The War Court and Lap Pillow, Austria's Mandate of Heaven

Chapter 1928 German Confederation Labor Protection Law
Franz had always been very patient and usually appeared to be in complete control, but at this moment he simply couldn't stand idly by.

Bismarck himself probably didn't realize how terrifying this economic nuclear bomb was; it was a complete negation of the existing economic system of the German Confederation.

If Franz doesn't do something soon, the world line might shift.

To minimize losses, Franz immediately cut off the German Confederation's foreign trade network.

Only Franz could do this; apart from the Austrian Empire, no other country in the Confederation was qualified to do it.

However, if it is implemented after several weeks or even months of discussion, although it may be legitimate, the losses will be real.

Franz wouldn't seek empty fame at the cost of real harm. The Austrian Empire's actions seemed overly domineering and would undoubtedly cause significant damage to itself.

But perhaps many people are hoping the Austrian Empire will do the same. And in the long run, Franz's approach is more beneficial than harmful.

This time, it's time for the Austrian Empire to suffer.

However, Franz's approach was in line with public opinion, and no country stood up to oppose it. Only some critics condemned the Austrian Empire for its tyranny and interference in the market economy.

However, Franz was tired of hearing these words; they were completely unoriginal, and even the theoretical models were almost identical.

This incident is not bad for our distant trading partners. As long as Franz handles things properly, the matter will be over by the time they realize what's happening.

However, the Russian market is not so easy to solve, because the economies of the two sides are already highly intertwined, and have even formed a path dependency.

Fortunately, Nicholas I himself was easy to deal with, so letting the Tsar handle the Russian issues made things much easier.

Although Franz blocked the purchases by the Russian government and private businesses, he did not stop Nicholas I, or rather the Russian royal family, from taking advantage of the situation.

This undoubtedly brought the two sides closer, and Franz also gave Nicholas I a reason he couldn't refuse.

"This is an exceptional, special supply. And wouldn't you make even more money if you monopolized these goods?"

Franz didn't say some things directly, but Nicholas I wasn't stupid; he understood the principle of give and take.

Strengthening the Russian imperial family would not have been too bad for the Austrian Empire, at least not while Nicholas I was still alive, as the likelihood of war between the two sides was not high.

In fact, the victories achieved by Nicholas I over the years, especially the conquest of the Balkans, the reconquest of Constantinople, and the restoration of the Eastern Roman Empire, would not be an exaggeration to give him the title of ten emperors.

However, the Russian Senate did not take any action for a long time. On the one hand, Nicholas I was not the legitimate heir; he was simply handed the crown of the Tsar. Otherwise, he would not have made the farce of pledging allegiance to someone else first.

However, one's birth was not that important. The real problem was that Nicholas I wanted to move the capital, reduce his power, free his soldiers from serfdom, and strengthen his control over the people and nobles.

Every step he took precisely crossed the red lines of the Russian nobility and bureaucracy, especially his attempt to free soldiers from serfdom, which touched upon the underlying logic of the entire Russian society.

Nicholas I himself may not have thought much about it, but his actions were seen by the vested interests in Russia as digging up their roots and taking their lives.

If they weren't currently unable to touch Nicholas I himself, the Tsar would probably have been replaced long ago.

Nicholas I also had a compromise: to emulate the Austrian Empire and make the soldiers and their families royal serfs.

Although they were still serfs, Nicholas I felt that he was much better than the nobles, and he did not intend to interfere with the lives of the serfs.

They were called serfs, but in reality they were more like free peasants or small landowners.

Nicholas I felt he was making concessions, but the Russian nobles and bureaucrats felt that the Tsar wanted to bypass them and raise a private army and assassins.

If Nicholas I had succeeded, would these people still have listened to the Russian government and military officers?

I'm afraid that if Nicholas I gave him a single glance, these people would arrest those who were blocking his way.

If the Tsar could control the country without these nobles and bureaucrats, then what value did they have? And what fate would they have met?
Nicholas I was one of the few people who could unite the Russian nobility, bureaucrats, intellectuals, and military, because the Tsar was too uncontrollable as a leader and everyone was hostile to him.

Coincidentally, Nicholas I did not trust anyone in the Russian high command, especially after Olga's affair. Nicholas I's suspicion escalated to resentment, and he would feel that someone was interfering whenever things went wrong.

But what truly caused the Russian vested interests to completely break with him was that Nicholas I, in order to increase the popularity of Constantinople, unilaterally bypassed the Senate and the State Council and disbanded a legion he had carefully selected.

Nicholas I freed all the serfs and their families in the entire legion. When some local nobles tried to sabotage the process, he followed Franz's example and used force to solve the problem.

The soldiers who had been granted freedom by the Tsar acted with extreme cruelty, and after a series of tragedies, Nicholas I had to temporarily halt the operation.

Nicholas I still felt he was making concessions, but his enemies only saw his weakness.

In fact, if Franz had not resolved most of the problems during the great upheaval of 1848, the reforms of the Austrian Empire would have faced a collective backlash from vested interests.

On the other hand, this price war severely damaged the Austrian Empire's reputation within the Apennine Commercial Union, resulting in losses for all merchants and factories.

To avoid the worst-case scenario, Franz had no choice but to buy up all the cheap goods on the market and temporarily suspend transit trade between the German Confederation and the Apennine Commercial Union before the market could return to stability.

Some habits may take more than a decade to form, but it only takes a few months to break them.

(This was under the conditions of the 19th century; with the advancement of technology, this cycle will continue to shorten.)
What Franz wanted to do was simple: he had to bring out the same Labor Protection Act that he had used against the German National Council.

The mere mention of seven insurances and three funds would send shivers down the spines of merchants and factory owners in every state, yet Franz deliberately entrusted the power to manage and distribute these funds to the government.

Furthermore, the ability to take coercive measures against violating companies and impose fines has placed the two sides directly at odds, to some extent undermining the basis for cooperation.

With the addition of a set of effective regulatory measures, a completely new system will be formed in a closed loop.

Other measures, such as banning child labor, equal pay for equal work, minimum wage standards, and protection for both workers and farmers, will significantly increase labor costs.

(For details, please refer to Volume 11, Chapter 40, Magical Showdown.)
While power is tempting, the system Franz established followed the principle of equal rights and responsibilities; great power also meant great responsibility.

This clearly runs counter to their goals, and the influence of classical economics' free market theory and the latest social Darwinism is not so easy to remove.

Franz's actions contradicted their understanding; in their view, he was tantamount to protecting a mob and nurturing those who would overthrow them. Most importantly, this went against human intuition: improving worker conditions meant increasing costs, which inevitably led to lower profits, and lower profits resulted in losing out in the competition.

Losing in competition leads to reduced tax revenue, which weakens the nation, and a weakened nation then leads to internal and external troubles.

In this way, the logic can form a closed loop. This is especially true for important figures who tend to trust their intuition more.

However, it is clear to discerning people that the core of the whole issue lies in government subsidies, rather than simply a wage problem.

Although the German states were suppressing workers' wages at this time, the proportion of workers' wages in costs was not very high, except for some industries such as textiles and mining.

Even in these industries, the proportion of wages has fallen to a fairly low level. Even in agriculture, due to the extensive use of agricultural machinery and fertilizers, the proportion of labor costs is also declining.

In large industries such as steel and glass, the wages of frontline workers account for less than 5% of the total cost. Moreover, the problem of wage disparity has existed for a long time and has not changed much over the years.

The reason for choosing to suppress workers' wages is simply because there is no cost to be paid.

Lowering supplier prices may result in receiving inferior raw materials, and reducing maintenance costs may lead to safety accidents.

However, suppressing workers' wages can save costs in the short term and even gain higher obedience and a certain degree of worship.

These benefits are immediate, while the drawbacks are almost nonexistent.

Because of this path dependence, even the radicals in the National Assembly felt that Franz was too extreme.

No one would agree to this, but does Franz, as the proposer, really not understand this?

Representatives from other states did not understand what the Austrian Empire was really up to, but anything that was unfavorable to them, or that they felt was unfavorable to them, could never be passed.

Of course, given Franz's current status, he would never dare to oppose it in public, so the proposal had to be shelved.

At this point, the representatives of the various states faced a problem: no one dared to agree, and no one dared to oppose.

Therefore, the Austrian Empire might very well use its vote to demand reforms across the entire confederation, since the Austrian Empire itself would not oppose its own proposal.

Since no one objected, a single vote was a unanimous approval. While this sounds absurd, it is indeed possible, and is even happening now.

Although the various states were opposed to it, even Bismarck did not want to take the blame.

Bismarck's ultimate goal was indeed to fight the Austrian Empire to the death, but he had no intention of fighting a war with the Austrian Empire, which was still at its peak and in a fit of rage.

To put it bluntly, what Bismarck always wanted was victory, not war.

What if no one is willing to step forward? Of course, the solution is to shift the blame and let the public and media escalate the situation.

The same issue raised by a political entity has completely different effects than one raised by the people.

If any political entity in the German Confederation insisted on going against the Austrian Empire and Franz, it was simply courting disaster.

But what if the objection is raised by an abstract concept called the public?

No matter how unreasonable or ruthless Franz and the Austrian Empire were, they could not completely eradicate this abstract concept.

As a result, the German Law on the Protection of Workers, Peasants and Those Working in the Service Sector has once again come into the public eye.

As soon as Franz's proposal was revealed, it caused a huge uproar, with unprecedented levels of discussion and participation from all sides.

However, before that, we need to mention something else: besides Franz's proposal, there were other opinions within the Confederation.

This price war not only caused heavy losses to the Austrian Empire, but also to smaller countries with weaker risk resistance.

Therefore, their proposal is to restore internal tariff autonomy to a certain extent, so that they will have the ability to resist external risks.

Of course, some smaller countries believe that member states should retain the power to impose embargoes and import quotas, and even think that the trade agreements within the customs union should be renegotiated.

After all, if this kind of thing happens a few more times, those small countries could really go bankrupt.

Although they were just testing the waters, and it wasn't necessarily true that they wanted to leave the German Customs Union.

But this was not the situation Franz wanted to see. The twenty-year process of alliance integration was directly reversed by this price war, and the idea of ​​separation and fragmentation resurfaced.

The Austrian envoy's first reaction was that the Prussians were behind it all, since in the eyes of the Austrians, the Prussians were the representatives of separatist forces.

Everything, both before and now, was planned by the Prussians in order to cause the German Confederation to split up once again.

What Prussia cannot have, they will destroy.

The news quickly reached Vienna, and after a thorough analysis by the high-ranking officials of the Austrian Empire, they concluded that it was indeed very likely.

After all, thinking about it this way makes a lot of things make sense. Especially when you connect these things together, a complete chain of evidence is formed.

The matter was quickly laid out on Franz's desk. The group's analysis was logical and well-founded, and he even began to doubt himself to some extent.

However, Franz quickly regained his composure. After all, regardless of the Prussians' thoughts, the Austrian Empire always had only one goal and only one thing to do.

As Franz calmed down, the Austrian Empire's actions proceeded methodically.

In fact, the Kingdom of Prussia did not want to see this situation either. Their goal was also unification, rather than simply maintaining the status quo or going back to the past.

They didn't want the German region to split up again, since it wouldn't be easy to bring these loosely connected states together.

Moreover, since the unification of states, their strength has significantly increased. If they were to disperse, it would be very difficult to bring them back together.

However, the Austrian Empire's envoys were unaware of these matters.