I want to be emperor

Chapter 890 The fine tradition of the empire: never cheat the poor
In the enlarged council meeting held in October 37, Chengshun had extensive discussions on food production and supply issues, and more importantly, Luo Zhixue, the emperor of the Great Chu Empire, gave clear instructions at the meeting.

It is required to preliminarily solve the problem of food supply within five years, so that the per capita food level will increase from the current 380 kilograms to [-] kilograms.

The impact of this meeting is significant!

The Dachu Chaobao used a lot of space to report this food conference in the latest newspaper, not only reporting the meeting itself, but also reporting some related actions of various ministers and departments in the follow-up.

The local morning newspapers also closely follow the wind direction and report on a large scale one after another.

Many officials, whether they are officials from various ministries in Gyeonggi Province or officials from various local yamen, all officials who have anything to do with food are patted their chests and made various statements.

Even officials in other fields that have nothing to do with food or even agriculture are rushing to make various statements one by one.

Even the Ministry of Taxation, which is only responsible for collecting money, only issued a document a few days later, stating that it will conduct research on the current agricultural tax rate and explore the feasibility of reducing agricultural tax in order to increase farmers' income and increase farmers' enthusiasm for growing food.

The industry and commerce department stated that it will further optimize the relevant processes in the grain circulation process, reduce the burden on the grain circulation process, and optimize the grain circulation volume.

The same is true of most other sectors.

As for the Great Chu Empire Grain Corporation, which has a relatively close relationship with this matter, the company’s supervision publicly stated in the Dachu Dynasty Newspaper: The Grain Corporation will make every effort to increase the grain supply and ensure that the local per capita grain supply within five years The grain level has been raised to [-] kilograms.

At the same time, a number of specific proposed plans have been released, such as preparing to build large-scale refrigerated ships, so that meat can be widely imported from overseas territories, colonies, and indigenous control areas, so as to reduce the pressure on local meat supply and reduce the cost of locally cultivated meat. resulting in food consumption.

Subsidies for sea transportation costs of bulk basic grains will be further increased, and the quantity of basic grains such as wheat and rice imported from overseas will be expanded.

The brewing business will undergo a transformation, drastically reducing the main grain wine making business, and switching to potato, corn and other crops that are not picky about the terrain and have higher yields as supplementary grain wine making business, so as to reduce the waste of staple food in the wine making industry.

And in some places, the purchase price of grain will be increased to support and promote the enthusiasm for grain cultivation in some areas.

In short, the Great Chu Empire Grain Corporation will make every effort to increase the food supply.

It can be said that the enthusiasm of various departments and local government offices for the matter of food supply is very rare... This cannot be blamed on them, the main reason is that this matter is Luo Zhixue of the Great Chu Empire. Make clear requests in person.

The last time he did this was the high-pressure steam engine in the early 20s. At that time, he personally publicly instructed to speed up the research and development, production and application of high-pressure steam engines.

Only in this way was it possible for the Great Chu Empire to burst out with super high enthusiasm and realize a series of large-scale mass production and application of various high-pressure steam engines in just a few years.

As for other matters that seem to be very important, in fact Luo Zhixue has never issued a clear request publicly, indicating how to do it, and what goal to achieve.

In most cases, it is a natural adjustment made by the high-level empire as a whole with the development of productivity and society.

Even if Luo Zhixue got involved in it, it was mostly through some non-public small-scale meetings, listening to reports, making simple instructions and many other inconspicuous ways to advance.

He seldom yelled out loud and asked people all over the country to follow him!
In most cases, Luo Zhixue rarely directly intervenes in domestic development!

Strictly speaking, Luo Zhixue did not intervene much in railway construction.

But even so, over the past ten years of seemingly vigorous railway construction, more than [-] kilometers of railways have been laid in just over a decade!
This data is extremely astonishing... Of course, this is also an inevitable situation in the case of productivity, a huge population, and a vast country. You must know that the United States in the original time and space had already laid 1860 kilometers of railways during the Civil War around [-].

However, the industrialization has been completed, the local population alone has a population of four to five billion, and it is expanding extensively around the world. With a large supply of overseas industrial raw materials and dumping markets, the national strength of the Great Chu Empire is actually nineteen times stronger than that of the original time and space. Any modern industrial country in the century will be stronger!

The laying of [-] kilometers of railways in the past ten years is actually not too fast.

If anyone has played the Victoria series of P agency, then they will know that the Qing Dynasty, which has a population of hundreds of millions, a vast land and abundant resources, and most of the resources needed for industrialization, will definitely be the hegemon of the world after it starts industrialization... the kind that can push the world horizontally.

This is not a Chinese self-indulgence, after all, this game was created by foreigners.

And today's Great Chu Empire is actually stronger than the Qing in these strategy games... The Qing in the game has other great powers as opponents, and there are restrictions and punishments of various game mechanisms!

But the Great Chu Empire has no opponents, let alone the expansion punishment mechanism of notoriety. For the Great Chu Empire, it can be said that it can expand wherever it wants to expand globally, and it can expand wherever it wants. .

Not to mention Southeast Asia, the Americas, India, and Africa, the Great Chu Empire is now promoting European trade plans...they plan to treat the whole of Europe as an economic colony.

The Great Chu Empire with such a strong strength is also extremely powerful when carrying out various infrastructure constructions. The construction of a [-]-kilometer railway in more than ten years is actually considered a small number...

The main reason is that the technical strength of basic engineering is a little weaker. It is more difficult to lay railways in complex terrain, and many places in China also have complex terrains. At the same time, the funds for railway construction mainly come from railway companies issuing railway bonds. The private capital was not allowed to rush in, so the railway construction was slightly slower.

If private capital is allowed to swarm in, the speed of railway construction will be much faster... It's just that the railways built by private capital will most likely be concentrated in the eastern flat terrain and economically developed areas.

As for other remote economically backward areas or areas with complex terrain, there is a high probability that it will not be done.

However, the railway is one of the most important basic facilities for people's livelihood. The empire will not tolerate the situation where private capital only builds railways in places where it is easy to build railways and where it is easy to make money.

Considering comprehensive development and people's livelihood, the high-level officials of the empire insisted on not letting go of the railway issue... In recent years, the Great Chu Empire has gradually liberalized even the salt affairs. The license system has been adopted in the industry. As long as the enterprise obtains the production, transportation and sales license, it can engage in the related business of table salt or industrial salt.

As for the retailing of salt, it has been fully liberalized. It is no longer limited to specialized salt stores, and all terminal retail places such as grocery stores are allowed to sell after applying for corresponding licenses.

This is the very important "salt licensing system" in the salt reform of the Great Chu Empire... From the monopoly system integrating production, transportation and sales, it has evolved to the current licensing system!
It's just that the business of table salt and even industrial salt has been operated by the provincial branches of the Great Chu Empire Salt Company, making small profits but quick turnover, with little profit...so even if the license application is released, not many companies enter it ... It's not that you can't apply for a license, but that you don't make money.

It's not good to do anything these days. If you have to engage in the salt industry that can't make much money, people's capital is not stupid...

Who doesn't know that the reason why your Salt Headquarters let go of the franchise is because it doesn't make money!

The railways that really make money, I haven't seen you officials and lords let go of the franchise.

The facts are similar... Mainly due to the continuous advancement of technology, the production of salt has become very simple. The profits and taxes seem to be a lot, but the voices of complaints from the people are not small... So the government has gradually abandoned the salt business profits and taxes many years ago, and gradually lowered the terminal price of salt by reducing the salt tax and reducing profits!

Until now... table salt is already very cheap... so cheap that even if the franchise is released, most of the capital is unwilling to enter this industry.

In desperation, the salt company can only continue to bite the bullet and continue to work, still monopolizing most of the domestic salt and industrial salt supply business!
Their monopoly is not because of their powerful technology... It is simply that the price of salt is made too low, making it unprofitable for latecomers!
It’s a bit similar to the Coke companies of the later generations... The two Coke companies can occupy almost the Coke market, not because of the secret formula or the like, but because they have already made the product price very low through years of accumulation, causing latecomers to want it. Entering this market requires a lot of investment and low profits... No, not to mention making money, it is estimated that you will have to lose money.

In this way, the threshold of the market has been raised a lot!

The moats of the two cola companies are not formulas or patents, they are simply about maximizing prices!

The salt company of the Great Chu Empire is similar. In the past ten years or so, in order to influence the appeal of the high-level empire, it has continued to lower costs and lowered the retail price of salt to the point where no one would pick it up... 20 years ago, I would not dare to imagine it.

But it is different in the case of railways. In terms of railways, the Great Chu Empire still maintains a monopoly system, and the operating profits of some railways are still very high... a lot of private capital wants to get involved.

Therefore, the empire's railway monopoly was driven purely by administrative power.

However, even if there is no private capital rushing in to create a boom in the railway, [-] kilometers have been built.

This [-] kilometers is not a small amount. Even the overseas territory of North America has started to build railways, and it is also building railways in southern Africa...there is a large gold mine deep in the interior of Africa, and a railway is built to facilitate transportation.

However... even for such an important matter as the railway construction, in fact Luo Zhixue has not paid much attention to it for so many years, that is, he paid more attention to it when the train was first built, and basically did not take much care of it later... ...Anyway, there are a lot of departments in charge of this matter, so nothing can go wrong, and the railway can be repaired step by step.

There are many other issues, such as the inclusive basic education proposed two years ago, Luo Zhixue did not take the initiative to express any attitude from the beginning to the end.

It's just that the courtiers discussed on their own, compromised with each other, and after exchanging interests, they reached a consensus plan and Luo Zhixue directly approved it.

In fact, this inclusive basic education is a very important government affair, but Luo Zhixue didn't pay much attention to it... After all, after the productivity has developed to a certain level, compulsory or inclusive education at the basic stage will naturally be provided, and there is no need for Luo Zhixue. Zhixue is dedicated to promoting it.

Inclusive basic education can also be regarded as the six-year compulsory education of the Great Chu Empire’s version to some extent...Of course, due to limited financial capacity, the basic education in the Great Chu Empire focuses on inclusive education, not education. All free!

In fact, even the later generations of Huaxia seem to have adopted the so-called nine-year compulsory education early on, but in fact, for a long time, limited by financial capabilities, although tuition fees are waived in name, the fees for books, miscellaneous fees, board and lodging are still waived. There are all kinds of messy fees and still a lot...

I won’t talk about it earlier, let’s say that for a considerable number of poor rural families in the 90s, it was still a relatively heavy burden to support their children to go to elementary school and junior high school during the nine-year compulsory period... If there are more children, then the children will go to school. Dropping out of primary school is also common.

After entering the 21st century, when the economic conditions improved, only books and miscellaneous fees, board and lodging fees, etc. were exempted in a real sense...

Don't feel bad yet, it's actually pretty good.

Compulsory education is a test of a country's financial capacity. For a country with a small population, compulsory education can be done with any effort.

Anyway, no matter how much you toss, you won't spend a lot of money!
But for a country with a population of more than one billion, compulsory education is very expensive.

For example, future generations will provide 700 million elementary and middle school students with free nine-year compulsory education... Generally speaking, elementary school students are subsidized more than 900 yuan, and junior high school students are subsidized more than 900 yuan... Boarding students have to pay an additional two to three hundred yuan a year... Putting it all together, it is about every The annual subsidy is about [-] yuan!
The subsidy alone is more than 1000 billion, and the subsidy of more than 1000 billion is only a small amount...

In fact, the bulk of compulsory education expenditure is not such things as books and miscellaneous expenses, but teacher salaries and school construction and operating expenses.

The salary expenditure of teachers in the compulsory education stage nationwide is more than 1 trillion a year!
The expenditure for the entire compulsory education stage has reached more than 2 trillion yuan, and teachers' salary costs account for about half of it.

Then there are actually a lot of expenditures in high school and college, which is about 2 trillion yuan... The entire public education expenditure is almost 4 trillion yuan...

This expenditure exceeds the annual fiscal revenue of most countries in the world... Not to mention fiscal revenue, the GDP of most countries is not so much.

be scary!
And this is also the difficulty of compulsory education in a country with a large population, and it is also the strength of a modern country!
It is impossible for a country with a huge population to have compulsory education without sufficient financial strength.

At least on the side of the Great Chu Empire, it is absolutely impossible for the time being... So many teachers can't afford the salary!
It’s not that the Great Chu Empire is not strong enough, but that the productivity is not up to that level, and the accumulation of wealth is not up to that level. If we insist on this kind of comprehensive compulsory education, it will either be financially ruined, or it will be forced to increase taxes, and then there will be uprisings everywhere...

Therefore, in the basic education stage of the Great Chu Empire, what was implemented was inclusive education... In simpler and straightforward terms: cheap education.

It is not completely free, but to lower the price to a certain level, so that as many people as possible, even children from poor families, can receive six years of primary school education.

These days, the younger generation of Chu State have to be educated when they go to work in the city!
If you want to enter a more formal factory, you must have an elementary school degree, otherwise people will not give you...

How to achieve inclusive basic education?

The Great Chu Empire did not take many measures. On the one hand, it increased financial investment, and on the other hand, it reduced the cost of education as much as possible.

Needless to say, increase financial investment, this has been done all the time, but the money is really limited, but the country is so big, even if it is divided into different regions, it will not be much. not enough.

It is more important to reduce the cost of education. Of course, this cost reduction does not mean reducing teachers' salaries... Teachers' salaries are not very high at all, just ordinary middle-income levels.

Reducing wages is also easy to cause trouble... So what is the method adopted by the top management of the empire?Salaries are not reduced, but the number of teachers in government-run schools is strictly controlled...

In short, money is just so little, increasing the number of people and reducing wages does not work, so the only way to maintain wages is to reduce the number of people.

A class with [-] students led by a teacher, and a class with [-] students led by a teacher, the difference in teacher cost between the two is directly doubled. Many officials in the empire are not stupid, they must all choose to engage in large class education System.

A sheep is also chased, and a flock of sheep is also chased... Of course, the teaching quality of the big class is definitely not as good as that of the small class.

But...if you have money, you can go to a private school. There is no need to squeeze in with poor students and occupy public education resources.

If you have money, you don’t go to private schools. Why do you come to government-run primary schools? It’s fun to grab the educational resources of ordinary people?

Master Guan is upset, so I'll slap you backhanded!

In private schools, you can get whatever you want. If you have money, you can even hire a group of teachers of various subjects to teach you at home. This is the so-called family education that is more popular in many rich and powerful families. Corresponding policy: Even if you study at home, as long as you pass the primary and secondary school graduation exams, the official will issue you a primary and secondary school diploma...

Many children from top wealthy families receive elementary school or even junior high school education at home, and then go outside to apply for high school or even university.

The Great Chu Empire is still very clear in terms of education: government-run primary schools and even junior high schools, all kinds of financial subsidies are prepared for ordinary people; for rich people, you spend your own money to go to private schools, don't meddle in it...

If you come to meddle in seizing the educational resources of ordinary people, and make all kinds of complaints about the quality of education, the masters will show you what is called a broken family county magistrate, and a magistrate who wiped out the door!
There are other measures to reduce the cost of education, such as centralized procurement.

At the beginning, the cost of books is too expensive, so we will conduct centralized procurement and bidding, let enterprises compete to lower the price, and lower the price of books to the price of waste paper...Of course, don’t expect how exquisite the paper and printing are for this kind of book , the basic paper and printing are only kept at a usable level.

But the role of books is to pass on knowledge, not to show off beautiful paper and printing!
If you can learn knowledge by printing ordinary books, it is a good book!
A well-printed book filled with a bunch of nonsense is a crappy book.

In order to save education costs, the officials of the Great Chu Empire quite agree with this aspect... If you don’t agree, how much do you plan to donate to education this year?
1000 million Chu Yuan or [-] million Chu Yuan?

What?You didn't...then you are against it!
For example, it is more expensive to build new school buildings, so it is necessary to use a large number of existing government-owned buildings. For example, when the empire was running education in the early days, a considerable number of school buildings were used. There are buildings.

Even if it is a new school building, even if it is on the premise of ensuring quality, the cost should be reduced as much as possible, as long as it can be used... Extra costs such as carving beams and painting buildings will be reduced.

As a result, many schools in the empire are actually a bare piece of necessary buildings such as teachers and school buildings, and the buildings are all practical buildings, basically there is no artistry at all, and they are ugly.

What do you mean by sports venues, cultural venues, etc., just use a piece of open space as a playground... Inclusive sex education doesn’t need a bicycle, it’s good if you can learn.

I dislike the poor hardware facilities of public education, and the same sentence: You can go to those private schools, you can have whatever you want...

The Great Chu Empire has never had any restrictions, and even encourages private schools!
Especially in rural areas, the officials of the Great Chu Empire have always encouraged local gentry and wealthy businessmen to run private schools.

In addition to encouraging them to run schools in person, almost every place has a so-called educational charity dinner every year...

This educational charity dinner is more interesting.

Usually, the county magistrate, magistrate, and governor of the local yamen invite the local gentry and wealthy businessmen to eat, drink and have fun... Of course, before entering the door, you have to fill out a check to donate to the local education cause!

This number can't be too small, you are shameless, and the official is even more shameless.

You are a big boss who only donates so much, is my face so worthless?

This officer puts down his dignity and personally invites you over to eat, drink and have fun with you, how dare you refuse to pay?

Who do you look down on?
Dare to look down on me, the official, and ruin your family every minute!
Well, this is an annual educational charity dinner with the characteristics of the Great Chu Empire!
The one that stands out is: you have to come if you don’t come, and you have to donate if you don’t...

In fact, it was all kinds of donations and losses in the pre-Ming period...only the officials in the pre-Ming period would only do it when they had something to do, and it also depends on the mood of the rich businessmen.

And in the Great Chu Empire, those local officials will come to you once a year...

Otherwise, how do you think the various primary schools that sprang up everywhere in the Great Chu Empire came from?

Official finance alone can't do it!
The development of education in the Great Chu Empire is inseparable from the generosity of the gentry and wealthy businessmen!

After more than [-] years of holding this kind of educational charity banquet... the gentry and wealthy businessmen in the Great Chu Empire have already acquiesced, and even they themselves take it for granted... Whenever it is time to hold an educational charity banquet, they will be very conscious According to your social status, this year's profitability, invitations, and the level of officials present, fill in the amount of the check.

Even some wealthy businessmen who have just risen are still eagerly waiting for this charity dinner invitation!
Getting the invitation card means that your financial resources and social status have been recognized, and you can truly enter the local upper-class circle, or else you will get rich without a few upper-class people coming for a treat!
Well, without a certain social status and financial resources, you still can't get an invitation!
In terms of education and charity, the officials and lords of the Great Chu Empire have always maintained the fine traditions that existed during the Unification War: never cheat the poor!
(End of this chapter)