Rise of the 1630s South America

Chapter 496 Economic Survey ([-])

"It's unbelievable that there are still unemployed people in a country like ours." Meng Hu, a commissioner of the Ministry of Agriculture who had just returned from a survey in the west of the lake, said in surprise in the office of the May Agency: "Aren't we a planned economy? Why are there still unemployed? It's not scientific!"

"There are people who are not planned in the planned economy." Wei Boqiu, the section chief of the Mei Agency, took a knife and concentrated on carving a section of precious rosewood. At this time, the work is almost completed, and it looks like a priest in distress.There was a noose around the priest's neck, and his expression was terrified and hopeless, lifelike, which made Meng Hu feel horrified.

"For example, the people who were assigned to the construction team after coming to the mainland should have been assigned to the new settlements in the west after the project was completed. However, the new settlements have limited conditions and cannot arrange too many people for a while, so they only They can wait in line. During this period, apart from occasionally participating in the construction of some local municipal projects to earn pocket money, they can only do odd jobs."

"In addition, some people who entered the country illegally, such as those from central and southern Europe, were employed by private employers when they held a temporary identity certificate, and they still stayed in the original factory or farm for various reasons after obtaining their official identity. Work. Sometimes business doesn’t work, or when the boss doesn’t feel the need to hire as many people as before, they get fired.”

Wei Boqiu put down the carving knife in his hand, picked up the wet towel handed to him by the secretary and wiped his hands, and then continued: "The last situation is that the official local residents send money to relatives far away in the old continent, so that they can take a boat Come to the east bank. After their relatives came to the east bank, due to various reasons such as lack of skills, language barriers, and unaccustomed culture, they were unable to find a long-term job in some large factories. They They can only live as peddlers, odd jobs or employed by private employers, and such people are generally Livonians."

"All the above three kinds of people are waiting for the construction of the next new settlement, expecting to be arranged there, allocated five acres of farmland and a house, and if they are lucky, there may be female slaves assigned to them." Wei Boqiu picked up the The dye is coloring the woodcarving, while saying: "But their luck is bad. With more and more immigrants from Ming Dynasty, now the executive committee is more interested in directly assigning the new immigrants from Shandong to the new settlements. As for the old citizens, although a few were recruited to go to the west to farm in order to better help the new immigrants get used to the system and culture of the east coast, the number has been greatly reduced.

"Besides, the old urban areas also require them to engage in some low-tech jobs. For example, in the shipbuilding industry zone of Zhenhai County, a large number of private supporting manufacturers need a large number of such workers. They don't need much professional knowledge and skills. Therefore, wages are destined not to be high. Moreover, the business of ship export is very cyclical and volatile. In the past, when the Spanish and Ottomans had strong demand, they needed to export canvas, cables, skins, anchor chains, and wood every month. The number of barrels is three to four times that of the current one. In those good years, private bosses tended to recruit new workers on a large scale to expand production; but once demand fell, they would not hesitate to lay off workers to reduce production capacity. All of these have led to the unstable living conditions of this ordinary group of workers. If the statistics are enlarged to a yearly basis, their average monthly income is actually less than 4 yuan."

"So what are you going to do? Apart from promulgating a so-called "Social Security Relief Law", what measures are there?" Meng Hu listened to Wei Boqiu's introduction of some domestic situations as if he was listening to a story.He himself is not very interested in government affairs. His interest lies in travel and exploration, which has something to do with his personality.He often writes some of his expeditions into a diary, and then publishes them in a "National Geographic" that he founded that has just been converted from Pheasant Magazine.

Of course, since he is a member of the time-traveling group, he can't do things according to his own temper.He usually accepts the employment of the military department, leads some expeditions to explore various areas inside and outside the East Coast Republic, and draws maps.Sometimes he also accepts the appointment of the State Council or the intelligence department to conduct some social or economic investigations, so as to give those in power a clearer understanding of the domestic economic or social conditions in order to better formulate policies.

This time, he accepted the employment of the Government Affairs Council and led a team to the Duck Lake Basin to make statistics on the state of forest resources in the country.The Executive Committee is currently preparing to introduce a "Forest Law" to regulate the current chaotic forest logging industry and the blurred property rights of forest resources in the country.

"The new "Social Security Relief Law" is definitely about to be introduced. The core idea of ​​the law is actually two: to implement price subsidies for the consumption of daily necessities for low-income groups of workers (including urban workers and agricultural workers); Levy a high income tax on high-income groups (including skilled craftsmen, senior technicians, wealthy farmers, military officers, etc.), and adjust the threshold from 2 yuan to 5 yuan." Wei Boqiu painted the wood carvings without raising his head, but Still talking.

"But the problem in the countryside has to be solved. The current imbalance between industry and agriculture should not continue. In the past, we lacked experience in governing the country and made some mistakes that we took for granted. Now that we have realized it, we must correct it. At present, rural work is not doing well. It is shameful that many grassroots village cadres cover up and conceal the real property of the villagers in their villages, and a considerable number of farmers who meet the conditions for property tax collection have evaded taxes. We have discovered this problem in many places during our investigation, and now we must It needs to be resolved. Also, the female slaves distributed to the peasants should no longer be free in the future.”

"The life of the farmers is really pretty good." Menghu agreed: "In my research in the eleven townships in the north and south of the Yazihu ​​area, I found that they are really rich. Especially in the early developed Ping'an County area, The houses of every family have been renovated, and each family has at least three livestock and a group of chickens and ducks; many people have newly built barns to store surplus food from the harvest; each adult man consumes at least three bacon and two beers a week on average and white wine once. Many people bought new furniture and leather goods; some people brewed wine privately, or sold grain illegally to some deep-processing workshops or enterprises, and the price was often higher than the government’s uniform purchase price. All in all, they didn’t need Like the urban working class who spend more than two-thirds of their income on the necessities of life, and at the same time have a lot of access to cash, the quality of life is indeed not comparable to that of workers.”

"So that's why the Executive Committee is considering the introduction of the "Corn Laws." Wei Boqiu finally finished the work in his hand, and he looked at it carefully, and then put the work on the nearby bookshelf.After finishing all this, he smiled at Meng Hu and said: "Your investigation report is rich in content and detailed information, which just complements the economic investigation of our Mei agency. Now the decision-making of the executive committee will be much easier. The "Corn Law" must be resolutely implemented. Some private workshops or enterprises will no longer have the power to purchase grain from the private sector. All grain must be purchased and sold by the government. The price is set by the Ministry of Agriculture twice a year according to the situation. The autumn grain harvest has been formulated and widely advertised before. The collection of agricultural taxes has been procrastinating in the past, and it has not been done properly, and now it must be strictly enforced."

"Hehe, the knives and knives are all cut on farmers." Meng Hu smiled slightly and said: "In the past, it was said that the scissors in industry and agriculture are bad, and agriculture subsidizes industry. His grandma, we are still in the initial stage, that is, industry subsidizes agriculture. It’s no wonder that those workers are dissatisfied. After all, they created most of the country’s wealth, but the distribution mechanism treats them unfairly. Now that these laws have been promulgated intensively, it is obvious who they are targeting.”

"The country was first established, and the system is full of loopholes. Now there are some problems, which naturally need to be adjusted. There is nothing to be ashamed of. If it is wrong, it is wrong, and it can be corrected in time." Wei Boqiu said, "The virgin forest resources in the west of the lake you investigated The situation of a large number of illegal logging is also very valuable. Many villagers go to the forest to cut down those thick trees, and then go back to use them for various purposes. Even some people are not willing to spend money to buy briquettes, and cut down trees for fuel. The worst is , they often only know how to cut down trees, but do not replant new saplings, which makes the forest area continue to shrink. Although our country's population is still small and the forest area is still quite large, this trend is wrong and must be curbed .”

What Wei Boqiu said is actually common.In addition to the sparsely forested areas in the south, in more than a dozen townships in the north, large areas of common land (that is, unallocated land) near the villages have been cleared of trees.There are even some exaggerated practices, that is, some villagers burn a small piece of forest and then plant some crops on it. The harvest is often considerable, but this is at the cost of destroying precious forest resources.

In the past, the country did not have a clear legal statement on these acts, so it was quite troublesome to deal with.Now the Executive Committee is planning to promulgate the "Forest Law", which is to conduct unified management of forest resources on public land, and any private logging or burning will be defined as illegal.In the same way, more similar laws such as the "Mineral Resources Law" and "Lakes and Rivers Management Law" will surely be promulgated in the future to further improve various domestic rules and regulations.

"By the way, why do all these wood carvings you make have the same style? They are all priests, and they are priests who are suffering. Their expressions are so lifelike, and some of them even look..." After talking about business, Meng Hu looked at Wei Boqiu's bookshelf On the row of wood carvings, he suddenly frowned and said carefully.

"It looks familiar, doesn't it?" Wei Boqiu said with a faint smile, "These are all the priests of the underground lecture hall who have been interrogated and executed by me personally, and they are all sculpted according to their real faces, of course they are lifelike. "

"I...I'm going back to deal with the report." Meng Hu suddenly felt that the room was a little cold, so he immediately packed up his things and left the office of Mei Agency.

(End of this chapter)