I'm the Dauphin in France

Chapter 1229 The Alliance of Capitalists

a few days later.

In front of the gates of the Donbas Coal Company, hundreds of workers were shouting in a chaotic manner: "My children are starving!"

"We need bread..."

"The wages are too low; they must be raised to 10 rubles per month!"

"Yes! We won't start work unless wages are raised!"

Standing at the window on the second floor of the company's office building, which was built of broken wooden planks, Viscount Olivier frowned as he looked at the rioting workers and shook his head at his assistant beside him, saying, "Haven't they ever seen a strike before?"
"They didn't even hold up a wooden sign, and their shouts were so chaotic!"
“Christopher, you’d better give them a good talking to tonight. Oh, more people, God, I have thousands of workers in my coal mine, how come there are so few?”

The assistant hurriedly said, "You know, these Russians all think they're going to get whipped, so they don't dare come at all..."

Viscount Olivier sighed: "If all else fails, just give some rubles to the ringleaders."

"Yes, sir, I guarantee the number will double, no, triple, tomorrow."

Under Christopher's manipulation, the strike at the United Coal Company grew larger and larger, and quickly spread from the coal mines to the iron mines and the ironworks, bringing the entire company to a standstill.

The Russian police from Yekaterinoslav came twice, but after secretly accepting bribes from the "workers' representatives" and the coal company's stingy boss refusing to pay "hardship fees," they disappeared.

The news quickly reached Krasnoyarsk, where several shareholders of the "John Coal Company" immediately launched into a sarcastic remark: "Poor Frenchmen, I heard even their foreman has joined the strike."

"Those Tatars are asking for 10 rubles a month, they're insane!"

"Olivier's in big trouble now, haha. Apparently, his output has dropped by 60% this month."

"Perhaps we have a chance to buy his mine cheaply."

More than ten days later, under pressure from orders, the distraught Viscount Olivier reluctantly agreed to raise wages for his workers, and the company was able to resume operations.

This drew another round of ridicule from their British counterparts to the south.

However, the good times didn't last long. The workers at the United Coal Company seemed to have tasted the sweetness of the strike, and just a month and a half after resuming work, they launched another strike with even greater momentum.

Well, Russia has seen that strikes are really effective and won't get them attacked. This time, without Kristoff's instigation, everyone participated willingly.

More than 1300 workers marched back and forth between the company and the town, with signs and speeches.

Keep in mind that at that time, the entire Yekaterinoslav region had a population of only 80,000 to 90,000, making the scale of this strike absolutely terrifying.

Olivier compromised very quickly this time, agreeing to raise wages to 13 rubles a few days later.

But the British in Krasnoyarsk were no longer laughing.

Their workers, hearing how effective the strike at the United Coal Mine Corporation was, began to follow suit and organized a strike of over a hundred people.

But the British bosses weren't going to let them get away with it. They immediately bribed the local police and, with the help of their own overseers, gave the striking workers a severe beating. Several ringleaders were also thrown into jail.

However, the matter did not end there.

Workers at several British companies, including John Coal Company, discovered that they were earning only 7 rubles a month, while in Yekaterinoslav they were earning 13 rubles.

It has almost doubled.

"I definitely want to work at United Coal!" Olivier accepted any offer.

The British boss finally started to panic and had to negotiate with Olivier. After paying a "verification fee" of 1 rubles, he received a guarantee from United Coal that they would not accept their workers.

Then the British company's workers began to resign en masse—something no one could accept. Even if it meant changing their names and joining a French company, or even losing their jobs, they didn't want to continue enduring low wages. The British bosses had no choice but to raise wages as well, all the way up to 11 rubles. The skyrocketing costs made them afraid to raise them any further—they were now on the verge of breaking even.

At this moment, Olivier put aside past grievances and took the initiative to approach his British counterparts to discuss countermeasures.

“You can’t compromise with these laborers!” Riley, the major shareholder of John Coal Company, said angrily to the Frenchman. “If you just give those policemen a little something, they can solve all your problems.”

“That would shut down my company for two or three months. Those workers were serious,” Olivier said. “They even wanted to burn down my warehouse.”

The capitalists immediately launched into a tirade of curses.

"What do we do then?" Riley exclaimed. "We can't afford to operate at a loss, can we?"

Viscount Olivier immediately replied, "I'm here to resolve the losses."

Everyone was looking at him.

"As long as we raise prices together, we can maintain our profits."

Riley shook his head and said, "This will make us lose our competitiveness. The mine owners in the Urals will soon be able to eat up our market."

“No, they can’t do it.” Olivier smiled. “The Donbas produce more than twice the amount of coal and iron as the Urals, and the shipping costs from here are only a fraction of those in the Urals.”

“After the buyers have bought up all their production, they will still have to come to us to purchase more.”

"So the mine owners in the Urals will soon follow suit and raise prices as well."

The eyes of other capitalists began to light up. The strike might even be an opportunity to unite the mine owners across Donbas.

In just half a day, Olivier reached a price alliance with British bosses, deciding to raise the price of coal and iron by 25%.

Of course, even so, the coal and iron ore produced here are priced lower than in Europe.

As Olivier predicted, just over a month later, the price of coal and iron in the Ural region of Russia also rose by 25%.

Only a fool wouldn't make money when it's available!

The Donbas and Urals together produce more than 90% of Russia's coal and iron ore.

The first to feel the pain were the Moscow Royal Cannon Foundry.

The soaring price of raw materials has increased the cost of their production of gun carriages, ammunition vehicles, and even shells by nearly one-sixth.

Therefore, they had no choice but to tell the Military Commission that the procurement budget needed to be increased.

Immediately afterwards, the prices of ships, farm implements, carriages, and even axes across Russia rose sharply.

To be honest, Russia, as an agricultural country, does not consume a large amount of coal and iron.

However, Russia's economic structure was also very fragile, and the price increase of a large number of iron products quickly pushed up the overall inflation level.

As January 1799 arrived, a strange thing happened—due to rising coal and iron prices, the price of bread in St. Petersburg increased by 1 kopek.

While the increase may seem small, it is an almost unbearable burden for the lower classes of Russians.

[Because there will be a double monthly pass event at the end of this month, please hold off on voting for now and save your votes for the double event at the end of the month. The author would be extremely grateful!]

(End of this chapter)