Volume 3: Confrontation! The Run of Civilization Chapter 457 Lian Zhen's Power Begins to Show
"Your Highness, I pay my respects to you."
"No need to bow, everyone."
On the sixteenth day of the first lunar month of the third year of the Tianqi reign, after the Lantern Festival, the Ming Empire's new year's State Council meeting was held as scheduled.
After the emperor and his ministers exchanged greetings, everyone sat down. Zhu Youdong cleared his throat and said, "Let's get started. This is the first meeting of the year, so I would like to ask the Ministry of Revenue first. Has last year's revenue and expenditure been received?"
"Your Majesty." Xu Honggang, the Minister of Finance, stood up and said, "The Ministry of Finance has only had two days off recently. We have managed to get the rough figures out. Although time is limited and some statistics are not very accurate, the exhibition should be able to be controlled within 100,000 yuan."
"Okay, then please ask Da Si Tu to report our income and expenditure last year."
"As you wish." Xu Honggang bowed and opened a booklet. "In the second year of Tianqi, the monetary taxes of the state's income, after all converted into silver dollars, totaled more than 64.35 million yuan. In addition to silver, there were also a large amount of in-kind taxes levied on rice, wheat, firewood, charcoal, and fodder. Among them, the staple food such as rice and wheat totaled more than 37 million shi."
After Xu Honggang reported this series of numbers, all the ministers present at the meeting reacted. Some were delighted, some were in deep thought, and some were whispering to each other. For a moment, all kinds of buzzing sounds rang out in the meeting hall.
After the ministers thought for a while and exchanged ideas in a low voice, Zhu Youdong said, "Grand Tutor, after the end of , what was the income for that year?"
"Yes." Xu Honggang bowed and flipped open another booklet that looked much older. "In the 46th year of the Wanli reign, the Ministry of Revenue's revenue totaled 47.5 million dan of grain and 21.785 million silver dollars."
"Huh?" When Xu Honggang reported this number, many ministers expressed surprise: It has only been two years, how come the tax in kind has decreased so much, while the monetary tax has tripled?
"I remember that the salt tax accounted for 12 million of the silver and money income that year, right?"
"Yes, Your Majesty. In the 46th year of the Wanli reign, the Ministry of Revenue, in accordance with the Emperor's will, changed all the in-kind taxes on silk, satin, linen, cotton, etc. previously levied by the royal family and the Ministry of Revenue into monetary taxes. The silver equivalent that year was 4.53 million yuan. Fodder, horses, etc. were also all changed to monetary taxes, and the silver equivalent that year was 2.3 million yuan. Starting from the 46th year of the Wanli reign, corvée labor could also be paid in silver dollars instead. That year, 3.3 million yuan in silver was received from corvée labor. The rest were tea taxes, metallurgical taxes, ship and banknote taxes, etc. Well, because Siam and Japan invaded our Ming Dynasty, the sea route was cut off, so the ship and banknote taxes were the lowest since the opening of the Longqing Port, only 135,000 yuan.
Last year, of the more than 60 million yuan in revenue, the salt tax was still a fixed 12 million yuan. The silver conversion of silk, fodder, horses, corvée, etc. was stable and declining. The main growth point came from commercial taxes. Last year, domestic commercial taxes soared from less than 1.5 million yuan (including highway usage fees) in the 46th year of Wanli to more than 31 million yuan. In addition to customs revenue and the country's foreign trade surplus of more than 12 million yuan, as well as tea taxes and taxes paid by the five overseas states, this money mainly came from various domestic commercial taxes collected by the newly established State Administration for Industry and Commerce of the emperor. "
"Hiss~" After listening to Xu Honggang's details of the sudden increase in income last year, the ministers attending the meeting all looked even more surprised. After a moment of hesitation, the Prime Minister Fang Congzhe slowly stood up and said, "Your Majesty, the commercial tax has been collected so much at once, I wonder if the people..."
"Hahaha, Prime Minister, three heads of the State Administration for Industry and Commerce are also here to attend the meeting today. Why not let them answer your questions?"
After saying this, Zhu Youdong pointed his finger, and Li Guojun, director of the General Administration of Industry and Commerce, stood up and said, "Prime Minister, all superiors, since the establishment of the General Administration of Industry and Commerce at the end of the first year of the Tianqi reign, after more than a year of operation, it has been able to fully perform its duties in the cities where the provincial capitals are located. Last year, the commercial taxes collected by the General Administration of Industry and Commerce totaled only more than 17 million yuan. According to our estimates, the national commercial tax is still probably only at the level of one-tenth of the tax, and there is still a lot of room for improvement. Moreover, with the promotion and continuous improvement of steam engines, there are more and more factories across . I estimate that after the end of this year, the commercial tax should be able to exceed 25 million yuan."
"This, this is simply... Your Majesty, I admire you wholeheartedly."
"Hahaha, the Prime Minister is obsessed. Prime Minister, all the ministers, I should let you know that commercial taxes are not easy to collect. Um, Wang Huaqin, how many battles did your tax police corps fight last year? How many people died?"
"Your Majesty, I am ashamed. Last year was the first time the country used a new method to collect commercial taxes, so there were many merchants in various places who did not understand or accept it. Some larger merchant groups even took up arms to resist the tax. Well, last year, the tax police corps participated in a total of 78 battles with more than 100 people, and one battle with more than 1,000 people. There were countless conflicts involving a few or dozens of people. Throughout the year, 323 tax police officers were killed by the tax police corps, and more than 70 tax police family members were killed in retaliation by evil merchants, including babies. Fortunately, local governments generally supported it, and the garrisons in various places responded promptly, so the commercial taxes were basically collected."
Seeing all the ministers nodding solemnly, Zhu Youdong pointed to Wang Zhi and said, "You come and report the other circumstances of collecting commercial taxes. "
"As ordered." Wang Zhi, the second deputy director of the State Administration for Industry and Commerce, stood up and said, "My superiors, the premise for the State Administration for Industry and Commerce to collect commercial taxes is to abolish the previous tolls in various places, as well as the corruption at various checkpoints, and the black hands of local officials must also be cut off. In the 46th year of Wanli, the highway built by the court collected 1.35 million in tolls. In the second year of Tianqi, the mileage of the country's cement highways was twice that of the 46th year of Wanli, and the toll collection was zero. It can be said that at least at the level of the court, it was an effective fulfillment of the contract.
However, local governments still continue to set up checkpoints to collect taxes from merchants. There are even a few officials, clerks and runners who demand benefits from merchants without reason. In the second year of Tianqi, the General Administration of Industry and Commerce received a total of 2,753 complaints from merchants from all over the country. All of them were about merchants being exploited by local government offices after paying business taxes in accordance with the law. As of yesterday, the General Administration of Industry and Commerce has handled a total of 2,687 complaints. Among them, most local governments returned the illegally collected taxes after receiving the opinions of our General Administration of Industry and Commerce. However, there are also some officials, clerks and even runners who are stubborn and even have bad attitudes. We have no choice but to impose sanctions on these people.
In the second year of the Tianqi reign, the General Administration of Industry and Commerce transferred a total of 358 cases to the Metropolitan Procuratorate and the Ministry of Justice. As of yesterday, more than 200 officials had been removed from office, and more than 70 officials with particularly bad conduct had their titles revoked. In addition, more than 900 clerks and more than 2,000 runners were dealt with.
Zhu Youdong felt greatly relieved after listening to Wang Zhi's report.
In the more than 200 years since the founding of the Ming Dynasty, there has been no formal collection of business tax, income tax, or property tax. However, the burden on merchants on a daily basis is not light: because there is no clear decree for collecting business taxes, local officials can do whatever they want when facing merchants. This leads to merchants paying less or even no business taxes in name, but having to use a large amount of profits to bribe officials. This has led to a deep combination of officials and businessmen, accelerating official corruption. It also means that while the Ming court cannot collect money, the exploitation of ordinary people continues to increase.
Collecting commercial taxes is to cut off the gray or even black income of local governments and bring everything to the surface. In this way, the administration of officials can be improved, and while the national income increases greatly, there will be more power to perform national duties, such as military construction, infrastructure construction, and disaster relief.
Zhu Youdong knew that it was against the human nature of the vested interests to cut off the previous inertial income of government offices at all levels and make everyone accept the new system. This was extremely difficult to do.
The key here is whether merchants can no longer be exploited by the previous "rules" after paying the commercial taxes according to the law. As long as this can be achieved, or the amount of "exploitation" is greatly reduced, so that the reduction exceeds the normal commercial taxes paid, merchants will be willing to support the court's new policies.
Therefore, the performance of local governments is the key here.
At present, it seems that although there have been many violations by local government officials in the past year when the collection of commercial taxes was vigorously promoted, most of them were just doing it out of habit. There are some who are really crazy and violate the law, but they are a minority.
You know, the Ming Dynasty now has more than 25,000 civil servants, nearly 60,000 clerks, and nearly 200,000 corvées. Among such a huge base, only more than 3,000 people were dealt with, which is already a very low ratio.
Although there must be a considerable number of merchants who paid business taxes but were still exploited but did not dare to speak up and report it, and although there must be some places that the State Administration for Industry and Commerce did not handle. But the low proportion still made Zhu Youdong overjoyed - he had been mentally prepared to follow Zhu Yuanzhang's example and kill all the officials in the country. He did not expect that when the operation was actually carried out, the proportion of officials who committed crimes was so low.
Well, very good, it seems that the effect of Lian Zhen is really starting to take effect.
