Chapter 10: Hiding the Beautiful Little One in the Golden House (2)

Zhang Juzheng was one of the greatest politicians of the Ming Dynasty. Of course, what later generations remembered him most was the reforms he led. Two of the laws were familiar to Zhu Yinglong, a later generation. One was "testing and achieving the law". The so-called test-making method was to examine the various decrees issued by the central court, check the implementation, and evaluate officials at all levels. Then, according to the assessment, give a certain level (or score), the excellent ones remained or promoted, and failed to pass the qualification and were demoted or dismissed. This was a bit like the "accountability system" in later generations. However, the test-making method was forcibly implemented under Zhang Juzheng with his personal prestige. Although it achieved certain results, many honest officials like Hai Rui were discovered and appointed. However, the typical human rule system of the feudal dynasty, the so-called emperor and the minister, good decrees often cannot be continued, and the dross can be lived.

The strength became stronger and stronger. As soon as Zhang Juzheng died, the "Examination Method" had no heirs in an instant. Because the "Examination Method" greatly harmed many officials who had a fortune after becoming officials, the "Examination Method" gradually remained in the form and became an empty method; there was another one called "One Whip Method", which was originally called "One Whip Method", also known as "Artificial Whip Method, Ming Whip Method, Chief Whip Method, etc. Later, "Editor" was also called "Whip", and occasionally "Border" was used. It mainly summarized the taxes and services of a county, and all of them were

In order to combine the taxes and labor service separately; then, the province will be divided into each province with a single province of labor service, with a certain amount of silver per grain and a certain amount of silver per tax. Finally, the labor service and labor service will be merged and collected. Zhang Juzheng completely abolished the labor service; the Lijia system will no longer exist in both form and substance; any remaining cap tax will be incorporated into the land tax. The taxpayer can fulfill its obligations to the state by paying single and fixed silver in installments.

The reform of the One-Whip Law was mainly a service law reform, which also involved land tax. In the Ming Dynasty, the corvee service was originally a regular service of Lijia, with both labor and mixed labor service. Among them, Lijia was the main trunk and households were the basic unit. The household was divided into three grades and nine according to the amount of grain, which was used as the basis for the registration of labor service. Ding refers to male resident aged 16 to 60 years old, and grain refers to land tax. The amount of grain depends on the land acres, so the labor service also includes a part of the tax of land acres. The implementation of this corvee service system was based on the widespread existence of small land ownership of self-cultivated farmers and relatively stable land rights. After the middle of the Ming Dynasty, land annexation was violent, land rights were highly concentrated, and officials and gentry were taken over by officials and gentry, and the labor service was increasingly heavy, and farmers fled and moved, and the land amount was already unreal, and the government's fiscal revenue decreased. In response to this phenomenon, many people proposed reform measures. The state started from ensuring tax service, and gradually shifted the focus of the labor service to the land acres.

The implementation of the One-whip method broke the past Lijia boundary in terms of the collection of in-service silver, and changed it to a county-level government as the basic unit, and all the municipalities and county-level governments were assigned to the grain of grain of the county. During the collection, the land property and labor conditions of the households were considered, which is the so-called "measurement of land and counties".

For farmers, labor and land tax are two different exploitations. Before the implementation of the one-whip method, although part of the labor tax was distributed to land acres, the proportion was very small. After the implementation of the one-whip method, the service bank was reduced from the part that the households were borne, and the part that was distributed to land acres increased. The additional labor taxes mainly fell on the land owners, and it had initially become the nature of storing taxes and simplifying the method of collecting taxes and simplifying the taxes and storing taxes, but more importantly, the change in the nature of taxes and storing taxes. This change specifically reflects two transitions, one is the transition of current property taxes and active duty system to monetary taxes, and the other is the transition of household taxes to land taxes. However, except for a few prefectures and counties, the population in most areas must also bear different amounts of service bank taxes. After the Qing Dynasty, the transfer was finally completed.

Due to the limitations of historical conditions, there was a Ming Dynasty that the One Whip Law failed to be implemented seriously. The tax and service reform touched the economic interests of the officials and gentry landlords, and there was great resistance. Later, after Zhang Juzheng carried out a large-scale clearance of land, the reform speed was accelerated. However, due to Zhang Juzheng's death and the secret rules of officials and gentry not paying taxes for thousands of years, the report was reported and the amount of land was reported seriously. In addition, land annexation, court corruption, emperor's stupidity, natural disasters and man-made disasters, etc., it was originally good laws and turned into evil laws. For the sake of immediate benefits, how could they care about others' lives and death? The collusion between officials and gentry and officials and businessmen, in areas that have been implemented, some local governments still forced farmers to engage in various corvee labor; some additional taxes were added, and small whips were set up in addition to fire consumption, and the scale head was added; more serious was the use of the One Whip Law to implement taxes, and some areas had the original tax of whips per mu of silver. During the Tianqi period, some increased to more than one cent in order to fight against the Jin people.

Land is the foundation, land is the foundation. Without land, no matter how gorgeous the pavilions are, they cannot be built on earth. No matter which country or nation, their obsession with land is the same. If a country cannot solve the most fundamental land problem, then the government of this country has basically reached the end of its life.

Zhu Yinglong did not have such a ridiculous idea. This is extremely unrealistic. Everything must be based on the current basic national conditions. It can only be used to release part of the land from some people with economic vision to alleviate the increasingly intensified contradictions between farmers and land in China. This road is long and time-consuming. However, if you go step by step, you can always achieve a day when the contradictions are eased or balanced. The key is that the rulers must unswervingly implement this policy. Second, expand forcefully and seize more land to meet domestic needs. This is not realistic at all. The domestic land is oversupply, and many lands are owned, but no one cultivates it. This phenomenon of serious waste of resources is everywhere. Moreover, the Ming Dynasty’s self-protection needs some strength and has no ability to expand. It will take at least five or even ten years to expand. Therefore, Zhu Yinglong decided to implement the previous policy first, ease domestic conflicts, increase support for industry and commerce, reduce taxes, recuperation, temporarily maintain restraint policies outside, do not take the initiative to fight with neighboring countries, and develop the domestic economy and military wholeheartedly.

The money is closely related to the economy. Although the Ming Dynasty minted a large number of copper coins into circulation every year, it was affected by copper production and consumption level. The amount of copper coins was too small and the weight of copper coins was inconvenient to carry. Although the imperial court also issued treasure notes, its circulation area was too small, and it was even less useful than the silver notes issued by some large monetary banks. Therefore, it was imperative to formulate a new monetary policy and issue currency.
Chapter completed!