In the original time and space, the ascension of Emperor Chongzhen caused the collapse of the Wei Zhongxian group, which had been working hard to maintain the normal operation of the country's finances. Since then, in the political map of the Ming Dynasty, the political forces that can compete with the bureaucracy representing vested interests have completely disappeared.

Because the state finances were collapsing in an all-round way, and at the same time as the self-financing warlord group appeared, because of the loss of state financial allocation, Li Zicheng, a staff member of the original Ming Dynasty public institution, was laid off. (Li Zicheng first served as a post soldier, and then as a border army, and was considered a person in the system of the pure Ming Dynasty.) After all, both jobs are funded by the state. The combination of necessity and chance made this man the leader of the excavation of the tombs of the Ming Dynasty.

When Wang Shuhui read about Li Zicheng's life, he thought jokingly: The people who destroyed the Ming Dynasty were actually characters in the original Ming Dynasty system. But he soon shuddered at his thoughts.

In the original time and space without the existence of Wang Shuhui and the Baath Party, the Ming Dynasty experienced an economic crisis and financial bankruptcy, and went to extinction because of fierce class contradictions.

However, in this time and space, with the emergence of Wang Shuhui and the rise of the Baath Party, in fact, the economic crisis of the Ming Dynasty has become more serious.

The so-called "the lake is wide and ripe, and the world is full". From the middle and late Ming Dynasty, the production base of commercial grain in China was transferred from the Jiangnan region to the Huguang region.

Everyone must understand that the reason why "the lake is wide and ripe, and the world is full" is not only because of the high grain production in Hunan and Hubei. The main reason is that a large amount of grain produced in the Huguang area is commercial grain that can be circulated through the market.

Before the Ming Dynasty, China's main commercial grain production base was in the Jiangnan region. At that time, the emphasis was on "Su Changshu, the world's foot".

However, with the development of the commodity economy and the mass reproduction of the population in the Jiangnan area, on the one hand, the agricultural production in the Jiangnan area began to change from grain production to cash crop production. (By the time of the Jiajing period, just to meet the silk production of an official organization, the Jiangnan Weaving Bureau, several prefectures and more than a dozen counties in the Jiangnan region were required to "change rice to mulberry", from producing grain to planting mulberry trees.) ）

On the other hand, due to the large number of people, by the middle of the Ming Dynasty, the local food production in Jiangnan could no longer meet the needs of the population in the region. Because of the continuous emergence of a large number of large and medium-sized cities with a population of hundreds of thousands or even more than one million, the Jiangnan region has changed from a grain export area to a pure grain import area.

It was from this time that the Huguang area became the only commercial grain production base in the Ming Dynasty because of its rich water resources, natural agricultural production conditions and convenient transportation conditions, and became a veritable granary for nearly 200 million Chinese at that time.

(Among the commercial grain production bases in modern China, the Songnen Plain and the Sanjiang Plain in the northeast region are currently occupied by the Eastern Captive Houjin.) On the one hand, the Jianghuai Plain and the Taihu Lake Plain in the Jiangnan region need to be cultivated with cash crops, but on the other hand, because of population development and urban concentration, grain production can no longer even meet the needs of the population in the region. The Poyang Lake Plain in Jiangxi, the Chengdu Plain in Sichuan, and the Pearl River Delta in the Liangguang region cannot be exported due to geographical location and transportation conditions. Only the Dongting Lake Plain and the Jianghan Plain in Huguang meet the conditions for grain production on the one hand, and meet the conditions for commercial grain production because they are located on both sides of the Yangtze River with convenient transportation. ）

The so-called commercial grain production base refers to the fact that this place can not only produce a large amount of grain, but also that these grains can not only meet the grain needs of the population in the region, but also be able to export a large amount of surplus. Originally, due to the influence of the climate of the Xiaoice River, in the late Ming Dynasty, agricultural production in the Huguang area, like agricultural production in all regions of China, began to enter a stage of comprehensive decline. Huguang's local grain production has already begun to decline significantly.

After the Baath Party developed in the Jingzhou region under the leadership of Wang Shuhui, its first expansion was aimed at the Han River Plain. For five years, from 1621 to 1625, the Fuxing Society relied on the support of the guns and the masses of the people, mainly through the means of land "redemption" and "transfer", and used land reform as a supplementary means, and spent five years to control all the land and peasants in the entire Jianghan Plain.

By 1626, almost all of the land and peasants in the Jianghan region had been transformed into industrial farms and agricultural workers under the strong impetus of the Baath Party.

At present, the agricultural production units scattered throughout the Jianghan Plain are all production and construction troops composed of local peasants and displaced people recruited by the Baath Party from various localities, and they are industrial farms that use super-time seeds, large-scale, self-produced, and mechanized agricultural production equipment, 70 percent of the chemical fertilizers and pesticides imported from time and space, and 30 percent self-produced chemical fertilizers and pesticides, as well as advanced scientific and agricultural production knowledge.

According to the statistics of the Baath Party Statistics Institute in 1625, the average yield of corn per mu of corn is more than 800 catties among the main grain crops grown on the farms under the Ba'ath Party. The average yield of potatoes and sweet potatoes per mu is more than 1,500 catties; The average yield of rice per mu is more than 600 catties (the yield of a single season is the same as that of the local double crop in the Ming Dynasty). Although the level of grain production of the Baath Party as a whole cannot be compared with that of modern China, compared with the production level of the Ming Dynasty itself, the yield per mu of rice alone is about twice that of the local yield of the Ming Dynasty.

However, although the level of grain production in the Jianghan Plain under the control of the Baath Party has developed by leaps and bounds. However, in order to cope with the imminent or already large-scale outbreak of refugees, the Baath Party began to formulate a comprehensive food policy of "only entering but not leaving" as early as 1621.

Under the Ba'ath Party, the personal food supply for workers, agricultural workers, and urban dwellers was 120 catties of coarse grain and 50 catties of fine grain per person per month for adults. For minors under the age of 18, each person has 80 catties of fine grain and 40 catties of coarse grain per month. Such a policy is simply to restrict the sale of grain.

Of course, although there were restrictions on the sale and purchase of grain, under the Baath Party, all finished grain products were freely available and bought and sold.

In the store, you can buy and sell rice, vermicelli (mainly sweet potato flour and potato flour), steamed buns, steamed buns, noodles, dumplings, etc. Moreover, whether it is a factory or a farm, an army or an institution, there are low-priced foods that are not restricted from being bought and sold. Other agricultural and sideline products, such as chickens, ducks, fish, meat, and eggs, which were very cheap under the Baath Party, are not even restricted from being exported.

The Ba'ath Party's grain policy of "only entering but not leaving" is a policy of unilaterally restricting the export of grain. Moreover, the Baath Party's grain policy prohibits export and requires large imports.

The Baathists exported large quantities of manufactured goods and absorbed large quantities of silver through their own monetary policy. At the same time, the Baath Party tightly controlled two-thirds of the commercial grain production bases of the Ming Dynasty, restricted the outflow of grain, and absorbed a large amount of grain from other places.

Under the Baath Party's policies, this originally non-existent force began to have a drastic impact on the Ming Dynasty in this time and space.

In the whole of China, on the one hand, because of the reduction in grain production caused by the climate of the Xiaoice River, on the one hand, because of the food policy of the Fuxing Society, and on the other hand, because of the large amount of silver absorbed by the Fuxing Society, which led to the rapid rise in food prices in the Ming Dynasty from 1624.

By 1625, the price of grain in the Jiangnan area had reached an average of about 15 taels of silver per stone of rice. In other words, in the economically developed Jiangnan region, the price per catty of rice has reached the price of about 100 copper coins.

100 copper coins, which is about 50 to 100 yuan in modern terms. Think about it, in modern times, if you buy 50 yuan per catty of rice, what kind of situation it will be

Space-Time Gate 1619

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Chapter 295 The Economic Crisis of the Ming Dynasty 2