"What do you say? How is this possible! Ninety percent of the grain and grass needed by Shaanxi's 100,000-strong army depends on businessmen to enter the middle school; if there is not a single stone of grain entering Shaanxi in the past three years, where will the grain and grass needed by the officers and soldiers come from? ”

Zhao Zhen stood up again from his seat and looked at Xu Ping with glaring eyes.

Xu Ping said: "There is no grain into Shaanxi, and the grain and grass naturally come from Shaanxi." Shaanxi's military expenditure is 15 million guan a year, and the taxes collected along the way account for about half of it, more than 7 million guan, and the other 7 or 8 million yuan is needed to enter the central government along the border. The tax in Shaanxi is lower than that of the northern roads, and slightly lower than that of Hedong Road, which is only half of Hebei Road. The so-called entry of Shaanxi into the middle school is nothing more than the additional taxation that should have been passed through the government, and after entering the middle school, it was transferred to the businessman Jia Haoqiang. After the ministers only said and acted into China and France, the people did not add endowments and used themselves to be self-sufficient, which seems to be the case at first glance, but in fact, the grain of the merchants was not exploited from the people of Shaanxi? ”

Zhao Zhen listened and slowly sat back in his seat, and after a long while, he said in a deep voice: "That is to say, the grain and grass needed along the border of Shaanxi after entering China and France were bought by the government after all. ”

Xu Ping was also silent for a while, the issues involved in entering the Chinese law are so complex, he only has a rough idea now, and he can't sort out the whole problem clearly.

One of the most critical problems Xu Ping has seen clearly, the reason why this problem only appeared in the Northern Song Dynasty, especially after the Zhenzong Dynasty, no matter how the tea law is changed, it is effective at first sight, and the disadvantages have been born in less than ten years, and it has to be changed again, the core contradiction is that the three divisions have completed the centralization of the world's finances, and the management methods of this era are not enough to support this centralization. This contradiction is concentrated in the tea law, naturally because of the characteristics of tea as a commodity.

Seeing Zhao Zhen looking at him, Xu Ping had no choice but to say: "Yes, the grain and grass were bought by the government with money, but this money will not reach the people who produce grain according to the Chinese law." The original intention of entering China and France was to transfer grain and grass from other sources into Shaanxi, and not to strip Shaanxi too heavily. However, the government only uses money to exchange tea for grain, no matter where the grain comes from, the merchants are very profitable, and naturally they are the most economical and profitable from the local exploitation of Shaanxi, who will transport grain over long distances. ”

Empress Dowager Liu was in power, and Zhao Zhen had been a trainee emperor for ten years, although he couldn't get an idea in the process, all kinds of pieces were carefully watched, not an inexperienced young and impulsive emperor. Needless to say than Xu Ping said, he knew in his heart that even if 10% of the money sent out went to the people, a few capable officials could be promoted among the officials who handled it.

But is it possible? I am afraid that the people will not only not be able to profit, but will also have to be exploited again.

The atmosphere in the room became solemn for a while, as the emperor, Zhao Zhen knew very little about the details of the administration, and the ruling minister reported on the reform of the tea law, and he could only make a rough judgment from the various data listed. And what Xu Ping said, no matter which minister plays the chapter, it will definitely not be listed in the data. Most officials are really unclear and do not think about this aspect, and some officials deliberately avoid it, but only pick up data that can show their political achievements.

"Yongxi's Northern Expedition, the army entered Zhuozhou twice, but had to retreat due to lack of food in the army. At that time, it was difficult to transport grain and grass, and there was a lot of old tea in Beijing, so it was only along the border that he entered China and France, and used merchants to help the army transport grain and grass, and it has been almost 50 years now. ”

Zhao Zhen looked ahead, muttered to himself, and shook his head when he said this: "In the past fifty years, the tea law has been changed once every few years. - It's better to abolish the tea method and sell it! ”

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

Xu Ping was stunned for a moment, he didn't expect Zhao Zhen's thinking to be so divergent, and he suddenly thought of the waste tea method, and said carefully: "This matter involves a wide range of issues, and it is still necessary to consider it in the long run." ”

If we can't solve the problem of grain and grass along the border, it is meaningless to put forward the abolition of tea law. Why is it necessary to use tea in the Northwest? Because this is a necessary material in the northwest region, it is considered hard currency, which can lure the merchants there to do this business. Other monopoly products, such as salt, do not have this effect, because the salt pond is on Shaanxi Road, plus the dumping of green and white salt by the party, Shaanxi Road itself has to sell salt.

If you don't need to use real things like tea, salt and spices, you can only use cash. Then there was another problem, because at this time, the finance was highly concentrated in the central court, and every year the Jingshi needed to send out a large amount of cash, and with the circulation speed of copper coins, once the cash was used to buy grain and grass along the border, it would lead to a shortage of money in the Jingshi. On the other hand, the accumulation of a large amount of copper money along the border will not only flow out to the party and the Khitan, but also cause local prices to skyrocket and the economic situation to deteriorate.

The reason why Xu Ping did not dare to talk about this matter lightly was because if it was to be completely solved, it would involve a series of problems such as the tea law, the salt law, the money law, transportation and warehousing, and almost the entire financial system would have to be completely reorganized.

With such a workload, Xu Ping didn't feel that he could complete it with a deputy envoy of salt and iron, even if he added the full support of the third envoy Kou Xuan.

There was a coughing sound from Xiaohuangmen outside the door, and I thought it was a few ministers in the garden who saw that Zhao Zhen and Xu Ping had been in the house for so long, and began to urge.

Zhao Zhen came to his senses from rethinking and said to Xu Ping: "Since it is not clear for a while, then you will come up with a real seal after the year, and talk about it first." By the way, what do you know first? ”

Xu Ping said: "Shaanxi has no foreign grain and grass to transport in, officials are greedy and businessmen are still a trivial matter, the most worrying thing is the ambition of the party Xiang Yuanhao wolf, once the rebellion, the northwest will start war again, how to transport grain in eagerly?" Therefore, the most important thing is that it must be the principle of transporting grain to Shaanxi, and the second thing is to reorganize the money method, otherwise the dilemma will be difficult to solve after all. ”

"Okay, let's do it in the next year."

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

Xu Ping followed behind, thinking about how to explain things clearly. The money law had to be changed, and in this era, copper and iron coins were used, and the transportation cost was too high, in fact, except for the large-scale transportation of copper and iron coins to various places, the scope of circulation of copper 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 in large quantities when it was far away. However, the circulation cost of copper coins was too high, and at this time, many economic matters of the government relied on merchants, and economic activities were not easy to carry out, which was also a reason why it was difficult to raise grain and grass along the border.

As for transporting grain and opening the road, Xu Ping did it in such a difficult geographical environment in Yongzhou, and it should be much easier to get to Shaanxi.

With such a complicated issue, Xu Ping didn't want to meddle in his heart. Back then, in Yongzhou, he was the chief official of one party, holding military and political power, and he could do things without scruples. Now that I have arrived in the capital, every move involves a lot, and the dilemma of entering the middle along the border has been removed, and I don't know how many people I have to offend.

A tea law, what is now being changed by Lin Te when Ding Wei was in power, and the cash law to be changed, since Li Di proposed the prototype, Li Zhi perfected the implementation, and the presiding officers were Lu Yijian, Zhang Shixun, and Liu Yun, Wang Jin, Zhou Wenzhen, Lu Zongdao and others, although the latter four died, but their protégés and former officials are all over the world, not to mention that the four people who are alive are now the powerful faction in power. With the exception of the current privy envoy Wang Zeng, almost all the ministers in power were involved.

If Xu Ping wants to abolish the tea law, then he will almost offend the ministers of the DPRK and China. (To be continued.) )