Santairiku Eiyuuki

Erkür is a human being.

It is true that Elquille possesses a variety of ideas, knowledge not found in this world, and is not bound by the fixed concepts of this world, so she can also conceive flexibly… but she is only human and her knowledge is limited.

Sure, Elquille may be smarter than a person, but he is nevertheless a human sphere, and limits still exist and can be mistaken.

It is true that Elquille has a setting on earth called 'The Proxy of God', but it is only a setting, in fact not a proxy or anything, a son of man.

There are therefore limits to Elquille's abilities.

In the traditional Lemurian Empire, the weight was placed on agriculture.

Rather than that, in this world, it is right.

In this world, commerce and industry are still considered humble things.

But Erkühl believed that it was commerce and industry that had a livelihood.

Erkühr therefore stabilized his finances by exclusively selling coffee, bone ash porcelain, encouraging the cultivation of commodity crops such as sugar and cotton, and allowing merchants to form unions (guilds) to take taxes from them.

But Elquille is not an economist, if not a merchant.

There are limits to that ability.

And the Lemurian bureaucrats are competent, but they could not say that they are too bright for the economy.

So...

Elquille decided to hire an expert.

"Shall I say thank you? Thank you for the meeting with the Minister of Finance, the Minister of Commerce, Industry and Trade, Mr. Shylock and Mr. Antonio."

"No, Your Majesty. I am honored to receive such honorable duties."

"I would like to do my best to ensure that it meets His Majesty's expectations"

It was a man of two tribes (human beings) who was summoned between the sights.

One has dark hair and is skinny in shape. The face is harsh, the black eyes gleam and shine, and the nose is pointy as the eagle's mouth, a middle-aged man.

This man's name is Shylock.

He is a six-star man and a merchant who mainly operates in the financial business, where Erkühr has diagnosed his appointment as finance minister.

The other has brown hair and a medium meat mid back in shape. His face is calm, his bright brown eyes look very gentle, a young man.

This man's name is Antonio.

He is a Messianic man and a merchant who mainly operates in trade, where Erkühl has been diagnosed with the appointment of Minister of Commerce, Industry and Trade.

Erkühr met these two about five years ago now… that is, when Erkühr was twelve years old, when he began his fiscal reform.

Having also heard the opinions of the bureaucrats, Erkühl began reforming the tax system and monopolizing specialties… but the policy could not be described as perfect.

It was these two who pointed that out.

It is a considerable amount of courage to be able to express an opinion to the emperor even though he is neither noble nor bureaucratic, and the inversion of what he thinks is right.

So Erkühl took on board the opinions of the two 'experts' and made amendments to the policy.

As a result… it was a great success.

As for Elquille's true intentions, I wanted to enroll the two of them at that point...

But we both had our own problems.

Shylock first.

He was a six-star man.

The Lemurian Empire is a Mesian country, and for Mesianism, Six-Star is the enemy who betrayed and murdered Mesia, the Son of God.

There was a lot of opposition to applying it.

Antonio next.

He was a Mesian but... he was not from the Lemurian Empire.

He was a trader from the Republic of Adolria, a western city state.

He himself has emigrated to Nova Lemuria for a long time and has obtained Lemurian citizenship…

For the Lemurian Empire, there was much opposition to holding Antonio, as the Adriatic Republic is an enemy in contention for the right to control the Album Sea and the trade area.

At the time, Erkühl could not yet say that his political base was stable, so he dropped him off.

At present, however, there are no political forces hostile to Erkür in the Lemurian Empire.

So you can shake a major player and hire him.

"Then let's ask the two of you to work quickly. I'm going to give you an overview of the second tax reform. I want you two to boil down with the bureaucrats on that detail."

That's what Elquille tells the two of us about the Second Tax Reform.

The content of the last tax reform, or 'first tax reform', is as follows:

"Commercial Tax"

Before the reform...... collect from each and every merchant.

After the reform… unions (guilds) are formed to obtain a payment from the unions (guilds).

"Head Tax"

Before the reform… levy, irrespective of the size of the property.

After the reform...... Orthodox and Alektian in Mesia are exempt. Later it is levied according to sects, religions and the number of possessions.

"Land Tax"

Before the reform...... Recommend 'Kinna' (...). Detection Act. Not including headcount taxes (low).

After the reform...... 'gold payment' is the principle (...). Taxes are paid annually for fixed amounts. Head Tax rolled in and collected (expensive).

"Slave Liberation Tax"

Before the reform...... unchanged

After the reform… unchanged.

These reforms were carried out with an emphasis on how to ensure that financial resources are secured, easily and easily, without human costs.

For this reason, there are about four things that are incomplete.

One is that the burden per merchant, of commercial taxes, is extremely heavy, and that the extremely light ones have arisen, or vice versa, regardless of their income, which may be taxed on 'equality'.

The burden per merchant is only to be determined by the union (guild), which does not specify the country.

Thus there could have been inequality between merchants or, conversely, equality that went too far.

Next, land tax.

First of all, there are major shortcomings in this way of collecting land taxes.

That's because it doesn't take into account currency value, price fluctuations in gold.

If we are to put it more plainly, we do not take price fluctuations into account.

What do you mean? Explained clearly…

For example, because of the size of the land, it is assumed that a single gold coin is taxed.

But for some reason monetary value crashed and prices rose......

And suppose prices eventually multiplied a hundred times.

Assuming the price has multiplied a hundred times, you will need a hundred gold coins for the things you have been able to buy with one gold coin.

This means that tax revenues are practically one-hundredth higher.

The more household purses, the less problematic it will be, but when this becomes state-scale finances, prices can rise only slightly, resulting in significant tax revenues cuts.

Tax revenues could similarly rise and fall because the headcount tax is still fixed.

And...

The final problem is that we still haven't got our hands on the slave liberation tax.

This Slave Liberation Tax is an antique that has been around for over a thousand years and is a very old smell.

By analogy, we are still talking about a level where the Japanese tax system is still conditional.

Now, what Elquille intends to do in order to solve those problems and ensure stable financial resources is' Second Tax Reform '.

"First of all, land taxes, but I'm going to stop fixing them and fix a constant rate of taxation in line with the fluctuating system...... that is, land income for that year. The problem is tax evasion... but for that reason bureaucracy has been strengthened"

It is for this reason that Erkühr has increased the number of bureaucrats.

Until now, the number of bureaucrats was low, making it easy for them to evade taxes.

So let's increase the number of bureaucrats so they can't evade taxes.

Labour costs will increase, but they will be cheap if we consider them a substitute for stable tax revenues.

By the way, it's very important...

Land income is not the crop that was harvested on the land, but the amount of money that was made using the land.

"A fixed rate of taxation shall also be established for headcount taxes, depending on the person's income. Is that good enough for you?

"I don't have any particular objections."

"Yeah, I'm fine"

Both Shylock and Antonio are merchants who do not own land, so there was less interest in land taxes.

Shylock is a six-star man, but he wasn't even poor enough to be dissatisfied with some head taxes or so.

"Then Shylock when it comes to land taxes and headcount taxes. You can put it together. [M] You're a six-star man... and your face works for nobility, right?

"Yes, I'll take care of it. Yeah, because nobility is my specialty."

The aristocrats were probably, landlords, and highly indebted.

There are times when nobles need money to behave like nobles, or spend money on investments such as new openings and waterways… and nobles need money that is put together, and in such cases it is always borrowed money from a gold loan like Shylock.

land, which is easy to collateralize and earn a steady income, so the Shylocks can lend it with peace of mind,

Note that it is premature to link debt = poverty.

Because if you can keep paying it back steadily, there's nothing wrong with it.

Well, some nobles live in extreme poverty, or sometimes they really take their land away from them...

Probably before that happens, the help of other nobles goes in, and the Shylocks are somewhat sweet.

The land, even if you get it, can't be operated by the Shylocks.

"Then commercial taxes are next. Until now, it has been collected from the unions (guilds) in return for their privileges… Now it will be collected from each trader belonging to the unions (guilds). And let the union (guild) undertake the levy, and in the event of tax evasion, fine it as joint liability, and in some cases punish the taking of privileges."

All you have to do is check your sales regularly afterwards to see if tax evasion has taken place.

This would solve the commercial tax inequality.

And... more than ever, we can effectively adopt taxes.

"This is Antonio. I'll leave you to it."

"Yes, let me show you what to expect"

Antonio has a face for every aspect of the merchant.

He was the one who brought it in to negotiate and coordinate with the union.

"And... abolish the Slave Liberation Tax and introduce a new Slave Possession Tax and Slave Purchase Tax. The former is Shylock, the latter is left to Antonio"

Mesianically preaching equality before God in the first place, slavery is less desirable.

From where it seems difficult to complain even if I take it, I take the tax.

That's what Elquille thinks.

It is Elquille's aim to keep the slave holder tight and eventually abolish slavery and take taxes directly from former slaves.

"Now, besides tax reform, there's something else I want you two to do. I mean, it's the job of the original finance minister, the commerce, industry and trade minister... Shylock, I want you to sort out your finances, especially your debt relationship. You have too many creditors...... it is a little cumbersome. Successfully assemble."

If there are one hundred creditors and twenty, the latter will save more effort and easier.

The decision is that Shylock will do better than Erkühr does.

"And point it out if it's good from your perspective but useless. That and a review of where to invest, please."

"I'm fine, I'm tough, right?

"Don't worry. If it's too tough, I'll loosen it."

Ultimate extraction is misplaced on Elquille.

Although I do intend to respect Shylock's judgment.

"Antonio, you must protect and nurture the empire's industries. For this reason, I leave some discretion to you regarding union (guild) control. Let them compete within the proper limits."

The power of merchants and industrialists is still weak in this world, and if we allow prices to compete in the name of freedom, we could fall together. There is a risk that too much protection could result in high prices and deterioration in quality.

What is needed to foster industry is a balance between freedom and protection.

Note that so far Erkühr has tilted his balance towards protection.

"Well, there's something else I want you two to work on... is this good for now? Please do me a favor."

"" Ha!!

Deep down, they bowed their heads to Elquille.

Shylock and Antonio are very unfriendly, as you can see from their names.

I hired both of them at the same time...

Nothing else to make them compete and watch each other.

... Erkühl is not so much an alertless person as to involve pagans and Gentiles in state politics by no means.