When the time was pushed to December of the seventh year of Chongzhen, the household finally breathed a sigh of relief, and this year was finally safely spent again. Compared with the previous work of only signing and sealing, the household department now finally has the appearance of being in charge of the state finances.

Today's household department is not only responsible for collecting various taxes from various localities and verifying the whereabouts of the tax grain according to the old rules. There are two main tasks of the household department, one is to review the budget preparation of various departments at the beginning of the year, and review the expenses of various departments at the end of the year; The other is to adjust grain in various localities and stabilize market prices.

The power of the household department has increased, but their responsibilities have also increased. Because of the fact that there is such a department with similar responsibilities as the Prime Minister's Yamen, the officials of the household department are now becoming more and more professional. The busyness of the household affairs made it difficult for officials who did not have a mathematics education to continue working in the household department.

Although there was a natural disaster in the seventh year of Chongzhen, because it was still confined to Shaanxi and Shanxi, the household officials relied on the newly established grain purchasing and marketing network to quell this small natural disaster.

As the head of the household, Guo Yunhou had to ask his subordinates every other week about the price changes in the Gyeonggi market, because the price changes in the Gyeonggi area were the easiest to attract the emperor's attention and the people of Gyeonggi to complain, so he could not ignore them.

On the morning of this day, Li Changshi came to Guo Yunhou's duty room on time for a routine report, and in front of Guo Yunhou's desk, he lowered his head and read the document in his hand, "... Last week, the price of rice was 1.90 yuan per stone, up 5 cents from last week, wheat was 1.28 yuan per stone, the same as last week, and flour was 2.5 yuan per stone, the same as last week. Cotton cloth is 1.1 yuan per horse... Kerosene costs 6 cents per catty ... On the whole, prices in the market are relatively stable. ”

Guo Yunhou leaned back, changed to a more relaxed posture, and then said easily: "Chongzhen's seven years have finally passed without danger, except for Vietnam in the south is not very honest, and Houjin in the north is fortunate not to toss us, this year's treasury should have some surplus, right?" ”

Li Changshi nodded and replied: "Back to Shangshu, in addition to the agricultural tax this year, the total commercial tax revenue, including the salt tax, is 12 million yuan, and after deducting various expenses, there is a surplus of about 2.6 million yuan. ”

Guo Yunhou's body is even more relaxed, and it is not easy for Daming's finances to have a surplus. I think that six or seven years ago, the income of the Ming Dynasty in addition to the agricultural tax was about 4 million taels of silver, less than 6 million Ming yuan, and if I did something, the treasury would be empty, and it was really the most difficult time for the household.

However, Guo Yunhou sat up straight again and asked, "How is the income of the customs this year?" ”

Li Changshi hesitated for a moment and said: "The revenue of the customs this year has also exceeded 8 million yuan, and this does not include the tax revenue managed by the customs in overseas territories, and the commission of the customs of Japan, Bo Ni and Malacca. It is said that their surplus this year will exceed 3 million yuan. ”

Guo Yunhou's face suddenly became ugly again, and after pondering for a while, he finally gently instructed Li Changshi: "Press the settlement of this year's expenses of the Tai Warehouse first, the end of the year and the beginning of the year are the seasons with the most temporary expenditures, let Feng Quan go to report the good news first, so that Your Majesty wants to use the money, and naturally will find the Prime Minister's Yamen first..."

Not to mention what Guo Yunhou is doing, Chongzhen's seven years is not too bad a year for the Ming Dynasty, when the economic data of the Ministry of Household and the Prime Minister's Yamen are summarized in front of Chongzhen, the annual industrial and agricultural production value of the Ming Dynasty has been counted in detail for the first time.

Among them, the total value of agricultural production in Chongzhen in seven years is about 1 billion yuan, and the total value of industry and commerce is between 4.7 billion and 490 million yuan. According to the estimates and comparisons of the governors, the total output value of industry and agriculture in the Ming Dynasty this year is about the same as that of the sixth or seventh year of Wanli, although it has not been able to catch up with the best years of the Wanli period, but the proportion of industry and agriculture has changed greatly.

In the best years of the Wanli period, industrial and commercial output accounted for only about 15-19% of the total industrial and agricultural output. However, in Chongzhen's seven years of total industrial and agricultural output value, the industrial and commercial output just exceeded 30% of the total industrial and agricultural output value. For others in this era, they may not understand what this number means, but for Zhu Youzhen, it is extremely exciting news.

Compared to agriculture, industry and commerce are the least susceptible to natural disasters. Industrial and commercial output accounts for 30% of the total output value of industry and agriculture, which means that the country's economy finally has a relatively stable foundation, and there will not be a scene of revolts of displaced people everywhere because of a natural disaster.

Zhu Youzhen also asked Lu Qi about the prices in the market, but he was more concerned about the wages of workers. Due to the overseas immigration program presided over by the imperial court, the number of people who have migrated overseas this year alone has reached 180,000, so the wages of workers in various workshops in the north, especially in Beijing, Tianjin, and Tang Dynasty, are still showing an upward trend. The standard wage for ordinary workers has been adjusted to 5 yuan per month, which is worth about 2 and a half stone of rice, which is still enough to support the family.

After listening to the reports of Lu Qi and Xu Xingsheng, Zhu Youzhen thought for a while and said: "This year's New Year is also good, and it can be seen that officials from all over the country and the internal affairs government are also attentive. In this way, the inner court will return to the inner court, and the outer court will return to the outer court, and we will also give out a little welfare, so that everyone can't work hard in vain. The welfare of the inner court is drawn up by the governor of the capital, and the welfare of the outer court is handed over to the household department and the prime minister's yamen to handle, so as not to be too wasteful. ”

Lu Qi and Xu Xingsheng suddenly complimented Chongzhen with a smile on their faces: "Your Majesty is kind, and the ministers have thanked Your Majesty..."

Zhu Youzhen waved his hand to interrupt the words of the two and said: "This topic ends here, let's talk about it next, how is Wei Zhongxian doing in Jiangnan?" How did the Taihu bandit case go? ”

Lu Qi immediately replied: "Back to Your Majesty, the Taihu bandit case is basically ironclad evidence, and the gentry who colluded with the bandits and mutilated the good people have also been arrested one by one. Thanks to the numerous reports in various newspapers, the people everywhere finally stopped believing the lies of the gentry covering up each other, and began to support the actions of the imperial court.

In particular, the wife of a student in Hangzhou was openly taken away as a concubine by a gentry surnamed Huang in Huzhou, and he even killed people to conceal his crime afterwards, which aroused the anger of the students in Hangzhou, Shaoxing and other places. On the same day, the Hangzhou general sentence who shielded the gentry surnamed Huang was also reported by a cadre of Hangzhou students and arrested by Ma Shiying.

Now the gentry everywhere have been in a wait-and-see state, and they no longer call friends to attack the case-handling personnel, and even the remarks attacking Wei Zhongxian have decreased a lot. It's just that Jiangnan Chengping has been in peace for more than 200 years, and a deep-rooted in-law relationship has already been formed between famous families, and pulling out the radish brings out a leg of mud.

Behind these big gentry who collude with bandits, there will always be one or several big families in the south of the Yangtze River, and some of them can even be related to the cabinet ministers. Therefore, there are not a few voices who intercede for these gentry, and want to make big things small, and small things into nothing..."

When Zhu Youzhen heard this, he couldn't help but interject and asked, "Then among my cabinet ministers, has anyone put pressure on the case-handling personnel?" ”

Lu Qi shook his head and said, "Back to Your Majesty, this is not true." However, with the help of the prestige of the ministers of the DPRK and China, there were quite a few people who went to lobby them. ”

Zhu Youzhen was silent for a while, and then he laughed a few times and said: "It's really not the heart of the Yellow River that doesn't die, and if you don't hit the south wall, you won't look back." How many treasury bonds have been sold by Wei Zhongxian? ”

Lu Qi lowered his head and thought for a while, before he said cautiously: "So far, the 99-year treasury bonds sold have exceeded 20 million yuan, and according to Wei Zhongxian's estimate, it should be sold out of about 30 million yuan in the end." ”

Hearing the figures reported by Lu Qi, Zhu Youzhen was also taken aback. He originally thought that it would be very good to be able to squeeze one or two million yuan from these Jiangnan gentry, but Wei Zhongxian was able to come up with such a figure, which was really surprising and delightful.

Chongzhen couldn't help asking: "How did Wei Zhongxian sell so many treasury bonds?" He probably wouldn't have used force, would he? ”

Lu Qi immediately denied it: "Back to Your Majesty, that's not true." Wei Zhongxian did use some means at the beginning, he invited the Suzhou gentry and wealthy families to the banquet... In the end, the banquet sold a total of more than 8 million yuan of treasury bonds. Then in Huzhou, he did the same, selling more than 6 million yuan, and the two prefectures alone sold nearly 14 million yuan.

The other provinces around the Taihu Lake have sold nearly 6 million yuan one after another, so that most of the gentry in the provinces around the Taihu Lake have bought treasury bonds. None of the famous families in these areas were exempted, and even the families of the first and second assistants also bought 20,000 or 30,000 yuan of treasury bonds.

As a result, the remaining rich gentry were a little unable to sit still. Some of them were worried that they were not forced to buy treasury bonds, and that others regarded them as party members who had defected to Wei Zhongxian, so they took the initiative to buy treasury bonds to show that they had nothing to do with Wei Zhongxian.

There are also merchants who want to buy treasury bonds to get involved with those famous families and win an opportunity to rebuke Wei Zhongxian with them. Therefore, the sales of the treasury bonds in '99 will be so good, but the minister is worried that these gentry will have the same hatred for the court because of this matter, so as to form a party against the court, and hope that His Majesty will be aware of it. ”

Regarding Lu Qi's worries, Zhu Youzhen didn't take it to heart, "To form a party that opposes the imperial court, it will take less than one or two points." At present, if the court has no money, it will immediately lie down.

If you can't survive today, who cares what will happen in the future. Wei Zhongxian still had a way, and he ordered him to go down and reward him and the members of the case-handling team once. In addition, the handling of the Taihu bandit case still needs to listen to Wei Zhongxian's ideas.

I have only one proposition on the Taihu bandit case, the first evil must be investigated, the coercion can be lenient, and the murderer and the adulterer will die..."

Lu Qi reluctantly wrote down the emperor's words, and then quietly withdrew from the living room with Xu Xingsheng. After the two walked out of the room, Xu Xingsheng, who had been silent, couldn't help but ask Lu Qi curiously: "Father-in-law Lu, how many families are involved in this Taihu bandit case?" Let those officials from Jiangnan be so panicked? ”

Lu Qi looked left and right before he said, "Just those who have meritorious fame are not less than a thousand. Haoqiang, who lives around Taihu Lake, has almost caught them all..."