My life skills in Daming Liver

Fang Wanghai said: "The biggest difficulty in the salt law of this dynasty lies in 'keeping the branches'."

Su Ze understood Fang Wanghai's meaning at once, and he asked back: "Father-in-law, Shou Zhi, does that mean that the salt merchants in Kaizhong can't get salt?"

Fang Wanghai nodded and said: "The blockage of the salt method in this dynasty refers to the fact that you can't pick up the salt in the salt field when you get the salt, especially in the Jianghuai salt field. No mention of salt."

Su Ze sighed in his heart, as expected, the laws of the market cannot be reversed, and it is not surprising that things like salt-induced congestion will happen.

In the early days of the Ming Dynasty, the price of grain in the border areas was not high. Generally speaking, one yin of salt required two buckets and five liters of grain, but the grain in the border areas was not high. Two buckets of five liters of grain only cost five cents of silver. , which is 0.05 taels of silver.

And Yiyin's salt can be sold for five taels of silver in the Jianghuai area.

Such a huge profit naturally led to the congestion of the Yanyin in the Jianghuai area, and a large number of merchants could not get the salt with the Yanyin.

After all, the salt production in a region is also limited.

Su Ze asked: "Is there something wrong with both salt production and keeping money?"

Fang Wanghai knew that Su Ze was very good at financial affairs, but he didn't expect him to be so keen.

After taking charge of the Nanjing household department, Fang Wanghai also checked the files related to the salt industry. This is why he found out after reading a lot of files. Su Ze caught the key to the problem at once.

Fang Wanghai said: "Yes, the output of the coastal salt farms in Jianghuai has been declining since the beginning of the country, and the output of some salt farms is not even half of what it was in the beginning of the country."

Su Ze knew a lot about salt farms, and his subordinate Zhu Qi was born in Yan Ding, and he had a deep understanding of how the imperial court squeezed salt farms.

Su Ze immediately said: "It's inevitable. The imperial court is still using the cost of labor to convert money for salt workers, and today it is still distributing precious money to salt households. If you don't sell private salt, you can't survive at all."

Under the "great" design of Emperor Hongwu, Yan Ding's treatment in the early days of the country was pretty good, and their wages were issued by converting precious banknotes.

During the Hongwu period, the treasure banknotes were still stable, and there was nothing wrong with this policy.

In the year of Yongle, we can't hold back anymore, and today's treasured banknotes are like waste paper.

However, Yan Ding’s wages are still paid with treasure notes, which has led to the situation that Yan Ding steals salt and sells it privately in almost all salt farms.

This problem is also very normal, everyone has to eat, if the upper level doesn't care about the food, then it can't be blamed for the lower level to find their own way out.

Relying on mountains to eat mountains depends on water to drink water, salt households can rely on salt, so several provinces that produce salt are also provinces where illegal salt is rampant.

Obviously, from the beginning of the Republic of China to the present, the scale of all salt farms has expanded, the number of people in the salt industry has also increased, and the technology has also improved, but the output of the salt farms has decreased, and some salt farms have even been in arrears with production tasks for a long time. .

Su Ze sneered and said, "I'm afraid I can't keep the center. Another important reason is the imperial court's indiscriminate use of salt."

Fang Wanghai smiled and said nothing, since Xiaozong, he liked to reward eunuchs and relatives with large amounts of salt, and the emperor had a tradition of rewarding salt to his close officials.

The emperor often rewarded his close ministers and relatives with thousands of citations of salt. These powerful families brought the salt citations to pick up the salt, and which salt farm would dare not give it.

The rebellion of Zhu Qi and his gang of Yan Ding was because Emperor Jiajing rewarded the eunuch Yan Yin, and the eunuch could not get salt when he arrived in Fujian, and then forced the salt households to produce salt.

This kind of thing has been common since the Xiaozong Dynasty, and such rebellions often occurred in the salt fields of Lianghuai and Liangjiang.

These contents are also clearly discussed by later generations, and Su Ze also knew these contents when he was studying.

But the next content is more in-depth content.

Fang Wanghai said: "Actually, the salt law can still be maintained like this, but the reform of the salt law by Ye Qi, the Minister of the Household Department in the fifth year of Hongzhi, completely corrupted the salt law."

Ye Qi's reform? Su Ze used his [History] to recall, and asked:

"Is it true that both the middle and the middle lose the color?"

Fang Wanghai looked at Su Ze suspiciously. How could Su Ze know about this?

One of the most important reasons for the Ming Dynasty to allow Jinshi with high rankings in the imperial examinations to enter the Imperial Academy and give preferential treatment to Imperial officials is that the Imperial Academy has a large number of national classics.

These classics include ministers' memorials, cabinet meetings and six ministerial records, and even a large number of emperor's edicts and memorials.

Not to mention that there are also the real records of the emperor, which are also included in the Imperial Academy, which can be studied by the Imperial Academy.

For example, Zhang Juzheng was in the Hanlin Academy. His job was to edit and edit the Hanlin Academy, and his main job was to check and proofread these classics.

This work is relatively easy, but you can freely view these materials.

The essence of state governance is in these important files, which is why officials from the Imperial Academy are not bad at governing.

Zhang Juzheng’s supernatural powers of never forgetting his photographs are like a fish in water in the Imperial Academy. He constantly absorbs the essence of various reforms of the previous dynasty, checks the discussions on various resolutions in the past, and accumulates a lot of experience in this way.

Fang Wanghai's imperial examination was not high enough to enter the Imperial Academy, so he could only start from the grassroots step by step.

He can only get access to these contents when he reaches the level of Minister of the Ministry of Accounting in Nanjing, and it is only limited to the meetings and discussions of the Ministry of Accounting.

The Ye Qi reform that Su Ze mentioned was carried out for a short period of time, and it was soon abolished. Fang Wanghai didn't know about it before.

He also read a lot of documents before he knew Ye Qi's reform had corrupted the salt administration.

But Su Ze actually knew about this matter, and could point out the harm of this matter to the point?

Fang Wanghai became more interested in Su Ze's father. Could it be that Su Ze's father was not only a great Confucian, but also a high-ranking official?

If not, how can Su Ze's financial talent be explained?

Su Ze noticed Fang Wanghai's strangeness, and he quickly said, "I also heard my father mention it by accident."

Sure enough!

But Fang Wanghai didn't plan to delve into it, anyway, his daughter was married to this kid.

And since Su Ze is aware of this matter, there is no need for Fang Wanghai to waste any more words.

He simply said: "Ye Qi's reform is to allow internal merchants to go directly to the Salt Transport Department to buy salt with silver, without having to transport grain in exchange for warehouse money. In the early years of the dynasty, the imperial court resumed the opening of Chinese and French, and abolished the opening of the middle and the middle, but the problem of congestion caused by this became more serious, and there are still a large number of salt quotations that have not been exchanged.”

Su Ze said bluntly:

"To put it bluntly, Ye Qi's reform is because the imperial court thinks that Yanyin is too cheap, so they want to earn more money."

Fang Wanghai sighed and nodded in agreement.

Salt is a monopoly commodity, essentially a poll tax.

The common people can not pay taxes, but they cannot not eat salt.

And eating salt is a kind of tax.

As a profiteering product of artificial monopoly, the reason why businessmen support the development of China is to make money.

But the imperial court felt that the merchants had made money from it, and was jealous of the profits, so they simply overturned Kaizhongfa and directly sold salt to attract money.

Su Ze said: "The problem of Ye Qi's reform is not only caused by salt congestion, but the problem of the northern border defense is also caused by Ye Qi's reform!"

Su Ze's words surprised Fang Wanghai.

He is the servant of the Nanjing household department, and he can only see the archives of the household department. This is where Fang Wanghai lacks the training of the Imperial Academy.

His current talent is also the ability of the servant of the household department, and he cannot fully consider the overall problems of the country.

And this ability to think about all aspects of ability is often the most in need of vision.

If we use the system to classify, Hai Rui, who can make decisions for the people, handle prefectural and county cases well, and manage local officials well, is almost Lv10.

Fang Wanghai's ability to promote a certain new deal, or to coordinate with Hu Zongxian the personnel and finances of several provinces, this is the ability of a feudal official, which is around Lv15.

Further up, one must be able to consider overall national policies and coordinate national personnel. This is the talent of Zaifu above level 15.

Fang Wanghai didn't even reach Lv15 now, thanks to Su Ze's help in counseling and patching.

And the current Gao Gong and Zhang Juzheng are only players below Lv15, who have rich theoretical experience but no practical experience.

Now in the entire Ming Dynasty, only Yan Song and Xu Jie were able to exceed Lv15.

This is also the reason why Emperor Jiajing used these two people no matter what, because not only their qualifications, but also their abilities were indeed the top of the Ming Dynasty.

According to his memory, Su Ze began to replay the Chinese and French games.

"Father-in-law, in fact, the little money for opening the Sino-French Institute is not much compared to the national finances."

Fang Wanghai thought about it, and it was true.

In fact, this is also the reason why Ye Qi was able to carry out reforms back then.

Su Ze said: "In the Tang Dynasty, Fifth Qi set up a salt courtyard in Jianghuai. Relying on the salt administration in Jianghuai, he supported Tang Suzong to put down the Anshi Rebellion. The Tang army regained Guanzhong after repeated defeats and battles. It is all thanks to the Salt Law."

Fang Wanghai had read this period of history. In addition to Guo Ziyi's contribution to the pacification of the Anshi Rebellion, Fifth Qi also contributed a lot. He relied on the Grand Canal to transfuse blood for Datang, and only relied on taxes from the Jianghuai River to support the army of Datang.

This shows the huge profits of the salt law.

However, the court did not actually benefit much from the salt law of this dynasty. In other words, compared with the entire financial market, the salt law of the Ming Dynasty was not a profitable project.

Su Ze continued: "The Kaizhong Salt Law of this dynasty is actually complementary to the border town system."

"In fact, since the Chenghua year, the imperial court began to acquiesce in the transaction of warehouse notes, and since then the salt merchants have been divided into two types."

"One is the merchants in the northern border towns. They mainly transport grain to the border towns, and then exchange them for warehouse bills. However, they don't go to 'Shouzhong' to pick up salt. They just sell warehouse bills to salt merchants in the interior for money."

Fang Wanghai nodded immediately, he had also read this part of the content.

Su Ze continued: "The internal merchants got the warehouse notes, and then exchanged them into salt to sell the salt. It can be said that both sides were profitable. But at that time, the frontier merchants were powerful and controlled the sale and pricing of warehouse notes, but they There is also a lack of relationship in Jianghuai, and it is impossible to stay in the middle, so it can only be sold to domestic merchants, and the two parties are a mutually restrictive relationship."

Fang Wanghai nodded. When he was preparing for banknote tariffs, he also had a deep understanding of business. What Su Ze said was all he could imagine. Compared with the files of the Nanjing Household Department he had seen, Su Ze said It is true.

Su Ze continued: "And border merchants are also an important reason for maintaining low food prices in border towns."

This point of view was beyond Fang Wanghai's comprehension, and he asked, "Why?"

Su Ze said: "Because businessmen pursue profit, it is also because of cost."

"In opening, you only need to transport the food to the frontier guards. The low price of food in the frontier is beneficial to these frontier merchants, so they will also organize people to farm in the frontier. This is the so-called commercial settlement."

"Because of the commercial settlements, the frontier merchants only need to buy grain directly in the frontier, and they can exchange it for warehouse money at a low price. It is true that they make money, but they also maintain the low grain price in the frontier."

"It can be seen from the price of grain in the early days of the country. There was not much difference between the price of grain in the frontier and the interior in the early days of the country, but what about now? Now the grain in Liao Town costs two taels of silver a stone, right?"

Fang Wanghai nodded, he is also very aware of this situation, which is why the cost of border areas is getting higher and higher.

On the one hand, the combat effectiveness of the guards has declined, and more soldiers are needed to guard the border, and soldiers have to be paid.

On the other hand, the price of grain in the frontier is too high, and the imperial court needs to spend more money to buy grain, and has to transport the grain there.

"Ye Qi's reform and opening up of China and France made the border merchants completely unprofitable. Since then, the border merchants have been in a slump, and the commercial villages have been withdrawn. Since then, the food prices in the frontier have naturally risen steadily."

"And what about internal merchants? At first they benefited, because they didn't need to buy warehouse banknotes from border merchants, they only needed to buy salt quotations directly from the Salt Transport Department. With the price increase, domestic businessmen are gradually losing money.”

"And now the largest salt transportation company in Jianghuai is in Huai'an, and Ye Qi is from Huai'an!"

"By the time the central government resumed in the early years of this dynasty, the frontier merchants were basically dead, and the internal merchants had no breath. Opening the middle has become a loss-making business. Shouzhong can't mention salt, and the imperial court's salt can't be sold. out."

Fang Wanghai patted the case and said, "Ye Qi is a traitor who has wronged the country!"

Fang Wanghai didn't expect that Ye Qi's small reform of the salt law would lead to a rise in food prices in the frontier, a huge increase in the court's frontier defense expenses, and even completely destroy the entire salt affairs.

Su Ze was also feeling emotional, I'm afraid Ye Qi would never have imagined that what he did would have such a huge impact.

By the end of the Ming Dynasty, the price of grain in the borderlands had reached ten taels of silver per stone. At that time, all the revenue of the imperial court was poured into the borderlands, and the border troubles could not be quelled, and the Ming Dynasty really perished.

In this way, the emperor was still distributing salt quotations indiscriminately, hoping to make money by issuing salt quotations.

Under the autocratic imperial power, the salt law, like precious banknotes, eventually perishes in greed.

Such a turbulent trend is definitely not something that can be reversed by a single whip.

But Fang Wanghai looked at Su Ze, waiting for him to solve the problem.

There is another chapter in the evening, before twelve o'clock