"Chief, the money and food in the county are already stretched thin!"
At the end of March, Heifu had just finished his vacation and went to work in the county government again. As soon as he entered the door, Jin Bucao, who was in charge of finance, began to complain to him.
Jinbu Cao is the department in charge of finance in the Qin State County. Cao Yu's name is Ku Ni. From the first time Hei Fu met him in a meeting, this person had a bitter look on his face. Every time Hei Fu wanted to do something, he asked the finance department to pay for it.
, the miserable face is even more ugly.
The bitter-faced man pointed his fingers and said: "After the county magistrate took office, he first established a school building and distributed scholarships to students who excelled in exams. He also built public toilets in various places to prepare for the promotion of compost composting methods next year.
Repairing paper mills, waterwheels, water vertebrae and many other things... County Lord, you have only been in office for two months, but you have done more than the previous five years of service combined!"
Hei Fu couldn't laugh or cry when he heard this. When did he do something wrong?
Ku Li said again: "That's all. Now we have to repair roads, build palaces, build wharves, and build ships. Lord, do you think the county's gold, cloth, money and food can't be used up?"
Listening to what this guy said, he really wanted to cut off more than half of Heifu’s plan!
Heifu was upset by what he said, but his attitude was still firm:
"The money for the palace comes from the Shaofu. Xianyang has agreed that Jiaodong can transfer the Yantieshanze city tax that should be paid to the Shaofu to build the palace. As for the docks and ships, this is a long-term plan and cannot be delayed.
."
Roads and palaces are in preparation for Qin Shihuang's eastward tour in the summer and autumn. Jimo, Zhifu, and Chengshan are at least three places, right? These must be repaired and cost about 3 million yuan. The widening and repair of roads also cost 2 million yuan.
money.
If Heifu thinks about it, Linzizhuang and Yue Street can get a city rent of 5 million within one month... No matter how bad Jiaodong is, the city tax for a year can still reach this amount, right?
As for the wharves and ships, it is Heifu's idea: to open the road from Jimo City to Jiaozhou Bay to prepare for the future development there and turn the currently barren Jiaozhou Bay into a new fishing port. This plan will cost about 500,000 yuan.
money……
He raised his neck and gave up on the burden: "Jiaodong is not rich to begin with. Even if the county guard kills me now, the officials will not be able to come up with more money!"
Heifu was also furious, so he called Chen Ping over on the spot and asked him to lead someone to check Jin Bucao's account.
You wouldn't know if you didn't check it, but you would be surprised if you checked it and found out that the complaints of hardship were really not fake. There were only 5 million left in the financial accounts of Jiaodong County! Of which 3 million were planned to be handed over to the Shaofu.
So after all the calculations, Heifu only has two million dollars on hand that he can actually use...
The Qin Dynasty had its own system. The central finance was divided into Sosu Neishi and Shaofu, which were in charge of public finance and royal finance respectively. Among them, land rent, adult head tax, and fine income all belonged to Sosu Neishi.
The income from Shanzeyuan, the salt and iron monopoly, as well as industrial and commercial taxes, customs taxes, and the money paid by children aged 7-4 must be handed over to the Shaofu.
These money and grains were collected by the local government, two-thirds were reserved for county finance, and the remaining one-third were given to Sosu Neishi and Shaofu respectively.
The northern region where Heifu stayed was a poor county that could not make ends meet. It had to subsidize a large amount of money and food from the central government every year just to pay the wages of soldiers and minor officials.
Jiaodong is different. It has the advantage of mountains and seas and a large population. It is considered a developed area in the whole world. It should be rich financially. It shouldn't be this difficult!
Heifu did the math. Even though he had put in a lot of trouble in the past two months, he only spent two to three million, right? How could such a big hole appear?
"Could it be that someone is corrupt!?"
But Ku Li also came from Guanzhong and had a clean resume. When Chen Ping checked the accounts, he found no problems. Ku Li even found out every expenditure this year one by one, filling Heifu's desk.
"Jiaodong is far less wealthy than the county governor imagined."
Kufu explained the truth: "It stands to reason that there are 30,000 households in Jiaodong. Even if each household only pays 0 acres of land rent, they still have more than 2 million shi of grain, totaling 60 million yuan! But in fact, the land rent is only 100 hectares."
Two-thirds of the 10,000 shi were handed over to the captain of the Sosu School, and only 300,000 shi were left in the county. After paying salaries to the officials and providing rations to the county soldiers and pavilions, there was not much left."
This is a big problem, and Heifu guessed the reason: "The reason why the land rent is so small is because of hiding the land and hiding the house?"
"Of course!"
Ku Lai held his palm and said: "The county governor should know that in winter, His Majesty has issued an edict, ordering Guandong Guizhou to go to the fields."
"Why should we be honest? The reason is that in many places, the government cannot leave the county seat at all, and can only control the surrounding areas of the county. It cannot take care of the villages further away!"
The black husband nodded, the language was blocked, the head of Guizhou was hostile, and the rich village officials covered the top and bottom. These are the reasons why the Qin Dynasty's rule in Guandong was difficult to reach the bottom like in Guanxi and Nanjun.
It was difficult for the imperial power to go to the countryside. In this case, it became impossible for the government to come forward to measure the actual acres of land of each household. In order to collect some rent and taxes, we could only take a step back and let the head of Guizhou voluntarily report
People seek advantages and avoid disadvantages. The Jiaodong people bullied the Qin officials and refused to go deep into the countryside, so they repaid the land of 100 acres as 50 acres, and the 50 acres of land as 30 acres, in order to avoid heavy rent.
As a result, the amount of rent collected every year was not as much as expected. In the process of collecting rent from one level to the next, who knows how much the local tycoons and rural officials exploited from it? In the end, all the blame was placed on the Qin officials.
above, leading to the hatred of Qin among the people...
Heifu asked again: "If the land rent is like this, what about the salt industry?"
Ku Li said: "The ancients said that Fu Chu has the gold of Ruhan, Qi has the salt of the canal, and Yan has the cooking of Liaodong. The three countries are rich because of this. The salt of the canal is in Jiaodong! Where the Weishui River flows into the sea
"
"It is said that at its peak, the Qi people boiled the sea into salt and could earn 200,000 shi a year! One hundred thousand shi were in Jiaodong!"
Heifu did the math and found that more than 100,000 pieces of rock salt was a lot of money. The average person in Jiaodong had one piece of rock salt, which was too much to eat. Most of it could be exported. When converted into money, there were more than 20 million, which was the bulk of Jiaodong's finances.
But Ku Li told Heifu an astonishing fact: "Five years after Jiaodong was established as a county, although the salt and iron were taken back to the government, the result was that the annual salt production was getting less and less year by year. Now it is only 50,000 shi."
Already..."
As a result, the income of the salt industry also dropped sharply. Looking for the reasons, one is that the salt and iron industry were government-run and became a state-owned enterprise. The salt workers lost their enthusiasm and muddle along.
Secondly, there were serious pirates and anti-Qin forces along the coast, which affected the operation of the salt field.
Thirdly, on the long coastline of Jiaodong, there are still many rich and powerful salt traders engaged in cooking and selling salt for private purposes! These people are colluding with officials internally and bandits externally, which is also a chronic problem in Jiaodong.
Land rent and salt tax, the two main sources of Jiaodong's finances, were withheld. It is not surprising that the treasury was short of money and grain.
After clarifying the whole matter, Heifu pondered for a while. Although he had taken care of the intellectuals and stabilized the farmers near the county seat, it was still too early to control the entire county.
This is not something that can be solved by a few inventions, but a problem with the entire administrative structure, not just in Jiaodong, but in more than 20 counties throughout Guandong...
The Qin Dynasty's rule in the east was like a high-rise building without a solid foundation. It could burn down and collapse with any fire, even involving the originally solid west.
"Governing Jiaodong is so difficult..."
For a moment, Hei Fu even secretly regretted that if he had known this, it would have been easier to stay in the empty Helan farm and fight against Rongdi.
But he immediately cheered up. There were still several years before the building was about to collapse. Whether it was for the country or for himself, he had to give it a try.
After that, Heifu began to make plans with Chen Ping: "The problem of government power being difficult to transfer to the countryside will have to be conquered county by county when the first batch of public school disciples leave in a few months!"
"After this matter is resolved, the people's hidden fields cannot be controlled for the time being. We must concentrate our efforts and start with the hidden households who are dependent on Zhu Tian, and use this as an excuse to uproot them."
"Then we will march from the inland to the seaside, crack down on illegal salt, and firmly control the salt industry. Finally, we will even build ships and go to sea to clear out the bandits, seize the islands where they are entrenched, and avoid the evil waves of Jiaodong!"
This is what Heifu has decided to do during his term of office, and it is truly a hellish difficulty.
"If I want to do this, first of all, I need an armed force that can stand up to Zhuda. It's obviously not enough to rely on county soldiers alone."
So, they returned to the original problem: money!
Heifu came to Ku Lai again and asked him what was the fastest way if the government needed money urgently?
Ku Ni tilted his head and thought for a moment, then spit out three words: "Take the money."
But Heifu shook his head: "This method is tantamount to drinking poison to quench thirst!"
He heard Chen Ping say that in Wei, some families had their children strangled to death at birth because they could not afford to pay for their children.
Logically speaking, 23 cents a year does not seem to be much for a person. As for strangling his own child alive?
But the actual situation is not that simple. Unlike the annual land rent, the Qin Dynasty's oral money can be added multiple times depending on local conditions. After repeated attempts, the amount has already been several times the stipulated amount. It was the head of the Qin Dynasty in Guizhou.
A very heavy burden.
It took Heifu a long time to recruit Jiaodong Confucian scholars and stabilize the farmers near the county. Once more money is collected, all these efforts will be in vain, and the fields will surely burst into laughter.
So he rejected the idea and asked Chen Ping to find a map of the entire county and check it county by county.
Heifu was looking for a place, a place that would become famous in later generations. Heifu also knew that it was in Jiaodong, but he didn't know where it was exactly.
"Zhaoyuan...where is Zhaoyuan?"
Heifu remembered that in his previous life, when he was in school, there was a classmate from Zhaoyuan, Shandong, who always boasted about how great their gold mines were. He also said that among the top ten gold mines in China, Yantai accounted for 5 of them, including 3 in Laizhou.
Zhaoyuan 2!
The more you brag, the more Hei Fu will remember it.
"If we can find this gold mine, everything will be solved..."
Heifu's gaze swept back and forth in Huang County, Ye County, and He County in the northern part of the Jiaodong Peninsula.
"The Sheriff is looking for...gold mine?" At this time, Ku Li whispered.
Heifu looked at Ku Ni. At this moment, his bitter face was not that ugly.
"you know?"
Ku Li said: "In the southwest of Huang County, there is a town called Qucheng, and there is a mountain in Qucheng. It is said that gold comes out of the mountain. The locals often pan for it in the stream, but the quantity is rare..."
He sighed secretly in his heart, maybe the county guard was crazy about money, and he began to get sick urgently and seek medical treatment. Qi State has never heard of any big gold mines since ancient times, otherwise Guan Zhong would not have to go to great lengths to obtain gold from Chu State.
It's gold...
Hei Fu was overjoyed when he heard this, and ordered Chen Ping: "Immediately ask people to collect rumors about gold withdrawals from various places, and then find some Yin and Yang alchemists who know how to look at mountains and rivers to find pulses!"
He paced around the room for a while, and then called the thief Cao Cao Shen: "Go and call Liu Ji, who has just returned from Chengshan, and tell him that the county guard has important errands to send him to do again!"