Chapter 958 How much money does the Chen family have?
Gong Wenbao was startled by his sudden forward pressure. Although the two of them were separated by a table, his whole body still involuntarily stepped back!
Now he knows why the outside world calls this man Chen Rentu!
Damn, I'm scared to death!
This man is not just a scholar at all as he looks. He seems to be thin and has a bookish look on his face. But now Gong Wenbao thinks that deep inside this man's seemingly thin body, there is a secret hidden at any time.
A demon that chooses people to devour.
After being startled by Chen Lifu's actions, he finally remembered what this man had just said!
Mountains of silver, rotten wooden boxes, silver scattered all over the floor!
Oh my god, if what Chen Lifu said is true, how much money does the Chen family have?
Also, if the Chen family is like this, what about the other gentry and landlords in the Jiangnan area? How rich should they be?
Although the Chen family has a certain reputation in the Jiangnan area, it is definitely not the top official family in Jiangnan. At least the Chen family has never had a senior official. Although there have been children in the past dynasties who have served as officials, most of them have served as middle-level officials.
Regarding lower-level positions, the Chen family has never had an official above the third rank.
However, such a family can become so rich, so how much money do other families have?
Gong Wenbao doesn’t know!
Not to mention that Gong Wenbao didn't know, even the tax department, which claimed to be all-pervasive, actually couldn't figure out how much the landlords in the Jiangnan area were worth.
They can find out how many acres they have, their shops, etc., but to be honest, wealth can exist in many forms, and it is impossible for the tax department to just go to someone's house and look in their cellar.
No matter how much money you have, it is impossible to say whether the furnishings in other people's houses are priceless treasures.
Judging from their apparent property, the Chen family is actually just an ordinary landlord family, owning thousands of acres of land and dozens of shops, which is nothing in Jiangnan.
But can such a family keep millions in cash in the cellar?
This sounds ridiculous, but what’s even more ridiculous is that there are many families who are richer and have more money than them!
Then Gong Wenbao suddenly had such a thought in his mind: The defeat of the Zhu Ming Dynasty was not unjust. The gentry and landlords in the world were so rich, but their fiscal revenue was only a few million taels of silver, and this could still be done.
For them to exist for nearly two hundred years is simply a miracle!
He heard a fellow villager who worked in the Budget Department of the Ministry of Taxation say that the country's finances are in dire straits now. If next year's fiscal revenue cannot reach more than 50 million taels, I'm afraid everyone's salary will be in arrears again next year.
At that time, he casually asked his colleague in the Budget Department, "Based on the situation of our country, how much money is needed per year?"
After hearing this question, the fellow countryman first smiled and then said: "Is it enough to spend? But it is impossible. With the budget system of our country, no matter how much money is spent, it will not be enough!"
If there are 50 million, other ministries and the military dare to raise the expenditure budget to 80 million; if there is 60 million in revenue, they dare to mention 100 million. Even if it is really 100 million, they will dare to shout 200 million!
"
At this point, he paused for a moment, and then said: "But if this year's situation goes according to this year, we will be able to barely survive with 70 million next year!"
70 million is just enough to survive!
This is the expenditure budget of the Tang Dynasty for next year. As for the revenue budget, people at the tax department estimate that it is only 65 million. In other words, there is still a gap of 5 million taels of silver.
But this is only theoretical. In fact, when it comes to deciding next year's fiscal budget, the Holy Emperor will definitely raise a butcher knife to cut, cut the army's military expenditures, and cut the funds of other departments. For example, the Ministry of Commerce has already
They clamored that they must have at least eight million taels of funds tomorrow so that they can carry out their work smoothly.
But will it really be 8 million?
Nonsense!
It is impossible to cut off half of it directly. If you can give two to three million taels, the people in the Ministry of Commerce should laugh. In fact, this is indeed the case. If there are really 3 million taels in the Ministry of Commerce next year,
The expenditure of silver.
The high-level officials such as the Minister of Commerce and the Minister of Commerce will definitely have a good time drinking and toasting together to celebrate the victory of Xuanping's seven-year budget war!
Because, in the sixth year of Xuanping, that is, this year, their commercial department's total annual funding was only 800,000 taels of silver.
For the eight million, they simply added a zero at the end and didn't expect it to be approved.
At the end of every year, various departments will fight for next year's fiscal budget and think of various ways to increase their department's fiscal budget. In the spirit of giving milk to a crying child, these departments basically spend this month at the end of the year.
I cry about poverty every day, and my life is extremely miserable.
At the same time, in line with the principle of asking for money all over the place and making counter-offers on the ground, their psychological bottom line is one million taels. They dare to directly ask for ten million taels. Their thoughts are very simple. Even if you don't give me a half discount, you can only give me a two-thirds discount.
If you discount, then I will make a lot of money.
Back then, this was just a small thought of other departments. The people in the Budget Department of the Tax Department were like a mirror. They would investigate on their own and then submit the expenditure reports of each department for this year.
An organization has only spent hundreds of thousands of taels of silver this year, and next year it plans to launch some big project, and then asks for millions? That's nonsense, the people in the tax department are not stupid.
The Tax Department was the purse strings of the Tang Dynasty. Although collecting taxes was their most important job, controlling financial expenditures was also their important job. Why?
Because once the fiscal support budget is approved and the amount exceeds the fiscal revenue, how to solve the fiscal gap? The various departments don’t care, they just want money. In the end, they still have to let the people in the tax department find ways to make money.
Close the financial gap.
In order not to have to work hard for themselves, people in the tax department would rather work hard for people in other departments!
The Tang Dynasty's fiscal revenue of tens of millions of taels a year was difficult to maintain, and it still owed the salaries of many officials. Moreover, as the occupied area became larger and larger, there were more and more officials, and
The number of arrears is getting bigger and bigger. Officials of the Payroll Department of the Ministry of Taxation have made petitions more than once, asking them to reduce expenditures in other areas and pay out salaries first to avoid further expansion of the total national payroll debt. Otherwise, this will
It will be a huge financial pressure.
You know, in the past, part of the arrears was owed every year. Added up over the past few years, the total accumulated national debt for official salaries has now exceeded 15 million taels of silver, and the annual interest payments alone have reached nearly one million taels.
Two, and some of the three-year salary treasury bonds are now maturing one after another. The principal of the salary treasury bonds that Xuan Ping needs to repay in seven years is as high as 3 million!
In addition, the Tang Dynasty also issued construction treasury bonds to the public with a total of eight million silver. The interest and period of this treasury bond and the salary treasury bond are the same!
In other words, the Tang Dynasty currently owes a total of 23 million taels of national debt!
As a central dynasty, it has never happened before in ancient times that it owes so much money. But what makes the people in the tax department helpless is that the Holy Emperor does not seem to care about the debt pressure, and even asked the people in the tax department to prepare for the announcement.
In the past seven years, we have continued to expand the issuance of construction treasury bonds, and to what extent?
Ten million a year!
Emperor Sheng said that in the seventh year of Xuanping, at least 10 million construction treasury bonds must be issued!
However, people in the tax department are worried that if the total national debt continues to expand, it will inevitably be necessary to borrow new debt to repay old debts. The annual interest will cost millions of taels of silver, and the finance will not be able to support it by then.
In the Tang Dynasty, tens of millions of taels of silver a year were not enough to spend, and they still needed to issue national bonds. However, the Ming Dynasty only had a few million in a year. It is not surprising that they were destroyed by the Tang Dynasty.
Gong Wenbao took several deep breaths in succession to calm down the excitement in his heart and suppressed many messy thoughts. Then he looked at his men on the side and saw that these people also looked dumbfounded.
Damn it, they were also frightened by Chen Lifu’s words!
After coughing lightly to cover up his embarrassed expression, Gong Wenbao said: "Director Chen is indeed from a noble family and is well-informed, but Gong is from an ordinary family. Let alone one million taels of cash, even if it is ten thousand
I’ve never seen two cash coins before!”
Gong Wenbao is actually quite knowledgeable. He has seen hundreds of thousands and millions of taels, but all he has seen are bank cashier's checks, but they belong to others, and although the numbers on the bank cashier's checks are huge,
, but it’s just a series of numbers, definitely not as shocking as cash.
Chen Lifu didn't say anything. He didn't mean to show off the Chen family's wealth. In fact, there was nothing to show off. Money, when it reaches a certain level, basically means nothing, and
There are many things in this world that money cannot help him solve.
For example, what Chen Lifu is pursuing now, money cannot bring him!
He wants to expel all the rebellious ministers and traitors from the court, and he wants to help the Holy Lord create a peaceful and prosperous age. Can this money help him?
cannot!
And in Chinese society, money is important even if it is important, and it is not important even if it is not important. Especially in Chen Lifu, power is definitely more important than money!
Only with power can he realize many of his ideals, but his family's millions of assets cannot help him realize these ideals.
He said this just to make it clear: "I am not short of money, and I will not ruin my future or my ideals just for a few hundred thousand taels of silver!"
Well, this is just Chen Lifu's own idea, because in his eyes, it's just a few hundred thousand taels of silver.
Gong Wenbao calmed down his mood and continued to ask another question he was concerned about, which was also the question he was most concerned about: "Director Chen Bing, the housekeeper of your house, should be very familiar with him. Let's talk about this person!"