This afternoon, Dr. Su needs to meet with several important people, these businessmen's money and their votes may not be important to the political situation in the province, but they are an important weight in the competition of the House of Representatives.

After struggling in Guangzhou politics for several years, Dr. Su, like other politicians, sees compromise as a magic weapon for survival, a word that has completely washed away its derogatory connotations in just a few years. Under the current law in Guangzhou, everyone can donate one percent of his monthly income to the politicians he wants to support, so theoretically, the people who can provide the most votes will also provide the largest source of funding. But this is only a theory, because people with low incomes don't give a penny to politicians, and although they no longer simply want candidates to spend money to buy their votes, they do want to exchange it for benefits; The only people who can really provide the money are the parties and the wealthy – in the city of Canton this is synonymous with businessmen. But the merchants, for the most part, contributed their money to the parties and the provincial councils, and they generously spent large sums of money on the central committees of the major parties, the provincial councils, and the governor's palaces, and there was very little left if they did not spend the one percent of the law permitted. Around the remaining little share, there are more and more fierce government and county politicians than vultures. This fierce competition often leads to unwise promises, and Dr. Su has seen many of his peers make promises to businessmen that are far beyond his means, get money, and lose the election by angering the voters. Dr. Su did not sympathize with them at all, it was this kind of two hundred and five that made his living environment worse, and fools could not be killed, after the first batch of people were eliminated, more new people would fill their positions, fortunately now the merchants are much more savvy, after they lost a lot of money in vain, they learned not only to care about the promises of politicians, but also to care about their ability to fulfill their promises. Funding and votes, Dr. Su walked on a tightrope between the two, and now he has understood compromise as moderation.

Not long after the establishment of the Guangzhou branch of Feng's Leather Company, the shopkeeper of the branch greeted Dr. Su at the door with a smile, saying that his presence had made the new factory flourish, and he was also a shareholder of the leather company and had full power in Guangzhou. Privately, Dr. Su is also very familiar with this person, and he can drink alcohol a few times a month on average. According to Dr. Su's staff, the factory's share is still wealthy, and he can donate a sum of money, although Dr. Su does not expect them to donate all the money to the Kuomintang, nor does he expect the other party to give him all the money he intends to donate to the Kuomintang parliamentarians in Guangzhou, but he hopes to get at least a part of it.

This is not a problem that can be solved by personal relationships, and Dr. Su also shoulders the tasks assigned to him by the party, and now he always strives to kill two birds with one stone, and strives to obtain funds for himself while completing the things sent down by the party, so that he can also get some funds from the party department - in the past, Dr. Su always heard that a political party is like a division, as long as you enter, you have to follow the division, regardless of right or wrong, give the division a strong voice, and the division will also cover you and promote you. But after joining the Kuomintang, Dr. Su realized that the previous rumors were all nonsense, that the party was a big chamber of commerce, which was completely naked buying and selling, and that the political party tempted you with the future of the political circles, buying your labor and service according to the principle of penny and merit, and paying bonuses according to your achievements -- and the party had the largest number of accountants and staff who were proficient in arithmetic, and no one could calculate the party leader, only the part that was calculated.

Like other businessmen involved in arms manufacturing, the Guangdong Feng Leather Company had contradictory aspirations: he wanted the Cantonese government and parliament to buy more weapons, but they wanted to recruit fewer volunteers, because workers became more expensive as volunteers continued to be conscripted into the army. In the past, some arms dealers jointly petitioned the Kuomintang to propose that because the arms factories were for the country, they should provide preferential treatment and subsidies to ensure the labor of the arms dealers, such as legislation prohibiting the recruitment of arms factory workers as soldiers.

Of course, the Kuomintang did not dare to raise such an issue, and if such a bill was raised, it would anger other industries and landlords, and although Leader Lu wanted the money of the arms dealers, he did not think that anyone would dare to openly challenge the principle of commercial equality in the current commercial law.

"We are serving the country," said the shareholder of Fung's Leather Company, who had rejected the demands of the arms dealers, and was still indignant: "We are serving the country!" ”

"The state doesn't require you to serve," Dr. Su teased as a friend, "The state is spending money to buy your service." ”

"Spend our money!" The arms dealers pointed out that they had been conscientiously paying the Guangdong provincial tax and the Guangzhou local tax.

"It took my money too, and it cost everybody's money."

In the newly built factory, a large number of milling machines were placed together in an unprecedented density, and the arms dealer led Dr. Su to tour one factory after another, one of which contained thirty lathes, and the rumbling sound of the machines forced the visiting councillors to rush to the nearby owner to shout to complete the communication.

In the past, such large processing factories in Guangdong were located along the river, and the same was true in Fujian, where merchants were happy to build dam after dam and build larger and heavier waterwheels, planting windmills on the seashore and on both sides of the river like planting trees. However, water and wind power are still difficult to meet the increasing demand for power in the factory, both water and wind power are quite unstable, and all the businessmen have invested huge sums of money for decades to gather the best craftsmen together to study how to make the hydraulic output stable and the turning effect of the machine tool to become less error-free. Over the past few decades, as long as someone can solve this problem and make the power output stable, then he can get rich overnight, but all of them have failed.

At the same time, the landlords and peasants resented the merchants' indiscriminate construction of the dam, and for 30 years there was an endless battle between the workers and peasants over the dam.

All these troubles ended with the advent of the steam engine, in the second year of Yongchang, the most dangerous year of the Southern Ming Dynasty, Qi Guogong announced that the new power engine had completed the miniaturization and cheapening, Qi Guogong announced that he had given up his patent rights after introducing this priceless new power engine to several of the most powerful machine manufacturers in the south, and gave the manufacturing license to everyone for free, and announced that his patent rights would not cover future improvements, and all businessmen who made improvements to the new power machine would receive full patent rights.

More and more new power engines were being built, and manufacturers in the South moved away from the riverside territories they had fought for and defended for decades, relocating factories to open fields or densely populated urban areas.

After walking out of the workshop, Dr. Su took the parts handed to him by the other party and looked at them for a while, and the threads on the smooth surface were perfect.

"It's better than what the old master has done for many years," the arms merchant said to Dr. Su: "If you give us the order, we can produce 10,000 rifles a month at this factory in Guangzhou alone." If I need more, I can also buy machines and recruit workers. ”

"There are too many merchants who make rifles now, and the imperial court does not have so many troops, and rifles are sold like sand." For Dr. Su and other officials in Nanming, they encountered a situation unprecedented in history, as for the first time, the production of weapons exceeded demand, and the government had to think about how to waste its own weapons production capacity.

Therefore, the government of Qi ordered the government to purchase only inferior products, all military rifle firing systems must be made of the worst quality iron, all products that can be used more than a thousand times are substandard products, and those excellent products that are not easy to damage have been recalled from the army and turned into civilian supplies. Now a volunteer will consume a large number of military rifles on the training ground, and the rifles of the front-line army will be scrapped after a month of use - the current southern military rifles have been captured by Dashun, and they will not be used for long: all the key parts of the updated southern army rifles are inferior products, and the Qi government requires cannons and other weapons that may be captured to implement such standards.

"We are arms dealers, but we have not given us any arms orders." The other party complained dissatisfiedly.

"That's not something I can say, man." Doctor Su said apologetically: "And now that rifles and cannons are sold so cheaply, do you really want to do them?" ”

"So what are you going to do with me today?

"I don't want rifles and cannons, but there may be other military supplies, you are not a leather shop, the party headquarters will let me see your factory and workers." There were also new types of power engines, which had not been popularized for a long time, and only the most powerful manufacturers bought steam engines in large quantities. According to Dr. Su's view, the new power engine obviously has a better effect, the machine he saw in the factory today is by no means the previous one or two dams can drive, even if a large number of windmills are added, the most important thing is that the steam engine from the part just now solves the problem of uniform power output, and no longer needs more manual workers to spend longer time processing the blanks produced by the machine - for efficiency, Dr. Su has already learned some common sense of machine production before coming, He believes that such a report will make the party more satisfied.

In addition, there is one more thing, "The longer I get mixed in the political circles, the more efficient Dr. Su will be, and it is best to do everything at once: "In order to repay the friends who have always supported me, I will propose the Anti-Unfair Competition Law to the Guangzhou Governor's Court within five days." ”

"What does this Fa mean?"

In the past, legislators enacted a number of laws on workers' welfare and insurance in order to get more votes — campaign funds were not as hard to come by then, and businessmen who invested in politics were not as savvy as they are now.

In recent times, factory owners have been hoping to repeal some welfare bills, but despite the funding problems, it would be political suicide to anger voters who hold the votes. If you don't do anything after getting the money, you will be discredited, but once you do something, even if it is a few simple welfare changes, those who are not in the eye to fight for campaign funding will demonize the lucky one who gets the money as an enemy of all working classes, and his political life will be over. Because most people don't dare to take this money, and these people have the idea that I can't get it and others don't think about it, so Dr. Su doesn't dare to move this idea - he also has this idea: if the benefit is not his own, go and muddy the waters.

"Welfare for workers leads to higher costs, making products more expensive and less easy to sell."

"Brother Su, no, Doctor Su, are you planning to put forward an anti-welfare bill?" The director of Feng's Leather Store looked at the person in front of him in surprise, and even changed his name, the doctors who used to have this idea died on their peers who fell into the well and harmed others and themselves, if Dr. Su planned to step on this minefield, the arms dealer immediately thought in his heart: maybe it is the best policy to dissociate himself from him first, otherwise he will also be implicated when Dr. Su is demonized by his red-eyed peers.

"No, no, I think welfare is very correct, it reflects the industrial and commercial unity of the dynasty," Dr. Su shook his head like a rattle.

"Then what does Dr. Su mean?"

"I think that not providing welfare to workers is a bad act, and only the blackest businessmen can do it, but it is undeniable that these black-hearted businessmen have caused some trouble for businessmen of high moral character like your brothers." Compromise, still a compromise, Dr. Su thought in his heart.

"Yes, it's so hateful." The arms dealer still didn't fully understand what Dr. Su meant.

"What I mean by this is that any businessman who does not give welfare benefits to his workers is not only unfair competition, not only breaking the social ethos, but also blatantly challenging the principle of equality in the current commercial law." Dr. Su explained: "These people should be punished. ”

The arms dealer had understood what the other party meant, and after weighing it, he found that Dr. Su did have a good chance of success, this bill would not anger the group with votes, and it would also curry favor with the group with funds - businessmen and politicians are no different, if I can't get one thing, then it's better that no one else can get it.

"The only problem is that I need everyone to understand me," Dr. Su began to cry poverty, pointing to the arms dealer's factory, "I must make it clear to the workers that I am defending their interests, and after this bill is passed, they will not have to worry about their bosses being crushed by black-hearted businessmen, and their jobs and benefits will be relieved." ”

"The younger brother still has a question to ask the elder brother for advice," the arms dealer did not immediately agree to Dr. Su's request for propaganda funds: "If it is other places, the welfare is lower than that of Guangzhou, or even a province without welfare, such as Zhejiang, if there is no welfare law there in the future." ”

"That is also unfair competition...... The core of the bill proposed by Dr. Su is that all goods sold in Guangzhou, whether to the government or private individuals, must be accounted for according to the cost of Guangzhou, and if the selling price is lower than the average cost price of Guangzhou, it will be determined that it is unfair competition and an investigation will be launched: "...... Finally, if it is confirmed that there is unfair competition, a fine will be imposed. ”

"This fine?"

"Of course, it is used to subsidize Guangzhou businessmen who have been damaged by unfair competition."

"Go to the proposal, go to the publicity, money is not an issue." As soon as the arms dealer grabbed Dr. Su's hand, he repeated: "Money is not a problem!" ”

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