Ming Dynasty: Domination of the World from the Imperial Examination

Chapter 122: Using the post station to support the post station! (The third update)
When Xia Zhibai began to plan further, Fengtian Palace was not silent at this moment.

What Xia Zhibai said attracted Zhu Yuanzhang's attention.

The salt administration of the Ming Dynasty followed the old Yuan system and implemented a management system in which the number of people per household and the amount of salt per person were calculated, which had major problems.

The size of the population resulted in a huge difference in the salt production of each household. The imperial court only collected salt according to the number of households, which easily caused households with a small population to bear a heavy burden of salt production, while households with a large population produced too much salt for the imperial court to collect, so they resorted to smuggling.

Zhu Yuanzhang was happy to change this system which had serious drawbacks.

Because this is benevolent governance.

However, with Xia Zhibai's reminder in mind, although he had promised the North to set up state-owned enterprises as Xia Zhibai had said, the South would not do so in the short term. Therefore, he wanted to take this opportunity to ask the ministers for their views on the salt policy and see if they could come up with some reasonable changes.

Furthermore, Zhu Yuanzhang also wanted to test whether it was true as Xia Zhibai said.

Under his rule, the ministers will be "incompetent"!
Fengtian Temple.

All the six ministers except the Ministry of Revenue are present.

Moreover, this should have been the highlight of the Ministry of Revenue, but now there is not a single official from the Ministry of Revenue in the palace.

The Guo Huan case broke out a few days ago.

Most of the officials in the Ministry of Revenue, from the second-rank Shangshu to the seventh-rank Jieshizhong, were thrown into prison, and the entire Ministry of Revenue was almost wiped out, with only a few newly appointed officials left. However, this kind of occasion was obviously not something that those newly appointed officials could participate in.

Therefore, only five were present.

Zhao Mao, Yu Hui, Wen Xiangqing and other ministers of the six ministries stood in the hall respectfully, without looking around, and with an extremely correct attitude, not daring to relax or be disrespectful in the slightest. The recent events in the Ministry of Revenue made the officials of the other five ministries tremble in fear, fearing that they would be implicated.

Not long after.

Zhu Yuanzhang walked into the hall with the steps of a dragon and a tiger.

Zhao Mao and others saluted quickly.

Zhu Yuanzhang said: "My dear ministers, please stand up. I don't like nonsense."

"I called you here this time to ask you about your views on the current salt policy."

"We have heard that many salt farmers in the community are resentful of the Ming Dynasty's continuation of the old Yuan Dynasty salt policy. They believe that these systems are unfair and have brought great burdens to the salt farmers."

"We originally wanted to ask the officials from the Ministry of Revenue."

"As a result, you should have heard about the recent events."

"Our Ministry of Revenue officials are corrupt. Take Guo Huan, the chief criminal, for example. According to the investigation by the Censorate, he colluded with local officials to embezzle taxes from Taiping Prefecture, Zhenjiang Prefecture and other prefectures, and also embezzled autumn grain from western Zhejiang."

"Western Zhejiang should have handed over 4.5 million dan of autumn grain last year, but do you know how much Guo Huan handed over to us?"

"More than two million stones!"

"He alone embezzled 500,000 shi."

"Why doesn't this bastard die of starvation? How dare he covet the autumn grain we need?"

"What's even more surprising is that we spent so much effort to design a fixed tax system in order to reduce the suffering of the people and allow them to store more grain. As a result, those bastards in the Ministry of Revenue came up with all kinds of excuses behind our backs. When we saw the excuses that the censors found, we were embarrassed."

"Water money, food money, treasury money, and money for gods and Buddhas, all kinds of money."

"What kind of tax is this?"

"When have we ever collected these taxes from the people?"

"When will our treasury receive these taxes after so many years?"

"It all went into these bastards' pockets."

"Let me ask you, do you think we can avoid killing?"

"If we don't kill them, the local people will stab us in the back and scold us."

"I feel really wronged. I just want to make people's lives better. Why do these bastards have to go against me?"

Zhu Yuanzhang cursed in great grief.

Zhao Mao and other officials said tremblingly: "The officials of the Ministry of Revenue abused their power and colluded with local officials to steal the state grain depot and embezzle state taxes. They are extremely evil and deserve to be put to death. I have not had much contact with the officials of the Ministry of Revenue and failed to take precautions for Your Majesty in advance. I am really ashamed of Your Majesty's trust."

"I implore your majesty to conduct a thorough investigation of the Ministry of Revenue and bring all the officials involved to justice, so as to rectify the situation and bring order to the world."

Other officials also spoke up in indignation.

They all hate evil.

They also coincidentally drew a clear line between themselves and the officials of the Ministry of Revenue.

Zhu Yuanzhang glanced at them coldly, and seemed to be satisfied with the statements of Zhao Mao and other officials. He waved his hand and said, "Let's not talk about this anymore. The people have paid so much more taxes for nothing. The public opinion is definitely surging and the public is excited. The case has not been investigated yet, but we can't just sit back and do nothing. We must change the evil and tyrannical policies left over from the Yuan Dynasty."

"Tell us about the salt administration."

"I know that you are not officials from the Ministry of Revenue and may not know much about the salt policy, but I have also heard an old saying that three cobblers are better than Zhuge Liang. This time, I have called all the officials from the six ministries who are in high positions and have great power in the court."

"With so many people, how can we not think of a solution?"

"Think about it carefully!"

Zhao Mao, Yu Hui and the others looked at each other, not daring to be careless at all, and all frowned and thought deeply.

a little.

Yu Xuan cupped his hands and said, "I have just thought about it. It is indeed inappropriate for the court to follow the old Yuan system. The main problem is that the salt tax is unevenly distributed throughout the country."

"If a household has one male salt farmer, and he sells 30 yin of salt, and if there are seven or eight male salt farmers, they also sell 30 yin of salt."

"Each household has only one male, but they have to pay thirty jin of salt. This is obviously something that such a family cannot afford."

"A household with seven or eight people can produce a large amount of salt every year, but only needs to pay 30 yin of salt to the court, and the rest of the salt is likely to be used for smuggling." "This may be the real reason why smuggling salt is still rampant despite repeated bans."

Zhu Yuanzhang nodded and asked, "Do you have any way to correct it?"

Yu Xuan glanced at the others beside him and saw that none of them had any intention of speaking. He thought for a while and continued, "I think the salt produced by the kitchen households should be divided into regular salt and surplus salt."

"Regular salt is collected by the government through official expenditures, that is, the government gives food and money to the cooks, and the cooks hand in the salt."

"Surplus salt is the salt left after the stove households pay taxes. The government can also exchange it with the stove households, but I suggest using a higher price. This will ensure that the salt produced by the stove households is in the hands of the court, and it will also be easier for the court to sell the salt through salt permits."

"I am not talented."

"But they thought this move would effectively combat illegal salt trading."

Wang Huidi, the Minister of Justice, said: "I think the court should enact stricter laws to crack down on the illegal salt trade."

Zhao Mao also followed suit and said, "My suggestion is different from that of other ministers. Since the problem lies in the system of calculating the amount of salt produced by the population, we should naturally change this system instead of focusing only on private salt trading."

"I think the tax should be levied based on the number of people."

"Since the current problem is that the number of people in a household varies, we should not count the number of households, but directly collect salt tax based on the number of males. For every male in a household, we will collect salt tax for that household. The more males in a household, the more salt tax we will collect."

"This move not only increased tax revenue for the imperial court, but also effectively cracked down on private salt trading."

"This is my humble opinion."

Inside the palace.

The ministers began to offer suggestions.

Zhu Yuanzhang listened quietly.

Among the suggestions made by these ministers, the only one that impressed Zhu Yuanzhang was Zhao Mao's "taxation based on the number of people".

He has decided to let Xia Zhibai manage the north.

The economy in the north is in decline, the population is dwindling, and both salt production and salt sales are not satisfactory. If Xia Zhibai could really make a fortune, it would be a great help to the people in the north. However, it is not the same in the south. The south has a large population and a prosperous economy.

The sale of illegal salt was even more prevalent.

Especially in Lianghuai, Jiangsu and Zhejiang.

Zhu Yuanzhang has always hated salt dealers who smuggled salt.

His former enemy, Zhang Shicheng, started out as a salt smuggler. Even now, Zhang Shicheng has been dead for more than 20 years, but many people in Jiangsu and Zhejiang still miss him. When he unified the country in the past, it was because of Zhang Shicheng's preferential treatment of scholars and common people in the southeast that these scholars in the southeast caused great trouble for him to unify the country.

Therefore, after unifying the country, he often targeted and suppressed the scholars in the southeast.

Even taxes in the southeast were heavier than in other places.

In addition to the fact that the southeast was indeed more prosperous, it was also Zhu Yuanzhang's deliberate revenge.

He wanted the scholars and common people in the southeast to hate Zhang Shicheng.

Because all this was caused by Zhang Shicheng.

But the effect is not as expected.

If the "taxation based on the number of people" is really adopted, it will deal a heavy blow to the private salt trafficking in the southeast region. The court can also collect a lot more taxes and put pressure on the people in the southeast, which can be said to be killing two birds with one stone.

However, Zhu Yuanzhang also noticed it.

Neither Zhao Mao nor Yu Hui thought of making any big moves.

They are just patching up.

Although Zhu Yuanzhang felt somewhat helpless, he didn't take it too seriously.

Because he got a good suggestion.

Even the idea proposed by Zhao Mao was more in line with his thoughts than Xia Zhibai's approach.

"Taking taxes based on the number of people is a good idea," said Zhu Yuanzhang.

Zhao Mao's face lit up with joy.

At this critical juncture, it is not easy to gain Zhu Yuanzhang's recognition.

Zhao Mao was deeply encouraged.

Zhu Yuanzhang added: "In addition to the salt administration, some people have given us suggestions, believing that there are some problems with the post stations in the Ming Dynasty."

"Today, there are more than 1,500 post stations in the Ming Dynasty, spread across all prefectures and counties across the country. Each post station has a postmaster, clerks and helpers. Even a small post station has dozens of people, and a large post station has hundreds of people."

"besides."

"The post station is also equipped with horses, weapons, livestock, cooks, etc."

"For this reason, the imperial court spent millions of dollars on post stations every year."

"Last year, the tax revenue of the Ming Dynasty was more than 2,700 shi. Now that the country is stable, many post stations are idle. Some people think that the court is still spending a lot of money and grain to support the post stations, which is a great waste of money and labor."

"I want us to change it."

"This person's suggestion to us does make some sense."

"They want us to split the functions of the post stations into two parts. One part will continue to be used to maintain the transmission of military and national affairs, while the other part will be used for commercial purposes. The court will use this to sell tickets and road transportation rights, and then make profits from the post stations, realizing the goal of 'supporting the post stations with the post stations'."

"What do you think of this suggestion?"

(End of this chapter)