Chapter 52: The Burden

Yu Qian thought for a while, wanted to persuade him tactfully, and said, "Your Majesty, I don't know how much food Your Majesty is willing to give to the university and middle school?" ”

Grain is the food given by the government, which can be understood as a subsidy.

Zhu Qizhen didn't know how to answer for a while, and said, "Food? ”

Yu Qian said: "Your Majesty, if Your Majesty doesn't plan to give food, the minister thinks that a truly talented person will not take this road." ”

"Your Majesty doesn't know the poverty of the people, and the minister doesn't know how much Your Majesty is going to accept in the middle school, but there are at least a thousand people in each of the four university halls. And His Majesty will not let everyone in middle school be admitted to university, otherwise it will not, there is an exam. ”

"If you want to come to the two capitals, 24 provinces and six capitals, a total of 32 middle schools, each sector has at least a few thousand people, and in total, there are more than 10,000 to 20,000 students."

"People who are really talented from a family background will not take this road, they will take the imperial examination, and people who are really poor and talented will not take this road, without him, the imperial examination can study by themselves at home, and they only need to buy books, and even if they can't buy books, they can copy books and borrow books."

"And living in a provincial city, all kinds of expenses are huge, even if the schools of the imperial court are not restricted, it is not something that such a poor student can afford."

"In this way, all Your Majesty can recruit is some gentlemen, what can you hope for?"

"It also directly selects talents from among the failed imperial examinations, enters the school to study, and then assigns official positions."

Zhu Qizhen immediately rejected Yu Qian's opinion in his heart.

He wanted a system that was cut off from the bottom of the imperial examination. It is not another path that has been transferred from the imperial examination.

Zhu Qizhen said: "How much food do you need?" ”

Yu Qian pondered for a moment and said, "One person has three stones of grain a year. ”

Zhu Qizhen frowned slightly and said, "Three stone grains? ”

Not too much, but too little.

In the records of the Ming people, one stone of grain is ninety-two kilograms, one stone is equal to ten buckets, and one bucket is equal to ten liters, and if a strong laborer works, the daily ration is one liter, nearly one kilogram of rice.

Don't think it's too much, the ancient people didn't have oil and water to eat, so they could only hold more staple food. Generally an adult is well fed, which is this number.

In this way, one stone of grain can feed a person for hundreds of days. Three stones of grain were enough to feed people for three hundred days.

But as Yu Qian said, this school will definitely be established in the provincial capital, and living in the provincial capital also requires expenses, so as to do so. He also needs to spend food.

In other words, this subsidy is simply not enough for students to blow their fill.

Yu Qian said: "It's enough, it's much stronger than Fan Wenzheng's porridge cut." ”

Zhu Qizhen was dumbfounded for a while.

Fan Wenzhenggong is Fan Zhongyan. When he was young, he was very poor, and every night, he cooked a pot of porridge with brown rice, and when it was frozen the next morning, he cut it into four pieces with a knife, ate two pieces in the morning, and ate two more pieces in the evening, which was called "drawing porridge". If there is no vegetable, cut some pickled vegetables and eat them, which is "broken teeth". Learning with such a firm belief is the only way to achieve something.

Although Yu Qian's family was a little better when he was young, he also saw the poverty and hard work of his classmates at that time.

Therefore, he felt that the standards he set were good enough, at least they could make the students hungry, so that they would not be cut into porridge, which was a little better than Fan Wenzhenggong at the beginning.

Zhu Qizhen did the math and found that it was not too much.

Although the price of grain has not yet dropped to 25 wen and one stone, the downward trend is obvious, after all, the imperial court will no longer fight, and if Zhu Qizhen does nothing, it is very likely that the price of grain will fall below 200 wen in the future.

Although it can't reach the plan of the Tang Dynasty, the rice is ten dollars. But it can also break the lower limit of 20 dollars for doumi.

Therefore, the grain of Sanshi is less than one tael of silver, so the annual subsidy is only 30,000 taels according to 30,000 students, and Zhu Qizhen is subsidized.

Although Zhu Qizhen felt sorry for the students, he also knew that he couldn't mention too high a standard of living, after all, the Ming Dynasty was here.

Although the imperial court was rich, most of the people were not wealthy.

Zhu Qizhen said: "Then according to what Mr. said, this money is out of the treasury." ”

Yu Qian said: "Your Majesty, if you take a hair and move the whole body, there will be no more than 1,000 officials in all departments of the imperial court every year, and no more than 10,000 people in the local yamen. ”

"And when students study, they can work hard and cultivate their minds, but if they enter the office, they have to support their families. Now there are more than 10,000 officials in Beijing, and the annual cost is tens of thousands of taels. ”

"These hundreds of thousands of taels are in the imperial court, which is a dime in nine years, but the capital is also a corner of the world. How to change the twenty-four provinces at the same time, why the imperial court can bear such a big burden, it can be said that it is not inferior to the weight of raising troops, please think twice. ”

The military expenditure of more than 10 million taels is the largest expenditure of the imperial court. The revenues from customs duties, salt taxes, and even tea taxes were appropriated.

If there is no war, 10 million taels may be a little less, but once there is a war, 10 million taels is not enough, at least 1,300 or 4 million taels, or even 20 million taels.

This has accounted for nearly forty percent of the imperial court expenditure.

The remaining few percent of the imperial court's finances are responsible for the hundred officials, the vassal kings, the emperor's gold and silver, and the most important ones are the water conservancy projects, the funds for the galloping project, and the disaster relief expenses that must be prepared all the time.

When the year is good, you can have a surplus, ranging from one million taels to several million taels. But once there is a catastrophe, it is not much easier for the court to spend money like flowing water, than to fight a war.

So Yu Qian really didn't want Zhu Qizhen to do this

Thing.

Zhu Qizhen said: "Is it right to abolish the officials and appoint officials? ”

Yu Qian said: "Yes. ”

Zhu Qizhen said: "The right thing should be done." Even if you can't do it all, you have to do it little by little, otherwise when? ”

"Don't worry about money, sir."

Yu Qian said: "Your Majesty, can you no longer raise taxes?" No more taxes must be raised. ”

Although Zhu Qizhen has done a lot of things, Yu Qian is more worried when he sees the rising taxes of the imperial court, after all, many people feel that the wealth of the world is constant, not in the government but in the people.

Today, the imperial court's financial income is more than 4,000 stone of grain and more than 15 million taels of silver every year. These figures are much more than in the middle of Yongle.

This made many people a little uneasy, especially for the sake of clearing the land, and the case in Suzhou made many people even more uneasy.

Collecting taxes from the private sector is really something that can easily cause shocks.

Zhu Qizhen said: "Please rest assured that Mr. has my own way." ”

Zhu Qizhen is ready to implement the financial reform that Zhou Chen did not complete before, and this time there are many favorable factors compared to before, that is, the technology of water conservancy stamping is already very mature.

After all, many armor and sword soldiers in the Ming army were built in this way, and a little transformation was used to create gold and silver coins, which also worked.

Coupled with the development of Northeast China, a large number of gold mines have been discovered, and Zhaoyuan Jinshan has also been produced. There is also the discovery of silver on Sado Island, which has greatly advanced the mining of silver in Japan.

After all, Japan itself is a country rich in gold and silver mines, and there are many legends of gold and silver in various places, and it is not unique to Sado Island.

The silver mine on Sado Island stimulated a large number of prospecting by the Japanese daimyo and the shogunate, and naturally there will be discoveries. As a result, Japan's silver production has been rising.

Most of their silver entered Haidong Province through Nagasaki and then into China.

Zhu Qizhen estimated that just the minting of silver into silver coins would have a profit of 30%, and at least a few million taels of input per year. Of course, this input is not stable.

After all, the Japanese form is not too good. 、

Last year, the Japanese envoy asked for the canonization of the Japanese prince, although Zhu Qizhen knew what was going on behind it, but after thinking about it for a long time, Zhu Qizhen still approved.

After all, first, when he came to Japan to ask for the crown prince, there was no problem according to the procedures of the Ming Dynasty, and it was impossible to refuse to accept the daily routine because of Japan's internal problems, and secondly, Zhu Qizhen even hoped that the Ming Dynasty would canonize the prince and be killed, just to take Japan down.

Japan's gold and silver, Zhu Qizhen has been in love for a long time. If silver mines such as Iwami are mined in advance, they can bring additional income to the Ming Dynasty.

Money is sometimes a weapon, and Zhu Qizhen's weapon allows him to better complete the change.