I am Da Song

Chapter 162 20 Million Stones
Zhao Huan's reform of the government, in addition to streamlining the organization and abolishing redundant officials, the biggest impact is to ensure that no one in the court is capable of resisting his will.

He can carry out various reforms of the Song Dynasty completely according to his own wishes.

Although the feudal autocracy suffered from exhaustion, it has to be admitted that the fastest way to lead the Song Dynasty to achieve a leap of civilization is autocratic centralization.The development of the entire country follows his will in order to have the highest development efficiency.

One of the most effective ways to control development is taxation.So after sorting out the situation in the court, the first minister Zhao Huan met was Minister Ji Yang Shi.

Yang Shi is now an envoy of the Third Division, in charge of Duzhi, Salt and Iron and the Ministry of Household Affairs.

Looking at the names of these three divisions, you can know where the focus of Da Song's taxation is.Duzhi is the budget department, Yantie is the state government, and the Ministry of Households is the poll tax.

This gray-haired old man is very healthy.When I met Zhao Huan for the first time, he was not serious and cautious. After seeing the ceremony, he quickly cut to the topic of tax reform, and said to Zhao Huan: "I heard that the government intends to reduce or exempt the common people's taxes?"

"It's not a reduction. It's not unusual for emperors of all dynasties to reduce or exempt. I plan to abolish Ding Fu completely."

Hearing this, Yang Shi nodded slightly. As a man of great knowledge and knowledge, he is extremely proficient in the tax system.Said to Zhao Huan: "The officials are sympathetic to the sufferings of the people, and I feel the same. But before the officials implement the tax reform, please first introduce the situation of my Song Dingfu to the officials."

"Good!" Zhao Huan said excitedly, "This is exactly what I want."

"Our tax system in the Song Dynasty probably continued from the two tax laws of Li and Tang, but all kinds of search items during the Five Dynasties and Ten Kingdoms also continued. It can be said that the ancient methods of cutting and stripping are all available in this dynasty."

"Leaving aside these exorbitant and miscellaneous taxes for the time being, let's just talk about these taxes first. According to the Two Tax Law, the imperial court sets the total amount of tax revenue according to the expenditure situation. Then it collects taxes according to the number of households in the country. That is, rich households pay more and poor households pay less. If the number of households grows, the tax will be reduced, and if there is a reduction in households or the separation of people and the imbalance, the chief official will be notified, and the collection will be made to the household department.”

"That's why our dynasty only counts the household registration but not the population. This custom has existed since the Tang Dynasty."

After listening, Zhao Huan learned a lot, and it was the first time that he realized that the Tang and Song Dynasties actually considered tax cuts when formulating taxes.

When formulating policies, court ministers must think that they can last forever.But in the actual implementation, various errors occurred.I only heard of exorbitant taxes and miscellaneous taxes that crushed the people, but I never heard that taxes were really reduced.

However, Zhao Huan quickly realized that if the imperial court implements this taxation system, the total expenditure will be allocated to each household within its means.Then if you abolish Ding Fu yourself, doesn't it mean that the court has no more money to use?
At this time, Yang Shi also pointed at the key point, saying: "The government intends to exempt the Ding tax and levy taxes on the basis of acres. Then we will face the situation of insufficient national financial coins. After all, the national tax revenue is mainly in kind, and it is rarely discounted."

Zhao Huan asked curiously: "Since the implementation of the two tax laws, isn't taxation calculated in currency?"

Yang Shi explained: "Since the mid-Tang Dynasty, although the two taxes are calculated in currency, the payment is still in kind."

"It's more complicated in our dynasty. There is no unified currency in our dynasty. The industrial and commercial economies of various places are self-enclosed, and currencies do not circulate with each other. In Gyeonggi, copper coins are used more, in Sichuan, iron coins are used, in Hedong, salt banknotes are used, Shaanxi even uses tea quotations and monk Taoism certificates as currency.”

Zhao Huan slapped his forehead in pain, and asked, "So the use of Jiaozi in Sichuan is entirely because the iron money is too heavy?"

Yang Shi nodded and replied: "That's true. Therefore, the imperial court often pays two taxes, or money for silk, or money for wheat, or money for wheat, and repeated payment, and the people suffer a lot. .”

Zhao Huan asked: "Is it possible to directly collect food from the land rent? I remember that the imperial court collects a lot of taxes, can it supply the imperial court's needs?"

"According to what you just said, if the total expenditure is distributed equally to the number of households across the country, it stands to reason that the country's regular taxes can meet the fiscal expenditure. The remaining various exorbitant taxes are even surplus."

Yang Shi analyzed for Zhao Huan one by one: "If the laws and regulations are unified, the real objects will be collected. The first problem that the court will face is the shortage of storage. After the country implements the tax law of square land, the land that can be cleared will suddenly increase by two to three times."

"At the peak of the Yuanfeng period, the country's cultivated land area was 520 million hectares. One hectare is one hundred mu, which is equivalent to more than 5 million mu of land. Even if it is doubled, the cultivated land will reach one billion mu."

To this number, Zhao Huan nodded slightly.In the Ming Dynasty, there were more than 100 million hectares of land, or 11 billion mu, which was slightly higher than that in the Song Dynasty. This is a normal figure.

After all, this is the official data of the Ming Dynasty. The Ming Dynasty has not figured out how many people it has for more than 200 years.Zhang Juzheng implemented a whip method, and found 8000 million mu of fertile land at one time, and he officially has more than one billion mu of fertile land.Zhao Huan felt that it was reasonable that there would be one billion mu of land after the Song Dynasty's investigation and concealment.

"Officials, the yield per mu in the Song Dynasty is about two stones (Song stone is the largest in history, equal to about 97 kilograms), and the national grain output is as high as 20 billion stones. Even if calculated according to the 2000th tax, nearly [-] million grains will be collected every year. Stone. In less than five years, the country’s accumulated grain will exceed [-] million stone. Just building new grain storage granaries can overwhelm the country.”

"In addition, the various miscellaneous taxes mentioned by the officials not only involve the Ding Fu, but also the Gen Fu. The young and strong laborers have to serve the government on a regular basis, or pay the Miscellaneous Fu to hire people. That's why the government In addition to counting the number of households, count the number of strong men."

"Those exorbitant and miscellaneous taxes are all based on these two items. Therefore, Xining's reform, big and small officials took the opportunity to collect taxes frequently, causing the people to suffer unspeakably."

Considering that it was his first meeting with the official family after all, Yang Shi opened his mouth, but kept the rest of the words in his stomach.

It is undoubtedly a great benefit for the officials to reduce or exempt the Ding Fu for the common people.

However, the state's regular tax only accounts for a very small share of the people's burden.If it is to reduce the country's regular taxes, it is maintained by exorbitant miscellaneous taxes.

Once this reform is carried out, it will become a paradise for grassroots tax collectors and ordinary people.They can use the righteousness of the court to justifiably call for all kinds of exorbitant taxes.

The little bit of state tax that the country has reduced is not even a drop in the bucket in the face of the various exorbitant taxes.

Zhao Huan nodded solemnly, and realized that his previous thoughts were naive.

Since ancient times, the country has formulated policies in anticipation of the prosperity of the country and the safety of the people.However, when a good policy is implemented, it often becomes a handy tool for exploiting the people in the hands of grassroots tax collectors.

Thanks to having this kind of national treasure who has experienced the previous reforms of the Song Dynasty sit in charge, Zhao Huan was able to avoid many detours.

Zhao Huan asked solemnly: "So according to Qing's wishes, how should the tax system be reformed?"

Yang Shi replied solemnly: "I report to the officials, I think that in my holy dynasty, the most important thing to do now is to simplify and simplify! Extremely simplified! So simplified that no tax collector can do any unnecessary operations!"

(End of this chapter)