The Wanli Emperor of the Ming Dynasty was extremely rebellious

Chapter 148 What to do with the land of dukes and nobles
Wanli deliberately disciplined the civil servants, and the civil servants actually became much more honest.

His tactic of killing the chicken to scare the monkey was quite effective.

After he had dealt with most of those mentally ill young men, the remaining officials in the court were basically normal in mind.

A sane person would consider the consequences before doing anything.

It is obvious that he is extremely rebellious and he will deal with anyone who goes against him.

He even considered anyone who dared to go against him to be a rebel.

In this situation, if a civil servant with a normal mind openly goes against him, then he is mentally ill.

Shen Shixing and his gang didn't dare to say a word, and no one dared to mention the affairs of the three major families in Puzhou anymore.

It seemed that the officials in the court had started to work honestly, and the results of the land surveys had begun to be reported.

The results of the land surveys in all prefectures and cities in the two capitals and thirteen provinces of the Ming Dynasty seem to have come out. They are reported in sequence starting from Northern Zhili, with several reports every day!
This is the power of two killings plus the dismissal and investigation of more than one hundred court officials at one time.

Now, all officials should understand that he is not joking when he implements the land survey regulations.

Anyone who fails to produce results from the survey will be dismissed and investigated, without any mercy.

The results of the land survey came out, and a problem arose: how to reclaim the annexed land, or in other words, how to make the land that had not previously paid land tax pay land tax.

After more than two hundred years of land reclamation in the Ming Dynasty, the farmland listed in the "Yellow Book of Taxes and Services" did not increase, but instead sharply decreased from more than 800 million mu to more than 300 million mu. This was because most of the farmland was annexed by others. These people not only swallowed up the land, but even refused to pay the 20% tax on land.

There are many reasons why these people do not pay land taxes.

The princes relied on their status and position to refuse to pay.

Corrupt officials are afraid of being discovered and refuse to pay back the amount they have embezzled.

The local tyrants and gentry would do everything they could to avoid paying the money and grain.

This is often the case, the richer people are, the stingier they are.

This can be seen from the results of the land survey. Most of the land surveyed are exempt from taxes and labor service!
In other words, even if the land survey is completed, it is useless and people don’t have to pay.

As for why.

That was the work of Emperor Hongwu.

Not to mention that the royal family not only did not have to pay any taxes but could also receive rice as a stipend, even Zhu Yuanzhang never imagined that his descendants would multiply to tens of millions!

In order to win over the scholars, Emperor Hongwu came up with a free way. That is, scholars who passed the imperial examinations not only did not have to perform labor service but were also exempt from a certain amount of land tax. Scholars could be exempted from 80 acres of land tax, juren could be exempted from 400 acres of land tax, and jinshi could be exempted from 2,000 taels of land tax!
This may seem like a small number, but that is because there were not many scholars, juren, and jinshi in the Hongwu Dynasty.

Emperor Hongwu seemed to always look at things from a stagnant perspective, rather than a developmental perspective. He never considered what would happen if more and more scholars achieved academic success in the future.

This is quite terrifying.

After all, if you rely on your achievements, you don’t have to do labor service and you can also be exempted from a lot of land taxes.

With this stimulus from Emperor Hongwu, anyone in the world who had the slightest opportunity to study would try their best to do so, and scholars would all rack their brains to pass the imperial examinations.

So, how many scholars had achieved official titles during the Wanli period?

This is actually very easy to calculate. You can get a rough estimate based on the admission ratio from scholar to juren and from juren to jinshi, and the life expectancy of scholars.

The admission ratio of Juren to Jinshi is about 20 to 1. Every three years, three to four hundred Jinshi are selected. That is to say, there are six to eight thousand Juren taking the Jinshi examination every three years.

The admission ratio of scholars to juren is about 30 to 1, and the class is held every three years. The number of juren admitted is 6,000 to 8,000, and the number of scholars is 180,000 to 240,000.

In other words, even if only one round of imperial examinations is held, there will be three to four hundred Jinshi, six to seven thousand Juren, and more than two hundred thousand Xiucai!
The average life expectancy of scholars should be considered relatively high. After passing the imperial examination, they can basically stay in officialdom for about 30 years. There is no need to calculate how long they can live after retirement. Even if we take these 30 years into account, that is equivalent to ten imperial examinations.

In other words, after a Jinshi passes the imperial examination, he will usually have to wait until he has taken ten imperial examinations before he dies. Then there will be as many as three or four thousand Jinshi alive at the same time.

This number is not too many. After all, there are 140 prefectures, 193 counties, and 1,138 counties in the two capitals and 13 provinces of the Ming Dynasty. In other words, there are 1,471 prefects, county magistrates, and county magistrates alone.

In addition, there are more than one official in the provincial government offices. There is also the Ministry of Civil Affairs, the Ministry of Censors, and dozens of government offices in the two capitals. The total number of officials is at least tens of thousands.

Therefore, three or four thousand Jinshi were not enough at all, and many county magistrates were Juren.

The number of Juren (a juren) is quite terrifying. They first passed the Juren exam and then the Jinshi exam, which means they were generally younger than the Jinshi. Even if we count ten batches, there are still 60,000 to 70,000 people. The number of Xiucai (a scholar) is even more terrifying, because most scholars passed the Xiucai exam in their teens or twenties, which is much younger than the Juren and Jinshi. Even if we count ten batches, there are still over two million people.

By this calculation, Jinshi can roughly exempt 6 to 7 million mu of land from tax, Juren can roughly exempt 20 to 30 million mu of land from tax, and Xiucai can roughly exempt more than 160 million mu of land from tax!

Of course, just passing the imperial examination doesn’t mean you can afford to buy so much tax-free land.

This is the problem revealed by the land survey regulations. It doesn’t matter if the scholars with official titles cannot afford so much tax-free land. The local tyrants and landlords can donate their land to them.

The meaning of "to offer tribute" is not to give the land to scholars with official titles, but to register the land under the name of scholars with official titles and give them some money or food every year to exempt them from paying land tax.

In this way, scholars with official titles made money, local tyrants and landlords were exempted from land taxes, everyone was happy, and the imperial court suffered a loss.

Speaking of donations, in fact, the land donated to scholars is not that scary. The land donated to princes and their royal family members is really scary, because the royal family does not have to pay land tax no matter how much land they have!

This is really terrifying. For example, the Henan Provincial Administration Commission has surveyed more than 90 million mu of land. If the land tax is paid at 20%, even if one mu of land produces two stone of grain a year, then the land tax will still be more than 9 million stone.

In fact, of course not. Now the total land tax of the entire Ming Dynasty is less than 9 million shi. The land that Henan Province has submitted to the land tax is only more than 10 million mu, and the rest are in the names of various princes and their clans!

How to solve this problem?
How can we collect the land tax?

Are they really going to take a hard line, reduce the power of the feudal lords, and cancel the tax exemption for all scholars?
If we do this, the world will definitely be in chaos.

Can he cause chaos in the world?
Early in the morning at about noon that day, Wanli was holding the reported land survey results and frowning in thought when the chief minister of the cabinet, Shen Shixing, came to ask for a meeting.

Shen Shixing seemed to have disappeared during this period of time and never came to see him.

What is this guy doing here all of a sudden?

He called this guy in and saw that he was holding a list in his hand.

After the emperor and his subjects exchanged greetings, Shen Shixing held up the list with both hands and said respectfully, "Your Majesty, I have ordered an investigation. Most of the farmland in Shuntian Prefecture in Northern Zhili and the surrounding Yongping Prefecture, Hejian Prefecture, and Baoding Prefecture is owned by nobles and relatives of the emperor. Most of this land was originally used for military farms and horse ranches for the Beijing military."

your mother!

Who asked you to check this?

This guy meant for him to deal with the princes, nobles, and royal relatives!
Wanli narrowed his eyes slightly and stared at the guy for a long time before taking the list and looking at it carefully.

These dukes, nobles and royal relatives are really excessive. The farmland in Shuntian Prefecture and its surrounding Yongping Prefecture, Hejian Prefecture and Baoding Prefecture is more than 30 million mu, and most of it is nearly 20 million mu!
Can he just ignore these guys and deal with them?
The others can be dealt with, but this group of people can never be dealt with.

That bastard Shen Shixing knew this, so he deliberately ordered people to investigate this.

The question is, can he say that what this bastard did was wrong?
Now he wants to increase the land tax by implementing the land survey regulations.

This bastard seems to have done nothing wrong.

At least, this bastard shouldn't be punished for this.

If they are punished this time, who will dare to investigate who has annexed the land in the future?
He stared at the list for a while, thought about it carefully, and then nodded slightly and said, "Well, not bad, good check."

Uh, you're praising me?

Shen Shixing was stunned when he heard this.

He was stunned for a long time before he quickly bowed and said, "Your Majesty, thank you for your praise. This is what I should do."

Yes, that's what you should do.

Wanli nodded slightly and said, "It seems that the fields in Shanxi have been surveyed. Send someone to check them thoroughly."

you!
I command your army, and you command my army, right?

Can the fields in Shanxi be checked?
You're going to take over my army, right?
Okay, I will send Zhang Juzheng’s old party to investigate and let them fight with those princes and royal family members.

Shen Shixing thought about it, then bowed and said, "I obey your order."

After saying this, he retreated respectfully.

Wanli looked at the guy's back, then looked at the list in his hand, and his brows couldn't help but frown.

What should be done with the land annexed by these dukes, nobles, and royal relatives?
(End of this chapter)