Rise of the 1630s South America

Chapter 475 Economic Work ([-])

After inspecting the wood products factory and the nearby artificial forest, Qiang Quansheng inspected the Henan Glass Factory.

To be honest, Henan Glass Factory has not had a strong sense of presence in China over the years, and their products are relatively simple, and their technology and quality are just that, very average.Over the years, they have solved problems such as a large number of bubbles in glass products and impure and turbid colors through research projects. The quality of their products has been greatly improved, but their craftsmanship has always been comparable to that of Venice, France, and the Netherlands in the old continent. There is a certain gap between these old glass-making powerhouses.For example, they are slightly inferior to each other in terms of talent pool and production technology, and the main form of production in factories is also handicraft.

Until last year, they were able to provide the country with some very ordinary quality glass, glass or crystal laboratory instruments, handicrafts and products such as telescopes.Restricted by the number of skilled workers, the scale of the factory has not been greatly expanded, which has caused the output to continue to stagnate, and it can barely supply the domestic market.

At the end of last year, people from the east bank paid a lot of money to recruit some senior technicians from the Netherlands, which is the most advanced glass technology in Europe (second-rate technicians, first-rate technicians cannot be hired).Since then, the technical capabilities of Henan Glass Factory have improved a lot. For example, the quality of their thermometers is better than before, and their accuracy is also higher.And more importantly, their product line is more abundant.Under the leadership of these Dutch technicians, Henan Glass Factory began to organize skilled technicians to hand-make high-resolution telescope and microscope lenses.Especially the microscope lens, which is the name mentioned above. At present, the design principle of this instrument, which is said to be the main investment and research and development of the Ministry of Health, has already been developed. It is waiting for the Henan Glass Factory to polish some high-grade lenses.

As for the materials needed to polish the lens, the few high-quality glasses produced by the Henan Glass Factory can be used, as can crystals (Uruguay is rich in crystals), and even gemstones produced in the New China region can be provided by the Ministry of Health. Now you just need to be able to grind out the lenses they need so they can put together a high magnification optical microscope.

The teachers and students of the Capital Medical College under the Ministry of Health have long been tired of observing insects, making specimens, and compiling catalogs of animals and plants with magnifying glasses with low magnification all day long.They desperately want some more "advanced", clearer and higher magnification microscopes to observe some interesting things, such as human blood and so on.

However, in view of the relatively poor glass manufacturing technology in China and the chromatic aberration that is difficult to eliminate under the existing conditions, these Dutch technicians are still required to produce some high-magnification single microscopes (ie magnifying glasses).The Ministry of Health offered a high reward for this, starting with a magnification of 50 times, and increasing the reward to a higher level every time a certain multiple was increased, and the highest reward even reached an unprecedented 2000 yuan.Moreover, their reward is open to the whole world. These technicians and craftsmen can write letters back to the Netherlands or the German region, inviting their highly skilled friends to join in and jointly grind high-quality lenses.

Having a microscope with high magnification—whether it is single or double—will undoubtedly provide extraordinary assistance for the observation of microorganisms and bacteria on the east coast.Only after the development of microbiology can modern medicine gradually get on the right track, and this is why the Ministry of Health has allocated a large amount of special funds to invest in this project.

After walking around the Henan Glass Factory, Qiang Quansheng was not very interested in those Dutch technicians recruited with a lot of money and their work.As a senior economic official, he is more interested in the living conditions of the workers in the factory today.There is a bad phenomenon in China nowadays, that is, every time the government builds new settlements in the inland areas, many industrial workers in the cities take advantage of this opportunity to apply for moving to new inland towns with their families.At this time, the government will always recruit some old citizens to live with the newcomers from Shandong, in order to strengthen the effect of the government's various assimilation measures.

Therefore, at this time, it is always easier for workers in these original cities to obtain government permission to transfer their household registration to those new towns.The new towns are generally agricultural towns, and the vast majority of residents are farmers. Therefore, most of these people will give up their status as workers and become farmers in the local area, starting to farm and herd sheep.

This phenomenon first appeared sporadically in the year before last, and gradually increased last year, and reached its peak at the beginning of this year with the successive establishment of Ningjin Fort and Canyon Fort. The agricultural workers on the farm and the apprentices in the wood processing factory applied to immigrate to these two places, which surprised the officials of the Ministry of Civil Affairs.

After receiving the report from the Ministry of Civil Affairs, the Executive Committee immediately ordered the newly established Mei Agency to conduct an investigation, and finally figured out what happened.In fact, this matter is very simple, that is, the average living standard of farmers is higher than that of workers.Take an ordinary worker in a glass factory in Henan as an example. Most of his monthly income of [-] yuan will be spent on staple food and some non-staple food, leaving only a small amount of money to meet his own needs. Certain hobbies, such as purchasing goods or services such as wine, high-end leather boots, woolen coats, tropical dried fruits, newspapers and books.

Farmers are different.Their food expenses are extremely low, because they produce their own food, and even some meat and non-staple food can provide a considerable part of themselves. They may only need to spend a very small amount of cash to buy some things such as fuel, soybean oil, and salt. necessities of life.In addition, they can go to the market to sell their agricultural products in exchange for cash, and then buy some items that many working-class people can't reach.Although the land rent tax of farmers was very high in the past few years, once their land is allocated from the initial five mu to ten mu or twenty mu, and the rent tax has passed the peak period of the first few years, their income will increase. Rapidly surpassing apprentice workers who have only been employed for a few years, and even directly catching up with ordinary workers whose income is not very low, this makes industrial workers in many factories envious and hateful, and expresses that it is difficult to accept.

In the final analysis, there is still a problem with the distribution system.The country collects grain from farmers at a reasonable price, and then sells it to European countries to make money in exchange for scarce foreign exchange.During this process, farmers have obtained a certain amount of cash income, which is enough to offset their expenditures on seeds (purchased from the agricultural technology station), chemical fertilizers, maintenance costs of water conservancy facilities, etc., and there is still a lot of surplus.However, a large amount of grain is exported abroad, and a certain amount of grain must be kept in the warehouse for emergencies, so the price of grain on the market will not be cheap.

In addition, a large number of able-bodied men in the middle of the river in South Africa were transferred to the Far East to fight in the Far East, and the supply of black slaves from Mozambique promised by the Executive Committee to the Eight Banners of South Africa was delayed due to financial constraints. Therefore, the production of sorghum in South Africa has also gradually declined in recent years. , the sown area is gradually shrinking, and the amount of cheap sorghum supplied to the local area is naturally declining year by year.Under the influence of these multiple factors, the local grain prices were finally balanced at the current price. Although the grain production in the western Huxi agricultural area has increased year by year and the price has fallen every year, the decline has been greatly slowed down.

A large amount of food was artificially exported abroad in exchange for foreign exchange to make up for the huge financial hole caused by the decline in textile sales, and the cheap sorghum originally provided by the colonies was in short supply due to the war in the Far East. People turned to buy relatively high-priced wheat and even rice, which undoubtedly increased the nationals' expenditure on food.

It seems that this problem must be solved, otherwise the development and growth of industrial workers, the future backbone group of the country, will be hindered to a certain extent.Although people with a discerning eye know that the development prospects of workers far exceed that of farmers, because as long as you improve your skills, wages will soon rise like a rocket, but for some short-sighted apprentices or ordinary workers, they only care about Immediate benefits, without considering too long-term things.Especially for those workers in brick kiln factories with little prospect of development, it is really better to live as a farmer.

However, it is troublesome to solve this problem, because there are only two ways to reduce food prices.One is to increase the food supply, and the price will naturally fall in response; the second is to provide financial subsidies, which is not easy when it comes to money.Now that the government is still burdened with a large amount of debt, the Far East is still at war, and there are still a lot of materials (including female slaves) in Europe that need to be purchased, the Executive Committee will definitely take a cautious attitude towards price subsidies for any commodity-especially food. A basic commodity that consumes a lot of money.This subsidy is worth more than ten or 20 yuan every year. It is really hard to say whether the executive committee is willing to spend this money now. Anyway, it is not optimistic about Qiangquansheng.

Other than that, there is only one way left to increase wages for workers.And this, in fact, is no different from implementing price subsidies for food, because it costs money.Thinking of this, Qiang Quansheng has the urge to look up to the sky and sigh. The economy is in a downturn. Is a penny a hero? How can there be living money to use nowadays?

It seems that we have to find a way from the Far East.This guy Mo Ming has been tossing around in the Far East for so long. In addition to bringing some precious furs and medicinal materials to the mainland at the beginning, he also sent some books, calligraphy and paintings, jade, jadeite, handicrafts and cultural relics to the mainland that could not be eaten as food. stuff.There are not many gold and silver that can be directly used as currency. Grandma is a bear. It seems that the military department should write a letter to the Far East. Give the army leaders a good shot, set a target for them, and send some silver to the mainland come over.Let Bao Chenan, the deputy commander of the gendarmerie who is in charge of the intelligence work there, pay close attention and try to send 10 yuan (about [-] taels of Kuping silver) a year to return to the mainland, so that many problems can be solved.

(End of this chapter)