At this time, the land price of Yongcheng is generally only two or three hundred per acre, and the good land around the county town is only five or six hundred. A sheep can buy one or two acres of land, this kind of thing Du Zhongxiao didn't dare to think about in his previous life. Of course, the Central Plains is vast and sparsely populated, with unpredictable droughts and floods, and land prices are lower than those in other regions. But even if it rises tenfold, two or three yuan per acre of land is actually not high.

Correspondingly, at this time, the price of rice is 50 wen per bucket, and the official price of hiring a helper is generally 100 wen a day for one person, and the private price is slightly lower, and 50 wen a day has to be taken care of by rice. If you are diligent and work hard to save for a few years, you can buy dozens of acres of land and become a middle peasant.

The ratio of land prices, rice prices, and labor prices reflects many problems. At this time, in the contradiction between the landlords and the peasants, land did not occupy an absolutely important position, and other means of production accounted for a greater proportion. Removing the lower price of cattle, the answer is obvious. All kinds of agricultural tools are the bulk of agricultural livelihood, and the same is true. The price of land is higher according to one acre, 30 acres of land is only 30 yuan, and the purchase of various agricultural tools is also 30 yuan. If one stone is harvested per mu, the annual output of grain is 30 stones, which is already a typical medium-sized household.

At the price of labor at that time, it seems that within ten years, you can get out of poverty and become the middle class of this era. In fact, it is far from the case, until now the Great Song Dynasty has been established for nearly a hundred years, the proportion of main customers has not changed much, and even the proportion of fifth-class households has not changed much.

There are many reasons for this situation, such as natural disasters, and a major disaster can easily wipe out years of savings. For example, the labor is heavy, and the peasants cannot work with peace of mind. But the most important thing is that being a self-sufficient small farmer's family is not very attractive to people in this era.

Du Zhongxiao didn't understand this point, but he was relieved when he saw clearly the drastic class changes in this era. I think my family was originally a self-sufficient small peasant family, and my father went bankrupt after taking the exam in Beijing, if it weren't for Du Zhongxiao's knowledge of later generations, I don't know which year I would be able to turn over. Wu Kejiu was originally a county tycoon, and he regarded his family as a slave, and in just a few years, he couldn't even support the restaurant.

To put it simply, there is a cost to holding assets in this era, and the state tax is an asset tax. If the assets in hand cannot bring income, they will be quickly drained by various taxes. The middle peasants happened to be in such a position, and most of the burdens pressed down by the imperial court were pressed down on them, and as long as the harvest was poor, the taxes and blood drawn by the servants would be particularly serious. In the event of an accident, he will fall into a poor peasant, or even become a hired peasant. If the errand labor is included, the life of the middle peasants is not much better than that of the poor peasants and hired peasants.

Land is not only a collection of rent, but also an important standard for the imperial court to share taxes, and the cost of holding land is very high. To be a landlord, not only must you have land, but you must also find someone to cultivate for you, and where the land is wasted, you have to use your own property to pay taxes. is like Wu Kejiu's family, because he offended Du Zhongxiao, Du Zhongxiao happened to be admitted to Jinshi, and his restaurant not only did not make money, but also kept losing money inside. The same is true for landlords, once they can't find a tenant, the land rent can't be paid, and the court is not polite to collect taxes.

The harvest in the field was not good, and the hired peasants did not become famine, but the landlords continued to bear the taxes of the imperial court. The hired farmers were forced to tighten, and it was a big deal to leave and continue to plant in another family. According to the rules of credit that are in vogue at this time, maybe life can be improved. The Song Dynasty abolished the personal dependency between landlords and peasants, all of which were contracts with limited limits, and the landlords lacked the means to bind the peasants to their land.

In addition to serfdom, there is also a method of usury. That is, the land is tied to the peasants by financial means, and the land will be particularly valuable when the land is bought and sold and the peasants who cultivate the land are also obtained. In this era, due to the crackdown on usury, the landlords lacked precisely this means, and they had to bear the cost of the risk of land capital.

To put it bluntly, the stability of hired farmers is insufficient. In Du Zhongxiao's previous life, if the wages were settled every day, the mobility of workers would be very large, and there would be no shortage of people who would not do so. When the manpower is more affluent, the capitalists will not even be satisfied with the monthly salary, and tend to bind the workers with the annual bonus. If this is not satisfied, it will make the workers go into debt, eat more food, and make you dare not leave. The same is true of the landlord's control of the peasants, and the greatest role of usury is not to exploit the peasants, but to control the peasants, and it is in the best interests of the landlords to provide lasting exploitation.

Du Zhongxiao's research on these is not to analyze the class relations of this era, those nerve-wracking things will be done by Wang Anshi and other people who like to do learning. What Du Zhongxiao needs to know is that he wants to develop science and technology, promote the technological progress of this era, start construction, run enterprises, and where do workers come from. Only when we understand the social foundation of this era do we know what measures to take.

In such times, there was no need for the enclosure revolution to drive the peasants into the cities, which was the means adopted by the capitalists in the face of serfdom. There is no need for land reform and field division, a lot of wasteland is there, there is manpower, and the tools are cheap enough, and it will naturally be reclaimed. What is needed now is to gather a limited population around the city, and with densely populated settlements, there will be sufficient impetus for the development of industry. Of course, this does not mean that we need to urbanize, but we must concentrate on transforming the land around the city, and the land that can be irrigated and can be harvested in drought and flood will be attractive. Customers make up one-third of the population, and making good use of these people is enough to secure a source of workers. In other words, we should solve problems in development, and not create problems to force development.

Nowadays, the first step in industry is to manufacture large quantities of useful and cheap agricultural tools, and the steam engine is not as important as this. This is the reason why Du Zhongxiao asked people to buy the "Book of Prayers", starting from the plow, to build a standardized workshop for manufacturing agricultural tools. It doesn't need to be on a large scale, as long as you find out the experience and form a standard, you can even promote it to every state in the future.

After sorting these thoughts again, Du Zhongxiao sat down, took a sip of tea, and sighed lightly: "I hope I am right, and there shouldn't be anything wrong." To do things, of course, is to pick the easy ones first. I came from an engineering background, of course, I have to pick the one I know best. ”

What is the most important thing to make farm tools? Steel. It's a pity that the county I am now in charge of everything is good, but there is no coal and no iron. Du Zhongxiao could only send people to Yingtianfu in the north to collect iron, just as he sent people to Caozhou to buy cattle.

Just when Du Zhongxiao was thinking about these things, Dong Zhushu found Hou Yalai, finished the ceremony, and said with a bitter face: "Zhixian, today Caozhou bought cattle and Yingtianfu bought iron in this county, and the merchants are waiting at the wharf." ”

Du Zhongxiao was overjoyed: "Just wait for them!" Lord, let's go, let's go together, let these merchants know that the county is in urgent need of these, and sell more in the future! With iron, we can make farm tools, and we have cattle, and we can turn all the surrounding areas of the county into fields of ointment! ”

Dong Zhushu had a bitter face: "What the county magistrate said is naturally right. It's just, where do we have so much cash now? More than 200 cows, it costs more than 300 yuan. 30,000 catties of iron will also cost more than 300 yuan. At this time, the spring tax has just been released to the state, where can I conjure up six or seven hundred yuan? ”

Du Zhongxiao was stunned: "There is no money in the county?" How come there is no money so quickly? ”

Dong Zhushu complained bitterly: "A few days ago, I borrowed about 1,000 yuan from the main household in this county, and most of it has been spent to run that 'commune', and the rest is useful capital. The magistrate set his own rules, we can't withdraw money from there. ”

Speaking of this, Dong Zhushu spread his hands: "In addition, where is there money in the county?" Even if it is a field job, it is now beyond its means. Originally, there was a fireworks factory to help it, and it was taken over by the state, and the county really has no money to spend now. ”