Since Li You came to Daming, he first copied the family property of the eight families of the Jin Dynasty, and now he has copied the family property of Qian Longxi, Wen Tiren, Zu Dashou and others, and got him tens of millions of taels of silver, but such a means can only be done occasionally, and may be able to solve the financial crisis of Daming in a short time, but in the long run, it is necessary to adjust the current financial means of Daming, so that Daming's finances become healthy. Pen & Fun & Pavilion www.biquge.info

After Chongzhen ascended the throne, the Donglin Party, which represented the interests of merchants and landlords in Jiangsu and Zhejiang, took the opportunity to clear Wei Zhongxian's forces to lure Chongzhen, who lacked political talent, to cancel or reduce the tax burden of overseas trade tax, mining tax, salt tax, tea tax and other taxes, making the Ming Dynasty's financial revenue source more single, all of which were pressed on ordinary peasants, and the imperial court's financial revenue was greatly reduced.

Take the tea tax as an example, the standard of tea tax collection in the Ming Dynasty has long been established, and the tax is 200 Wen per 100 catties of tea, which was later increased to 1,000 Wen per 100 catties, which is recorded very clearly in the "Ming Huidian", "The official gives the tea introduction, pays the tea Fuzhou County, where the merchant buys tea, has the number of officials to go to the official, pays the money to the citation, and each quotation pays 1,000 Wen, according to the tea 100 catties." According to this standard, tea-producing places such as Jiangnan and Sichuan should pay a large amount of taxes to the imperial court every year.

However, some large tea-producing provinces collect taxes that are ridiculously low, for example, the number of tea taxed in Sichuan exceeds 5 million catties, but the total amount of tea revenue collected in a year does not exceed 20,000 taels; This is quite a lot, Zhejiang's tea tax is only six taels, Yunnan is 17 taels, it is said that the tax amount is assessed with the Ming treasure banknotes that have almost depreciated into waste paper.

The taxes that should be paid have changed from 10,000 taels to only 6 taels, the Donglin Party and the merchants of Jiangsu and Zhejiang have benefited, but the lack of the imperial court has overwhelmed the poor peasants, coupled with the continuous natural disasters at that time, resulting in a large number of bankruptcies and a large number of displaced people, the Ming Dynasty soon fell under the attack of the displaced people and the slaves.

And those gentry in the south of the Yangtze River did not get much benefit, decades later they were slaughtered by the Jiannu who went south, but the wealth accumulated by hard work was cheaper than the Jiannu, but I don't know if they regretted what they did at that time, if they were more generous at the beginning, providing enough military pay for the imperial court, let them block the construction of slaves, would their fate be better?

If it weren't for the imminent death, these people would still be reluctant to give up their money, right? Li You shook his head secretly, he has seen a lot of businessmen like this who ask for money and don't want to die in so many mission worlds, and Daming businessmen are by no means the only ones.

Li You can underestimate their eyes, but they can't underestimate the strength they have now, the gentry of Jiangsu and Zhejiang have great influence in the court, and they have been operating locally for hundreds of years, and their influence has long spread to all levels of society, and it is extremely difficult to attack them before they are not ready, so Li You still decided to take a long-term view, and first aimed at another wave of forces that put a heavy burden on the Ming Dynasty's finances, that is, the Ming clan.

In the third year of the Ming Dynasty, the population of the clan exceeded 18,492. After another 26 years, to the 23rd year of Wanli in the Ming Dynasty, the population of the clan recorded in the jade has reached more than 157,000 people. It is estimated that by the end of the Ming Dynasty, the clan population had exceeded at least 200,000, which was probably the fastest growing clan in the world.

The huge number of clans brought huge financial expenditures, and the Ming system stipulated that the clan Lu gave the standard, 10,000 stone for the prince Lumi, 2,000 stone for the county king, 1,000 stone for the general of Zhenguo, 600 stone for the general of the auxiliary country, 400 stone for the lieutenant of the Zhenguo, 300 stone for the lieutenant of the auxiliary country, 200 stone for the lieutenant of Fengguo, 2,000 stone for the princess and the concubine, and the county lord and the following gradually decreased.

For example, in the 31st year of Jiajing, the total revenue of the country's tax and grain was 22.85 million stones, and the annual expenditure of the royal palaces reached 8.53 million stones, accounting for 37% of the total tax and grain revenue of the country, becoming the largest expenditure in the state funds; Just to support these clans that are not beneficial to the imperial court, the Ming Dynasty will consume almost forty percent of the national income every year, what a terrible data! I'm afraid Zhu Yuanzhang didn't expect the problem of the clan to develop into such a serious situation, right?

In addition, the clan also occupies a large amount of land, take King Fu, who was deeply loved by Emperor Wanli as an example, when he was in the domain, he got 20,000 hectares of farmland, and thousands of salts, and these lands are not subject to taxes, a single Fu Wangfu occupies so much tax-free land, and how much is the total of the entire Ming Dynasty 200,000 clans? If those gentry tax-free land, hidden fields that are concealed and not reported, and monk fields are sent out, how much land will be left to pay taxes in the Ming Dynasty? The taxes of the state are overwhelming on the poor people, and it is unreasonable for them not to rebel.

In the late Ming Dynasty, many emperors also felt a headache because of the problems of the clan, and they came up with various ways to reduce the money and food of the clan, such as stipulating that the members of the clan must register their official names in the jade in order to get the title and money, but due to the naming rules stipulated by Zhu Yuanzhang, after so many years of development, the words that can be used have been used all over, and many people cannot find the right words to name themselves, and the imperial court just took advantage of this to save this money and grain.

In addition, the emperor began to delay the payment of money and food to them, and the actual amount of money distributed was far from the prescribed amount, but this could not fundamentally solve the problem of the clan.

Zhu Yuanzhang stipulated that the Ming clan should divide the feudal clan and not tin soil, rank the lords but not the people, eat Lu but not govern affairs, and they must not participate in the business of the four people, they must not interfere in local political and military affairs, they must not leave the fiefdom without authorization, they are not allowed to do business, they are not allowed to participate in scientific examinations as officials, they are not allowed to engage in handicrafts, and they are not allowed to ...... Anyway, they can only stay in the house to eat, sleep, sleep and eat, and the rest can hardly do anything, Zhu Yuanzhang is planning to raise these people as pigs, raising them for more than 200 years, and finally raising more than 200,000 wastes.

In a sense, these Ming clans are even more unbearable than the children of the Eight Banners, at least the Eight Banners can also be officials, soldiers, if they have a little ambition, they can also mix up, and these Ming clans except for a few wonderful, using their economic strength and free time to make a little contribution to art, science and technology, the rest of the people have hardly left any deeds.

This kind of garbage must be removed, the clan does not have the corresponding strength, and solving them is just to damage their reputation, it is much easier than dealing with those gentry groups, persimmon first picks up the soft pinch, Li You aimed at the clans of the Ming Dynasty.