When Kaifeng Prefecture sent several old officials to patrol the Yanhe Avenue, Xu Ping ordered his servants to watch on the shore, and then left the Bian River. When he returned home, he spoke to his mother and Lin Su Niang, and Xu Ping rushed back to the Sansi Yamen.

The founding marquis was the third rank. Although the officials were still mainly treated by the officials at this time, when it came to "Tonggui" officials and "Anti-guided" officials, the founding marquis was still useful. When the public officials and guards in the yamen saw Xu Ping, they became much more respectful than before and bowed to salute.

Xu Ping went back to his official office and looked at it. There was no particularly urgent official document, so he asked the official to call the head of the commercial tax case.

Zheng Zhaoyan, the chief officer, was a three-generation official official, and was familiar with the classics and stories. For example, he brought the silver wine supervisor Wu, namely the Yinqing Guanglu Dafu, the Imperial College Priest, the Imperial College Priest, the Wuqiwei, and the Wuqiwei, respectively. Although these official titles also have formal official reports, they have no practical significance. The Yinqing Guanglu Dafu came from the second rank and really took the scattered official to the priest and gave them to these minor officials, which was just to satisfy their vanity. In the three sects, everyone called Zheng Zhaoyan the Zheng official. Only when they sat together with public officials of similar identities, would Zheng Yinqing say that he felt glorious.

This principle is similar to the "Jie Fei" and "Jie Zi" who choose people. Xu Ping's father-in-law Lin Wensi is the one who chooses people. After working for a year, he can wear vermilion official uniforms, namely "Jie Fei". Xu Ping was "given to Fei" many years later as an official in the Beijing court.

This tradition is precisely because the actual status of public officials and candidates is too low that they use these unrealistic honors to comfort them. These official titles are neither salaries nor related treatment. However, on the other hand, it also shows that the status of officials at this time is much higher than that of later generations, and far less than that of a lowly person.

Zheng Zhaoyan came in and greeted Xu Ping: "What order does Xu have?"

"I'll take a look at the books I have in the past few days, especially the prices and taxes on the market recently."

Zheng Zhaoyan agreed, and not long after a while, he brought a large number of cases to get in.

Xu Ping felt a headache when he looked at the current case files. Although there was a fixed format, he had been following it for many years and did not have a unified system. It was quite a test of a person's intelligence, patience, and physical strength. The three departments had millions of cases, thousands of officials, and dozens of officials who could sort out the numbers were all amazing figures worthy of writing in history books.

After putting down the case file, Xu Ping asked Zheng Zhaoyan to stay, and then called a few experienced officials to help organize the case file.

Xu Ping spread out the paper and recorded it in different categories, asking Zheng Zhaoyan to take several others to find data, and listed the changes in price changes and the changes in commercial tax revenue in recent days in a table, which seemed to be clear at a glance.

Prices are not counted every day, and they don’t seem to fluctuate significantly, so the revenue from commercial tax is much more conspicuous. Since the ceremony of offering prisoners, the commercial tax is getting higher and higher, and the days ahead will be even higher.

Commercial tax is collected based on the value of goods, which means that rising prices and increasing transaction volume will lead to an increase in commercial tax. Judging from the recent days, there is no doubt that rising prices are the main reason for the increase in commercial tax revenue.

After calculating the data clearly, Xu Ping said to Zheng Zhaoyan: "Tomorrow, you will take a few deli subordinates to a few markets and lively places in the capital to see what the current prices are, and report them clearly to me."

Zheng Zhaoyan agreed, and Xu Ping asked them to carry the file back.

Sitting alone behind the desk, Xu Ping thought about the recent surge in charcoal prices.

When supply is less than demand, prices will rise until a new balance is formed. This is the objective law of the commercial society and does not mainly move by people's subjective will. But it is hard to say that it is a commercial society now. From emperors to officials, they do not want this society to become a commercial society. They have their own reasons.

Officials will not care much whether the price rises or not. Until it affects people's livelihood or even their own lives, it will become a major event that the government and the public are concerned about. At this time, merchants must have lost their conscience. Otherwise, the ancient sages think that merchants are social borers.

The first step is to release the official inventory to suppress the price. If the first step is invalid, Kaifeng Prefect Zhang Guan will be powerless and will probably have to replace him. If he changes the means, he will be more tough and then force the charcoal merchants to sell at a low price. Whether he can gain the upper hand in the battle of wits and courage with merchants is the standard for evaluating an official's talent.

Xu Ping didn't care about these things, and he was not interested in the battle between officials and merchants. The real problem of people's livelihood is to force the charcoal shop to sell all the stored charcoal, and then what?

This season is the time to store charcoal. Whether it is the charcoal industry, the imperial palace, or the rich and wealthy families in the city, they have only started to store charcoal for a while, and there is indeed not much inventory of charcoal in the capital.

Suddenly, the weather was severely cold, the road was blocked, and the canal transportation was blocked. Now, the lack of charcoal in Kaifeng City is real. It is to use various methods to force all the charcoal in stock to the market and sell it all, but it is still in short supply. Compared with demand, the supply gap is hard and will not be transferred by human will.

At this time, forcing limited inventory into the market with force may cause a disaster, a disaster that is unbearable for the poor people in the lower classes.

Even if the charcoal in the market is sold at half price of 300 cents, the poor still cannot afford it. Even if the price is reduced by half, they still cannot afford it to 150 cents. When the charcoal in the market is sold out, the charcoal will be entered into the family of the rich and at least middle-class people, and the poorest families in the lowest class can still use their bodies to resist the cold winter.

At that time, it was the real trouble. Now, whether it was in the palace, in the Sanshiku, or in the charcoal store, as long as Kaifeng Mansion had the intention, it would be able to gather together. Whenever he entered the house, he was afraid that the emperor would not be able to get it out in person. Will the lower class have to freeze to death?

Thinking of Panpan clapping his hands and laughing happily under the big willow tree, Xu Ping sighed secretly, spread out the paper on the desk, and wrote his first memorial to the government's policy.

After being an official for so many years, Xu Ping's memorials have always been routine. As long as they are not directly related to their position, they basically ignore them. This mentality is very wonderful. He always thought that being an official is just something he had to do in this world and never regarded it as his career.

Let’s first write about the current situation of heating fuel facing the capital. The carbon price has soared, from 30 ci per before the snow to 600 ci. The original price of 45 ci per ci. The carbon (coal) of each ci. It also rose to 150 ci. Although Kaifeng Prefecture has set up a yard to sell charcoal, it did not suppress the price of charcoal, which has led to rapid loss of official ci. It overdraws the capital to deal with the tense situation in the future.

Then the supply and demand of charcoal and carbohydrate in the city was analyzed. The huge gap exists in reality. The measures taken now seem to be solving problems, but in fact they will not play an ideal role. What’s more terrible is that this will accelerate the heating fuel to enter the upper class of society. If the weather cannot improve quickly in the future, a large number of lower class people in the city will have no charcoal to keep heating.

The poor people have air leaks everywhere and their clothes cannot keep warm. If the north wind blows strongly, it is not uncommon for a large number of people to die of freezing and frostbite.

At that time, the government did not have charcoal or charcoal collection methods, and was unable to provide assistance, which would most likely lead to human disasters. People who could not even keep warm gathered and turmoil would not be uncommon.

Compared with scholars of this era, Xu Ping's words are quite gentle, unlike them who always speak alarmistly. However, the prospect of acting according to the current method is dark, and Xu Ping can also write it clearly.

Finally, Xu Ping asked Kaifeng Prefecture and the Sansi to cooperate and immediately do their best to collect all the charcoal and carbohydrate in the city to form necessary emergency stocks. First, Xu Shen, who had stopped working but failed, then all the officials and other places that could be suspended, and the charcoal used was concentrated by Kaifeng Prefecture and the Sansi.

The government will hold a charcoal for up to three days. If the situation does not improve, it must be stopped immediately to prevent the emergency loss of carbon stocks used to deal with emergencies.

Three days later, if the weather continues to be severely cold, Kaifeng Prefecture will forcibly implement the distribution system of heating fuel, and allocate heating charcoal and charcoal according to the number of households and other households, so as to try to tilt towards the lower class people to avoid large-scale freezing.

After writing, Xu Ping sealed the memorial and sat quietly for a while.

The market mechanism can only cope with normal social situations, communicate with each other, and even allow social wealth to proliferate. However, once an emergency occurs, the market mechanism will fail and will double the social crisis.

People in this era do not recognize this, do not understand the essence and function of various governance methods, and act on their own feelings and experiences, which will lead to a disaster if you accidentally.

Having memories of his previous life is almost instinctive. When it comes to an emergency, Xu Ping first thought of the rationing system. The rationing system is not a good system, but it is a life-saving system. It can use limited resources to overcome the crisis at the minimum overall cost. As long as the most deadly time is spent, there are countless means to solve the fundamental problem in the future.

The only thing to worry about is whether the rulers of this era can understand these suggestions and how likely they are to adopt them. Xu Ping does not want the ruler to remember the meaning of his words after a real human tragedy.

Thinking of the memorials returned by the Secretariat a few days ago and Wang Sui's comments, Xu Ping felt unspeakable.

The collision of ideas in different eras is difficult to understand each other. At least what Xu Ping is facing now is not who said what he said is right and who said what he said is wrong, but who has a higher official position and who has greater authority.

He has been scolded by the Secretariat once. Xu Ping doesn't know what the outcome will be like this time, but this is the only thing he can do for this time.
Chapter completed!