After the Tax Department discovered the tax issues in Chizhou, they sent Chen Lifu and another sixth-grade inspector to Chizhou without hesitation!
However, as soon as they arrived in Chizhou, another sixth-grade inspector received an emergency transfer order and was dispatched to Huizhou Prefecture.
Therefore, the tax inspection task in Chizhou Prefecture can only be handled by Chen Lifu alone.
The duties and responsibilities of Chen Lifu's tax inspection are not very clear. Simply put, it is to urge and assist local tax agencies to solve problems and ensure the smooth progress of local tax work.
To put it bluntly, Chen Lifu's mission is to ensure that the tax revenue of Chizhou Prefecture this year reaches expectations, and Chen Lifu understands even more clearly that if he wants to reach the expectations set by his superiors, many people in Chizhou will probably have their homes confiscated and their families exterminated.
Chen Lifu has always been in this position with the mentality of feeding the tiger with his own body, but what he has to do now makes him feel a sense of guilt that he is feeding the tiger!
During this time, he urged the local tax agency to collect taxes, and in accordance with the tradition of tax inspections, he used the local tax inspection team to investigate suspected tax evaders in Chizhou Prefecture. However, Chen Lifu did not
It seems that that is not feasible, and the most critical thing is to rectify the tax agency.
Because in Chen Lifu's opinion, the entire tax system of Chizhou Prefecture, especially the personnel of the tax inspection team, are extremely bad, and they are particularly troubled by the gentry and landlords. It will not work without rectification!
Of course, the tax system itself also has many shortcomings. For example, in the Chizhou Tax Inspection Team, except for a few high-ranking ones who were transferred from other places, in fact many members of the inspection team are locals and are based on their status and background.
Mainly people who are not very clean, such as the original gangsters.
The entire tax inspection team was in a state of chaos, which made Chen Lifu ignore it. During this period, he also used his authority to deal with many scum of the local tax inspection team internally.
This gave him some sense of accomplishment. He was finally able to rectify the notorious and criminal tax inspection team. Although this was just a tax inspection team in Chizhou Prefecture, he believed that with this start, there would be more in the future.
There is such an opportunity.
Sooner or later, he will always clean up the tax inspection team and bring peace to the gentry in the world.
Then after he arrived in Chizhou, he took care of rectifying the tax inspection team and tax officials, but he never paid much attention to tax collection. The tax inspection team had already made several reports, saying that several companies with serious tax evasion and evasion would be punished.
Landowners raided their homes, but Chen Lifu found excuses to suppress them.
But these days, he was not in a good mood, because three days ago, he received a letter from the director of the Inspection Division of the Grain Collection Department of the Ministry of Taxation, um, his immediate boss!
This is not a personal letter, but a very formal official document!
The letter said that Chen Lifu had been in Chizhou for nearly three months, so why had the tax situation in Chizhou still not improved? The tax collected in the first quarter was still half less than expected!
Although this situation is much better than only collecting one-third at the end of last year, it is still far from enough for the tax department.
Therefore, his immediate boss severely reprimanded him in an official letter for his poor performance, and directly told him that if the tax situation did not improve in the second quarter, then he would send another person to Chizhou to inspect the tax.
The letter did not say what would happen to Chen Lifu at that time, but there was no need to mention such a thing, because a tax inspection that could not complete its task had no value at all.
Chen Lifu has heard of several tax inspectors who failed to complete their tasks. Basically, they were devalued and sent to remote areas. For more serious cases, they would be dismissed.
As for the tax inspector who bent the law for personal gain during the inspection and had not completed the inspection task, needless to say, he was terminated without even a chance of going to jail.
However, some people are still trying to make money, but even if their tasks are completed, they can still get promoted and make a fortune.
Otherwise, why would you say that this tax position is a good job? It can really make a lot of money. As long as the impact is not too bad, or if someone doesn't expose it, the boss will pretend that he didn't see it.
Evaluating whether a tax inspector is qualified or not does not mean whether he makes money for himself, but whether he makes money for the tax department!
Chen Lifu naturally did not accept money, and he himself was not short of money. He was from a scholarly family, and the Chen family, a traditional big landowner, was not short of money. What he was short of was power.
But he did not make money for himself, and he also did not make money for the tax department, so he failed in his responsibilities, and he was seriously delinquent.
He has no doubt that if Chizhou's tax situation still does not improve in the second quarter, demotion is a good idea, and he may even be directly demoted.
He didn't sleep that night. He watched the tax inspection team of Chizhou Prefecture send him a list for a long time in the evening. This was a list of suspects. The list included more than ten gentry who the tax inspection team believed were the most serious tax evaders.
, and he had known these gentry for some time in the past, and even had pleasant conversations with some of them.
Those are all upright gentry, upright and upright people, and some of them are particularly famous!
In the early hours of the morning, after Chen Lifu sighed deeply, he finally picked up a pen and tremblingly wrote down his opinion: "Arrest immediately and transfer to judicial disposal."
The Tax Inspection Team, as the fourth largest armed force of the Tang Dynasty, has law enforcement rights. Of course, prosecution and trial rights still belong directly to the Supervisory Yuan and the Grand Court.
At the same time, the tax inspection team also has the power of armed action to fight against armed tax resistance. The cannons they are equipped with are not just for watching, but can actually fire.
If the tax inspection team encounters a tough opponent, it will call its big brother the Army to help. However, this is usually a large-scale armed resistance to taxes. It is not just tax evasion or tax resistance, but an act of rebellion. The Army will thunder with thunderous force.
means of suppression.
After Chen Lifu wrote down his opinions, he closed his eyes. He could already predict the fate of the more than ten gentry above. Being in the tax system, he had a profound understanding of the tax department's policies in the past few months.
What is the attitude of people who evade taxes? The fines are always light, and it is common to resist and arrest people. In serious cases, homes may be ransacked.
All he can pray now is that the gentry will not resist. If they are arrested and have a good attitude, pay back the tax arrears, and pay a high fine, then the matter will be over.
But if you refuse to pay, or simply resist the tax directly, the outcome will not be that simple, and your home may be confiscated.
The next day, Chen Lifu put on an official robe and went to enforce the law with the Chizhou tax inspection team. To be honest, he was worried and worried that the inspection team would mess up. He wanted to watch it in person to prevent the inspection team from messing up.
He came with good intentions, but as soon as he arrived outside the first gentry's manor, when the members of the inspection team arrested the owner of the family, the gentry with whom he had been chatting happily a few days ago turned to him.
A look of disdain: "You are a beautiful woman, how can you be a thief!"
At this time, Chen Lifu was not angry, but his heart was filled with sadness!
However, when it came to the third house, the owner refused to pay taxes. The inspection team immediately used a two-pound shotgun to blast the landlord's door to pieces, and then rushed in.
They went in and arrested all the people inside, and even killed and injured several people when conflicts broke out.
When those people were escorted out, the head of the family, a well-known gentry in the neighborhood, saw Chen Lifu. His face was filled with grief and anger, and then he spat at Chen Lifu: "Traitor!"
Chen Lifu didn't speak, he just checked the saliva on his body, and then said softly: "Take it away!"
This day can be said to be the darkest day in Chen Lifu's nearly thirty years of life. It made him feel even more depressed than when he was dismissed from office in the Ming Dynasty!
He didn't want to, but he had to arrest them with his own hands!
After arresting nearly a hundred people in one day, Chen Lifu did not go to the tax bureau's celebration banquet. Instead, he returned to his residence alone. That night, he had no sleep all night.
What happened in Chizhou can be regarded as a microcosm of other places in the south of the Yangtze River. Compared with other places, the land annexation in the south of the Yangtze River is more serious, and there are many landlords and gentry. These people have never paid taxes. Now the Tang Dynasty makes them pay taxes.
, most of them will hand it over, but even if they do, they will definitely not hand it over honestly, but try to conceal the number of acres as much as possible.
And the tax department has never been merciless towards these people.
The tax department has a very heavy task this year, because in the fiscal revenue budget for the five years of Xuanping, the tax budget reached 25 million taels of silver.
Taxes in other places have basically stabilized, and overall they can collect about 15 million, which means that in the Jiangnan region, at least 10 million taels of silver have to be collected.
This is no easy task.
Judging from the number of acres of land and the bustling industry and commerce in the Jiangnan area, it is entirely possible to tax 10 million taels of silver, even low. However, it is not that easy to collect these taxes smoothly.
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Because in Jiangnan, the tax evasion situation is far more serious than in other places. They were fostered by the Ming Dynasty and were all willing to pay taxes. They did not dare to resist on a large scale, but they always liked to play hide and seek with the tax department.
, the tax department is very troublesome.
Nowadays, in every state capital in the Jiangnan region, the tax department has sent out tax inspections one after another. This situation has never happened in other provinces. This shows how stubborn the landlords and gentry in the Jiangnan region are.
But even though the work is difficult, the tax department still gave Li Xuan a guarantee that the Jiangnan region's regular tax revenue this year will definitely exceed 10 million taels, and it also guarantees that there will be no turmoil in Jiangnan!
Because there is a very interesting phenomenon here: although there are relatively few cases of tax evasion and even tax resistance in other places, large-scale armed tax resistance is very common. However, in Jiangnan, there are many tax resisters and even more tax evasion.
However, large-scale armed tax resistance or even rebellion miraculously never happened!
The landlords in the prosperous places south of the Yangtze River are used to enjoying themselves and cheating, but their bones are not that hard anymore!