My life is like walking on thin ice

Chapter 523 Good, good, good

Since the decision was made to increase officials' salaries, Liu Rong had to do some calculations.

——Today, the Han Dynasty has nearly 30 million people and more than 5 million households.

Among them, the fiefdom of Chehou occupied 300,000 households, and the people of the princes and relatives in Guandong occupied at least 1.5 million households.

The remaining three million households were scattered in Guanzhong, as well as Longyou, Beidi, Shanggu in the north, and Hanzhong and Bashu in the south.

These more than three million peasant households paid agricultural taxes directly to the court in Chang'an.

Taking these three million households as an example, each household has 100 mu of farmland, with an average annual millet output of 300 dan. The agricultural tax is one-thirty, which means 10 dan per household.

All in all, the annual agricultural tax revenue of the prime minister's treasury was 30 million shi of millet.

The value of these 30 million shi of millet was still calculated according to the red line set by the Lord Commandant: no more than 40 coins per shi, which was 1.2 billion coins.

Excluding the 30% withheld by local counties, the annual fiscal revenue of the prime minister's treasury would be around 850 million coins.

Now let’s look at the Shaofu’s treasury.

Now, among the five million households and thirty million people of the Han Dynasty, only three million households paid agricultural taxes directly to the court in Chang'an.

However, the head tax was not divided into marquisates or princes - all Han people had to pay it to the court in Chang'an.

There are more than 30 million people. According to the legal tax rate, each person should pay 120 coins per year. The annual head tax income of the Shaofu treasury should be 3.6 billion coins.

As early as the reign of Emperor Taizong Xiaowen, the Han people's oral tax was reduced by half to 40 coins per person per year.

During the reign of Liu Rong, the annual allowance of 40 coins per person was further reduced by half to 20 coins per person per year.

In other words, according to the current actual head tax rate, the actual head tax income of the Shaofu treasury in one year is actually only 600 million coins - even lower than the income of the Xiangfu treasury.

But think about it: if the Shaofu Treasury and the Han emperor who controlled the Shaofu Treasury really valued this income, it would be impossible for them to change the original 120 coins per person per year to the current 20 coins per person per year, which is only one sixth of the statutory tax rate.

At least the current emperor Liu Rong will not further reduce the tax by half on the basis of Emperor Taizong Xiaowen's "reduction of two-thirds". In the end, the actual head tax will be reduced to one-sixth of the statutory tax rate.

The reason is very simple.

If there is no change, according to the statutory tax rate and the current population of the Han Dynasty, the per capita tax income of the Shaofu Treasury should be 3.6 billion coins per year.

Even after Emperor Taizong reduced it by two-thirds, there was still 1.2 billion coins - still higher than the agricultural tax revenue of the prime minister's treasury.

But even so, Liu Rong still further halved it on this basis, reducing the head tax income of the Shaofu treasury from 120 million coins to 60 million coins.

There are only two explanations for this.

Either Emperor Taizong was a saint + a fool, or the contemporary Liu Rong is even more "following the example of his ancestors", even worse than before.

Either Emperor Taizong is a pure saint, and the current Liu Rong is a pure upstart.

The latter is clearly the case.

Starting from the period when Liu Rong was the Crown Prince and Regent, the income of the Shaofu Treasury has long changed from "only oral contributions" in the past to the current diversified and multi-channel total income model.

As mentioned above: At present, in the Han Dynasty, the three million farmers who paid agricultural taxes directly to the central court in Chang'an could contribute 30 million shi of millet as agricultural taxes every year.

These 30 million shi of millet were collected at an ultra-low tax rate of 'one out of thirty'.

Based on the tax rate and the actual output, the total grain output contributed by these three million people will reach an astonishing 900 million shi!
Even taking into account the large acres of land in Guanzhong and the small acres of land outside the Great Wall, the actual grain output of these three million farmers is probably only around 400 million to 500 million shi, which is still a staggering and terrible number.

This terrifying figure also led to the Shaofu Treasury, under the promotion of the current Liu Rong, officially implementing the "official management of grain" and completely monopolizing the grain market, thus obtaining a long-term and continuous huge source of income.

Even if these three million farmers only produced 400 million dan of grain per year, the former Shaofu Internal Treasury and the current Zhujue Duwei only handled half of it, that is, 200 million dan;
Even if there is only one cent of profit margin for every stone of grain, this is still a full 200 million cents.

Two hundred million yuan every year!

A little bit at a time adds up to a lot. If we save up for ten or eight years, it will be enough to fight another battle of Gaoque!

And ceramics.

Although Liu Rong initially launched ceramics as a luxury product to increase the income source for the Shaofu treasury out of considerations of "low cost, short cycle, and high return", the subsequent development of the situation had long since gone beyond Liu Rong's expectations.

——First, the "top-notch goods" among ceramics: porcelain, in the past few short years, has become the world's most sought-after and highest-standard burial object.

In the past, the Han people, regardless of whether they were officials or civilians, rich or poor, would spend a huge amount of money on the funeral arrangements for their elders, going through great pains and even spending more than half of their family wealth.

The reason is simply to have more gold in the graves of parents, so that the elders can be "protected" in the underworld.

After the advent of porcelain, this more exquisite, luxurious and scarce luxury product replaced the mid- to high-end funeral market.

Ordinary people naturally could not afford porcelain, but the rich, officials, and even princes and nobles quickly formed the idea of ​​"buying a few pieces of porcelain as a reserve and taking them underground in the future."

This item can bring tens of thousands of gold, or tens of millions of coins, in revenue to the Shaofu treasury every year.

——A little bit adds up to a lot.

The more exquisite ones are worth dozens of gold each, and the defective ones can also be sold for a few gold. If you sell a few thousand or eight hundred pieces, you will be worth tens of thousands of gold or even hundreds of millions of dollars.

Check it out!

The porcelain alone has brought huge profits to the Shaofu treasury, which is no less than the government-run grain and monopoly of the grain market!

What was most unexpected to Liu Rong was that ceramics, which were originally thought to be luxury items, would make more money, but he did not expect that in the end, pottery, which was more for display purposes, would become the real major income item for the Shaofu treasury.

Nowadays, pottery produced by the Shaofu treasury can be seen everywhere in the world, from north to south.

The unit price is very low.

Pottery bowls, plates, tiles, and jars, each one cost only a dozen or several dozen coins - at most a hundred or eighty coins.

But I can’t stand the huge volume!
Take terracotta for example.

A piece of clay tile only sells for one penny. After deducting the labor, time, and material costs, it takes several pieces of clay tiles to make one penny of pure profit.

But when people ordered pottery tiles from the Shaofu treasury, they would not buy them in small quantities.

——Wealthy merchants wanted to build houses and wanted to use the pottery tiles from the Shaofu treasury, which would easily cost thousands or even tens of thousands of pieces!
Not to mention the princes and nobles.

For a manor or a house, Taowa would order tens of thousands of pieces - and each batch was tens of thousands of pieces, divided into several batches.

How many people are there in the world?

There are more than five million households. Even if only one percent of them can afford ceramic tiles, there are still 50,000 households!

But in fact, the pottery tiles produced by the Shaofu treasury are definitely not luxury goods.

Even if you are an ordinary farmer, if you encounter a good harvest year, you can grit your teeth and buy thousands of tiles to replace the "hat" for your house with a better-looking and practical one.

This is just tiles that are not often used and are not easily damaged. Kitchen utensils related to daily necessities are an endless "small business".

Today, the Shaofu Treasury can earn hundreds of millions of yuan every year by relying on the pottery modules that are more inclined towards the low-end market among ceramics.

Again.

The profit is thin, but the volume is too high.

To put it bluntly, even a homeless beggar might buy a ceramic bowl from the treasury of the Shaofu.

When all is said and done, the government has 200 million tons of grain, tens of millions of porcelains, and tens of millions of pottery.

Adding them all together, it’s nearly two hundred million!

The big part hasn’t even been calculated yet.

——Salt and iron!
When Liu Rong reformed the court system, the emergence of the Chief Duke left people inside and outside the court confused for a while.

But now, when the Lord of Nobles held the official monopoly of three major commodities, namely grain, salt and iron, and cloth, no one said that the Lord of Nobles was a "fake Nine Ministers" specially created by Liu Rong to arrange for his maternal relatives.

The profits from grain cannot be compared with the profits from salt and iron.

If we say that the former Shaofu treasury and the current Zhujue Duwei official grain and rice are almost all profited at the amount of one penny per stone - or even not profited at all, it is just a policy that benefits the country and the people;
However, the salt and iron business run by the Lord Duke and the Commandant is now making a fortune every day.

Let’s talk about salt first.

At present, in the Han Dynasty, the coarsest and lowest quality lumpy bitter salt is priced at 150 coins per catty.

A pound!
Not one stone!
As for the fine salt which is less bitter, finer in texture, whiter in color and contains fewer impurities, it can be sold at a high price of four to five hundred coins per catty.

As for the snowflake white salt?
Let's just put it that way.

As long as you can produce snowflake salt that has almost no bitterness, has almost no color other than "white", and has almost no impurities, then you don't have to worry about sales.

Don’t even worry about the price.

As long as your salt appears on the market, it will inevitably trigger a bidding war among the nobles.

It is common to sell each pound for three to five thousand coins.

Eight thousand coins is not worth making a fuss about.

Tens of thousands, or even hundreds of thousands of dollars, is not uncommon!

In the Han Dynasty today, fine snow salt is like the elixir of Laozi - everyone has heard of it but never seen it.

I saw it by chance and didn’t care whether it was real or not. I just ate it.

Therefore, when Liu Rong, during the period when the crown prince was regent, relied on the help of his fifth brother, King Jiangdu Liu Fei, to open fields and dry salt in the southeastern coastal areas, and entrusted the matter to the hands of the Shaofu Neijin and Zhujue Duwei, the Han Dynasty's "salt" market also ushered in a huge wave of impact.

Let's just put it that way.

Once upon a time, the poor people who could not afford salt and could only lick salty stones can now afford to eat coarse salt.

In the past, those self-employed farmers and middle-class families who could not get used to eating coarse salt but had no choice can now eat good salt that is barely satisfactory.

What about the flake salt that was once in short supply and rarely seen for years or even decades?

——It’s available at the Salt and Iron Shop of the Lord Commandant outside the East Market, 500 coins per catty.

Clearly marked prices, large quantities, and no cheating.

As long as you can afford it, Lord Commander can sell it to you as much as you want.

People in later generations often say: Man is iron and rice is steel. If you don’t eat for a meal, you will feel hungry.

However, few people know that in most periods of China's feudal history, salt was the most needed and indispensable daily necessity for the lower classes, and it was also the most difficult daily necessity to obtain.

Because salt is not only a daily necessity for the people, but also a strategic material for the army.

Just like a farmer who doesn't eat salt won't have the strength to swing a hoe and plant the crops, a soldier who doesn't eat salt won't be able to wield his sword; a war horse who doesn't eat salt won't be able to pull the strong and powerful cavalry.

Liu Rong obtained salt from the sea, and through the Lord Commandant, he made it possible for most people to eat salt - no matter whether it was good or bad, at least they could eat it.

People all over the world, especially the people in Guanzhong who "get the moon first because they are close to the water", are grateful for this positive change. Even their identification with the Han Dynasty has unknowingly increased a lot.

But this does not mean that the Lord Commander will not make money from the salt business.

The profit of salt, especially the salt produced by the Lord Duke through the salt-drying method, can almost be said to be a huge profit in the market.

——Material cost is basically zero!
All you need to do is dig out a salt field by the sea, then let in seawater and expose it to the sun!
After drying, the salt grains are dug out from the salt fields and sold directly, and they become the best quality coarse salt on the market!
If it is easily soluble in water and then filtered, it is a very good quality among fine salts.

As for the more surprising process of distillation and removal of impurities, it naturally produces snowflake salt, which is commonplace in later generations but a miracle in this era.

In this entire production process, whether it is the Shaofu Neiku in the past or the Zhujue Duwei today, it is difficult to find cost investment points worth mentioning.

The salt fields were dug by conscripted civilians and slaves of the Shaofu officials;
Seawater is brought from the sea to the salt pans free of charge;

Even the processes of filtering and distilling the salt after drying are all done by the former Shaofu craftsmen, now the officials under the Lord of the Court - they are serious officials who already have salaries and do not need to be paid extra.

If there is a cost, it is the transportation and warehousing costs incurred in the process of distributing the product to all parts of the world after it is manufactured.

But salt is different from food.

It does not require high transportation and storage conditions and has a very long shelf life.

In this era where a cold can kill people and the lower classes have no concept of "expiration", the shelf life of salt is almost infinite.

Even if the storage conditions are too humid and the salt becomes moldy, people will just say: Just cook it.

If worst comes to worst, just take out the moldy part!

The remaining parts are still usable.

This makes the cost of the salt produced, manufactured, and subsequently transported and stored by the Lord Duke extremely low.

Salt is a major necessity in life, just like food.

This meant that the treasury of the Shaofu could earn hundreds of millions of coins in salt profits every year through the "salt" item of the salt and iron official business managed by the Chief of the Imperial Household.

Sounds like a lot.

However, considering that the Han Dynasty now has a population of more than 30 million, an annual per capita salt expenditure of 100 coins is the most conservative estimate.

(End of this chapter)