loss-making state for the first time. This is difficult for people who have been engaged in the steel industry for decades to understand. After all, in their impression, even the economic crisis did not have much impact on them. Now they have become the source of the crisis. They have no idea how to deal with such things.

Starting from April, the steel industry began to turn from profit to loss, but because Dahan's entire focus was on rescue at the time, no one noticed the changes in the steel industry.

Only the top executives in the steel industry knew about this, but they dared not tell anyone about it, and they even dared not shut down the blast furnaces to reduce the amount of iron smelting. They all wanted to hold on and wait for small steel mills to vacate the market, but all the steel mills were gritting their teeth and persisting. The more their steel inventories piled up, the greater their losses. The entire steel industry was caught in an involution, and no one in the steel industry dared to stop the involution, because if they were eliminated, their entire fortune would be gone, and it would be difficult for them to recover in the rest of their lives. But as long as they held on, no matter how much debt they had, they would not be eliminated. As long as the steel industry recovered, their industry could be saved.

These steel mill directors underestimated the resilience of their peers. These steel mills had been in a state of internal stagnation for half a year, and their losses were getting more and more serious, but they all tried their best to maintain production. Not many steel mills were actually able to avoid bankruptcy, and most of them were small steel mills. The production capacity cleared out was obviously not enough to restore the steel industry to normal.

By September, most steel mills had warehouses filled with steel and were running out of money. This marked the beginning of a full-scale outbreak of overcapacity in the steel industry.

Because the steel industry is an asset-heavy industry and has a close relationship with the money bank system, both upstream and downstream of the steel industry need the support of the money bank system. The relationship between the two sides is extremely close and is comparable to the real estate industry in later generations. A large amount of bad debts owed by the steel industry are related to the money banks. As a result, the bad debts of the Han Dynasty money bank system have surged across the board, increasing by more than ten billion yuan almost every month.

By September, the upstream and downstream of the steel industry had an additional 60 billion yuan in arrears in the money bank system in one month, which directly scared all the money banks in the Han Dynasty. When the textile industry experienced an economic crisis, bad debts did not accumulate so quickly and so much. If the arrears continued to accumulate, it would exceed billion yuan. Not to mention protecting the steel industry, their own money banks might even be dragged down by the steel industry. After realizing the seriousness of the problem, the four major money banks in the Han Dynasty all cut off the loan projects to the steel industry. The private money banks in the Han Dynasty also tried to protect themselves. Not only did they not lend money, but they also tried to find ways to recover the loans. The loans to the steel mills became a project that everyone disliked.

If you want to take out a loan, you just need to pay off your previous debts first. There are even many money house managers who, in order to reduce losses and shirk responsibility, deceive the steel plant director and borrow money from other friends and relatives first, and then take out a loan after paying off the debts. As a result, many honest people really go to their relatives and friends to borrow money to repay their loans, but when they want to take out a loan again, not to mention the doors, even the windows are welded shut (it is said that there is a new type of bridge loan, and they report themselves. I am not involved in it and don’t know the details).

The steel industry is an industry with extremely many related industries. The ore industry and coal industry downstream of the steel mills are also dragged down by the steel industry. They have a large number of IOUs from steel mills, but have not received any money for more than half a year and cannot pay salaries to the miners.

But the miners are manual laborers, and their salaries are hard-earned money. They can tolerate delays of one or two months, but they cannot tolerate delays of half a year.

Under the command of Mozhe, these miners surrounded the mine owner. This time, even their security guards did not stand on their side and joined the miners in shouting: "Pay back the money, pay back the money, pay back the money!"

The shouts of hundreds of people were so loud that they could be heard more than ten miles away.

Finally, the owner of the coal mine was dragged out by the craftsmen and surrounded. They threatened to beat him to death on the spot if he didn't repay his salary.

The coal boss could only say with a bitter face: "It's useless for you to arrest me. I don't have as much money as you do now." Then he took out a pile of IOUs and said: "These are IOUs from Luoyang Iron and Steel Plant, Lv's Iron and Steel Plant, and Wang's Iron and Steel Plant. As long as you can collect these money, not only can I repay your salary, but I can also split the remaining money with you. If you dare not do it, just beat me to death here. Anyway, I have no money."

The angry workers shouted: "You profiteer, we will report you to the court for refusing to pay your salary and let you stay in prison for a few years."

These miners are not fools. Everyone knows that there is an economic crisis in the steel industry. Even if they have IOUs, they will not be able to get the money.

The coal boss smiled bitterly when he heard this and said, "It's fine to go to jail. You don't need to sue me. I'll go there myself."

At this time, the county lieutenant of Luoyang City rushed over with soldiers to maintain order and said, "Don't mess around, don't mess around. Everyone, believe in the laws of the Han Dynasty and believe in the court!"

Seeing the county lieutenant coming, the craftsman pointed at the coal boss angrily and said, "He owes us half a year's salary. You have to take care of it for us and get our hard-earned money back."

The county lieutenant just turned his head to the coal boss, but the coal boss held up the remaining IOU and said, "I am also going to sue all the steel mills in Luoyang City. They owe me 56 million yuan in goods and have not paid me back. County lieutenant, you have to make the decision for me. I don't want to owe you money, but they owe me money and won't pay it back."

The coal boss said in a sobbing voice: "They are forcing women of good character into prostitution."

The county lieutenant looked helpless, he had no say in this matter. He was in Luoyang City so he naturally knew the situation in Luoyang City. The directors of those steel mills had long been besieged by craftsmen. Now in the whole Luoyang, only the Shaofu Steel Mill was still in operation, but its production capacity had been reduced to the lowest. If the blast furnaces could not be shut down, I am afraid that the blast furnaces of many steel mills would have been extinguished.

The coal boss also knew about this situation, and gritted his teeth and said, "I am going to sue the Industrial and Commercial Bank of the court. They clearly agreed with me that if I repay the previous loan, they would issue me another loan to tide me over the difficulties. As a result, I borrowed money from all my relatives and finally repaid the loan. The Industrial and Commercial Bank refused to lend me money again. They are committing fraud, and they are committing fraud in the name of the court. Otherwise, how could I borrow money at this time and have it go bad? Now I have implicated my relatives and can't even go home."

There was silence at the scene. They knew that their boss was in bad condition, but they didn't expect it to be this bad. It was even more miserable than their own. For a moment, all the craftsmen didn't know whether they should be angry or sympathize with their boss.

Finally, the coal boss said in despair: "I am going to sue myself. I have committed the crime of refusing to pay my salary. County lieutenant, please put me in jail. There is no place for me in this world."

The county lieutenant patted the coal boss on the shoulder with sympathy and said, "There will be hope!"

He didn't know what to say about the money house matter. He could only say that some people were beasts in disguise.

The coal boss said in despair: "Since you don't want to imprison me, I'd better find a crooked tree to hang myself on, and put an end to it once and for all."

At this time, the craftsmen around him refused to let him go. His death was the end of everything, but what about our salaries?
The county lieutenant said nervously, "You must not go to a dead end. As long as you are alive, there is hope. Don't forget that there is still the court. As long as the court rescues the market, everything is hopeful. If all else fails, you can go to the New World. The second prince has established the Tang Kingdom, and there is a large gold mine there. Maybe you can dig up a piece of nugget gold and turn your life around. The Han Dynasty still has many opportunities. Think about your wife and children. Think about your wife and children and don't go to a dead end."

Having said that, he still ordered the soldiers to jail the coal boss. Just as he said, people were forcing him from all sides and he had no way out now. Going to jail might not be a bad thing.

Then he said to the craftsmen around him, "Everyone, I believe that the court will do you justice. Go to the government office to register for unemployment benefits and wait until this period of time passes."

The craftsman was also disappointed and had no choice but to go to the government office to register.

This kind of scene happened everywhere in Dahan. Due to the drag of triangular debts, the upstream and downstream steel industries collapsed, and hundreds of thousands of industrial workers lost their income.

The steel industry is the pillar industry of the Han Dynasty. The crisis in the steel industry is more serious than that in the textile industry. All walks of life in the Han Dynasty have been dragged down, including five small industries such as building materials, service-oriented inns, restaurants, pubs and other industries, and finally transmitted to all walks of life such as food, clothing, housing and transportation.

By October, everyone knew that this was the third economic crisis in the Han Dynasty. It was impossible to save themselves at this time, and the only one they could rely on was the imperial court.

In October of the 32nd year of the Han calendar, in Chang'an City, Afang Palace Hotel, the First Emperor's suite.

Hu Hai sat at the highest point of the Afang Palace, holding a glass of wine in his hand, looking towards the direction of Chang'an City and said disappointedly: "I wanted to see the so-called City of Light, but in the end I only saw a dark Chang'an City. It's really disappointing."

Then he looked at the layout of the house and said with a smile: "This is similar to the Qin Palace where I lived back then, but the layout is a little smaller. My father would not be so stingy as to divide the house into so many rooms."

Zhu Pei looked around a little nervously, it was the first time for him to come to such a luxurious hotel. For other people, they might come to stay in this room just for the name, but the boss next to him was Qin II, so why not be more discreet?

Hu Hai smiled and said, "Don't worry, the current emperor is not as stingy as you think. Since he dared to transform the Afang Palace into an inn, he naturally wants as many people as possible to live there."

To be honest, Hu Hai hadn't been back to Chang'an for more than ten years. When he learned about the Afang Palace Hotel, he immediately moved in. Not to mention that the design here is 70% similar to the Qin Palace of that year, except that the palace is much smaller.

As for taboos, Hu Hai might have worried about it decades ago, but now he doesn't care at all. He knows clearly that the Han emperor is an extremely pragmatic person, and he will not care about these false names, not to mention that he came to Chang'an this time because the court had something to ask of them.

The economic crisis broke out again, and the court had few effective solutions. One was to develop infrastructure, increase court spending, and digest the inventory of the steel industry to overcome the difficulties. The other was to transfer the Han Dynasty's steel production capacity to other vassal states of the Han Dynasty, just like what he did in India back then.

And this time the court asked him to come to Chang'an City, obviously with this in mind.

Of course, Hu Hai's high profile was closely related to his habit of living this way. Just as Zhang Pijiang said, Hu Hai was the uncrowned king in Tianzhu, and his food, clothing, housing and transportation were all treated like an emperor.

Because no one in India cares about these things. The princes of the Han Dynasty only care about whether he can bring them profits.

After getting used to this kind of life, Hu Hai naturally did not want to lower his standards.

(End of this chapter)