Of course, only Li Hao knows what is behind this, after all, Shen Tugang and Zeng Gongliang are not traversers.

It's just that the two of them also know Fu Bi's pride, so he succumbed to Ouyang Xiu, even if Fu Bi took office, he might not be convinced in his heart.

It is naturally impossible to persuade Ouyang Xiu to abdicate and let Xian, but if you want to let Fu Bi become a privy envoy, who is responsible for the problem behind this.

So when facing Han Qi's treatment, the three of them felt a little tricky.

But fortunately, Ouyang Xiu also knew that things were difficult to do, and he didn't plan to really embarrass Li Hao and them.

said directly: "When the period of worry expires, Fu Bi will naturally return to Beijing to report on his work and serve the country."

At the beginning, Fu Bi Daxianggong was from the position of Pingzhangshi under the Tongzhong Shumen and Zhaowenge University Scholar to Ding Wei, and this time he should have been reinstated as an official. ”

Hearing this, Li Hao really looked at Ouyang Xiu in surprise, he didn't expect him to have such a high demeanor.

As a result, Ouyang Xiu said again: "It's just that the situation in the court is changing too quickly now, and the first emperor suddenly died of an accident, and he ordered me to come to assist the Zuo official family."

The first emperor is so trusted, how can I disobey it, so this time I can only grieve the rich and the great.

I invite you here today in the hope that one of you can go to Luoyang for me, meet the Prime Minister Fu Bi in person, and explain this matter. ”

Sure enough, Li Hao knew that he was thinking too much, and Ouyang Xiu was indeed not so stupid.

But that's okay, Li Hao is more familiar with Ouyang Xiu after all, and it's better to have him in charge than Fu Bi.

It's just that this dripping goo only stopped for a while, and Li Hao quickly reacted, Ouyang Xiu seemed to have said that he wanted people to go to Luoyang.

Hurriedly said: "Recently, the Third Division is preparing to reform the tax law to deal with the empty treasury, so I can't get out for the time being. ”

After finishing speaking, he accompanied Ouyang Xiu and quietly looked at Zeng Gongliang and Shen Tugang, which guy went to Luoyang last.

In fact, Ouyang Xiu didn't want Li Hao to go over, so he called him to simply make up the number of people.

After all, Li Hao has been an official for too short a time, and it is estimated that he has no face in Fu Bi.

Don't invite Fu Bi by then, it will be embarrassing then.

It's just obvious that Zeng Gongliang and Shen Tugang don't want to go, after all, this time it's not good news, and the ghost knows what Fu Bi's reaction will be after hearing it.

But in fact, after Li Hao withdrew, the final outcome had already come out, because Shen Tugang still had to supervise the Yongzhao Mausoleum, and it was impossible to leave for too long.

So after a heated discussion, Zeng Gongliang reluctantly took on this task.

After the candidates were decided, Li Hao and Shen Tugang left together, leaving Zeng Gongliang in Ouyang Xiu's mansion to give a good face-to-face lecture.

On the way, Shen Tugang was chatting with Li Hao, and talked about Qi Heng in the middle.

Shen Tugang said: "I heard that Yuan Ruo, the position of Langzhong in the Ministry of Works, was recommended by Master Li to the Prime Minister. ”

Hearing this, Li Hao thought that Shen Tugang knew something and wanted to ask him for the crime, after all, the Ministry of Industry was the last in the list among the six departments.

But there is no way, there is Shen Tugang in the sixth department, and it is impossible to arrange his son-in-law in again, which is unreasonable.

The rest of the Ministry of Household and Ministry of Rites are fictitious, and the functions and powers of the Ministry of Household are under the jurisdiction of the three divisions, and the entire Ministry of Household only retains the position of the Ministry of Judgment, which is responsible for accepting tribute from the whole country.

This position is okay to use for oil and water, but it is estimated that Qi Heng is unwilling to do it, after all, the Duke of Qi is not short of this bit of silver.

And the Ministry of Rites is the same, there is only one person in the Ministry of Rites, although the authority left behind is quite large, because just the person in charge of the imperial examination and the tribute court is enough to make people moved.

But because of this, Qi Heng couldn't raise this position at all, after all, Qi Heng had only finished the imperial examination for a long time, how could he have this prestige and ability.

Needless to say, the criminal department has relatively high requirements for this profession, and Qi Heng has not experienced it below, so it is a bit hasty to directly ask him to judge the life and death of others.

As for not going to the Ministry of War, it is Qi Guogong's pot, this guy is bent on getting the Qi family out of the identity of military generals, so he doesn't want Qi Heng to have too much to do with the generals in the Ministry of War.

After such calculations, in the end, he could only be arranged to the Ministry of Industry, but the yamen was worse, but the position was not discounted.

Moreover, Li Hao also found a companion for Qi Heng, and transferred Sheng Changbai to the Ministry of Industry as Yu Langzhong.

Although Li Hao's main purpose was to see that Sheng Changbai's progress was much slower than in the original play, so he deliberately helped, but this also shows that Li Hao still values the Ministry of Industry very much.

Li Hao planned to defend himself, and by the way, he smashed the pot on Ouyang Xiu's head.

But before he could open his mouth, Shen Tugang continued: "I and the Qi family have recorded Master Li's affection for this matter, and I will repay it in the future." ”

"Is this guy saying the right thing or the other way, is it so easy for them to be satisfied?" Li Hao pondered what Shen Tugang meant.

After speaking, Shen Tugang and Li Hao said goodbye, and the two went separately, and Li Hao ignored Shen Tugang's words.

After more than ten days, Li Hao has been busy in the three divisions, and what Li Hao said in Ouyang Xiu's mansion at that time was not just an excuse, but really prepared to reform the tax law to increase the treasury revenue.

In fact, Li Hao has long intended to reform the tax law, but he did not have the authority when he was appointed as the salt and iron envoy in the past.

I am also afraid that I will be hindered by others, and then I will be distorted, which will be harmful and useless.

This time, Li Hao became the third envoy, and there is no need to worry about this authority issue, and there is the support of Ouyang Xiu, the top boss, which is just convenient to show his skills.

Li Hao reretrieved the account books and records for several years, and according to the actual situation, the amount of taxes paid for the whole year of last year was increased.

From 84.6 million taels of silver the year before, it has increased to 89.7 million taels of silver, and of course a considerable part of this is the new salt tax revenue.

Even so, it can prove that the overall economy of the Great Song Dynasty is good, at least much better than the poverty of the Ming Dynasty.

It's just that Li Hao also found some problems, that is, in the tax, the proportion of agricultural tax and commercial tax is getting larger and larger.

According to last year's proportion, the agricultural tax mainly based on the two taxes was 26.91 million taels, accounting for about 30 percent, while the commercial tax was 62.79 million taels, accounting for 70 percent.

But this ratio is still almost half in the Qingli period, and it has undergone such a huge change in just over ten years.

Of course, according to normal terms, the larger this ratio, the better it should be for the common people, especially for the peasant class, their burden will be lighter.

However, this is not the case, because the bulk of this commercial tax comes from various monopoly activities, and it is these monopolies that cause the prices of the necessities of life to surge.

Only grain, cloth, tea, and salt account for 60% of the year's commercial tax, so on the surface, these are commercial taxes, but in fact they are not much different from agricultural taxes, and they are already asking for money on the heads of ordinary people.

Of course, if all these taxes can be strictly enforced according to the requirements of the law, then perhaps the people will be able to get by.

But in fact, in the operation of the officials below, there are too many tricks that can be made.

For example, "additional consumption" is the most commonly used means, because the collection of agricultural tax is that the people pay rice and grain to the government in kind, and the households must spontaneously send wheat grain and silk to the designated place, and generally the place to be transported is not close.

In this way, there will naturally be attrition, after all, it is normal for rats and sparrows to steal and gnaw bad things, which is something that cannot be avoided in modern times, let alone ancient times.

Therefore, in order to make up for this part of the loss, the local government will collect an additional part of the rice grain from the peasants, which is the so-called "additional consumption".

And since this is the local government's own arrangement, if the local officials are honest, it is fine, but if they meet a black-hearted person, it will be a heavy burden for the people.

Of course, in order to deal with this situation, in fact, the imperial court also has corresponding countermeasures, that is, "branch transfer and change", in order to reduce the burden of the people.

This policy means that it is not necessary to hand over the goods in kind, but to exchange them for silver taels or things prescribed by the government, and pay them as taxes.

It sounds like this policy is very beneficial to the people and can effectively reduce the burden on the people.

But in fact, this policy is also played by the government, which often folds this thing into another thing, or into money, or into money.

If you fold silk silk with money, or fold wheat with money, or fold silk into wheat after folding, and repeatedly fold it, you can always artificially lower the price of the goods paid, and then raise the price of the converted goods.

In this way, in order to offset the original tax of the conversion, it is necessary to pay a larger amount, and the tax is imposed in disguise.

In addition to the "branch transfer and change", the imperial court originally had another tax policy that benefited the people, but now it has also changed, that is, "and buy." ”

This is also the policy that Zhao Zhen wanted to benefit the people, that is, the government lent money to the households when the green and yellow were not accepted, and the households lost silk to the government to repay the loans after the summer and autumn harvests, which was originally intended to help the households survive the time of poverty, and this policy was also the prototype of the green seedling method in Wang Anshi's reform.

However, in the actual operation process, the government can specifically manipulate the interest, so it has become a harsh policy for the government to lend usury and collect interest.

In addition, there are more miscellaneous taxes, such as "cowhide tax", "deed tax", "head money", etc., all kinds of taxes together, the burden on the people is even more than the regular tax.

If you want to say that the money is really in the treasury, Li Hao won't say much.

But in fact, most of the silver went into the pockets of corrupt officials and corrupt officials, but it made the court a target.

Moreover, because of the increased burden on the peasants, the yeoman peasant class became more and more scarce, which accelerated the pace of land annexation and concentrated the land in the hands of a small number of people.

Of course, Li Hao now belongs to this small group of people, but he is not so obsessed with land compared to Li Hao.

In addition, in addition to the problem of agricultural tax for the common people, the problem of commercial tax is also very large.

Originally, Li Hao did not have a clear understanding of the checkpoint of tax collection, after all, Li Hao had not really walked the business road from beginning to end.

It wasn't until this time that Li Hao discovered that there were so many tax customs in the Great Song Dynasty, more than 2,200 tax customs.

And because the Great Song Dynasty is not like now, the accounts and everything can be clearly counted, and the tax can be paid directly according to the transaction amount.

Rather, it is mainly divided into two categories: residential tax and overtax, of which over-tax is a tax levied on business travelers who resell goods, and is taxed at 2% of the price of the goods.

The residence tax is 3% of the price of goods when a merchant who opens a shop sells goods in the local area or when the merchant arrives at the place of residence and sells the goods.

Although it stands to reason that there will be corresponding vouchers after the tax is paid once, there is no need to pay it a second time.

However, as far as Li Hao has learned, in the actual operation process, the repeated collection of taxes is a very common phenomenon, which has caused great damage to normal business activities.

Because in this way, small businessmen will be unable to sustain themselves due to the heavy pressure of commercial taxes, while the giant businessmen with strong financial resources and those with official backgrounds will be more and more able to expand their capital strength and carry out mergers and acquisitions.

It means that whether it is land or merchants, it will always be the officials and gentry who will profit in the end.

If it weren't for the fact that the Song Dynasty officials and gentry were only exempted from forced labor, and the taxes had to be paid correctly, otherwise the Great Song Dynasty was estimated to be poorer than the Ming Dynasty.

Faced with this situation, Li Hao naturally wanted to carry out a reform of taxation, and the primary goal was to focus on commercial taxation.

It is not that commercial taxes are more important than agricultural taxes, but to a certain extent, the reform of commercial taxes is smaller than the interest groups touched by the reform of agricultural taxes.

After all, don't look at the fact that the money paid in commercial taxes is more than that on the land, but the love of the Great Song gentry for the land is more important than simple money.

After clarifying the goal, Li Hao sent people to conduct a census of all tax customs in the country, and correspondingly only set up checkpoints on some important traffic arteries.

Anyway, the Song Dynasty was not the same as modern times, and the traffic extended in all directions.

Here, if you want to transport large quantities of goods, you can only take the official road, and there are only one or two roads, and you may not know where to run if you change the road.

In addition, Li Hao also wants to imitate the modern business license and make a household registration system for merchants, and if you want to do business in the future, you must go to the government to get a license.

But later, in discussions with his subordinates, Li Hao gave up this idea.

One is troublesome to operate, after all, there is no computer in this era, and this kind of non-uniform style of things has to be written by manpower, which is a lot of work.

Second, it is not easy for the local government to cooperate with each other, and it is also difficult to do this anti-counterfeiting thing.

Of course, the most important thing is the third point, Li Hao really has no trust in local officials, and now they are all so rampant.

If these people are really allowed to control the entry and exit of merchants, these people will not be able to turn the sky upside down.

Therefore, Li Hao finally decided to first rectify the tax collectors and combine the two systems of tax collection at the central and local levels.

However, this move is a suppression of local power, and in order to avoid being counterattacked by officials in various state capitals, Li Hao is particularly cautious in this matter.

First of all, Li Hao needs to get Ouyang Xiu's support, only in this way can he maintain his absolute advantage.

What Li Hao didn't expect was that after listening to Li Hao's words, Ouyang Xiu directly asked Li Hao to stop first and not to worry.

said that after Fu Bi returned to Beijing, he would discuss the matter together.