Chapter 615 Chongzhen's Anger Beijing City at the end of the Ming Dynasty has many ancient buildings, especially Fayuan Temple, which is an ancient temple built in the nineteenth year of Tang Zhenguan, which was the place where the Jin Dynasty detained Song Huizong and Song Qin Song, and hundreds of years of buildings abound.But from another point of view, the economy of the capital is stagnant, and now there are almost no decent enterprises in the capital, and all the business establishments cannot be operated without background and background.In particular, many streets are paved with stone slabs, but those muddy alleys will turn into a sea once the rainy season arrives, and there are yellow and white things floating in the sewage, which is simply miserable.The rain system in the city of Beijing is hard to believe, except that the sewer system of the Forbidden City is quite powerful, and it has never been flooded since it was built......
Can only hehe.Not to mention that Chongzhen fell in love with the Jinzhou City in the painting, Quan Xu also liked it, because Jinzhou was a city he built according to the city of later generations, in fact, the entire Liaodong, and even the current Taiwan, Luzon and Qiongzhou Mansions, are almost the same.For example, the sewer system alone is more than fifteen kilometers long, and in addition to sewers, there are also culverts, and each fort is a higher place in the local area, and is never built in a low-lying place.The city of Liaodong is clean and hygienic, even if it has a large number of horses and cows, and the horse manure and cow dung cleaned up every day are as many as several million catties, but the urban living conditions in Jinzhou are indeed better than those in the capital.Of course, this is only relative, if you are in an industrial area, the noise, dust, smoke and pungent smell there are also desperate, especially the cement and fertilizer plants, which are surrounded by fifteen kilometers and are filled with pungent smells and desperate dust.Quan Xu faced Chongzhen's doubts, and there was no way to answer, he thought for a while and said: "I can only work hard, there are no idlers in Jinzhou, Liaodong, everyone needs to work, everyone pays taxes, including myself, those textile factories, cloth villages, and embroidery buildings under the supervision of Anqing also need to pay taxes, and she is still angry with me."
I told her, I can't do this, everyone is watching, if I don't pay taxes, Shen Mingze doesn't want to pay them, and other powerful people won't pay either, and the result is that I can't collect taxes, the government has no money, what do I want to build roads to, and rely on those landlords and gentry to be conscious?
They will spend a lot of gold on Yangzhou thin horses, and when they pay taxes, they don't even want to pay a tael of silver!
”Chongzhen fell silent.In a capitalist country, if Congress wants the capitalists to raise taxes, it is conceivably difficult that they would rather spend a billion dollars on a president than pay an extra 10 million in taxes.Correspondingly, the gentry of the Ming Dynasty are actually "capitalists", they are essentially different from capitalists, capitalists are willing to do anything in order to pursue profits, such as improving machines and improving production efficiency, but these gentry are far from this consciousness.They only thought of using the tenants to farm the land, using their own privileges to seize by force, and to a certain extent, the capitalists promoted the development of science and technology, while the gentry hindered the development of science and technology.Chongzhen is indeed working hard for the Ming Empire, he is 1611, now he is only twenty-three years old, and he is twenty-four years old, in fact, he is several years younger than Quan Xu's actual age, but, due to hard work, his hair is a little thin, the hairline has moved up, and more importantly, his hair and beard have shown signs of gray.The people of the Ming Dynasty, although they are poor and have a difficult life, among the ordinary people of a thousand people, there is a thin person, but most of the officials of the Ming Dynasty are obese, seven of the ten officials are fat, and two are born thin and weak, otherwise they are like Sun Chengzong and Yuan Keli, because of anxiety and hard work, they are getting thinner and thinner.Chongzhen sighed: "In the past two years, the rain in Beili has become less and less, the weather has become colder and colder, and the weather has become more and more abnormal, has Liaodong not been affected?"
”"To say that there is no impact, that is impossible!"
Quan Xu smiled bitterly: "The weather in Liaodong is colder than the capital, the coldest time, like this time, has been covered by heavy snow, overnight, the heavy snow will bury the windows and doors, and there have been many tragedies, some people because of the heavy snow buried, can not get out, exhausted the air in the room, suffocated to death, this phenomenon is very rare, under normal circumstances, there is a chimney in their room, there will be no phenomenon of running out of oxygen." ”"What about the drought?"
Chongzhen's most worrying problem is drought, if you want to say cold, which year will be cold in winter, but Chongzhen's six years, Chongzhen's seven years almost the eighteen mansions in the north of Zhili, all of them were affected, and none of them were spared."
There is also dry weather in Liaodong, it is rare to not rain for two or three months, although the grain production will be reduced, but there are enough ditches, there are also enough water wheels and screw pumps, although the grain output is reduced by two or three percent, but it will not be lost!"
Chongzhen is a little difficult to accept, the same weather, why can Liaodong protect higher grain production?
You must know that if it weren't for the two million stone grains that Quan Xu transported this year, the capital doesn't know how many people would starve to death.There are about 134,000 households in the capital of Beijing, plus more than 200,000 Beijing camps, a total of more than 1 million people, and now the Beijing camp has been streamlined by two-thirds of Chongzhen, and now plus the people and military families, Beijing's population is free of more than 1 million, that is to say, the grain transported from Liaodong, each person can share nearly two stones, that is, more than 370 catties, basically these grains can ensure that they will not starve to death."
Why don't the people learn from Liaodong to build ditches and build waterwheels?"
Chongzhen was a little puzzled: "Are those ministers blind, or are the people too lazy?"
”"It's not that they're lazy, it's not that they don't learn!"
Quan Xu muttered: "Because of the cost, there is no shortage of water in the capital, such as the Juma River, Yongding River, North Canal, Chaobai River, Ji Canal, etc., these rivers can supply two-thirds of the farmland consumption, but the problem is that although the cost of building a waterwheel, a waterwheel that can irrigate ten acres of land, the cost needs eight taels of silver, but the output of ten acres of land is not worth eight taels of silver, and many rich landlords would rather lose the harvest than repair the waterwheel!"
”Quan Xu used the grain of Liaodong, Taiwan and Luzon to desperately suppress the grain price in the Central Plains, and would rather lose money or even ride the road fee to suppress the grain price, just to force those landlords to death.The grain grown by ordinary people is barely enough for themselves to eat and drink, because the price of grain is low, it is not cost-effective to farm, and the landlords still need tenants to cultivate, and they can collect three or five buckets of rent for one acre of land, which is not a small amount in total.However, Liaodong, Taiwan, and Luzon, those who need population, Quan Xu can emigrate there and fool the tenants of the Central Plains, so that the landlords' fields can only be deserted, and in a short time, they can still hold on, but after a long time, they will be finished.This way of suppressing food prices will definitely affect ordinary people, but ordinary people have very low requirements for life, and they can barely bear it, they will grow vegetables in front of and behind the house, and they will use the sea salt in Liaodong to meet the basic needs of life.In this way, in fact, the most uncomfortable is still the landlord.This is just like the macroeconomic regulation and control of later generations, when macroeconomic regulation and control, the most uncomfortable people are not ordinary people, but the so-called middle class.They have a certain economic foundation, but they are eager to pursue a high quality of life, so their lives are even more difficult.The so-called middle class is actually leeks, harvested one by one.Chongzhen suddenly grasped the core of the question: "The poor grain harvest in the northern provinces is not the real weather reason, but unprofitable, those landlords, take the initiative to abandon the waste?"
”Quan Xu said lightly: "You can't say that......"
In fact, the fields in the north are abandoned, and Quan Xu and the Liaodong Department are the real culprits.Chongzhen roared indignantly: "I know, I know, these damn landlords ......"
In fact, nominally, the emperor is the landlord of the feudal era, but in fact, the emperor is very pitiful, especially Emperor Chongzhen, he is the poorest emperor in the history of the Ming Dynasty, there is no one.He was also the poorest emperor in the entire history of ancient China.The Ming gentry were actually spoiled, they did not have to pay taxes, but used their status privileges to monopolize the fields, and they were unscrupulous to create internal contradictions.If you want to say that you are rich or unkind, you are talking about them.Chongzhen seemed to think of something, and waved his hand to beckon Wang Chengen: "What Wu Weihou said just now, did you hear it?"
”"Back to the emperor, the slave heard it!"
Chongzhen said: "Around the capital, did those landlords abandon the fields?
”"It's not all, there are quite a few landlords who have abandoned their fields!"
Wang Chengen observed Quan Xu's face while observing Chongzhen's face."
Who is the biggest landlord in the capital?""
Jiading Bo Zhou Guozhang!"
Jiading Bo Zhou Kui is actually not the largest landlord in the capital, but nominally it is, because the landlords of the other gentry will more or less hide people's eyes and ears and scatter, it is possible that a little-known landlord, the hundreds of thousands of acres of land under his name, are actually the property of a certain magnate.Zhou Kui had the most land, and that was because he used his status as a noble to accept a large number of investments, and one or two hundred middle and lower landlords hung the fields in Zhou Kui's name.Chongzhen asked, "How much land does he have?"
”"There are no less than 500,000 acres, and there are more than 60 granges!"
Chongzhen asked again: "How many stones is he?"
”"Taking Chongzhen's seventh year as an example, he harvested more than 54,000 stones every year!""
Bastard!"
Even if the weather is dry and only one stone of grain is produced per acre, he should have a harvest of more than 500,000 stones, in fact, Zhou Kui's annual grain harvest is only 54,000 stones, less than one-tenth of the land under his name.How could Chongzhen not know what kind of character his father-in-law was?
However, the son does not say anything about the father, the elders are the elders, and Chongzhen did not want to leave a reputation for being unkind, so he did not deal with it, but when he learned that Zhou Kui's field exceeded 500,000 mu, he only received more than 50,000 stone of grain.Chongzhen was out of control in an instant.