Qiming 1158

Chapter 1215 Daming Treasure Banknotes?

There is a tradition of using iron money in Sichuan and Sichuan. For hundreds of years, they trust iron money and their own children.

Whether it is common people or wealthy families, they basically agree with the use and circulation of iron money.

After all, it is still a kind of physical currency. It is difficult to say that it will have no value. Even if iron is not made into currency, it is still valuable.

Although physical currency will also experience the explosive depreciation of paper money, it is mainly due to the operation of the imperial court that the weight is too low.

The value of physical currency comes from itself, and it mainly depends on its quality and weight. The biggest variable is the behavior of the court that issued the currency.

For example, Dong Zhuo's insanity and Sun Quan's extreme greed, if Dong Zhuo's small money or Sun Quan's big spring is used as a thousand, if there is no guarantee, just take a dollar and force others to use it as 1000 yuan, even if it is a physical currency, it will be out of circulation directly. value.

As long as the court that talks a little about the rules does not go too far, the value of physical currency is still strong. For example, Song copper coins, which are well-known world currencies, are very strong in value and have a high degree of credit, and everyone is willing to use them.

It was Jiaozi and Huizi who were played badly, and the copper coins were full of value.

This is the case with copper coins. Although iron coins do not have such a large circulation area, they are still valuable. Therefore, there are many iron coins in the trade with them in the Guanzhong Province of the Ming Dynasty.

During the Northern Song Dynasty, the Guanzhong Province of the Ming Dynasty, which had frequent economic exchanges with the Sichuan and Shu regions, had a parallel situation of copper coins and iron coins. Later, it was the same during the Jin Dynasty, and it was the same after the Ming Dynasty established the Guanzhong Province, which continued until There is no trend to change now.

But Su Yonglin didn't really like iron money.

The value of iron money is too low, the weight is too large, and the commercial circulation is too restrictive. Chuanshu himself could not bear the weight, and finally came up with Jiaozi as a substitute.

Moreover, iron is more unstable in chemical properties than copper, silver and gold, and is more prone to oxidation and rust. It is prone to large-scale rust when left untouched, and its value preservation efficiency is low. value crisis.

Therefore, after comprehensive consideration, Su Yonglin has already planned to abolish the circulation of iron money at that time. Therefore, the Central Capital's treasury is not allowed to receive iron money, taxation does not accept iron money, and iron money is not used as a national reserve, only copper money is used.

This kind of behavior brought certain troubles to the merchants in the Guanzhong area, causing the iron money in their hands to have a value and credit crisis for a time, causing them to protest, thinking that it was unfair to them by the imperial court.

However, Su Yonglin was determined not to change, and clearly told the merchants in Guanzhong that it was impossible for the court to accept iron money as a tax reserve, either copper money or white bars, whichever was the best choice.

But the court temporarily recognized the value of iron money.

The arm can't twist the excavator. After the court has determined this, how can the merchants in Guanzhong be the opponent of the court?
Nevertheless, for a considerable period of time at the beginning of the founding of the People's Republic of China, Su Yonglin was busy with various economic affairs and had no time to adjust the monetary policy, and temporarily expressed his support for the long-formed folk traditions.

Except for the feeling of issuing white notes due to the economic tension, it has basically not touched the currency situation.

And in the end, Su Yonglin really doesn't have any good plan for reforming the currency.

Of course, iron money will not work, copper money is also very difficult, and physical currencies such as gold and silver are even more difficult.

Although Su Yonglin collected a large amount of gold and silver reserves from the nobles of the Jin Kingdom, the purged bureaucrats, and the families of tyrannical landlords, and put all these precious metals into the treasury for storage, the amount could only roughly meet the gold and silver standard circulation in a region.

For example, the Yanyun area, or the Liaodong area, or the Guanzhong area, etc., etc., if you want to carry out nationwide changes, this kind of storage is simply not enough.

The scarcity of precious metals in China has indeed increased the difficulty of currency reform to a considerable extent. The lavishness of the emperors in the Western Han Dynasty and the prevailing system of burial of precious metals made a large amount of gold and silver buried underground and could not be circulated.

It is not impossible to use copper coins, the currency minted in the Southern Song Dynasty, for a long time. Anyway, the Southern Song Dynasty will be completely destroyed soon, and the currency they minted will be directly converted into the currency of the Ming Dynasty.

But the problem is that the problem of deflation will always be a headache for the imperial court, and it will affect the economic development of the Ming Dynasty all the time. If you want to get out of the shadow of deflation, you must find another way.

For example, he started a big voyage to engage in American silver, and used a huge amount of American silver to complete the reform of the silver standard currency.

However, it seems that it is not unrealistic at present. It is just that it is very difficult and requires a lot of time. It is also necessary to carry out a large voyage operation to explore the Americas.

This is by no means impossible. Su Yonglin did not believe that what the Portuguese and Spaniards could do back then could not be done by the people of Daming, but the risk and difficulty were indeed greater.

There is a lot of silver in Japan, and the distance is close, but Japan itself is still using the copper coins of the Southern Song Dynasty for circulation, and often uses the strategy of exchanging silver for copper coins to return copper coins, which further aggravates the situation of the outflow of copper coins in the Southern Song Dynasty.

The silver of this small island country can be the icing on the cake.

Therefore, the reform of the silver standard and the gold standard has always been in Su Yonglin's plan, but he has not proposed it.

The Ministry of Finance was very concerned about the currency issue, and expressed dissatisfaction with Daming's use of copper and iron coins from the Southern Song Dynasty, and wanted to change the status quo and use Daming's own currency to develop the economy.

In the absence of precious metals to build physical currency, they hope to promote the reform of paper currency, so that Daming will be free from dependence on metal currency.

This idea is very advanced.

Since the fifth year of Hongwu, Lin Jingchun led the Ministry of Finance and proposed to upgrade the imperial white bars to Daming treasure banknotes, and then link the Daming treasure banknotes with the staple food and salt, two life-sustaining necessities, and simply let the copper coins out of circulation to solve the problem. huge financial problems.

People can't leave the staple food and salt. They have to buy staple food and salt in Daming. No matter who they are, they can only use Daming Treasure Notes, and only recognize Daming Treasure Notes.

The imperial court has always mastered sufficient storage of staple grains and salt, and controlled the production of staple grains and salt to a considerable extent, so as to ensure that the value of the Daming Treasure Banknotes is always strong.

State-run farms and state-run saltworks must be established on a large scale, maintained in good operation, and fully controlled by the imperial court.

The Ministry of Finance will set up a special and rigorous plan for this, and will firmly control the issuance of Daming Treasure Banknotes and the production and sales of staple food and salt.

Daming treasured banknotes are food and salt, so they have a strong value. The imperial court can safely issue a certain number of Daming treasured banknotes, and set a strict period for the rotation of banknotes.

In this regard, some practices of the Southern Song Dynasty can be adopted, and there are precedents.

After this proposal was put forward, some people expressed their support, believing that this is the most feasible strategy under the current state.

Because everyone knows the meaning of staple food and salt, and everyone who can read and don't know it, it is possible to do this, and it can solve the current economic dependence on copper and iron coins.

But others have suggested that this is not acceptable.

Grain and salt are indeed inseparable from everyone. They are good value anchors. However, it is not easy for these two things to be stored for a long time. They may be corrupted and damp due to various problems at any time. Storage costs Very high.

Moreover, the total amount of storage is difficult to stabilize. Whenever there is a dilemma, the imperial court needs to open warehouses on a large scale to provide food relief to the victims, or when there is a huge military operation, it is inevitable that the Ministry of Finance will not be used for storage.

At that time, it will be difficult to ensure the total storage of grain and salt, and it will face great challenges, and this may affect the value of Daming Treasure Banknotes to a considerable extent, causing market panic and the like.

As a result, the value of the Daming Treasure Notes will face frequent fluctuations.

Especially in the years of frequent famines and frequent use of troops, it is especially unfavorable for the long-term stability of the court.

In the final analysis, your Daming treasure is just a piece of paper, even if it is a relatively high-value water-textured paper, but the price of a piece of water-textured paper is the same as the price of a piece of water-textured paper. Not everyone agrees. What's the point of this piece of paper?

(End of this chapter)