Abundant manpower is the main reason that restricts the progress of social productivity in the Ming Dynasty.

Grianchi's point of view is undoubtedly a question that Zhu Yunwen has never thought about, and in his perception of ancient society, he has always been an unswerving population party.

That is, the more mouths and more land there are in the country, the stronger the country becomes.

Even a few hundred years later, when the Manchu Dynasty, with a population of 40,000, was overwhelmed by thousands of Anglo-French troops, the vast majority of people would only think that it was because of the development of firearms in the West.

At a time when firearms were not fully popularized or evolved to the point where large-scale slaughter could be formed into a formed army, wasn't population the most intuitive expression of national strength?

"How cheap is the labor force of Daming?"

Grianch gives a vivid example to support his point.

"A landlord owns 10,000 acres of land, and he hires a thousand landless tenant farmers to farm, and each tenant farmer only needs to pay one or two taels of silver every year, and Ping Suri only needs to take care of a full meal at noon, these are the landlord's input for a year, and the return is the output of 10,000 acres of land.

The landlord also had the option of buying 100 ploughing oxen, tying them to a plough rake, and hiring 100 tenant farmers to drive them to plough 10,000 acres of land.

One hundred ploughing cattle, even if the Ming Dynasty now owns the entire grassland, is worth far more than five thousand taels, and the annual expenses of eating cattle chew are three hundred taels.

In ten years, the expenditure of employing tenant farmers for ten years is only more than 10,000 taels.

Although the purchase of cattle is a one-time investment, the expenditure over the past ten years has also reached 8,000 taels.

The return on investment is too low and the risk is too high.

If the cattle die within 10 years and the land suffers a natural disaster, these investments will be wasted.

Therefore, the landlord will still choose the most primitive mode of production for production, which is the subjective manifestation of cheap labor. ”

After presenting this example, Grianch continued to elaborate his point.

"This is the development of social civilization, the main mode of production of society along a certain model has reached the upper limit, so that stagnation is a kind of internal inability to fully digest excess capacity, resulting in the continuous reduction of the remuneration obtained by labor according to the hierarchy."

The content of Grianch's paragraph has a professional term in later generations, called economic involution.

China's economic involution process is a landmark and unique overpopulation.

"In Daming, you can see idle people everywhere."

Grianch's words are biased, but it is also a very grim fact: "After the annual agricultural work, the people will idle a large number of laborers, and in the early years, there were still government-run projects in the Ming Dynasty to employ these idle laborers.

In recent years, after your country has taken a large number of labor slaves in India, the infrastructure projects that require the most labor force have been replaced by the Indian Asan, which has freed up hundreds of thousands of civilian labor at once.

The vacant labor force wants to seek a job, and the hired capital party can naturally reduce the payment of wages in this situation.

Labor costs have fallen to an extremely low level, which has greatly suppressed the consumption power of the people, and even in Nanjing, more than half of the people are in a state of poverty and poverty.

And Your Majesty, do you think there is a family in Quanzhou like the one in Nanjing who is barely able to make ends meet?

No, the quality of life of the people of Quanzhou is completely several times that of Nanjing, the capital of your country, isn't that enough for you to reflect? ”

"According to what you say, it's me, isn't it?"

Zhu Yunwen's face was a little unbearable, he felt that his IQ or insight was pressed to the ground by an ancient person and rubbed against it was a shame for a modern person, especially when this ancient person was still a foreigner.

"If I don't catch the slaves in the infrastructure project, will it be difficult to fill in the flesh and blood of my Ming people?"

Where is the infrastructure can be opened with a touch of the upper and lower mouths.

In the early days of the Yongle Dynasty, the Shandong Canal was repaired, and tens of thousands of workers and peasants were killed and injured before and after, which directly forced the White Lotus Sect in the land of Qilu to rebel.

There were two prosperous dynasties of Hongwu and Yongle, and local and periodical rebellions also emerged one after another, not to mention the Jiajing and Wanli dynasties in the middle and late Ming Dynasty.

Ten years and nine anti-anti have become the norm.

"Also, you said that the overcapacity of labor has led to a decline in productivity, and the capital side is stagnant, is it possible that you still let me kill my own people to release it?"

Zhu Yunwen glared, startling Grianchi.

The latter waved his hand again and again, and his face turned pale: "No, no, no, the excess population capacity is not necessarily all disadvantages, but it is also beneficial." ”

Seeing that the emperor did not speak, Grianch looked at him cautiously and said carefully.

"The surplus of labor is absolutely detrimental to a closed society, because if it cannot be digested internally, it will continue to produce a decreasing economic hierarchy internally.

Not only will it undermine the urbanization process, but it will also shift the focus of other industrial sideline industries except agriculture.

However, the surplus of labor is relatively favorable for an open economic environment.

This is the reason why your first two economic requirements, Your Majesty the Emperor, are in conflict with the third, as I mentioned earlier. ”

Restricting the development of capital and strictly controlling the inflow of foreign capital is a closed social and economic system, and the surplus labor resources of the Ming Dynasty are bound to inevitably produce involution.

"Without the inflow of external capital, Daming's domestic capital can enjoy the demographic dividend and enjoy the inexhaustible population resources.

If there is not enough grain, they hire people to plant it, if there is not enough cloth, they hire people to weave it, and if there is not enough coal mines, they hire people to dig it, and this is to increase the quantity of production by piling up the number of people.

Once the access of foreign capital is liberalized, there will be more choices of available labor in the employment relationship, although the nature is still oppressive.

But at the very least, it can increase the cost of hiring labor.

In foreign trade, because the cost of goods in the Ming Dynasty itself is correspondingly reduced because of the extremely low cost of labor, it is absolutely competitive in large transactions.

For the same spinning, the price of Europa is more expensive than that of Daming, which is caused by the poor labor.

In this way, there is a trade surplus, and this is where I mentioned earlier is relatively advantageous.

The introduction of a large amount of foreign capital and the internal increase of labor costs can shift the focus of development on the capital side.

Once it is difficult to make ends meet by relying on the number of people to increase production, then it is necessary to find ways to reduce labor costs while still keeping productivity from decreasing.

Either the desperate exploitation and exploitation of labor, or the technological innovation.

At present, Quanzhou has taken firm and powerful steps in this area, and has also seen the achievements.

Compared with the records I saw more than ten years ago, Daming's sea ship technology has made obvious progress, which is what the capital side has guided and promoted in order to increase the speed of maritime trade and make more money by making two more trips.

Therefore, I suggest to Your Majesty the Emperor that Quanzhou's progress should not stop at this time, but on the contrary, you should encourage and support a larger-scale opening up, not only in Quanzhou, but also in Fuzhou, Guangzhou, Zhujiang and other places.

The Ming Dynasty is a great empire, and it is also an empire full of wealth and opportunity, and it is a treasure land that countless overseas merchants rush to. ”

After Grianch's words were finished, Zhu Yunwen fell silent.

He understood what Grianch meant, so he needed to think carefully about the pros and cons.

Is it to fully liberalize and encourage the progress of capital and its proportional position in this country, or to draw a limited framework, so that capital can jump in it, only as one of the sources of tax revenue in the country.

But Grianch does have a point.

The Ming Dynasty includes all previous dynasties, whether it was the prosperous era such as the Kaiyuan Dynasty, or the highly developed free trade during the Southern Song Dynasty.

The people of the Central Plains have never really achieved prosperity.

The vast majority of more than 90 percent of the people are still barely passing the food and clothing line.

Most people have been emphasizing productivity, but a few of them really understand what the social relations are related to productivity.

Zhu Yunwen originally thought he understood, but after coming to Daming, he found that he didn't understand, but now he understands.

The increase in productivity due to technological innovation is only the result that can be seen at a glance, and the change of socio-economic patterns is the precondition for promoting technological innovation.

And at this point, Chinese dynasties for thousands of years have not bothered to think about this problem.

This was the case in the Tang, Song, Yuan, Ming and Qing dynasties, and even the most serious era of economic involution was the Qianlong and Jiajing periods.

More than 400 million Chinese live on this land, and local small landlords and small capitalists can safely lie on the heads of hundreds of millions of people and suck blood.

In modern terms, it is to enjoy the 'demographic dividend'.

The demographic dividend has never been enjoyed by the common people, but by the factories and capitalists.

Because the more people, the cheaper the labor.

And the cheaper the labor, the less valuable the handicrafts that the people have worked so hard to produce, or the precious medicines that they have taken their lives to hunt and rummage through the mountains and mountains are not worth much.

Human life is not valuable, so what you exchange money for is still worth it?

This is the low-level equilibrium trap in the process of economic involution.

After this socio-economic system, only the ruling class and the bourgeoisie are the most comfortable, and as for the quality of life of the more than 400 million ordinary people, it is impossible to imagine.

You can't eat enough, and you can't wear warmth.

Modern China has not even undergone a process of changing its socio-economic form, but has directly reached the stage of increasing productivity due to technological innovation.

It's just that this way of obtaining technological innovation is not derived by ourselves, but passively using Western science and technology to learn after the Opium War.

"Your Majesty the Great Emperor, I have read some books collected from your quotations in the Hanlin Academy in Nanjing.

In this book, you mentioned that when the domestic environment of the Ming Dynasty reached saturation, it was necessary to seek external expansion to divert domestic contradictions.

I am in awe of your foresight, and isn't that exactly what I suggested. ”

"Eat first."

At this time, a row of waiters entered with delicious food, and Zhu Yunwen didn't say anything more, and began to beckon Qi Glianqi to eat.

"I will think about your proposal, and in a few days, you will go south to Guangzhou with me to have a look."

Grianch was overjoyed.

There is a saying about his honor in the Ming Dynasty, which is called accompanying the royal front.

Keep up the good work, maybe you can remove the sub-word on your head!