I, the Ming Dynasty, can still save me

Chapter 357 Tariff Reform
"Your Majesty is a man who understands that the ambitions of Western countries must be guarded against."

Bi Ziyan nodded when he heard the words. Since he opened the sea, he has been very concerned about maritime affairs and has heard many rumors about Southeast Asia.

There were many cases where the Folangji oppressed the Ming people in Nanyang. He even heard that the Folangji had repeatedly massacred the Ming people in Nanyang, which made him very angry and had no good impression of Westerners.

"Yes, there is no need to delay the addition of new warships. Fortunately, the imperial court allocated 10 taels of silver after I came to Beijing. Although it is a drop in the bucket, it is better than nothing. We will raise the other money, which involves the third task entrusted by His Majesty. Two things.”

Hearing this, Bi Ziyan, Sun Chuanting and others suddenly looked at each other with curiosity. It seemed that this second incident had something to do with money.

Yuan Keli was silent for a moment, collected his thoughts and then spoke slowly:
"The second thing is to change the tax system."

“Change the tax system?”

When Sun Chuanting heard this, he immediately began to think about it. He was afraid that this matter would involve a lot of money. Although it had not been long since he opened the sea, he always knew that there were huge interests involved.So I became even more curious about how the tax system was going to be reformed.

"Your Majesty thinks the current tariff system is unreasonable?"

"It's not just His Majesty who made the decision after the Ministry of Household Accounting found that the tariff system was unreasonable and then reported it to His Majesty."

As he spoke, Yuan Keli stood up, put his hands behind his back and looked around at everyone, and then paced back and forth in the main hall while talking.

"According to the Ministry of Household Accounting's accounting of the tariffs paid by Yuegang during the opening and closing of Longqing, it was found that the tax system was not only rigid in tax amounts, but also had many restrictions. Therefore, the annual tax amount in Yuegang was less than 3 taels, which was a drop in the bucket for the court. The reason was that it was not If you dare to do it, take the introduction of tax, one of the three major types of tariffs at present, as an example.

I don’t know if you have heard of a tax invoice. This type is also called a "ship invoice". To put it bluntly, it is a certificate for maritime merchants to go to sea. Only with it can maritime merchants be qualified to go to sea to do business and foreign businessmen are qualified to enter the port.

In the past, if maritime merchants wanted to go to sea to do business, they had to spend money to buy ship guides from the "Governor's Pay Office" before they could go to sea for trade.

During the Longqing period, the imperial court issued ship-baiting in Yuegang every three years. The amount was very small, only 110 bai was issued each time, and later increased to [-] bai. The price of ship-baiting also gradually increased from three taels per unit to six taels.

Such a small quantity naturally gave local officials an opportunity to start. As long as they spent money, they could ask officials from Yuegang's "Duration Office" to handle additional ship navigation, but they also squandered the money.

According to the information obtained by the Ministry of Household Affairs, the chief secretaries and ports along the coast are now selling ship guides, but the actual amount distributed is very small. The purpose is to learn from the previous practices of Yue Port and allow maritime merchants who want to go to sea to bribe officials. This This time, an additional ship will be issued to enrich their own pockets. "

Sun Chuanting secretly smiled bitterly when he heard this. As a member of the Nanjing Household Department, he naturally knew these inside stories.

Now Liuhe, Haimen and other ports in South Zhili are first-class ports, and local officials have also made a lot of money from them, but now it seems that their good intentions have come to an end.

Bi Ziyan and Hong Chengchou naturally knew the inside story, but they didn't expect that the Ministry of Revenue actually knew the following situation clearly. After thinking about it, he also guessed that Wang Yingjiao, who had previously served as the Minister of the Ministry of Revenue in Nanjing, was responsible for Jiangnan. It might be relevant if you are familiar with the financial situation in each place.

"Brother Yuan, in this case, the imperial court is going to completely let go of Chuan Yin."

Hearing Bi Ziyan's inquiry, Yuan Ke nodded immediately.

"Yes, once the customs yamen is established, the ship guide will be completely liberalized, but the price of the ship guide will be raised to ten taels of silver per guide. This price is actually not high. By then everyone can go to the customs yamen to buy ship guides. No Restrictions, when the problem of privately selling boat guides will be solved, the income of the imperial court will naturally increase."

"I'm afraid that the yamen below will secretly obstruct me."

Hong Chengchou hesitated to speak, but a cold snort came from Yuan Keli's mouth.

"Secretly obstructing it, let's see who is more powerful, them or the court. In addition, the customs duties are also escorted to the court from time to time, [-]% of which are escorted to the court for subsidies, and the remaining [-]% are reserved for the use of the chief secretary and prefectures. If you still don't understand, Then don’t blame the court for being ruthless.”

When Sun Chuanting heard what Yuan Keli said, he felt relieved.

If all tariffs are taken away, the localities will definitely not be willing to do so. If [-]% is left to the localities, the Chief Secretary and the prefectures and counties will not object openly even if they object.

"This is feasible, and there will be little resistance from the imperial court to implement it."

Bi Ziyan also expressed his support after hearing this. It is not impossible for the central government to eat meat and the local government to drink soup.

Yuan Keli nodded when he saw this. This ratio was calculated by the people in the Ministry of Revenue, and there are not too many contradictions when divided.Seeing that everyone had nothing to say, he continued to pace and talk about other tariff reforms.

After a while, Sun Chuanting and others understood the subsequent reforms, but they were still a little surprised after hearing it.I secretly thought that Yuan Keli was really well prepared this time. It seemed that he wanted to establish the Ming Dynasty's tariff system in one fell swoop when the sea had just opened and the system was not yet complete to prevent any problems in the future.

Because according to Yuan Keli, this time in addition to the ship guide reform.Among the tariffs, the more important thing is to reform the other two items, namely shipping tax and cargo tax.

Shipping tax is an import and export tax.

First of all, all ships leaving the port will be taxed according to the width of the ship. If the ship is less than [-] feet wide, [-] silver taels will be levied; if it exceeds [-] feet, an additional [-] taels of silver will be levied for each additional foot. If it goes to the West, an additional [-] tael will be levied. times.

The tax for traveling to and from other chief ministers along the coast is reduced by [-]%. If traveling to and from Liaodong, the tax is reduced by [-]%.This is done to promote various merchant ships to do business in Liaodong and drive the economy and development of Liaodong.

In addition to exports, there are also import taxes.All imported goods are subject to an ad valorem tax based on their value, with a tax rate of [-]%.

In addition, there are excise taxes.Zhu Youxiao knows that Europe is now obsessed with Chinese goods, especially after Spain colonized Luzon, which has completely become a trade transfer station between Europe and China.

Chinese maritime merchants shipped silk, tea, and porcelain to Luzon and sold them to European merchants, and their profits were doubled or more. However, there were no goods worth shipping back to Luzon for domestic sales, so merchants often returned to China with empty ships. If this was the case, the government There will be no import tax levied.

So Wang Yingjiao discussed with Zhu Youxiao to levy additional goods tax on merchant ships transporting Chinese silk, porcelain, spices, medicinal materials, furs, grains and other goods. Each ship will have a different amount of additional tax depending on the goods, which is probably It ranges from 50 taels to 120 taels.

Of course, if the incoming ships are carrying grain, copper, silver, gold and other materials or metals in short supply when entering the port, the court can exempt or even charge no tariffs to encourage merchant ships returning from Nanyang or Japan to transport grain or even minerals back home.

"The court thinks far ahead."

Hong Chengchou couldn't help but sigh when he heard this. Shipping quotas, import and export taxes, and cargo taxes can also be tax-free to stimulate import and export.Especially the tax increase on porcelain and other items, and the tax reduction and exemption for returning ships, made him feel that the court was thinking long-term. Wouldn't this stimulate merchant ships to transport these things to the Ming Dynasty?

In particular, I first heard that traveling to Liaodong is tax-free at [-]%, and that transporting grain to Liaodong is also partially tax-free. Isn’t this an incentive to transport grain to Liaodong?

"No wonder the Ministry of Revenue wants to set up a shipping department and a special customs office. It seems that it is thinking about the profits from sea trade and the huge profits from future tariffs."

Sun Chuanting had been in Nanjing's Ministry of Household Affairs for so long that he knew the money and food bills of Nanzhili very well. Naturally, he knew the huge profits in sea trade. The total annual trade amounted to at least 500 million taels.

If the tariff reform is rolled out on a large scale, the annual tariff amount will be at least 80 taels. This is only the first year, and it is estimated that it will be more and more in the future.

"Indeed, the imperial court now spends a lot of money. It builds captives in the east of Liaoning, deploys troops in the southwest, Mongolia in the north, and Westerners in the southeast and west. None of these are free of money. But now the people are poor. They have already increased the Liao salary and can no longer increase the tax.

Therefore, since your Majesty came to the throne, you have been eating and sleeping at night, increasing revenue and reducing expenditure, equalizing land and tax, and prohibiting the collection of customs duties in the sea. This is so-called to avoid adding taxes to the people.What we are doing are all appointed by His Majesty, so naturally we have to do this well. "

When Yuan Keli saw this, he looked at everyone. They were all people who had been ordered by the emperor himself, and he believed they could understand the emperor's painstaking efforts, so he spoke with sincerity, making Bi Ziyan and others all moved and nodded in agreement.

"Brother Yuan, don't worry. When I came here, I was also entrusted with the same great trust by His Majesty, and there were also constraints and threats from various officials. But with His Majesty's support behind me, as long as I serve the court wholeheartedly, it will be easy to accomplish things. In the future, you If you need any cooperation from Nanzhili, just say it and I will do my best to help."

Listening to Yuan Keli's words, Bi Ziyan understood deeply.

At the same time, he also understood that Yuan Keli was the person he had to win over. He and Yuan Keli were both reformists and had similar opinions.Helping him is helping yourself, so why not do it yourself.

Upon seeing this, Sun and Hong expressed their support and expressed their strong support, so everyone discussed for a while before letting Sun and Hong leave.

When the two of them left the back hall of the Chief Secretary, they were disturbed by today's thoughts and had different thoughts. Although they had long expected that an important task would be entrusted to them, they just did not expect that it would be so soon.

"Brother Hong, I heard that Guizhou is difficult and dangerous, so we must be careful when the time comes."

After listening to Sun Chuanting's words, Hong Chengchou smiled and shook his head.

"Brother Sun, don't worry. You also know that I have always loved military affairs. I can't be happy enough to go to Guizhou and serve under Governor Zhu. I am worried about you, but I also know that you are a strong-tempered person, so there is no need to say more. ”

Sun Chuanting laughed when he heard this, feeling that Hong Chengchou still understood him, so he said nothing more and went back with Hong Chengchou to continue discussing the matter.

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(End of this chapter)