It is late autumn, and the yellow leaves on the waterside outside the window are full of yellow leaves, and the white sails cross the river and disappear into a snow-white reed.

Autumn is the time for war. The grain was harvested, the farm work was idle, and the grass and trees in the north withered. When the nomads were high in autumn and the horses were fat, it was also the time when the grain and grass of the Han people in the Central Plains were abundant, and they often had to do one. This year, Nong Zhigao from Quang Nam was added, and the miasma gradually subsided in autumn and winter, making it a good time for the army to go south. Du Zhongxiao looked at the fallen leaves floating on the river, thinking about how he would lead the army to the expedition in a month.

After drinking for a while, Wang Anshi said: "Wait for you, Huainan is not a vast and sparsely populated place, if you want to camp a field, what should you do?" ”

Du Zhongxiao came back to his senses and said, "No matter where the camp is, it's actually pretty much the same. At the beginning, Jingxi Road set up camp fields to settle the camp field and army that had nothing to do, not to develop the place, which is different from Huainan. This area is vast and sparsely populated, and there are people and idle land for camping and farming, and there is not much local turmoil. Taking Zaoyang County, where the yamen is located, as an example, it is just because the treatment of recruiting people in the camp is stronger than that of the locality, and all the villagers of the big families have left their masters and entered the camp and field affairs. As soon as the camp was opened, all the rich people in the countryside could not continue to operate, so they had to sell their land to do something else. ”

Wang Anshi said: "As waiting for Xiao to say. Huainan Road camps, the states have no land and no hands, and they don't know where to start. ”

Du Zhongxiao said: "As long as the field work is not regarded as a yamen, but as a field work for growing grain, it will not be so difficult." There are magnet-burning farms everywhere and sake brewing farms, so why can't there be farms? As long as the money is invested, the government presides, and it is difficult for the people who farm to eat and drink, and the income is better than being a banker in a large family? If not, don't do this kind of camp! ”

Han Jiang and Wang Anshi listened and laughed together. Indeed, if it is officially sponsored, the peasants will not be treated as well as the landlord's villagers, so why should they engage in any field work? In places like Huainan Road, the purpose of opening field operations is not to alleviate the oppression of the peasants by the landlords, and second, to let the government control a part of the stable source of grain, which can be used as a supplement to the regular liquidation. Other than that, what are the benefits? Grain can be collected by taxes.

Du Zhongxiao said again: "As long as you have the capital, you can buy land." Choose those large fields where there is no water and no roads, and the place does not want to cultivate. After the camp was bought, roads were built and canals were opened, and it was converted into fertile land. The second is to select idle land that is uncultivated, build roads and canals, and reclaim them. Both of these can be used by the local government as a place of conscription to assist, and manpower can be used as a substitute for the cost. If you have land, you can recruit people. According to the experience of Jingxi Road, to attract people, first, there must be public land for field work, and the people working in the public land must be able to get 40 to half of the grain. Why this number? Because the farmer rents land from the master's family, and this is often the case. With this grain as a foundation, and with farm tools and cattle ploughing, there is no fear that no one will come. Again, be sure to remember to let every household have private land. The number is not too much, one to two acres of women in a household can be done. With these private fields, they can plant fruit trees and vegetable gardens, and grow some miscellaneous grains, as a supplement, in exchange for some cash in their hands. The rest is nothing more than mulberry, and it is best to arrange some in each village. These must be needed, and after having this, the women who camp in the field will have something to do, and the family will be busy. After these were done, some idle fields were left in the village, and the camp field affairs were opened. ”

Du Zhongxiao is talking about government-run farms, that is, state-owned small and medium-sized farms in later generations, and now they all have templates, just follow them. One of the advantages of government-run farmland is that it can adjust the per capita cultivated land of each farm to the most economical scale and maximize income. With the different levels of agricultural development, the popularization of new agricultural tools, the emergence of improved seeds, and the improvement of infrastructure, the optimal amount of cultivated land per capita is constantly changing. The goals are different, such as the pursuit of the highest grain yield, which is one number, and the pursuit of the highest economic efficiency, which is another number. For example, in later generations, China and the United States, because of their different natural endowments and different national conditions, pursued different benefits to maximize their benefits. One is biased towards the highest yield, the other is biased towards the best yield, and the number of cultivated land per capita is necessarily different. Production-oriented, even on industrial farms in China, farmers will cultivate much less land per capita than in the United States, which is seeking profits. When it comes to agriculture, it is compared to the big farms in the United States, which is just the guidance of public opinion by economists who have returned from the United States and the combination of big capital.

Wang Anshi thought for a while and asked, "Why do you want to buy fields that others don't want to plant, and then go to open up wasteland?" Wouldn't it be much better to buy a well-planted ripe field directly, and everything else is as discussed earlier? ”

Du Zhongxiao said: "Jiefu, the official does not compete with the people for profit, buy ripe fields, and turn it upside down." ”

Wang Anshi said: "The benefits of the world are not in the officials, but in the people." Entering the official, after all, it is still used on the people, it is better than the rich people Tian Lianqian Mo and the poor have no place to stand, Zhumen wine and meat stink, and there are frozen bones on the road! ”

Du Zhongxiao shook his head with a smile: "It's not surprising that we read the books of sages and have the heart of sages. Assistant Professor Taixue Li talked about flat soil, which means that the cultivator should have his own land and distribute the land in the world to the cultivators. It's good to think that way, but can it be done? The official does not compete with the people for profit, which means that the benefit is in the people, not in the hands of a few wealthy and powerful households. Now the population of the world is not large, and there are idle fields, and what is lacking is people, not land."

Han Jiang said: "It's not entirely right to say so. There are different places in the world, some places have fewer people, and some places have less land. ”

Du Zhongxiao said: "Generally speaking, the production of food is now a shortage of people in the world. Everyone knows that in order to produce food, the most basic thing is to have land, followed by people, and thirdly, to have farm tools, ploughing cattle, canals, roads, warehouses, and so on. When food is scarce, the price goes up, and the price of these things goes up. The fundamental purpose of the camp is twofold, but it does not include the adjustment of land prices, which the government cannot do in the field management. ”

Wang Anshi said: "If you don't adjust the land price, what are the two purposes of the field work?" ”

"One is to adjust the local labor price, that is, the customer's income. If the income of local customers is too low, there is no doubt that some of the income they deserve is taken by the owner who occupies the land. At this time, the camp recruits people and absorbs the excess manpower, thereby raising the price of local manpower for farming, which is for the people. Another purpose of opening up a field is to open up wasteland for the sake of the future. It costs money to open up wasteland, and it cannot be equipped with roads and canals, and if the land is not leveled, the land is not good land, and if it is forcibly planted, it will not produce much food. Why are there wastelands in many places? It's not that it's not suitable for growing food, it's that there are no roads, canals, and leveling, which we can call infrastructure. With this infrastructure, wasteland is cultivated before it becomes a mature field. Most of the people who cultivate the land are small farmers, and it is not easy to do these things, so many of the land has to be idle. There was really no way to reclaim it. After an unknown number of years and generations, it was reclaimed before it was reclaimed. The government used the power of the government to build up these infrastructures. The government invests much more money than private individuals, and when the local development is established, the land can also be sold to the local government, and it will be all good land. This is called the government bearing the cost of development, and the people getting the benefits. When it was first built, it was only seen for food, and the infrastructure built was not beneficial, so it was called an invisible asset. When encountering difficulties, these lands are given to the people, and the government collects money for emergencies, it is called sunk cost realization, which is the same as the fact that there is a shortage of money here. ”

Wang Anshi and Han Jiang glanced at each other, and said to Du Zhongxiao: "Is there too much to think about?" ”

Du Zhongxiao shook his head: "I'm in Yingtian, Jingxi Road, and I raised Changping again, I don't want to know what to do." If you don't understand it, you can't do things well. If you are lucky, it will come to naught when something happens, and it will be empty after all. ”

This is the story of China's co-production contracting, in which collective assets were distributed to farmers, and large sunk costs were quickly realized, resulting in a prosperity that lasted for several years. For the regime, the realization of such assets can survive a crisis. When there is a surplus in wealth, turning the surplus into an invisible cost and cashing it out if necessary is one way to deal with the crisis.

Du Zhongxiao's identity has already changed from Yingtian to the director of Chang Pingsi, and he has also come out of stabilizing grain prices, not only stabilizing the price of goods in the market, but also stabilizing the price of assets. The role of field affairs has changed from the placement of surplus manpower to the reserve of assets. Li Shen keenly felt this, and only then camped on Huainan Road. Otherwise, it is densely populated and there is no large amount of idle labor, what is he doing all this?

Wang Anshi pondered for a long time and said: "If according to what Shicai said, Yingtian cannot buy mature land, but can only buy idle land to open up wasteland, otherwise it will be meaningless." However, the rich in the people are getting richer and the poor are difficult to survive. ”

Du Zhongxiao said: "Of course, politicians can't pretend not to be invisible, let alone let it go. However, relying on field affairs cannot deal with this matter, and it is necessary to rely on other means. When talking about camp and field affairs, we should only do what we should do, and don't put on the things that we can't do, otherwise we will fall short at both ends. ”

Wang Anshi said: "Even so, when people enter the camp and fields, fathers give birth to sons, and children give birth to grandchildren, the population will always increase. Even if there is a vacant field, there will be a day when it will be finished. What if the land is limited and the people are increasing? ”

Du Zhongxiao said: "Therefore, the land for the field is owned by the field service, even if the private land of each household is only allowed to be cultivated, and it is exempt from taxes." These lands are not to be bought or sold, unless the camp is removed or disbanded, and the people are on the land and in the hands of the camp keeper. What happens when there are more people and less land? The camp is owned by the government, and it is natural for the government to organize the opening of new land, or let the extra people do other things. Therefore, the village where the field is run has a village community, which is connected to the shopping mall of Changheiji. When the mall is done, more people will go to the village community to do things other than growing food. As long as the place is done well, there is always a balance. ”