Although it is already spring, the further north it goes, the colder it feels, especially in the morning and evening, when the breeze blows, it can be cold to the bones, Li Jie is wearing the clothes made by Zhu Yuning for him, although the style is not very good-looking, and it is not very comfortable to wear, but it is very warm, enough to withstand the cold wind in the morning and evening.

Li Jie sat in front of the car window, looking at the farmland on both sides of the official road and fell into contemplation, now they have entered the boundary of Henan, although the administrative areas of Henan in the Ming Dynasty and Henan in later generations are somewhat different, but they are generally the same.

When it comes to Henan, Li Jie's first thought is the land of the Central Plains, and Li Jie remembers that when he was in middle school, it was clearly written in the textbook that Henan was the only province with a population of more than 100 million at that time, of course, it was later surpassed by Guangdong, but Henan's population still ranked second.

You must know that when Li Jie was in middle school, it was not long after the reform and opening up, and the differences between the provinces were not very obvious, and the area of Henan was not large, and it was only ranked in the middle and lower positions in each province.

But the facts are the facts, the reason why Henan can feed so many people is because Henan really has the capital to feed so many people, compared with other provinces, most of the territory of Henan is an endless plain, coupled with the suitable climate and fertile land, resulting in a high grain production here, since ancient times it is the largest grain producing area in China.

However, everything has advantages and disadvantages, for example, in later generations, Henan was positioned as an agricultural province, and the area of cultivated land had a strict red line, which led to great restrictions on industry, so Henan's economic development in later generations was not very good, although it ranked fifth overall, but per capita was very low.

In the ancient agricultural society, although Henan seems to occupy a great advantage, but this advantage also brings a curse, that is, whenever there is a war, the plain of Henan is not dangerous to defend, and the army of the Quartet can enter Henan at any time, and Henan is a granary, which is naturally regarded as fat meat by many people, attracting countless troops to fight here, and the people also frequently suffer from war.

For example, taking the present as an example, the war at the end of the Yuan Dynasty led to a great decrease in the population of Henan, and after Lao Zhu unified the world, he once counted the population of various places, of which the total population of Henan was only 1.89 million, and Hebei in the north was not much better, and the population was almost equal to Henan.

In contrast, the adjacent Shanxi has a population of more than 4 million, more than Henan and Hebei combined, the main reason is that Shanxi is mountainous, and it is difficult for rebels to enter Shanxi, and even if they are killed in Shanxi, the people can take refuge in the mountains, so the barren Shanxi can retain so many people.

It is also in this context that Lao Zhu started a vigorous migration in the early Ming Dynasty, moving the residents of Shanxi to the Central Plains, it is said that there were a total of 17 times, and it was not until the Yongle period when Zhu Di was in power that it stopped, and it lasted for more than 40 years, and the total number of migrants reached more than one million.

Although in the eyes of later generations, the migration of a million people is not too difficult, but it is extremely difficult for the ancient society, because at this time, the transportation is backward, and people can only walk on two legs, in addition to the lack of materials, coupled with the rural concept is heavier, so that the people are not willing to stay away from their homeland, which makes it more difficult to immigrate.

However, Lao Zhu is very tough on the matter of immigration, he first put the people of Shanxi into the military households, and then in the name of mobilizing the army to relocate these people, in order to prevent the immigrants from escaping on the road, but also tied their hands into a string, these people want to urinate when they can only let the guards untie their hands, over time, the release has become synonymous with urine, and even until later generations, people in Henan and other places still call the toilet as a relief.

Li Jie was also observing the fields on both sides of the road along the way, when he first entered the territory of Henan, he found that there were barren fields everywhere on both sides of the road, you must know that this is an official road, and the fields on both sides should be very sought-after, but there are still a large number of wasteland, because there are few people on the land, and they can't be cultivated at all.

However, as the team moved forward, Li Jie found that the further north he went, the less wasteland on both sides of the road, most of which had been reclaimed into fields, and even some villages could be seen on the plains.

After these people are relocated, the local government will set aside a piece of land for them to open up the wasteland, of course, the imperial court will also provide some seeds, farm tools and other materials, as long as you can reclaim the wasteland, and plant it for several years in a row, then this land is yours, and the imperial court will not collect taxes in previous years.

Compared with those real wastelands, most of the wasteland in Henan used to be fertile land, only because of the war, the owner of the field either fled or died, which led to the abandonment of the field, but as long as the patient cultivation for a few years, these wasteland can be restored into fertile land, which is much easier than starting from scratch, so these immigrants can get a large piece of land as long as they survive the first few years.

"What do you think?" At this moment, Zhu Biao suddenly patted Li Jie on the shoulder and asked, this journey is too boring, so Zhu Biao often calls Li Jie to accompany him, or play chess or chat, and sometimes discuss what he has seen on the road.

"I'm thinking about Your Majesty's relocation of people to the Central Plains." Li Jie said truthfully.

"It turned out to be this matter, but to be honest, my father and emperor had a lot of infamy in order to do this, and many ministers also opposed the relocation of the people, believing that it would make the people leave their hometowns and may even cause civil unrest." Zhu Biao sighed at the end, in fact, those people were not wrong, the relocation of the people did cause some riots, but these still did not change his father's decision.

"There are pros and cons in everything, and sometimes some decisions made by the upper echelons, although beneficial in the long run, will touch the interests of the lower echelons." Li Jie also sighed when he heard this, there is no right or wrong in this kind of thing, and some decisions that seem right now may also become wrong in the future as time goes by.

"Yes, there must be advantages and disadvantages, for example, taking household registration as an example, my father took over a chaotic world, in order to restore order in the world as soon as possible, so all walks of life were classified into household registration, so that the world was orderly in a short period of time, but after a long time, I always feel that there will be problems with this household registration system!" At this time, Zhu Biao suddenly said with some emotion.

"Your Highness also thinks there is a problem with the household registration?" Li Jie also looked at Zhu Biao in surprise when he heard this, he didn't expect Zhu Biao to see the drawbacks of household registration, and he really deserved to be the heir selected by Lao Zhu, if Zhu Biao could really take over smoothly, maybe he could really correct many of the shortcomings left by Lao Zhu.

"What do you mean, do you feel the same way I do?" Zhu Biao also looked at Li Jiedao in surprise, he was just taking household registration as an example, and even used it to teach Li Jie a lesson, but he didn't expect Li Jie to have the same opinion.

"Yes, although the household registration makes the world orderly, but after a long time, the people are firmly tied to their respective occupations by the household registration, and the farmers are forgotten, but the military households and artisan households will inevitably have big problems!" Li Jie said with great certainty.

Hearing Li Jie say this, Zhu Biao's eyes lit up, and he immediately discussed the pros and cons of the household registration system with him in detail, and the more he discussed, the more shocked he became, Li Jie's cognition of the household registration system was far beyond his imagination, and even many places he didn't expect, Li Jie also thought of it.

In fact, it is not that Li Jie is smart, but he knows that the military collapse of the Ming Dynasty in history is mainly the collapse of the military household system.

The artisan households are the same, Lao Tzu is a blacksmith, and his son is still a blacksmith, and no matter how much he does, it is the same, just like eating a big pot of rice, so that the craftsmen have no motivation to work at all, which also leads to a sharp decline in the quality of the army's weapons, and the musket is frequently exploded, and it cannot be used at all.

It turns out that the Ming Dynasty in history was deeply affected by the Japanese invaders, mainly because the southern guards were too corrupt, and the northern guards were threatened by the grasslands, and the guards could still maintain a certain combat effectiveness, but the southern guards were rotten to the roots, and even a few Japanese robberies could defeat thousands of Ming troops, and the root cause was the complete collapse of the military household system.

Of course, the harm of the hukou system is far more than that, because the hukou will most people are firmly tied to the land, can not flow freely, which also greatly hinders the development of industry and commerce, the original in the Song Dynasty appeared in the bud of capitalism, but in the Ming Dynasty stagnated, although it can not be said that the harsh hukou system, but it is certainly one of the main reasons.

Zhu Biao was also very excited to listen to Li Jie's story, he found that he still underestimated Li Jie, he didn't expect him to have such a deep insight into government affairs, it seems that his son-in-law is really right.

"Since the hukou system will cause so much harm, how do you think it should be changed?" Finally, Zhu Biao asked Li Jie.

"Change is definitely going to change, but not now!" When Li Jie heard this, he dissuaded him, although the household registration system will cause great harm, but that will be in the future, and now the household registration system is still beneficial to Daming, at least it can allow Daming to recover his strength faster, so now is not the time to change.

Zhu Biao also woke up when he heard this, and immediately nodded in agreement, he was indeed a little anxious, the household registration system was set by his father, with his father's ability, of course, he knew the pros and cons of the household registration system, but he still implemented it, presumably it was the advantages of its early stage, as for the disadvantages of the later stage, it was necessary to correct it with his children and grandchildren.