Emperor Chongzhen of the Ming Dynasty

Chapter 70 Currency Reform Brewing
Now the Gyeonggi area has fallen.

Yingtian Mansion became the first mansion of Ming Dynasty, and it is also the richest mansion at present.

Therefore, the focus of tax reform is also in Yingtianfu.

Chengde, as the current Yin of Yingtianfu, is also a northern official who followed Emperor Chongzhen on his southern tour.

He naturally knew that whether the Yingtian Mansion under his command could implement the tax reform was crucial to the effective implementation of His Majesty's New Deal.

And Zhu Youjian personally called him into the palace and had a few interviews with him.

"Those imperial relatives, bureaucrats and gentry in Nanjing City, if they dare not cooperate and act as domineering, you can directly arrest them, and then report them directly to me."

After Zhu Youjian entrusted Yin Chengde of Yingtian Mansion in this way, Chengde, who was born as a censor, also vowed:

"Don't worry, Your Majesty, I assure you that even if you get bruised and bloody, you will make the first contribution to the new taxation policy for the imperial court!"

Immediately after Yin Chengde Miansheng in Yingtianfu began to carry out tax reform in Yingtianfu.

Although no tax is levied this year, tax registration must be carried out. It is necessary to register the business scale of shops and workshops corresponding to the size of Tianfu, and to charge a ten-cent business license to show that the shop or workshop is operating legally, and at the same time determine the responsibility person, and the person in charge of each shop workshop must be a living person recorded in the household registration file of the county government.

In addition, the inspection departments of various places also have to check and count the daily import and export volume and value of goods in various places, and declare all kinds of contraband that the imperial court strictly prohibits private sales.

At the same time, it is necessary to clean up and measure the properties of each household to determine how much apparent income there is from civilians to officials and gentry, so as to prepare for the collection of personal income tax.

In fact, on paper, these taxes have already been collected, but no real money has been collected, and each has issued a receipt.

Naturally, there are still great obstacles in this, especially when measuring the fields of rich and noble households everywhere, not everyone is willing to disclose the number of their fields to the public.

But because of the support of the emperor Zhu Youjian, the dignitaries in Nanjing City can only submit obediently.

However, Yin Chengde of Yingtian Mansion was sometimes unavoidable to be thrown stones into the sedan chair or poured cold water on him unexpectedly.

He was even bitten by dogs and slapped.

Moreover, many of them were Dukes, Dukes, Earls, etc., and even members of the clan.

Zhu Youjian was not polite when he knew about it. It happened that Wang Chengen, the admiral of the East Factory, returned to Nanjing to replace Shi Kefa in charge of the East Factory.

Zhu Youjian directly ordered He Xin to select 5000 capable men from the Second Guards Army to Dongchang, and ordered Dongchang to be responsible for arresting these royal relatives.

Even Xu Wenjue, the Duke of Wei, was arrested by Zhu Youjian and sent to Dongchang for not cooperating.

Fortunately, it is just statistics, not real collection of money, and there are only some small disputes. More bureaucratic gentry and imperial relatives are focusing their energy on sales promotion, so the tax reform is still going on.

Tax reform is underway.

Before the recruiting work of Huaiyang governor Li Mingrui and Fengyang Henan governor Li Banghua was not over.

Zhu Youjian had to reform the currency system.

Zhu Youjian knew very well that in the future, fighting Jiannu would not be a simple military struggle, behind this was to use the existing national strength of Ming Dynasty to contend against Jiannu.

The first thing we need is a sound economic system that is healthy and can be transformed into national strength, so that we can have a steady stream of financial resources to train strong soldiers.

Reform of the tax system is one.

But as an important medium of various transactions - the reform of currency is also crucial and needs to be implemented immediately.

The currency chaos of the Ming Dynasty has been a problem that has plagued the national economy for a long time, and it has caused great difficulties for the economic environment of the Ming Empire.

This is why the reforms during Zhang Juzheng's period also focused on the monetary unity of tax collection.

Now that Zhu Youjian has nearly 2000 million taels of cash, he naturally has to do a good job.

However, what he didn't expect was that when he was thinking about how to make money with this money, Qi Biaojia, the right servant of the household department in charge of financial expenditure, suddenly asked for an urgent matter.

"Your Majesty, the Ministry of War has come to ask, the military salary of Nanjing Jingying has been owed for almost ten years, do you think it will be reissued?"

"Your Majesty, the Ministry of Industry is here to ask if the Qinhuai River needs to be dredged, and if several halls in Miyagi need to be rebuilt?"

"Your Majesty, the Ministry of Officials came to ask, now that the taxation reform is in full swing and manpower is urgently needed, will the number of subordinate officials in each prefecture and county be increased and their salaries allocated?"

"Your Majesty, the Ministry of Rituals came to ask, many schools in Henan, Shandong and other places were destroyed by war, should they allocate money to rebuild?"

"Your Majesty, the Ministry of Criminal Justice came to ask. The prison of the Ministry of Criminal Justice collapsed a lot last year due to floods, and funds need to be allocated for reconstruction."

"Your Majesty, and our household department."

Qi Biaojia, the right servant of the household department, has not finished speaking.

Zhu Youjian, who was rather depressed, threw the book in his hand on the ground and scolded angrily: "Qi Shilang, you said that you have something urgent to see me, so you just came to tell me this, and you also come to me for such trivial matters. What are you doing!"

"Your Majesty, calm down. The national treasury is only tens of thousands of silver, and all the ministries have come to our household department to ask for silver. The humble minister can only go to the cabinet elder Fan Ge, but Fan Ge is busy reforming taxes now, saying that the silver is still in your majesty. If you are here, let me directly ask to see you."

After Qi Biaojia explained, Zhu Youjian also calmed down: "You guys, seeing that I have tens of millions of silver, you start to ask for money in a different way, you go and tell them, just say what I said personally , give them an answer in two months."

Naturally, Zhu Youjian would not casually allocate the money he had confiscated from his home to these yamen.

The so-called currency is a general equivalent representing the value of goods.

With the development of society, precious metals such as gold and silver are naturally the most suitable for general equivalents.

However, directly using gold or silver as currency is not good for macroscopically controlling the economy of the entire Ming Dynasty, and the preciousness and rarity of gold and silver make it difficult to use them as currency to limit commercial development.

Therefore, Zhu Youjian naturally wanted to find a cheap, easy-to-manufacture and not easy-to-imitate item that could replace gold or silver as a substitute for gold and silver.

Zhu Youjian knew that Zhu Yuanzhang had done it too, otherwise there would be no treasures.

However, the emperor who was born as a peasant didn't know the reserve, so the treasure banknotes had no currency's due value. On the contrary, as soon as the imperial court issued banknotes, it was said to be a bad government that embezzled the people's fat and anointment.

Now that Zhu Youjian is going to carry out a new currency reform, he naturally needs to prepare a large amount of gold and silver reserves, so that the currency he issues can represent the value of gold and silver.

And for the nearly 2000 million taels of gold and silver, Zhu Youjian naturally wanted to take most of it out as a reserve fund.

In other words, Chongzhen Emperor Zhu Youjian now wants to open a bank first, and use this bank as the issuing bank of legal tender.

It is a government-run financial institution directly controlled by the imperial court.

As the emperor, Zhu Youjian naturally didn't have to care about who agreed or disagreed.

Now that money banks of the nature of exchange have emerged among the people, naturally no one can stop Zhu Youjian from opening a bank, and he will not be too unfamiliar.

Moreover, in Zhu Youjian's view, while there is still a sum of cash, and taxes have not really started to be collected, and before huge military expenditures appear, monetary and financial reforms must be carried out immediately. Money and monetary support from the imperial court in military spending and tax collection gave a strong impetus to currency reform.

　The protagonist is not making a big leap, but because it was Huang Renyu or Qian Mu who mentioned that the worst thing about Daming is the financial system. If you don’t have major surgery on taxes and currency, you can’t start a powerful military model. After all, Daming can’t be like The Tartars rely on plunder to support their troops.Thanks to the book friend Thunderbolt Six Disasters Canglong for rewarding 100 book coins.The update time is basically two shifts in the evening.Roughly eight to eleven o'clock.

　　
　
(End of this chapter)