But what about the truth?

Even for the sake of the banking department, Zhao Ji couldn't really allow Wang Ju to do this.

In fact, Wang Ju promised Zhao Ji two things that day, Xie Jingwen or maybe two or three other ministers who are used to establish authority, and they will all be transferred back next winter, not necessarily to the capital, but to other regions.

Besides, the war will start the year after tomorrow, what can Xie Jingwen do if he stays in the security army?

As for An Tao, Liang Tao and Wang Yansuo, they were also brought back by boat from the other side in the spring of the following year, but not next year, the banking department will not be completely settled next year, and the time is short, these three guys may be able to change their capital.

If the two Liang and Wang became ill because they couldn't stand the local weather, they would immediately move to Feng City or further east to Lin City and Flower Market. But there is one thing, you can only turn farther and farther, and you can't move back, otherwise these three guys won't be able to change their temperament.

And that's it, it's over, it's over, it's too late. Wang Ju also learned from some sources that for this reason, Gao Tao was furious and found Zhao Ji, and the mother and son argued for a while.

But it's enough, the entire court and the field, inside and outside, are silent, like a chilling cicada.

And there's another thing to do......

There is a lot of potatoes growing in the Imperial Garden.

In fact, when he was on the ship, Wang Ju saw that the potatoes were seriously rotten, and the dampness on the ship was too great, even if the quicklime was left to absorb the water vapor, after all, they were not brought from the other side, but from the other side, and they stayed for too long, and a lot of time was loaded on the ship. In fact, not only potatoes, but also some cured meat products brought from the other side, so in order to prevent spoilage. Sometimes the meat is boiled in a salt marinade. It is then dried or baked to a leather strip as hard. Only then did it go inland.

But these local tofu are rotten, but they can't be grown on ships. Therefore, when he arrived at the port of Mizhou, Wang Ju simply asked the sailors to water it to urge it to germinate, which was equivalent to shortening the growth time after transfer. Otherwise, when it is about to ripen, winter will come, so what will be harvested? Is it difficult to build a greenhouse for it?

It is this measure. Although I missed the season, I also avoided the arrival of winter.

The division of the Imperial Garden is just a model, which represents the emperor's emphasis on agriculture and food.

The rest of the people are in the official fields of Kaifeng Prefecture and the relevant nearby prefectures and counties, and they are very cautious in managing, fertilizing, and hoeing, and now they cannot be regarded as food, but as valuable seeds.

When it was harvest time, Wang Ju said that they would be highly yielding, and whether they would be high in yield will be revealed immediately.

Zhao Ji passed on dozens of important ministers to go to the imperial garden. Then let a few eunuchs and guards dig up the potatoes one by one, even afraid of missing the digging. Dig deep.

But everyone understands that.

Ancient food was indeed a problem, such as the Tang Dynasty, even the staple food of the incorruptible prime minister was soybeans.

The introduction of Champa rice in the Song Dynasty further alleviated the food problem, but that's it, the white rice is still one of the six grains, so some bullies deliberately opened the river embankment for a variety of rice and turned the fertile land into a pond, so as to grow the rice for profit. However, think about what kind of day it would be if you didn't eat and eat white rice every day.

The eunuch continued, and the potato had been dug up, and the dirt had to be cleaned so that it could be weighed in true weight.

It took a while for the eunuch to fetch the scale and weigh it.

One hundred and seven pounds.

Wang Ju frowned, didn't he say that the production capacity of potatoes per mu reached 10,000 catties?

He really misunderstood, in fact, for a long time in the early days of the Celestial Empire, the yield of potatoes per mu was only one or two thousand catties, and then I won't say anything, even rice can reach a yield of more than 1,000 catties per mu, let alone potatoes.

Therefore, Wang Ju had a misunderstanding, is it because he missed the season, or he is not adaptable, or the planting method in his memory is wrong?

He was thinking about it, but dozens of important ministers were surprised.

There is no problem with this area, Zhao Ji does not need to praise Wang Ju by cheating, he can only say that the land in the imperial garden is more fertile, but if he doesn't miss the season, whether the yield is higher, at least seven or eight hundred catties per mu.

Think about how much the yield per mu is in the north, and after two seasons, it is just more than two stones.

The potatoes that missed the planting season can maintain the yield of ten stones, at least seven or eight stones, how many people can be fed?

Listening to everyone's surprise, Wang Ju smiled bitterly, this is a potato, if it is a sweet potato, the yield will come out, and these people will be so frightened that they don't believe it.

He waved his hand.

The eunuchs around Zhao Ji will understand, and the output will come out, but how to eat it.

Wang Ju provided several sets of recipes, making food and dishes.

The eunuchs carried the potatoes down and began to make meals.

Everyone was also curious about how to eat this thing, so they came to the banquet hall together, and the waiting time was not long, it was not a difficult thing to cook. There are staple foods, there are dishes. However, Wang Ju also ignores a problem here, that is, the relationship between food, whether potatoes or sweet potatoes are placed in China, they cannot be used as staple foods, the reason is simple, they are too low in white matter. This is different from Western countries, where meat is the staple food, so with potatoes, it solves the food problem well.

But they can be used as a side food, can also be used as livestock feed, although not the ideal staple food for the Chinese, but in the case of hunger and corners, it is better than eating Guanyin soil. Think about Li Zicheng's uprising, if Shaanxi popularized these grains, would Li Zicheng have the soil for an uprising?

Cook it in the imperial dining room, and it will be delicious.

After eating, Lao Wang sighed: "Don't eat it, how many potatoes can they make in the next year." Hey, Wang Zi'an, why is it called a potato, not a local melon. ”

In his impression, beans are soybeans and mung beans, and the difference between the two is too big in appearance.

Wang Ju said vaguely: "It's the name taken by the maritime merchants on the other side, but it's just a name, it's not that important." ”

Then potatoes.

After everyone finished eating, this is a great credit, Wang Ju also happened to say another thing, he stood up and said: "Your Majesty, Zhugong, I went to the Third Division some time ago, and asked the Third Division to check all the taxes and direct income related to Carboniferous, and found that its net income was less than two million yuan. ”

Cai did ask, "Is there anything wrong?" ”

That's two million guan. Xinguan. Not a lot.

"Cai Gong. You know how much charcoal the Great Song Dynasty has to consume in a year. ”

Cai Qu shook his head.

Wang Ju said: "I estimate that it will be at least 60 million stones, and it may reach 100 million stones. ”

"So many?"

"Cai Gong, think about it carefully."

The number of households in the Song Dynasty is approaching 18 million, this is only the number of households on the household register, and the actual number of households may have to increase by one or two million.

With the increase in the amount of coal mining. Coal is being used in all directions. In particular, Wang's initiatives in Gyeongju have now officially spread to the whole country, including honeycomb coal and fireplaces. The fireplace is only used by the people in the north, and those who have no money build a warm pit with coal. This is the heating effect.

There is also the function of cooking, rural people don't care, burning straw for various crops, urban people also burned straw at the same time, with charcoal. Or firewood, so there was a unit in the two taxes of the Song Dynasty. Bundles, that is, grass, are not only used to feed horses, but also for cooking.

However, it is now being replaced by honeycomb coal, and the industry feeds many people.

The scope of its use is too wide, not only in the northern cities, but also in the southern cities and households commonly use charcoal for cooking.

This is anthracite, and as for bituminous coal, it is also widely used, and all kinds of smelting, even some ceramic workshops, have begun to use charcoal. Don't mention this industrial coal, it's this civil coal, how much coal does the Song Dynasty have to consume in a year with so many people?

And from another aspect, it can also be seen that the current coal production area is mainly in the north, especially after the use of gunpowder, with the improvement of mining technology, the price of a stone out of the pit has dropped to less than 250 Wen, if the transportation conditions are backward, then a stone is only 200 Wen, of course, in the hands of the people is still maintained at about 350 Wen. However, in the south, there is more than that, such as Quanzhou and Guangzhou, the entry price is close to 350 Wen.

In fact, this price is really a bit tricky, but there is no way, as long as it is stained with the word bulky in this era, a transportation cost is an amazing number.

It is precisely because of its relatively high price that the other side also transports a lot of coal every year, mainly in Guangzhou, followed by Quanzhou, which originally had only a few hundred thousand stones a year, and now there are more than 60 ships that specialize in transporting coal every year, and the weight has reached nearly 1.5 million stones.

Therefore, there is no problem with Wang Ju's estimate.

However, with this data, the following question arises. Wang Ju continued: "Your Majesty, based on the minimum quantity, if all these charcoal are operated by private individuals, and the imperial court is only responsible for dividing it in half, how much revenue will the imperial court get? And what about commercial taxes? ”

It is possible that later generations are not clear about the mining tax of the Song Dynasty, the Song Dynasty Fang Mine is divided into two types: state-run and private, the state-run is not calculated, and the private one has to pay the tax solution, because the course solution is chaotic, it can often be more than five points.

Wang Ju proposed the Fangchang River crossing system, and Wang Anshi further improved it. In the end, the private class solution was determined to be a 28-point system, that is, ten stone of coal was produced, the imperial court was divided into two stones, and the remaining eight points were obtained by private mine owners. The same is true of the pit system on the other side, after the class is solved, the commercial tax is levied according to the amount after the class is solved. However, at the time of the Fangchang River crossing system, at the suggestion of Wang Ju, the imperial court also contracted out some pit mines that were not operating well and caused losses or low profits, and the pit mines were contracted for the longest time.

This loss is not necessarily artificial, artificially is poor management, or officials are greedy for ink, and non-artificially is that the veins have been exhausted and cannot be mined, so what is the profit?

However, carboniferous is not a metal deposit that is chaotic in the rock, and it is very difficult to identify it with current technology.

Yes is yes, no is no.

As long as there are no major accidents, there will be no technical losses in the operation of coal.

So now there are many government-run charcoal pits, of course, directly intervening in the operation, and its profits must be much more than this dichotomy extraction.

Therefore, Wang Ju used this analogy, according to the small calculation, there are no government-run charcoal mills, all of them are privately run, only two points of extraction, 60 million stone and stone coal is worth 15 million guan, and the income from two points of class will be 3 million guan.

Then there is the commercial tax, which is 5 percent within a state, 7 percent within a road, and 9 percent within the whole country, and plans to be 7 percent, 1 million percent.

That is to say, the imperial court does not need to pay any cost, nor does it need to be harsh on any artisans. As long as the commercial tax is carefully implemented. A few more officials were sent to check the output of the various pits. You can get four million dollars. This is calculated at 60 million stones, and if it is calculated at 100 million stones, it reaches more than 6 million guan.

I don't know if I don't compare, and I'm shocked when I compare.

Everyone was silent.

Zhao Ji asked: "It refers to commercial tax." ”

"Not only the commercial tax, but also the management and operation of the pits and mines have serious problems, but the commercial tax has indeed reached the time when it must be aligned!"

"Here we go," thought to everyone's minds.

Wang Ju said again: "Your Majesty, the minister will talk about this stone coal. Although it seems that the imperial court directly or indirectly makes a profit of two million yuan a year. But actually, Your Majesty, Rong Chen brought someone in. ”

As he spoke, he whispered a few words in the ear of the guard next to him.

The guards went out and brought in an old beggar in rags for a while.

Everyone doesn't know what to say, but it's not surprising that it's in the hands of Wang Ju.

The old beggar was frightened, trembling, and Wang Ju said, "Sun Weng Weng." The officials love the people like sons, and the princes also love the people like sons. You don't have to be afraid. Tell the official, what did you do? ”

"Official, Your Majesty, the grass people turned out to be a charcoal seller."

"Why are you begging now?" Wang Ju asked.

"Your Majesty, now the charcoal can't be sold, and the grass people have only one wife, no children, and no way to make a living, so they have to beg for a living."

It's not that charcoal can't be sold, but the impact of charcoal, charcoal is far less popular than the original, and the price is cheaper than the original. Think about it, how troublesome it is to bake wood into charcoal, and you have to pull it into the city by cart and sell it slowly. Therefore, many people who relied on charcoal to make a living had to change to other businesses. There is a way, and there is no way, and life immediately becomes difficult.

But it cannot be said that it is not good for charcoal to replace charcoal, although the charcoal industry has shrunk, but the charcoal industry has also fed many people.

"This is the trend of the times, but it does not mean that the imperial court will sit back and watch these people, but we don't know where to start, and we can't even figure out who really suffered losses. So what to do? Take it from the people, use it for the people. ”

When he started to get down to business, Wang Ju took out more than a dozen large handovers from his arms and put them in the hands of the old beggar, and said to the guards: "Send him out of the palace." ”

Zhao Ji couldn't bear it, and added a sentence later: "Lin Duzhi, go and get a hundred Jiaozi and give it to this Li Wengweng." ”

But that wasn't the case.

If you can save today, you can't save tomorrow. Therefore, Zhao Ji wrinkled his brows and asked, "Wang Qing, are there many people like this?" ”

"It's a lot, but Your Majesty doesn't have to worry, you're not afraid of problems, you're afraid that you don't know where the problem is, or you know where the problem is, but you don't have the courage to solve it. Therefore, the minister deliberately invited Li Weng Weng to come, just to say one thing, if you want to use it for the people, the country must have a good and healthy tax and fiscal system, not just care about this little income, but do not see the greed of the various officials, put most of the profits of the various farms and mines in their own pockets, or tax the poor, and the rich will immediately levy a small tax as if the sky is falling. If the state does not correct this in time, I believe that it will not be long before the country will be corrupt from the bottom up, the poor will get poorer and the rich will get richer. It has developed to a certain point, not freezing bones, but a large group of yellow nests that even eat human flesh! ”

"Only fair and reasonable taxation can the country's financial situation be good, and only then can we have money to fund the poor, set up various pension charity homes, solve the problem of these lonely and widowed elderly people who have no children and no daughters, and can we reduce the harm of the charcoal industry to some people......"

"So how to repay the people, let me give another example, for example, the number of errand servants in the whole country has almost reached nearly 500,000, even so, many states and counties do not dare to hire too many errand soldiers because of poverty, and have to force the people to do so. With such a huge number of errand servants, the state only pays 6 million or hundreds of thousands of dollars a year, or to make another analogy, the number of errand servants is equivalent to 20 times that of officials, but the total expenditure is only nearly one-fifth of that of officials, and the whole gap is 80 to 100 times. Is this normal? ”

Although many of these errand soldiers were short-term soldiers, they were only divided into a dozen or so per person, which is very small!

Cai did ask: "How much is the salary of the errand on the other side?" ”

"It is divided into two parts, one part is the errand, and each Ding Zhuang shall not be less than twenty days of errand service per year, but shall not exceed one month of errand. And these servants are only responsible for their own villages and towns, such as building local school roads and water conservancy, if there are many natives around, they must repair the village wall and send people to take turns on duty. For the rest of the work, this amount of service cannot be used, so it is necessary to hire a servant, and the salary of the servant is generally between fifty and one hundred. The long difference is between 30 and 50 yuan, and the short difference is divided into 50 to 100 wen per day, but the price on the other side is relatively low compared to the Great Song Dynasty. ”

Even if it is cheap, it is much higher than the salary of the Song Dynasty.

But there is a difference over there, which is equivalent to invisibly reducing the number of differences. However, this errand is only responsible for the village and town, and is led by the village head, who has to please the people in order to be re-elected, so he will be very cautious about these errands.

Therefore, although it is good, there is no way to achieve it in the Song Dynasty.

Wang Ju said again: "And the biggest gap between the two sides is that the salary difference between officials and servants is not large. ”

As Wang Ju said, the Song Dynasty had to pay nearly 30 million yuan of salary for officials every year, but not every official's salary was very high. However, as high-ranking officials, people like Wen Yanbo and Fu Bi are frighteningly well paid. One Wen Yanbo can feed two thousand servants.

"Of course, I am not referring to the reduction of the salaries of officials, but to the fact that the imperial court can slightly increase the remuneration of the servants after a reasonable tax, so that they can have the motivation to do things for the state. Otherwise, it would be hired, because it couldn't support the family, so it had to use the power in his hands to break the law and discipline. Don't think that they are just officials and errands, in fact, ordinary people deal with the government, not with officials, but with these people. ”

"If a country wants to become better and better, there are three types of people that must be paid attention to, the first is the professors, who not only impart knowledge to students, but half of the students' outlook on life in childhood and adolescence will be influenced by them. If all the gentlemen are moral people, most of these students will not be too bad when they grow up. If all the gentlemen are only interested in receiving gifts and greedy for money, these students will grow up to attach great importance to money, and even do not hesitate to bend the law for bribes. The second category is all kinds of doctors and doctors, the husband is half of the parents, and the doctor must also have a parental heart, if the doctor does not care about the life or death of the patient, and only cares about accumulating money, the people will turn this disappointment into disappointment with the country. The third category is the officials and officials of various states and counties, and their practices directly affect the people's attitude towards the imperial court. ”

"Wang Qing is right, but what does Wang Qing want?" Zhao asked.

"Reform the Exemption Law!" (To be continued.) )