"My father-in-law, we have been talking for a long time about what exactly the content of the second new law of Mr. Yan and Mr. Fang has made my father-in-law so dissatisfied. Can you please let my son-in-law know?"
"Look, you are Fang Dunru's student, but he doesn't regard you as a confidant at all. But you want to know such a thing from my mouth. Tell me, why are you still holding his thigh? In his eyes Here, you are nothing." Guo Bing smacked his lips and looked at Lin Jue, shaking his head.
Lin Jue didn't have the time to think about this, so he frowned and said, "Father-in-law, please speak clearly."
Guo Bing said: "That's all, it's okay to tell you. Yan Zhengshu and Fang Dunru reported to the emperor the content and direction of the second new law, the Labor Service Law. Its general meaning is to reduce the labor of the people and allow them to Focus on farming and management. At first glance, this sounds like a great thing.”
Lin Jue smiled bitterly and said, "This is indeed a good thing."
Guo Bing scolded: "What a fart! If the people don't do hard labor, tell me, who will do the hard labor? Who will do the work of building cities, digging rivers, digging mountains and paving roads, running errands inside and outside the yamen, and doing night watch in the rural streets?" Isn’t that going to be a mess?”
Lin Jue said with a smile: "With the new law, there must be a solution. Mr. Yan and Mr. Fang will not make a one-size-fits-all approach without a solution."
"Hmph! Their solution is quite simple. They don't have to do any labor at all. The government will hire people to do the labor. In the future, all labor will be done by hiring people." Guo Bingbing said.
"Isn't this good? Hire people to do the work, idle people can be utilized, and people can farm and do business. Isn't this a waste of time?" Lin Jue said with a smile.
"Where does the money come from? Tell me, where does the money come from? Is it free to hire people? What is employment? It is to provide food and drink for the workers. Taking Hangzhou as an example, people in Qiantang County have to go out for reinforcements every winter. The long embankment of the Qiantang River was built to prevent the next year's high tide and rain. Several counties mobilized tens of thousands of manpower, and it took more than a month to build it. In the past, the common people brought their own food and drink to work for a month, but the court did not spend a tael of silver, at most It's just some scattered expenses. What now? They all employ people, tens of thousands of people eat and drink, and make money for processing. At a rough calculation, it costs hundreds of thousands of taels of silver. Who pays for this money?" Guo Bing shouted.
Lin Jue frowned and said, "Isn't this money... coming from the imperial court?"
"The imperial court is out of control? Then what else can we do? Didn't Yan Zhengsheng and Fang Dunru boast in front of the emperor that they want to enrich the country and strengthen the army? Can the reform solve the financial problems of the imperial court once and for all? Instead, they take money from outside? Besides, the imperial court can afford it. Huh? That's not a small amount. Even tens of millions of taels of silver that can be discounted for labor service may not be enough to stop it. All the 12 million taels of silver that were discounted in Changping Warehouse were obtained from the sale of all the grain in the warehouse. Yan Zhengsu claimed that from then on There is no need to use one or two taels of the court's tax money anymore, so does he want to slap himself in the face?" Guo Bingbing said with a smile.
"So... this money... is going to come out of the people's heads?" Lin Jue frowned.
"Isn't that right? Yan Zhengfang Dunru is very smart. The people are exempted from labor, so they need immunity money to provide the people who hire laborers to the government. In addition to the immunity money, an additional 20% is called the immunity surplus money. This The money can also be used to support the people. Do you think Yan Zhengsu and others will spare these people? Monks who can escape cannot escape from the temple. If they don't do hard labor, they will all be given money. There is no such thing as free food in the world. Hehe, these two people are still Scholars? They are obsessed with money. I don’t know where the saints’ books have gone. Isn’t this bringing shame to the saints?”
Lin Jue was speechless. What he was most worried about had happened. Sure enough, the purpose of this second new law was not only to encourage production, but also a means of making money for the people. In the past, hard labor could be offset, but now there is no need to serve hard labor.
, but it must be offset by cash. This forces the people to dig out money from the land. Although it has a positive effect on production, it is a more oppressive and coercive method.
"Originally, these are nothing. It is only natural and natural for the people to give money if they do not do hard labor. After all, the common people cannot care about the life and death of the court. However, in addition to collecting money from those who should have done hard labor, the solemn and peaceful way
What's the point of Dunru actually wanting to plunder the people who were originally exempted from labor? He wanted to set up a collection of money called "helping money", which was used by official households, temple households, young Guo households, and women who were not required to bear labor labor.
Households, single-person households and under-aged households need to pay half of the fixed amount. Damn, isn't this a money grab? Do those female households with single-aged and under-aged households have money to contribute? Monks and Taoist priests also have to pay.
, officials also have to pay, isn't this a mess? Scholars work hard to study and become officials, but in the end they have to pay for labor. What is the truth? Since ancient times, those who work hard govern others, and those who work hard govern others. Now study
Officials have to do hard labor in disguise, so why are they still studying? Isn’t there already a lot of waiting in this world?" Guo Bingwu said angrily.
Lin Jue's heart felt cold. Yan Zhengsheng and Mr. Fang were brave. In order to break the unfairness of society, they finally attacked the privileged. But this also meant that they had touched the cheese of the vested interests. This reform
It was unexpected for Lin Jue to enter the deep water area so quickly. Lin Jue believed that in order to succeed in the reform, it is necessary to proceed step by step, enter slowly, gradually win the consent of the majority of people, and finally launch a tough battle.
, entering deep water. But obviously, as Yan Zhengsheng said, they will never be the kind of people who take their time. They want to use strong medicine to heal this country. The spearhead has been pointed directly at the chronic disease, and there is no intention of compromise.
.
"What's even more annoying is that the amount of the assistance money is actually linked to the land and real estate owned. Is this okay? Even if I only pay half of it, the amount of assistance money I have to pay every year is actually hundreds of thousands of taels.
Isn't this an open robbery? Who among our officials in the Zhou Dynasty has no job or property? They are trying to steal money from these people's pockets. I finally understand that Yan Fang and the two are killing the rich against the rich.
, they are happy to make the officials of this dynasty become extremely poor one by one. They are asking us to spit out the land in disguise. This is their intention. This is not to reform labor, but to reform the land system.
, this is an act of building a plank road openly and secretly plotting against Chencang. These two people are so cunning that they thought others wouldn’t be able to see it."
Lin Jue nodded secretly. Indeed, Guo Bing was not completely expressing his emotions. What he said still made sense. Officials asked for help money, and this money was linked to the land they owned, which effectively circumvented the need for control.
The exploitation of those widowed and lonely female households with single-person households. Because these people do not have much land, and they don’t have much money to pay half of the help money of ordinary people. But the officials and the big landowners and wealthy households are different. The more land they own, the more money they have.
The more assistance money you need to pay. Even if you only pay half of it, it is still a huge amount. The prince's palace pays hundreds of thousands of taels of silver a year. On the other hand, it also shows that the Liang prince's palace annexed a lot of land and acres. Although
I don’t know how these hundreds of thousands of taels of silver were calculated and how the proportion of collection was determined, but it can be seen at this moment that this is a major move aimed at annexing and merging large households with acres of land.
If the acres become a burden and become a certificate for paying a large amount of service money every year, then annexing the land is no longer a good thing. Having a large number of acres is not necessarily a good thing. If you want to pay less money, one of the options is to transfer the acres
The quantity is reduced to an acceptable amount. This is a disguised attack on the problem of land hoarding and annexation, relieving the pressure of too many people and too little land, and effectively allowing more idle people to return to land farming. This is probably the real purpose of this method.
.
As for the saying that those who work hard govern people, and those who work hard govern others. Scholars and officials will oppose this measure for the sake of face. In fact, it is not important. What we really want to oppose are those who have to pay a huge price and are passively benefiting.
man of.
"Father-in-law, is your source of information reliable? It stands to reason that the second new law has not yet been enacted, and my son-in-law, as the Procurator and Literary Officer, has not yet received an order to formulate the terms. How could so much inside information be revealed?" Lin Jue
Frowning.
Guo Bingbing smiled and said: "You doubt my source of information. Aren't my ears and eyes as good as yours? Unless Fang Dunru is serious and solemn, he keeps these things in his heart and doesn't say them out. As soon as they open their mouth, no matter who they say it to
Yes, I will know it soon. Don’t ask me where I know it, and I won’t tell you. In short, just wait and see. The second new law will be enacted soon, and you will know it soon.
What you said is true or false, will you understand it soon?"
Lin Jue frowned and said nothing. In terms of the source of the information, he was obviously not as good as Prince Liang. Yan Zhengsheng and Mr. Fang were not the kind of people to make big claims. The most likely possibility was that they were just reporting the new law's proposition to the emperor. Then they would leak the information.
Nine times out of ten, the key point is within the palace. The emperor himself will most likely not tell anyone about the new law before it is promulgated. Maybe he will consult some people privately, and these people are likely to leak the news. But this chance
Not big. The chance that the emperor himself would tell Guo Bing is even smaller, because Guo Bing is simply excluded from state affairs.
Then the only possible source of this news is the people around the emperor. When Yan Zhengsheng and Fang Dunru visited the emperor, they must have been served by eunuchs. These people are the most suspicious. If the eunuchs really leaked the news
This news means that Liang Wang Guo Bing may have put his eyes and ears next to the emperor. Thinking about it, this is quite scary.
This is not the point. The source of the news is not important. What is important is whether the news is true. Obviously, judging from Guo Bing's reaction, the news is nine out of ten true. Otherwise, Guo Bing would not have overreacted. This is also
It can explain why Mr. Fang said what he said to me alone in the morning, and why Liang Wang jumped out and said something, so he asked himself to ask clearly. After a few verifications, the accuracy of the news can basically be confirmed.