Listening to Yi Zhi's contented words, Xie Xiuyuan and Zhao Liewen both looked suspicious, they both felt that it was too incredible, even if they couldn't dump it at a low price, they couldn't destroy it, isn't this a tyrannical thing?

After hesitating, Xie Xiuyuan said: "It's not going to be destroyed, can't it be sold at a low price?" Or is it charity? ”

"Relief also comes at a cost." Yi Zhizhi said with a smile: "Under the economic crisis, those farmers, plantation owners, and business owners are on the verge of bankruptcy, where will they spend extra money for charity." ”

After a pause, he continued: "Moreover, overproduction, destroying a large number of them, is also in line with the principles of economics, the essence of the economic crisis is overproduction, and overproduction will inevitably break the balance between supply and demand. It is very cheap and hurts the peasants.

In the case of overproduction, a large number of them are destroyed to maintain the necessary prices, which is not only a means to maintain the balance between supply and demand, but also to protect the enthusiasm of producers. To put it bluntly, this is the choice made by market participants to maximize the benefits according to the realistic situation, and it is also the optimal choice of cost, which is understandable! ”

After a slight groan, Zhao Liewen groaned and said: "It is very expensive and hurts the people, and it hurts the peasants; If the people are injured, they will be scattered, and if the peasants are injured, the country will be poor. Therefore, it is very expensive and very cheap, and its injury is also one.

Those who are good for the country will not harm the people and benefit the people...... It is the one who is good at leveling, and he must be careful to observe the upper, middle and lower years...... Make the people sufficient, and Jia Ping will stop. Therefore, although there is famine, flood, and drought, the people are not expensive and the people are not scattered, and they take more than enough to make up for the shortage. ”

"This is from the Book of Han: Food and Goods." Zhao Liewen added, and then said: "In ancient times, China knew that grain prices were stabilized by means of leveling to maintain food prices, but don't Western governments know how to adopt measures to stabilize them?" ”

Stabilize? How can a capitalist economy adopt the means of stabilizing prices? Yi Zhizu remembers very well that from 1929 to 1933, during the most protracted, deepest, and most severe cyclical world economic crisis in the history of capitalist economy, the federal government of the United States purchased 6 million pigs in 1933 alone, and then destroyed them. Huge quantities of agricultural products are buried under ploughs in order to get them out of the market and thus to maintain prices at the official level.

After a slight sigh, he said: "The overproduction caused by the economic crisis is in all walks of life, not just food, and it takes extremely high costs to stabilize the prices of the whole society, which is difficult for Western governments to bear, even if they are as rich as England.

Moreover, Western countries practice a market economy, advocate free competition, and the survival of the fittest, so as to promote the improvement of productive forces and production technology. ”

After a pause, he continued: "According to statistics, this is the eleventh economic crisis that broke out in England, right? It can be said that periodic economic crises are the law of the capitalist economy, and in the same way, every economic crisis will promote the improvement of productive forces and production technology. ”

Zhao Liewen asked rhetorically: "That being the case, why does the big shopkeeper want to subsidize the domestic industry, isn't this restricting the improvement of China's productive forces and the improvement of production technology?" ”

Yi Zhizhi said with a smile: "These domestic industries are currently like children who have not grown up, they need to be carefully cared for, otherwise there is a possibility of premature death, once they grow up, they can also let go of it, let them compete freely to survive the fittest!" ”

Hearing this, Xie Xiuyuan said worriedly: "In other words, we will also have an economic crisis in the Qing Dynasty in the future?" ”

Yi Zhishu nodded and said: "Taking the road of capitalist development, economic crisis is inevitable, unless we don't take the road of capitalism!" ”

Zhao Liewen asked: "Could it be that there are other roads to go?" ”

"Huifu has time, you can pay attention to Carl. Marx's Treatises. Yi Zhizu said slowly: "He proposed another path. ”

Xie Xiuyuan didn't care about these things, and asked instead: "Big shopkeeper, the Western economic crisis has had a great impact on the stock market in Guangzhou and Shanghai, and the stock market is falling during this time. ”

"It's good to go down sharply, and the stock market will be more attractive if it goes up and down." Yi Zhi's contentment said without thinking, during this time, he was also paying close attention to the stock market, the collapse of the stock market in Western countries has caused a lot of impact on the stock market of the Qing Dynasty, a large number of foreign funds have been withdrawn, and the stock price has fallen a wave, once the price of the Qing Dynasty has fallen in an all-round way, the stock market will inevitably plummet because of panic.

However, compared with the past, today's Yuanqi is not afraid of the stock market crash, a Yuanqi does not lack funds to bail out the bottom, and furthermore, today's financial market has begun to take shape, and the stock market systems that have experienced several ups and downs have been relatively standardized, financial speculation has also been popularized, the stock market has plummeted, and there are also a lot of speculative stockholders entering the market.

In addition, a large number of foreign funds are withdrawn from the stock market, which is also a good thing for Yuanqi, so as not to stir up the wind and rain, and take this opportunity to squeeze out the bubble of the stock market, which is more conducive to the growth of the stock market!

Huaihai Road is the most prosperous commercial street in Shanghai, "Minfeng Cloth Village" is located in the middle of Huaihai Road, is the largest cloth store in Shanghai, famous for its complete range of goods, mainly engaged in all kinds of high-end cloth, silk, leather goods, ready-to-wear garments, the biggest feature is that all the goods are domestic products, know the root are clear, chain stores open all over the north and south of the Qing Dynasty "Minfeng Cloth Village" is actually the industry of Yuanqi.

As soon as the door opened in the morning, "Minfeng Cloth Village" put out a banner at the gate, with a big reward of 10%! As soon as the news spread, it was like a market, attracting a lot of customers, "Minfeng Cloth Village" has always been genuine, fair trading, and business is prosperous, there are very few discounts, sudden discounts, naturally can attract many people.

"Minfeng Cloth Village" suddenly ten percent off the reward, Shanghai cloth shops are tired of the taste, "Minfeng Cloth Village" was originally a good business, and now it is a nine-percent discount, and their customers are snatched away! Greasy taste is greasy, no one has the courage to accuse, they are all in the cloth business, who can not know the background of "Minfeng Cloth Village".

What they didn't expect was that the discount of "Minfeng Cloth Village" was just the beginning, one after another, one after another cloth shops began to give a nine-percent discount, a group of cloth merchants were dumbfounded, and hurriedly inquired around, only to know that the discounted cloth shops were picked up from Yuanqi's textile factory, and the textile factory delivery price dropped by one percent!

This time, whether it is the cloth merchants who operate the native cloth or the foreign cloth, they are all panicked, and they have begun to follow the trend of discounts, but what makes them desperate is that the nine-fold reward is only the beginning, as if it is competing with them, when they also launched the nine-fold reward, the price was reduced again, the eight-fold reward, and when they followed the eight-fold reward, they were already seven-fold reward.

Although after the seven-fold discount, the price will not be reduced, but this business is no longer possible, many cloth shops have closed their doors, and some shrewd simply turned to Yuanqi's textile factory to pick up the goods, however, to their disappointment, Yuanqi's several major textile factories to pick up the goods of the cloth merchants have lined up in a long line.

The price reduction of textiles opened the trend of price reduction in the Qing Dynasty, as large as various machines, steam ships, four-wheeled carriages, bicycles, sewing machines, and small to various daily necessities, such as clocks, glass, mirrors, soap, soap, toothbrushes, tooth powder, matches, needles and threads, etc., and even cigarettes began to reduce prices to varying degrees.

This wave of price cuts has also caused a huge panic in the stock markets of Guangzhou and Shanghai, except for a very small number of people, no one knows the reason, all kinds of speculation emerge one after another, and the stock market, which has just shown signs of stabilization, has begun to fall sharply again.

Yuanqi's major newspapers began to guide public opinion, blaming the wave of price cuts on the impact of the economic crisis in Europe, and also reported on the collapse of the stock markets in Europe's four major financial centers - London, Paris, Frankfurt, and Amsterdam, as well as the collapse of a large number of banks and factories in England due to the economic crisis, and the loss of workers.

At the British Embassy in Beijing, Minister Walson put down the newspaper in his hand, glanced at Counselor Wittoma, and said with a frown: "The economic crisis in Europe will have such a big impact on the Far East?" The economic crisis of 1857 did not seem to have had much ....... ”

Wei Tuma said unhurriedly: "Under the leadership of Yuan Qi, the industry of the Qing Kingdom has developed rapidly in the past ten years, and it is not surprising that it is already qualified to be affected by the European economic crisis. ”

Walson said: "I think this wave of price reductions in Qingguo came quickly and urgently, and it was weird. ”

"This wave of price reductions started in the textile industry." "It should be the panic caused by the anticipation of the economic crisis in Europe. ”

"Send a telegram to the country, and truthfully report the situation of the Qing country." Walson said and skillfully lit a cigar, he had a faint hunch that this wave of price reductions in the Qing Kingdom was not affected by the European economic crisis, but should be aimed at the economic crisis in Europe, with the current price and price reduction momentum of the Qing Kingdom, the British Empire could not dump at a low price in the Qing market, once dumped, prices will definitely continue to fall.

Thankfully, the Qing court had tentatively agreed to build a railway from Beijing to Zhangjiakou, and there seemed to be some relaxation of the attitude towards the construction of a railway in the northeast, which was definitely good news for domestic bankers and railway companies.

After receiving the prepared telegram and signing it, he casually ordered: "Book me a ticket to Shanghai, the day after tomorrow." ”

Wittoma asked, "Do you want to be notified by the French embassy?" ”

"There's no need." Walson shook his head, "Yuan Qi is not the Qing Imperial Court, and you must negotiate with Yuan Qi with full sincerity. ”

Supervise the administrative office and sign the detention room.

Gong Wang Yixun put down the newspaper in his hand with a complicated mood, Yuan Qi's public opinion guidance is false and real, true and false, if he didn't clearly know the purpose of Yi Zhi's contentment, I am afraid that he will also believe the words in the newspaper, it seems that the imperial court is far inferior to Yuan Qi in terms of public opinion guidance.

Standing up, he slowly paced to the window and pushed the window open, a cool breeze immediately poured in, looking at the late autumn scenery in the yard, he couldn't help but sigh, he clearly knew how much price Yuan Qi needed to pay for this wave of price reduction, this kind of thing, I am afraid that only Yuan Qi can do it.

Not to mention that the imperial court can't think of this layer, and doesn't realize that the economic crisis in Europe will have a huge impact on the domestic industry of the Qing Dynasty, just want to get this layer, even if you have enough financial resources, you can't easily be satisfied with this kind of courage, sometimes think about it, Yuan Qi seems to be more conscientious than the imperial court to the Qing Dynasty.

"Tuk Tuk" A gentle knock on the door sounded, and Yi Xun didn't look back and said, "Come in." ”

"Lord, the Queen Mother has summoned."

Ci'an usually doesn't call, what happened? Yi Xun immediately ordered: "Prepare a sedan chair." ”

Hurriedly entered the palace and entered the East Warm Pavilion of the Heart Cultivation Palace, and after knocking on Sheng'an, he listened to Ci'an's soft voice, "Excuse me, sit down." When Xie En sat down, he listened to the voice behind the bead curtain, "Yuan Qi instigated the imperial court to borrow money to build roads, what does the imperial uncle think?" ”

Didn't Zaigaki report it truthfully? Yi Xun was secretly strange, hesitated before saying: "The European economic crisis, the collapse of prices, and the sharp drop in the cost of railway construction, this is a favorable opportunity for the imperial court to expand the scale of the railway, and it is also conducive to close relations with Britain and France. ”

Ci'an then asked, "I heard that Yuan Qi instigated the imperial court to build a railway in the northeast?" ”

Is it for the Tohoku thing? Yi Xun Deng was vigilant and groaned slightly, and he said cautiously: Back to the Queen Mother, Yi Zhishu did encourage the construction of the railway in the Northeast, he said that the Northeast is rich in mineral deposits, and it is necessary to speed up the exploration of mineral deposits in the Northeast and build the railway, which is conducive to the development of industry in the imperial court. ”

As for Yi Zhi's rebellious words, he naturally won't report it truthfully, and he believes that Zaiyuan won't report it truthfully, after all, Zaiyuan won't be stupid enough to provoke the relationship between Yuanqi and the imperial court, and those with a little bit of eyesight know that if Yuanqi is really forced to rebel, the Qing Dynasty will definitely lose the country.

Ci'an said coldly: "Yuan Qi has such a good heart, and he is dedicated to the development of industry for the sake of the imperial court? ”

"Back to the Queen Mother." Yi Xun said in a deep voice: "This time Yuan Qi did not hesitate to spend a huge amount of money to launch this wave of price reduction to resist the low-price dumping of Western countries, not only the southeast industry, but also the north industry also benefited a lot, and the court will also benefit. ”

Seeing him speak for Yuan Qi like this, Ci'an's face was a little ugly, and after a long silence, her face softened, and she said softly: "Uncle Huang said before that Britain and France intend to cooperate with Yuan Qi, can you tell Ying and France the truth to provoke the relationship between Britain and France and Yuan Qi?" After a pause, she continued: "Uncle Huang should know very well that once Britain and France cooperate closely with Yuan Qi, the imperial court will not be able to deal with itself. ”