The elite did not migrate south

Chapter 775: Not Very Reasonable
The two of them didn't know how long they talked. When Cao Mao stood up and prepared to leave, he remembered the purpose of his visit!
No! I'm here to discuss policy with someone!
Cao Mao hurriedly told Pei Xiu the purpose of his visit.

"Should the Imperial College's admissions system be slightly modified?"

Cao Mao talked about the many unreasonable aspects of the current Imperial College admissions.

Pei Xiu could discuss with Cao Mao from another perspective. For example, Cao Mao believed that it was inappropriate for the teachers to directly recruit disciples. Wouldn't this give them the opportunity to recruit their own relatives?
How can a teacher recruit students for the school on his own?
But Pei Xiu said, "Your Majesty, the Confucian scholars are famous scholars. If they want to pass on their knowledge, they will definitely choose suitable candidates. Many famous scholars already have many disciples when they come to the Imperial College. If you don't give them this power, what will happen to their existing disciples? Unless we simply don't recruit these famous scholars with disciples."

"But what famous scholar who was invited to be a teacher at the Imperial Academy would not have disciples?"

"Your Majesty, don't worry that they will use this quota to favoritism. They may favoritism in other matters, but not in academic matters, especially in matters of classics."

"The study of classics requires both talent and a solid foundation. The students these classics teachers recruit represent them. They don't dare to recruit idle mediocre people. They only recruit talented people."

Cao Mao then talked about the recommendation by local officials.

Pei Xiu explained again: "Your Majesty, this is actually the best way for poor people to enter the Imperial College. The descendants of officials of the fifth rank and above do not need to be recommended and can enter directly."

"Therefore, Your Majesty, you must retain this and the next one. If you abolish the fifth-rank direct entry, they will seize other paths, which will be detrimental to the poor families."

Pei Xiu talked about those privileges. In fact, allowing the children of wealthy families to retain these privileges was a protection for the rest of the students.

Imagine what would happen if these people lost these privileges? They would immediately seize all other avenues for advancement, and the poor would have no hope of rising.

Cao Mao thought about it and thought, okay, it does make some sense.

So, is this the purpose of your establishing the Imperial College in history?

Separate the nobles from the common people and reduce monopolies?
Pei Xiu said seriously, "If Your Majesty wants to be more favorable to those from humble backgrounds, then you can strengthen the Imperial College's own examinations."

"The Ministry of Rites currently has too many things to handle. Your Majesty could set up a dedicated agency to handle these matters. Of course, the Imperial College examinations should also be managed by them. Separate the Imperial College examinations from the Imperial College, expand the scale of the examinations, and improve the rank of the officials within the Imperial College."

"However, the places where truly humble scholars gather are still the local academies. In recent years, the number of academic officials in local academies has increased. Your Majesty, there is no need to worry too much. Within twenty years, the situation will have changed dramatically."

Pei Xiu was now truly on Cao Mao's side, analyzing the future situation for him.

After officially taking over the title reform and deciding to help Cao Mao wholeheartedly, Pei Xiu betrayed his own class.

In fact, in history, Pei Xiu also became a traitor in the later period because of a series of actions to restrain the big families and suppress the famous families, because if the temple was not restricted, it would be destroyed.
Cao Mao listened carefully to his many suggestions.

"I intend to establish an academic supervisor in the Ministry of Rites, who will be responsible for all academic affairs!"

When Cao Mao left here, he was in a very good mood. Today's trip had achieved quite a few results.

At the same time, the Wei court was also doing its best to handle all matters.

The first thing was the reform of Pei Xiu’s title.

Although Pei Xiu is still reflecting on his mistakes at home, this does not affect the implementation of his policies. After all, the specific executor is still Zhong Hui, and it doesn't matter whether Pei Xiu is there or not.

Following Pei Xiu's ideas, Zhong Hui formally established the five ranks and nine nobility.

King, Prince, Duke of a County, Duke of a County, Marquis of a County, Earl of a County, Son of a County, and Baron of a County.

Many domestic titles have undergone large-scale changes. The workload is extremely staggering and not something that ordinary people can accomplish.

There are many people with titles nowadays, and the titles in the past are incompatible with the current title system. The Western Jin Dynasty chose to retain the past titles and required that future titles adopt the new title system.

This is certainly a convenient way to avoid trouble, but for Zhong Hui, it is not the most perfect solution.

Zhong Hui was a rather stubborn perfectionist, as could be seen from his neatly dressed appearance and his beard which he trimmed every day.

Every day, he makes sure he looks his best.

Zhong Hui also followed the same principle when it came to policy: if he did something, he would either not do it at all, or if he did it, he would do it to perfection, not giving future generations the chance to improve. If they did improve on it, wouldn't that mean he wasn't good enough?!

This is absolutely unacceptable.

So, Zhong Hui began to exchange them one by one. He wanted to completely abolish the past titles and turn all the old titles into new ones. Although this was a huge workload and might cause huge controversy, Zhong Hui didn't care.

Because new titles are not the goal, the reduction of new titles is the most important thing.

The first one has to be done by yourself!
Zhong Hui was a ruthless man. He drew his sword and chopped himself first, and then chopped his son.

Zhong Hui had already become a county marquis at this moment, which was much easier. It was a county marquis among the new titles, and his adopted son could naturally be converted directly as well.

When the nobles all over the world heard the news, they were all worried.

They were mainly afraid of being cut down too harshly. Zhong Hui summoned many ministers to discuss and finalize this matter, and the negotiation process was extremely fast.

While the title system was being reformed, Enke also began to make preparations.

The remedial plan of the Secretariat also began to be implemented, and a time limit was set for those who migrated. They were not allowed to go there today and participate in the assessment tomorrow!

Looking at governance as a whole, it is nothing more than a process of discovering problems, solving them, generating new problems, and then solving them again.

Cao Mao has been quite busy these days, as he is busy appeasing the royal family members.

He was originally worried that the reform of the title system would frighten these royal family members who had finally settled down, but fortunately, Cao Mao's appeasement work over the years was very smooth.

He almost never killed any member of the royal family, and even kept Cao Fang by his side.

The royal family members had a very good impression of him, and because they were not affected by the demotion, they had no opinion on the change of title.

The biggest impact on the world this year is the skyrocketing birth rate.

The unification of the world and the end of war will naturally trigger a population boom.

This situation has occurred in the Former Han Dynasty, the Later Han Dynasty, and the Western Jin Dynasty under Anshi.

What's more, Cao Mao had abolished the head tax at this time, and the number of newborns that year reached a very scary level.

Zhong Hui was ecstatic. He believed this was the foundation of a prosperous era. The population of the Wei Dynasty must exceed the 53 million people at the peak of the Later Han Dynasty!

But not everyone thinks so.

At this moment, Lu Zhi sat in front of Cao Mao with a melancholy look on his face, holding reports from various places in his hands, and was extremely worried.

"Your Majesty, there are too many newborns. It's simply too many. It's unprecedented. If the number continues to increase at this rate, I'm afraid something big will happen."

"Even if the population hasn't increased, in twenty years, the population of Wei could easily exceed 30 million, reaching the size of the Later Han Dynasty. However, our arable land is less than half of theirs, Your Majesty. If there are too many people and insufficient arable land, and food is scarce, then..."

"Then we should strive to increase the area of arable land and make it exceed that of the Later Han Dynasty."

Lu Zhi shook her head, it wasn't that easy.

As the population increases, the cost of governance will also increase, and if the income of the temple does not increase significantly, problems will arise sooner or later.

Cao Mao laughed and said softly, "Don't worry too much, Duke Lu."

"I know what you're worried about. Arable land is always limited, while the population will continue to increase. If things get this far, we should find a way to increase the output of arable land. What do you think?"

Lu Zhi was a little surprised, "What does your majesty mean?"

"Of course it's a heavy weapon."

"A man as famous and clever as Ma Gong is the best person to handle this matter."

"Name Qiao?"

Lu Zhi frowned, not very satisfied with the answer.

The famous scholars of the time were divided into two types. The first type was people like Lu Zhi, who had good moral character, the style of the Later Han Dynasty, and were relatively serious. Cao Mao liked these people very much, but their problem was that they were too conservative. Apart from Confucian classics, they did not really look down upon anything.

Even though Lu Zhi respected Ma Jun very much, he did not think that he could play such a huge role.

Another type of celebrities are, of course, the new generation such as Pei Xiu and Du Yu.

The new generation of celebrities were more open-minded and usually had various hobbies. Du Yu liked to invent, Pei Xiu liked to make maps, and Zhong Hui liked to be a celebrity.
They are still relatively good. The other celebrities have some moral flaws, but the good thing is that they are very open-minded and have no contempt for science and technology. They do not think that everything other than classics is garbage. They all like music, calligraphy, and poetry.

Cao Mao felt that a combination of the two would be best.

We don’t want the unrestrainedness of the Western Jin Dynasty, nor the conservatism of the Later Han Dynasty.

Lu Zhi's worries cannot be said to be groundless. Population growth is a good thing, but too rapid an increase will lead to various problems. Cao Mao also feels that many policy reforms have been almost completed.

Then the next step, of course, is to further improve productivity and pay attention to technology.

Of course, Cao Mao has never underestimated science and technology over the years, and there are a lot of inventors gathered in Luoyang today.

However, this is not enough. We need to motivate and encourage them better and raise productivity to a certain level. If productivity is raised, many problems can be solved.

Of course, the Dazu still has to continue to be beaten, and the whip cannot stop!
(End of this chapter)