Li You's Tang Dynasty

Chapter 710 The Yantian Law of Dengzhou
In the 20th year of Zhenguan, Dengzhou began to develop. Li You started to build a sea field in Dengzhou on a whim. What is this sea field for? Hehe, it is used for drying salt.

We all know that salt is a strategic storage and distribution material in ancient times. This table salt is mainly distributed in sea water, salt lakes, salt wells and salt mines.

In addition to seawater, other methods of obtaining salt were not very mature in the Tang Dynasty, so these salts were large salt blocks, even bitter salt. The salt eaten by the people in the Tang Dynasty was actually not good.

When Li You went to the common people's house once, he saw a big salt block in the common people's house, so he thought of building a sea field, followed by using the salt drying method to obtain salt, and then sold salt.

But what Li You didn't expect was that this method of drying salt is very difficult. At the beginning, Li You used his own memory to dry salt, but it didn't work at all. In the end, he had to go back to modern times and observed it for a few days in modern times. Come back and teach success.

The salt field method brought back by Li You from modern times is called the solar evaporation method. Its principle is to use the sun to evaporate the seawater in the salt field, gradually increase the concentration of table salt, and finally the salt crystallizes out of the seawater.

The salt field method first involves building a salt pond on a wide and flat beach, and letting in seawater when the tide is high, that is, "tide receiving".Then the seawater is exposed to the sun through multi-stage salt ponds to evaporate the seawater and concentrate the salt. This process is called "making brine".

During the process of making brine, impurities such as iron, calcium, and sulfur will be the first to be precipitated from the salt pool.When 90% of the seawater evaporates, the salinity of the brine reaches 26%, that is, the "salt point", and the brine is introduced into the crystallization tank to crystallize.

When 85% of the salt is precipitated, other minerals such as magnesium and potassium salts are extracted from it.The table salt obtained from drying sea salt is coarse salt, which contains more impurities (such as calcium chloride, magnesium chloride, etc.).Through the purification of coarse table salt, the salt obtained is refined salt.

Once these refined salts were produced, they became the most popular commodity in the entire Tang Dynasty. At this time in the Tang Dynasty, salt was relatively relaxed, and salt did not need to pay taxes, so Li You's salt was not only good, but also sold. It is cheap, which is one of the reasons why Li You's salt has become a popular commodity.

Of course, although there was no tax on salt in the Tang Dynasty, the management of the salt industry in the Tang Dynasty was consistent and did not let it go.

If you want to sell salt, you must have Yanyin, but others may worry about Yanyin, but Li You doesn't need it. You must know that the Prince Li Zhi is in power in the Tang Dynasty now. For Yanyin, Li You directly approved the number of Yanyin.

Although Changsun Wuji wanted to object, there was no tax on salt, and there was indeed a shortage of salt in Chang'an and other areas. In addition, Li Zhi was desperate, and Li Shimin didn't pay much attention to this matter, so although Changsun Wuji wanted to object, he did too tired.

The main reason is that there is no need to pay taxes on salt now, so it has nothing to do with the imperial court. Li Zhi’s big hand will approve a lot, and Li You has no shortage of salt at all, so Dengzhou relies on salt to make a fortune. a sum.

Moreover, this sum is not a one-off, it is eternal. Li You used this sun-salting method to directly bring back the people of Dengzhou, from 5 people to the current 10 people.

It's really a lucrative deal.

Of course, Li You's salt is cheap and good. Of course, it hit some folks who sell salt. These folks are basically controlled by the aristocratic family. Being hit by Li You also made many The family hated Li You deeply.

This also led to Li You's troubles in the future.

In fact, Li Shimin has already seen this step, so Li Shimin is indifferent to Li Zhi's approval of Li You, because this is a good thing, it can not only hit the family, but also arouse the family's resistance and dissatisfaction with Li You , It's killing two birds with one stone.

No, it's San Diao, because Li You's salt is really good, not only cheap but also fine, which allows the people of Datang to eat cheap and good salt, what is it if it's not San Diao?
Li Shimin is so cunning and scheming that he has to admire him.

This salt actually did a good job in the early Tang Dynasty, because in the early Tang Dynasty, in order to encourage production and cultivate life with the people, the court adopted a lenient attitude towards private salt management and did not levy salt tax. The sale of private salt among the people was acquiesced.

It has always been very good, but after the Anshi Rebellion, the economy of the Tang Dynasty suffered heavy losses, and there was an urgent need to increase revenue and reduce expenditure.

So Tang Xuanzong turned his attention to the salt government and began to levy salt taxes.During Tang Dezong's period, the Two Taxes Law had replaced the Zuyong modulation as the way the court collected taxes, and the salt tax became an important source of taxation for the court.

This is over, and soon there is a kind of salt monopoly. The salt was first popular to solve the problem of "resource depletion" of the army. Later, in order to increase fiscal revenue, the salt monopoly system began to take shape after the Anshi Rebellion, and the government began to monopolize production. And the whole process of sales, is the so-called "discuss the salt of the world".

The specific method is to set up a special supervisory office in the salt producing area, responsible for purchasing the locally produced salt, and then the government is responsible for selling it to all parts of the country.The government monopolizes the sale and purchase of salt, and all profits go to the treasury, and the price of salt is determined by the court.

However, the country has obtained huge financial revenue through the salt industry, but this is based on the exploitation of the people. The imperial court has set high taxes for the merchants, so the merchants will naturally increase the price and pass it on to the people in order to make profits.

The rise in the price of salt started a vicious cycle.During the Tang Dynasty, there were many merchants who became very rich because of selling salt. In contrast, the burden of life of the people increased, and they even had to choose light food.

The imperial court strictly controlled the official salt, and the merchants were greedy to increase the price to sell salt, and the people naturally sold illegal salt. The Tang Dynasty strictly controlled the illegal salt sales, and the punishment was very heavy. Anyone who sold a stone of salt would be punished Death penalty, more than one bucket will be punished with stick.If he was caught selling illegal salt in the capital, his neighbors and family members would have to sit down.

However, the profit of selling salt is so high, naturally some salt households took the risk and sold the official salt to merchants at a high price, and the merchants sold it at a price lower than the market price to make huge profits. Over time, those who sold private salt were supported by the people. The government gradually lost popular support.

Later, a large number of followers appeared around the illicit salt sellers, who openly challenged the government. The peasant uprising leaders Wang Xianzhi and Huang Chao at the end of the Tang Dynasty were born in illicit salt peddlers, and later Wang Jian and Xu Wen also made a living by peddling illicit salt.

The demise of the Tang Dynasty has more or less the shadow of salt, but this situation has not yet occurred in the current Tang Dynasty, so Li You may sell salt openly. It just wasn't true, because at that time the salt tax was the most important source of the Tang Dynasty, and it had to be nationalized.

Li You dare not say that he will get permission from the government to sell salt. Even if he gets it, Li You will still lose it if an official obstructs it. The good thing is that the current Datang salt tax is not the only one, so Li You's salt is It can be sold or sold all over the country.

It's a matter of timing.

(End of this chapter)