"What did you say? How is this possible! 90% of the food and grass needed by tens of thousands of troops in Shaanxi rely on merchants to enter. If no stone of food has been entered into Shaanxi in the past three years, where will the food and grass be needed by officers and soldiers?"

Zhao Zhen stood up from his seat and stared at Xu Ping.

Xu Ping said: "Without food entering Shaanxi, the food and grass naturally come from Shaanxi. Shaanxi's military expenditure is 15 million jin per year, and the tax collected along the route accounts for about half of the taxes, more than 7 million jin. The gap of the other seven or eight million is the need to enter the border along the border. Shaanxi's taxes are lower than those in the north, slightly lower than Hedong Road, and only half of the Hebei Road. The so-called entry into Shaanxi is nothing more than the increase in taxes, which should have been transferred to the merchants and tyrants after entering the Central Government. After the ministers only talk and act in the Central Government, the people did not increase their taxes and used their own responsibilities. At first glance, this seems to be the case, but in fact, the grain of merchants is not exploited by the people of Shaanxi?"

After hearing this, Zhao Zhen sat back on his seat and said in a deep voice: "That's the case, but after entering China and France, the food and grass needed for the borders of Shaanxi were finally bought by the government for money."

Xu Ping was also silent for a long time. The problems involved in China and France were so complicated that he only had a rough concept and could not clarify the entire problem clearly.

Xu Ping has seen the most critical issue clearly. The reason why this problem occurred in the Northern Song Dynasty, especially after the Zhenzong Dynasty, was increasingly serious. No matter how the tea method was changed, it was first seen to be effective. It was born in less than ten years of implementation and had to be changed again. The core contradiction is that the three departments completed the centralization of the world's finances, and the management methods of this era were not enough to support this centralization. This contradiction is concentrated in the tea method, which is naturally because of the characteristics of tea products.

Seeing Zhao Zhen looking at him, Xu Ping had to say explicitly: "Yes, the grain and grass were bought by the government for money, but this money was not allowed to be distributed to the people who could not give grain in any case. The original intention of entering China and France was to transfer grain and grass from other channels into Shaanxi, and not to exploit it too much. However, the government only used money to exchange tea for grain. No matter where the grain came from, merchants valued profits, so naturally they exploited the most from Shaanxi and made the most profits. Who would transport grain from a long distance?"

Empress Dowager Liu was in power, and Zhao Zhen had been an intern emperor for ten years. Although he could not make any decisions during this process, he read all kinds of memorials carefully, not an inexperienced young impulsive emperor. Without Xu Ping's words, he knew in his heart that even if 10% of the money sent out was in the hands of the people, several capable officials could be promoted from the officials he handled.

But is this possible? I am afraid that the people who provide food will not only fail to benefit, but will also be exploited again.

The atmosphere in the room became solemn for a moment. As an emperor, Zhao Zhen had limited knowledge of the details of the governance. When the ruling minister reported to reform the tea law, he could only make a general judgment from the various data listed. What Xu Ping said, no matter which minister gave memorials, the data would definitely not be listed. Most officials were really not clear and did not think about this aspect. Some officials deliberately avoided it, but only picked up data that could show their political achievements.

"Yongxi's northern expedition, the army arrived in Zhuozhou twice, but both had to retreat because of the lack of food in the army. At that time, the grain and grass francisco was difficult to reach, and there were a lot of old tea in the capital, so they entered China and France along the border, and used merchants to help the army transport food and grass. It has been almost fifty years now."

Zhao Zhen looked ahead and murmured to himself. When he said this, he shook his head: "In the past fifty years, the tea method has been changed once in a few years. Every time the accumulated problems have not been eliminated, new diseases have arisen, and they have been changed over and over again. - It is better to abandon the tea method and sell it!"

Speaking of this, he turned to look at Xu Ping.

Xu Ping was stunned for a moment, but he didn't expect Zhao Zhen's thinking to be so dispersed. He suddenly thought of the method of using tea and said carefully: "This matter involves a lot, so we still have to make a long-term plan."

It is meaningless to propose a waste tea method that cannot be solved. Why should tea be used in the northwest? Because this is a necessary material in the northwest region, it is considered a hard currency, and can lure merchants there to do this business. Other specialty items, such as salt, have no effect, because the Yanchi is on Shaanxi Road, and with the dumping of green and white salt from Dangxiang, Shaanxi Road itself has to take out salt.

If you don’t use tea, salt and spices, you can only use cash. That’s another problem, because the finances are highly concentrated in the central court at this time, and the capital needs to send a lot of cash out every year. At the speed of copper coins, once you use cash to buy food and grass along the border, it will lead to a shortage of money in the capital. On the other hand, a large amount of copper coins accumulated along the border will not only flow out to Dangxiang and Khitan, but also cause local prices to soar and economic situation to deteriorate.

The reason why Xu Ping did not dare to talk about this matter easily was that it involved a series of problems such as tea method, salt method, money method, transportation and warehousing, and almost the entire financial system had to be reorganized.

Xu Ping didn't think that he could complete such a workload, even if he had to add Kou Yu, the commander of the three corps, could do so.

The coughing sound of Xiaohuangmen came from outside the door. It was thought that several civic officials in the garden had seen Zhao Zhen and Xu Ping staying in the house for so long and began to urge him.

Zhao Zhen woke up from Chongshuo and said to Xu Ping: "Since you can't explain it clearly for a while, then you can submit a letter of truth after the New Year and say it roughly. By the way, why do you know what to do first?"

Xu Ping said: "There is no external road to transport grain and grass in Shaanxi. Is it a trivial matter for officials to corruption and merchants to invade profits? The most worrying thing is that Dang Xiang Yuanhao is a wolf-like ambition. Once he rebels, war will start again in the northwest. How can he transport grain in urgently? So the most important thing is that the principle of transporting grain to Shaanxi must be opened, and the second is the method of reorganizing money, otherwise the dilemma will be difficult to solve."

"Okay, I'll give you a memorial after the New Year."

Zhao Zhen said, stood up and walked out the door first.

Xu Ping followed behind, thinking about how to explain things clearly. The money method had to be changed. In this era, copper coins and iron coins were used, and the transportation cost was too high. In fact, in addition to the large-scale transportation of copper coins to various places, the scope of copper coins and iron coins was very narrow. Not to mention this era, even in Xu Ping's previous life, the circulation of coins was particularly widespread in one or two provinces around the mint, and paper money was used a lot if it was far away. The circulation cost of copper coins was too high. At this time, many economic matters of the government relied on merchants, so economic activities were not easy to carry out, which was also a reason why it was difficult to raise food and grass along the border.

As for transporting grain and opening the road, Xu Ping has done everything in such a difficult geographical environment in Yongzhou, so it should be much easier to go to Shaanxi.

Xu Ping didn't want to interfere in such a complicated issue. Back then, he was the chief official in Yongzhou, holding military and political power, and he could do nothing without any scruples. Now when he arrived in the capital, he was involved in every move, and the dilemma of entering the border was removed and changed. I don't know how many people he would offend.

The tea method, which is now implemented by Lin Te, who changed it to the cash method when Ding Wei was in power, has been improved and implemented by Li Di since Li Ji proposed the prototype and Li Zi has implemented it. At that time, Lu Yijian, Zhang Shixun were presided over, and Liu Yun, Wang Rong, Zhou Wenzhi, Lu Zongdao and others participated. Although the four people died, their disciples and former officials were all over the world, not to mention that the four living people are now powerful factions in power. In addition to the current Privy Councilor Wang Zeng, almost all the ministers in power participated in it.

If Xu Ping wanted to abolish the tea law, he would offend almost all the ministers in the court.

...
Chapter completed!