The Great Arcanist Who Traveled Through the World of American Variety Shows.

Chapter 426 Salary and Silver Coins

The Zhou Dynasty improved the salary system and simplified the complicated salary system of the previous dynasty. It converted all the salary of rice, meal money, charcoal, salt, paper, pens and ink, autumn and winter clothes, etc. into rice, copper coins and cloth.

The salary of the first rank is 600 coins and 300 dan of rice. The salary of the second rank is 550 coins and 280 dan of rice, decreasing successively to 450 coins and 220 dan of rice.

This amount of money seems to be a large sum, but it is after all previous benefits are cancelled and deducted. When you really calculate it, it is less than before.

Besides, how many high-ranking officials above the second rank are there in the whole country? At most, there are only thirty or fifty.

When it comes to the third rank officials, their salaries will be reduced again, to 300 strings of cash and 200 dan of rice.

After reaching the fifth rank, the salary will be reduced again. The salary of the seventh rank is only 50 strings of cash, and the salary of rice is 60 dan. The salary of the lower rank is 45 strings of cash, and the salary of rice is 55 dan.

These are monthly salaries. Even for a seventh-rank official, these salaries are enough for his family to live a comfortable life. He can hire a few servants and afford a carriage.

You should know that during the Ming Dynasty, Zhu Yuanzhang gave a seventh-rank county magistrate an annual salary of 7.5 dan of rice. Note that it was one year, which averages out to dan per month.

How much is 7.5 dan of rice? It is about the same as kilograms of rice. kilograms of rice is barely enough to feed a family. After all, people cannot only eat rice, but also need oil, salt, sauce, vinegar, cloth, etc. The combined purchasing power is about yuan a month now.

In addition, the Ming Dynasty also had a system of depreciation. The so-called depreciation means that the purity of silver is insufficient, reducing its purchasing power. When it comes to salaries, it means that 70% to 80% of the salary is paid after the depreciation.

The salaries were low to begin with, and after the reduction, those officials really couldn't even afford to eat.

In comparison, the salaries approved for Richard and Guo Rong were much higher, enough for them to live a good life.

In addition, some officials will receive corresponding additional salaries for their additional titles, honors, etc. Honor is honor, but material reduction is still necessary.

Even in the Soviet Union, if you received a medal, you could receive more pension after retirement.

In the past, the treatment of low-level officials in the former Tang Dynasty was very low. After the Great Zhou Dynasty, the salaries of low-level officials were increased. Therefore, after this new salary system was announced, the officials of the court were in a good mood.

On the other side, in the Baoquan Bureau supervised by Richard, silver coins were pressed out one by one. Richard picked up a silver coin at random. The pattern on the front of the silver coin was a flying phoenix. Yes, it was the Phoenix Qingxuan. This was also what Guo Rong requested.

After all, "Phoenix dancing in Youzhou" and "The rise of the Zhou Dynasty" have become synonymous with Guo Rong. Below the phoenix pattern, it is marked with one string of pure silver, and on the back is written "Great Zhou Yuanbao" and the year and place in which it was minted.

When such a silver coin is pressed, the image is not clear enough, but with the continuous improvement of technology, the pressed silver coins will become more and more sophisticated. After pressing, these silver coins will also be carved by craftsmen to make the coin patterns clearer.

"How many machines does the Baoquan Bureau have now? How many silver coins can it press in a day?"

"Reporting to Prime Minister Li, the Baoquan Bureau now has four sets of pressing machines. As long as there is enough silver material, it can press 2,000 silver coins a day."

Two thousand silver coins equaled two thousand strings of cash, and three hundred and sixty-five days in a year equaled seven hundred and thirty thousand strings of cash. Through coinage, the Hosen Bureau could earn nearly one hundred thousand strings of cash a year.

Of course, with the improvement of technology and the increase of machines in Baoquan Bureau, this number will definitely get higher and higher.

The Baoquan Bureau is now suppressing silver coins, which is very important to the imperial court, and the imperial court will directly govern this area.

Richard shook the silver coin in his hand, and it was indeed forged according to his requirements. Then he picked up the silver coin and blew it next to his ear. Then he heard a clear and pleasant sound of "ding-ling-ling".

The quality of the silver coins was also within his requirements.

"Very good!" Richard nodded in satisfaction. This kind of silver coin is much more exquisite than those copper coins, and this kind of anti-counterfeiting is also difficult to imitate. Richard deliberately stuck to this purity. Once the purity of the silver coin is reduced, the sound after blowing will not be so crisp and pleasant.

In ancient times, many powerful people used various means to control coins in order to gain profits. It was a common thing to reduce the copper in coins and increase the amount of other metals.

Some powerful people would scrape the copper coins to remove a layer of the originally thick copper coins. Some people would go even further and directly trim the edges of the copper coins, that is, they would cut off a circle from the outermost edge of the copper coins.

Therefore, when pressing the silver coin, Richard pressed the outermost edge of the coin into a jagged shape.

At the same time, large-denomination silver coins like the one-yuan coin are usually not used by ordinary people. Only big businessmen and dignitaries can use them.

These people are not ordinary people. The powerful can force ordinary people to exchange good money for the bad money in their hands, but this approach will not work if the other party is a big businessman or a high-ranking official. Therefore, it is impossible to cut the edges of a silver dollar.

Soon, three months after the court announced the salary system reform, silver coins began to appear in the payment of salaries.

In the middle of early July, Zhao Zhi took his servants to the Taifu Temple to collect his salary. The Zhou Dynasty's salary was collected in the early part of each month. For those high-ranking officials, the salary was delivered to their door by the officials of the Taifu Temple. However, a seventh-rank official like Zhao Zhi had to come in person with his servants to collect it.

After all, a seventh-rank official also receives 720 dan of rice as salary, which is equivalent to kilograms of rice. He cannot carry so much rice back by himself.

The time of distribution by the imperial court was different. Usually all the distribution would be completed within ten days. The order was based on the rank of the official, and the distribution was made one department at a time.

As a reformist official, Zhao Zhi had a good time in distributing salaries before the exam. At this time, the Taifu Temple was already full of long queues, and almost all those who came to collect their salaries drove horse-drawn carriages.

Soon it was Zhao Zhi's turn. After he handed over his seal, the salary was soon distributed. However, to his surprise, there was only one pile of money for the fifty strings of cash. A cloth bag was not even full, with only a few coins in it.

Seeing this, Zhao Zhi quickly stopped the official who was distributing the salary and asked, "Fifty strings of cash weigh more than a hundred kilograms, so why is there only this little this time?"

"Minister Zhao, these are the silver coins that the court has just made. One silver coin is equal to one string of money, and fifty strings of money are exactly fifty silver coins. Is that ok?" said the official in charge of distributing salaries.

"One coin is worth one string of coins?" Zhao Zhi's face looked grim. He was thinking of other dynasties in history that, due to lack of money, directly minted large-denomination copper coins, with one coin being worth a hundred coins. Now the imperial court has also started to do this, and it's even more excessive, directly using one coin as a thousand coins!
"The court has minted thousand-yuan coins?" Zhao Zhi said with a trembling voice.

"What do you mean by 'a thousand coins'? These are silver coins!" the clerk said unhappily. He then opened the bag and asked Zhao Zhi to check it himself. When Zhao Zhi saw the exquisite silver coins in the bag, he was also surprised.

These silver coins were surprisingly finely minted, and they felt quite heavy in the hand. On the other hand, the anti-counterfeiting features on these coins were also very easy to identify.

After seeing these silver coins, Zhao Zhi was very excited and happily collected them, then left with his servants. He let the servants go home by themselves, and he went to the market to buy some things.

When he took out the silver coins to pay, the merchants were very fond of them and strongly demanded that Zhao Zhi pay with silver coins. They also said that they were willing to pay an extra 10% as compensation for the silver coins.

Zhao Zhi was very happy to hear this, and immediately agreed to the merchant's request. Then he made the transaction at a 10% premium on the face value of each silver coin. As a result, his fifty strings of silver coins were turned into fifty-five strings of copper coins.

The salary increased by one tenth, and Zhao Zhi was very happy.

Next, officials in the capital saw a large number of merchants frantically chasing after silver coins. A silver coin that was originally worth one coin could now be traded at the price of three coin per coin.

And this situation is still improving. Even Richard did not expect that silver coins would be so popular.

Every time the court distributed silver coins, people would flock to exchange them, and the court officials also made a fortune with the silver coins.

Seeing this situation, Richard asked someone to check and find out what was going on.

Soon a large amount of information was sent up. After reading this information, Richard finally understood why silver coins were so popular.

For those big businessmen, copper coins were too inconvenient to use when conducting transactions.

The face value of ancient Chinese coins was very problematic. Almost all of the coins in denominations of twenty, fifty, or one hundred would depreciate as soon as they appeared.

To put it bluntly, this practice is to forcibly plunder the wealth of the people. Richard's silver coins are different. They are exquisitely shaped and made of pure silver, which immediately made those big businessmen recognize his coins.

The transactions of big merchants were usually several hundred or even thousands of guan, so if they were to be exchanged for copper coins, they would need several carriages to carry them. This was very troublesome for the transaction, and so many copper coins were needed in the transaction.

Now, with the silver dollar, one silver dollar is equivalent to one guan of money, which makes it much more convenient for big merchants to trade. Hundreds or even thousands of guan of money only need a small box.

There is absolutely no need to carry around several carts of copper coins.

It can be said that the emergence of silver dollars not only alleviated the problem of money shortage, but also promoted commercial trade. The emergence of a silver coin made transactions easier.

Most of the silver coins circulating in the market now fell into the hands of these big businessmen or those powerful families. After seeing the silver coins, those powerful families immediately began to exchange the copper coins in the cellar and prepared to collect silver coins.

(End of this chapter)