Zhu Houzhao began to appreciate Wu Wending, for Wu Wending, he actually did not have a deep impression, only knew that this guy was a general, but he also had a rough temper, because the eunuch Zhang Zhong wanted to take away his participation in the pacification of King Ning and had an unpleasant quarrel with Zhang Zhong, and was recommended by Wang Shouren to go to Nanzhili as a governor to replace Yan Song.

Now, because of the reform of the tax administration in Jiangnan, this Wu Wending directly suggested that all the officials who were unwilling to reform the tax administration and disregarded the interests of the people in Jiangnan should be killed, so that Zhu Houzhao had to admit that Wu Wending was really a civilian official on the outside, but in fact he was actually a military attache who was decisive in killing and killing, and it seemed that he would directly take people's lives if he disagreed.

But in fact, only such officials can calm down thoughtful officials.

Although Wang Chengyu, Zhang Jin and others hated Wu Wending in their hearts, they couldn't come up with a reason to accuse Wu Wending for a while.

Wang Shouren was in a much better mood, Wu Wending was his former partner, who had killed the rebels back to back together, and his affection was naturally not comparable to ordinary officials, and now he was naturally very happy to see Wu Wending stand up and support him, at least they could fight side by side again.

Wu Wending also glanced at Wang Shouren, his thick eyebrows couldn't help but raise, he didn't want his friend who was the founder of the heart to fight alone when he was a minister, as for himself to make the emperor happy by doing this, let Wang Shouren regard himself as a political ally, and continue to promote himself in the future, that is just a passing meaning.

Cong Lan's bombardment of Wu Wending at this time did not mix some personal feelings like Wang Shouren, but he also admired Wu Wending's courage to stand up and fight against the Jiangnan chaebol and his wisdom in insight into the relationship between the government and the people, at least better than Huang Zhen.

Cong Lan glanced at Wang Chengyu provocatively: "Let's see, even Wu Wending of Huguang wants to reform the tax administration, can you officials from Nanzhili and Zhejiang resist the discussions of officials from other provinces?" ”

Zhu Houzhao saw that these officials were silent, and he didn't know what these officials were thinking for a while, and sometimes he felt that it was difficult for him to guess the minds of these officials, although he had a thing factory and a brocade guard, but when everyone only pondered him, and he needed to ponder everyone, it was obvious that everyone knew him better, not that he knew everyone better.

At this time, the only thing Zhu Houzhao can do is to keep his own thinking and have his own opinions.

To reform the tax administration in Jiangnan, to put it bluntly, it is necessary to increase the commercial tax, because Jiangnan is no longer an agrarian society, and the collection of commercial tax in accordance with the way of collecting agricultural tax is obviously a loss to the imperial court.

After all, the level of productivity of commercial civilization and agricultural civilization is not the same, one is to have an industrial science and technology foundation to transform nature, and the other is to rely on the sky for food.

Of course, the imperial court can suffer a loss, not increase the proportion of interests in Jiangnan's commodity economic activities, and let the people of Jiangnan achieve prosperity, but the consequence of this will only make more chaebols appear in Jiangnan.

Now there are also chaebols in the Ming Dynasty, and the officials who followed Zhu Houzhao to strengthen the centralization of power have all been divided by the state, such as Wang Shouren, who presided over the tax reform in Jiangnan at this time, is one of them.

But these chaebols are the same as Zhu Houzhao, their interests are linked to state income, you can say that they are bureaucratic capitalists, sucking the profits of the people of the world, but people are at least unwilling to let the Ming Dynasty die, and even desperately increase state income, because by increasing state income, he can share the profits.

But the chaebols that appeared after Jiangnan are different, they have nothing to do with the country, their capital is not linked to the state, if they can, they can sell the whole country, and the rise of the Manchu Qing Dynasty in history also has the shadow of the secret support of the Jiangnan chaebol.

Therefore, Zhu Houzhao had to worry about whether these Jiangnan chaebols would engage in this kind of operation of collusion with external forces for their own interests.

After all, capital has no borders, and once the emperor and the Ming court led by him cannot provide him with protection of interests, they can sell themselves directly.

Moreover, if the Jiangnan chaebol is allowed to rise and more and more wealthy private businessmen appear, it may lead to another phenomenon.

In that case, the centrality of autocracy and centralization will certainly be challenged, and democracy in the West will probably emerge as a result, and history has proved that capitalism and then democracy emerged in the West.

But can this democratic ideology brought about by capitalism really represent the interests of the majority of the people?

Zhu Houzhao was not a thinker, and as a science student, he could not distinguish between these pros and cons, but he knew that if the Ming Dynasty let the chaebol and the factory owners have the final say, then the peasants who accounted for the vast majority of the Ming Dynasty would definitely not agree.

Don't underestimate the peasants, although the peasants' endurance is superb, but once they are forced to the point where they can no longer survive, the destructive power generated can destroy all the classes above them, and even directly evolve into the tyranny of the majority, and even the alliance composed of the great powers, gentry and landlords, warlords, etc., can be pressed to the floor and rubbed.

"Your Majesty, what Wu Wending said is a great rebellion! Or even deviant! The minister believes that the dynasty should rule the world with etiquette, because etiquette is the law, the position of the meat eater, the non-virtuous can not live in it, the rule of morality can open a benevolent government, can benefit the people, can extend the dynasty for eternity, and the rule of law of the country, it is difficult to have the life of the third generation, such as Qin is only the second and died, the two Song Dynasty Chongde and etiquette, Ming Gang discipline and Shen Lixue, is a three-hundred years of luck, today as long as the court officials abide by virtue and etiquette, loyal to the monarch and love the people, naturally can make the politics clear! ”

Feng Zhe, the head of the household department, stood up before Zhu Houzhao could speak, and said a few words, he knew that if he wanted His Majesty the Emperor to give up the reform of tax administration, he could only argue Wu Wending on whether to rule the country by virtue or by the rule of law, so he did not mention the matter of whether the tax policy reform would not be changed, but began to lead the topic to whether to rule the country by virtue.

Zhu Houzhao has always felt that it is very unscientific to let a powerful person be fair and even actively handle affairs and only hope for his moral standard, he admits that Confucianism is very good at self-cultivation and self-cultivation, and is also very good at brainwashing a layman into a moral gentleman, but most people do not eat his set, or even just eat it openly and behind his back.

Now Feng Zhe, the head of the household department, once again emphasizes the rule of virtue and pins the stability of the empire on Confucian ethics, which is also a stupid or bad idea in Zhu Houzhao's view.

"Governing the country by virtue or by the rule of law, this is a matter discussed by the scholars of the world, this is the court, not a university forum, nor a school forum, we only talk about the reform of Jiangnan tax administration, I make an assumption, if Jiangnan tax administration is not reformed, and let the provinces of the world become rich in Jiangnan, what will be the consequences!"

"Although the nobles of Southern Mongolia and Northern Mongolia in the north are exiled or emigrated overseas, there are still a large number of Han and Mongolian mixed inhabitants in Hetao and Liaodong, who are mainly engaged in agriculture and animal husbandry, and there are female fishermen and hunters in the north of Liaodong, and there are Wara in the northwest, although the imperial court is now a large army on the border, and there are superior weapons, and there will be no border troubles, but do you know, according to Qintian's monitoring calculations, the temperature in the north has dropped year after year, and disasters occur frequently in villages outside the northern Saiwai, once the northern Saiwai land is more severe in the future and the imperial court is not enough to supply, What will they do? ”

When Zhu Houzhao asked, Wang Shouren, who was familiar with border affairs, said: "It will go south in a big way, and it may even be that the Han, Mongolia, and Manchu forces in the north will join forces to go south, nominally they will overthrow our Ming Dynasty, but in fact they will rob the wealth of Jiangnan to solve the crisis of their survival!" ”

Zhu Hou glanced at Wang Shouren, he appreciated Wang Shouren's point, he was able to directly foresee the historical future, and the later historical development was not like this, the Manchu, Mongolian, and Han bureaucrats formed a bandit group (Eight Banners) and went directly south, and flattened the Jiangnan where capitalism was budding with the momentum of destroying and decaying, and the Jiangnan gentry and chaebol, who were selfish and had no foresight and even aided in the abuse, have since collapsed, and in front of the Manchu nobles who have absolute military strength and are not without national feelings, they do not even have the slightest bargaining power.

"Not only the north, the southwest and northwest of the alien Tusi, even if it is strong in Henan, Shandong and other places, how can you make Jiangnan rich, the husband is not guilty of his crimes, Jiangnan is unwilling to let the world with profit, the world can only share the benefits of Jiangnan with a sword, back then, the Southern Song Dynasty occupied the benefits of Jiangnan, and could get a hundred years of peace, so that the white people did not know hunger, and it was not because of the contribution to the north in the year, if the Jiangnan tax policy is not changed, and the court is not allowed to benefit, then it is likely that there will be chaos in the world in the future, and even the rise of foreign races to slaughter Jiangnan!"

Cong Lan also said so, Wang Chengyu remained silent for a long time, and then said:

"What Your Majesty and the officials said, or it is reasonable, the minister is not ignorant of the trend of the world, but the people of Jiangnan can benefit because of their own diligence, and there is no fault, not to mention, even if the imperial court has not reformed the tax policy, the local government has already increased the levy, and the miscellaneous fees collected secretly have made the profits of the merchants and the people thin, if the tax administration is changed and the tax is levied (the official tax on the surface), I am afraid that the people will not have a surplus profit, and it is for this reason that the minister suggested that the court will not compete with the people for profit!"

Wang Shouren wanted to speak and stopped, he really didn't expect Wang Chengyu to be so hard-mouthed, he and Cong Lan both said it directly, and they even insisted on their own opinions.

"What Wang Qing said also needs to be considered, local apportionment, dark taxes, the government, gentry, officials, and township officials benefit the most, and only the court and the people benefit the least, this is the most unreasonable, and it is also the most need to be contained, the court has no money to maintain stability, and the people will turn into business if they have no enough profits!"

Zhu Houzhao said a word at this time, and Wang Shouren also stood up and continued to add:

"Therefore, we are talking about reforming the tax administration rather than directly saying that it is necessary to increase the tax, how to change the tax policy is naturally not simply to levy according to commercial interests, and the details of the internal must be carefully scrutinized, first of all, to set the tax threshold;

If it is a small business, and the profit is only enough to support the family, the court can exempt it from taxes, and even subsidize it, but those who are profitable need to be levied, and a gradient can be set, that is, the collection share of different profit levels is different, and for those who monopolize malicious competition and even operate unfavorable to the world, not only heavy taxes will be punished! ”

When Wang Chengyu heard Wang Shouren say this, he had to give up the idea of letting the imperial court not change the tax policy for a while, and only continued: "In this case, how to determine the specific tax system is the top priority, the tax system should be formulated by the imperial court, and should not be collected by the local government, and the imperial court should prohibit the local government from levying additional levies and levies, and ban excessive taxes and miscellaneous taxes. ”

"Wang Butang said this, the lower officials dare not agree, how can the local government have no surplus money to help the needy, once there is another drought and flood, how can they wait for the imperial court to allocate funds, that will not lead to the food has not arrived, and the hungry people have starved to death first!"

Wu Wending, as the governor of Nanzhili and a local official, naturally hopes to be financially free and does not have to rely on the Ministry of Household Affairs to allocate money.

"The dynasty has been running for more than 100 years, and it is funded by the imperial court, and there is nothing wrong with it, the local government already has fire consumption income, and then seeks its own finance and taxes, what does Governor Wu want to do?"

Zhang Jin, the left waiter of the Nanjing household department, asked aggressively.

As a representative of the gentry in Jiangnan, he did not approve of changing the tax policy in his heart, but now even if the imperial court wants to change it, it has to be changed, and he does not want the tax policy to be in the hands of the local government, which can only affect the centralization of power and is not conducive to the interests of him, a Beijing official.

Zhu Houzhao couldn't help but smile, he had to admit that all sides in the officialdom had their own considerations, and although both sides began to accept the reform of tax administration, the power to levy taxes and the power to set tax quotas became the focus of contention.

In fact, this is just a question of whether the tax system is a tax sharing system or a tax package system, which means that the central government collects taxes uniformly and then allocates a part of them to the local government, and the tax package system is that the central government outsources the collection of taxes to the local government or private organizations.

Undoubtedly, the former is more conducive to centralization and unified financial scheduling.

And Zhang Jin is asking Wu Wending so now, naturally questioning Wu Wending's desire to be the kind of temperance envoy of the Tang Dynasty, and the idea of relying on taxation to stand on his own.

Wu Wending didn't expect that he would set such a trap for himself, and hurriedly said to Zhu Houzhao: "Your Majesty, the minister has no such intention!" The minister just thought that the reform of the tax administration of Nanzhili was originally to prevent the local government from exploiting the people, and to promote the local government to have more financial resources to benefit the people's livelihood, but now the tax is only collected by the imperial court, which will inevitably make the local government have no wealth to benefit the people. ”

"Okay, the right to tax and how much tax to collect can only belong to the Ministry of Households, and the Ministry of Households can share part of the tax for local use, but any local officials have no power to add power, this is the bottom line that the Ming Dynasty relies on, otherwise, is the Ming still a country?"

Zhu Houzhao naturally will not delegate financial power, allowing local officials to have a certain administrative appointment power and share part of your money is already the biggest concession of the emperor, how can you let your local autonomy be so high that you can tax freely, and if you have a high degree of autonomy, what is the difference between it and an independent kingdom, so how can the central court control the localities, how can the wealth of the rich areas be subsidized to the poor areas, so as to achieve the purpose of alleviating contradictions and maintaining stability.

Zhu Houzhao doesn't want Daming to become the EU in the future, an organization that you can break away from if you want to.

"The minister's words are wrong, but His Majesty is still wise!" Wu Wending said with some shame.

At this time, Wang Shouren, Wang Chengyu, Cong Lan and others all shouted: "Your Majesty is wise! ”

"In this case, it is now certain that the imperial court still has to change the Jiangnan tax administration, and how to change and how to re-tax is the responsibility of the central imperial court.

However, the cousin of the Jiangnan State Taxation Bureau has to be changed, and I am worried that Zhang Jin, you, the left servant of the Nanjing household department, will not be able to keep busy."

Zhu Houzhao said that he was worried that Zhang Jin would not be able to keep up, but in fact, he was worried that Zhang Jin cared too much about the interests of the people in Jiangnan, and the tax was still levied at a lower level.

And Zhang Jin can't say that His Majesty the Emperor is not afraid of being tired, so he can only give up his hand and say modestly: "Your Majesty Xie is considerate of your subordinates, and the ministers should do their best, although it is difficult to repay Your Majesty's kindness even if you die, and you are only shallow in learning, it is difficult to take on the big responsibility alone." ”

"Proposed purpose, the establishment of a tax reform group, by Cong Lan, Zhang Jin, Xiong Hu three people in charge, transfer Fang Xianfu to take over Xiong Hun post, Xiong Hun promoted to Nanjing household right waiter, with Cong Lan as the positive, Zhang Jin, Xiong Hun as the deputy."

Zhu Houzhao naturally did this with consideration.

The person in charge of the Conglan Daming Audit Bureau knows how much tax the imperial court needs to collect from Nanzhili and Zhejiang, and it is from Shandong, so it will definitely only levy more and not less, after all, only more will benefit the people in Shandong and other places;

And Zhang Jin is a native of Nanzhili or a bureaucratic family, so naturally he will not let Cong Lan levy too much;

And Xiong Hun has been a magistrate in Nanzhili, and is familiar with the actual income of the people at the bottom of Nanzhili, and he is from Jiangxi, and he is still a student selected and transferred by Jian Zaidixin, so he is naturally more objective and can play a role in reconciling the contradictions between the two.

Wang Shouren couldn't help but secretly admire this, secretly thinking that His Majesty the Emperor was indeed following some rational thinking in employing people, rather than just relying on personal likes and dislikes, which was the move of the Ming Emperor!

Cong Lan and Zhang Jin were naturally in a complicated mood, knowing that they would inevitably have a quarrel with the other party next, and the most important thing was to see which side Xiong Hun was on.

……

Next, it is naturally a matter of tax quota and gradient setting, Cong Lan and Zhang Jin had already quarreled before Xiong Hu came to Nanjing, and almost didn't fight, but they also blushed several times.

"Let me go to Nanjing Central University to find a few high-level students in arithmetic, the old man has to hire a few masters who can calculate, this tax reform can't let Cong Lan and these northern officials overexploit the people of Jiangnan too much!" Zhang Jin said.

And here, Cong Lan was no exception, asking her staff: "Has Director Le of the Money Law and Arithmetic Department of Beijing Normal University arrived!" This tax reform can no longer allow the gentry in Jiangnan to take advantage! ”

……

"Cong Lan and Zhang Jin have been arguing about tax reform, Cong Lan hopes to take one out of five, Zhang Jin hopes to take one out of fifteen, you come just in time, try to choose a suitable tax rate between them, get the result as soon as possible, within a month, I want to get your final result!"

Zhu Houzhao was summoned by Zhu Houzhao after Xiong Hun arrived in Nanjing, and Zhu Houzhao was also instructed by Zhu Houzhao in person, and then he was asked by Wang Shouren to meet again, and finally came to the yamen of the Jiangnan State Taxation Bureau.

"Xiong Shilang, you came just in time, I'll take you to the Shandong Hall, some of them came from Shandong to work in the southern capital, you can understand their current pressure of the year, and then think about whether it is more reasonable to take one of the five proposed by the official!" Cong Lan pulled Xiong Hu and was about to go out.

At this time, Zhang Jin also came over and stopped Xiong Hu: "Xiong Shilang, Zhang also just asked you to go to the cement factory in Jurong, Nandu, you can find out how much income the factory owners there can make every month, if you calculate according to the five of Cong Butang, how many workshops will not be able to open!" ”

Pulling and pulling, Xiong Xun almost didn't trip to the ground, so he had to arch his hand and said: "Don't worry, two adults, Xiong just arrived in Nandu, only to see His Majesty and the elder of the pavilion, and also know the argument between the two, I also visited a lot of people along the way, and also brought Ningbo, Songjiang, Suzhou over the years in cloth, cotton, silk, silk, tea and other aspects of trade quota, then we will discuss carefully." ”

Cong Lan and Zhang Jin didn't pull Xiong Hu anymore.

Xiong Xun also discussed with the two again.

Cong Lan and Zhang Jin are still arguing with each other, Cong Lan is from the National Academy of Administration, and the theory is a set, while Zhang Jin is a famous Confucian in the south of the Yangtze River, and there is also a set of various theories for the people.

Fortunately, Xiong Hun was persuaded by his practice data in Jiangnan for many years, and finally let the two agree to a compromise tax reform plan.

Wang Shouren gave Zhu Houzhao the tax reform plan of the three people, and Zhu Houzhao was also very satisfied after taking care of it, he had to admit that Cong Lan, Zhang Jin, and Xiong Xun had done a good job, and even had some forward-looking, such as adding personal income tax and value-added tax similar to that of later generations.

After all, in a developed commodity economy area like Jiangnan, there have been many professional managers with high salaries.

These people can't afford to pay some public service fees while enjoying high social treatment, but in this way, it also means that staff members like Master Shaoxing also have to bear the corresponding taxes.

Don't look down on these staff, with the development of the commodity economy of the Ming Dynasty and the development of the new policy of the imperial court, many officials are required to understand both finance and technology and control public opinion, not to mention agricultural production and statistics, which means that these officials need to hire more and more staff.

In this way, many students of the new-style schools have become the darlings of the staff of major officials, and even, for some high-ranking staff, the officials treat them as well as some local officials.

Value-added tax is naturally a new tax after the development of the commodity economy.

Zhu Houzhao could guess that the three officials, Cong Lan, Zhang Jin, and Xiong Hu, had inspected the actual situation in Jiangnan and knew that the circulation of commodities in Jiangnan was no longer as simple as a transaction between buyers and sellers.

According to his experience as a magistrate in Susongning, he realized that the rich have more sources of income, but the poor have a single source of income, and the low tax rate of many taxes can naturally avoid the burden of the common people, so that although the taxes are increased, it is only about one out of ten, and it is not considered to hurt the people;

Moreover, Xiong Hun proposed an inheritance tax, but let the minister feel quite desirable, Jiangnan chaebol rich households, the minister found that there are many families involved in the division of family property or because of the division of the family and become enemies, even more desperate, forcing widows to commit suicide to occupy their wealth and sell their daughters, and the court also needs to legislative intervention in the inheritance, naturally also need to collect some inheritance tax, in order to ensure the smooth inheritance of their family property! ”

Wang Shouren said this, Zhu Houzhao nodded: "According to the Confucian etiquette, it is an ominous thing to divide the family, and it is taboo to divide the family, and pay attention to the same family for several generations, but regardless of the rich or poor, the family will inevitably have disputes, and it is inevitable that the division will be divided due to profit, in order not to cause the weak to be bullied, and the strong are too domineering, there should be this law!"

In addition, the children of the gentlemen enjoy wealth because they eat the surplus grace of their ancestors, but they do not contribute to the peace of the country, and it is unreasonable. It's just that this will make the wealthy even more disgusted! ”

。 m.