Seven years after the liberation.

The waves caused by the imperial examination are still shaking in the Ming Empire.

The huge industrial production that spread from Guangdong to Liangjiang, and the huge productive forces that burst out of the industrial revolution were like a monster, turning the southeastern territory of the Ming Empire into the world's largest industrial production base.

The Industrial Revolution slammed into the crumbling old order.

A whole new era, quickly dragged out by the roar of the steam engine.

Fires were flying.

This new era is like a newborn baby.

His life will bring new hope and vitality to the Ming Empire and the entire history of mankind.

But at the same time.

The farewell to the old times is also accompanied by labor pains.

No change can be without cost.

And the people who bear the cost of this change are often the lowest and most disadvantaged groups.

After the age of 30, the landlords could not take the imperial examination, they could still become agricultural capitalists, and they could still learn those new things with their own knowledge, and they were still the group with a relatively prosperous life after all.

And in fact.

In the midst of this change.

The most painful.

It is the lowest level of peasants.

At the same time that a part of the gentry transformed into industrial capitalists.

This meant that a large number of tenants began to lose their land.

Forced to join the ranks of immigrants to the Northeast, the South Seas, and the New World.

Of course, there are also some landless peasants who are unwilling to go far from the world, and the future awaits them is to enter the cities, become industrial workers, and become members of the proletariat, the gravediggers of the bourgeoisie of the Ming Empire.

These landless peasants poured into the cities.

Gather in the slums.

Become a cheap labor force and further promote the industrialization process of the southeastern territory of the Ming Dynasty.

In this case.

The populations of Shanghai and Guangzhou began to gather continuously.

The prototypes of two megacities located at the mouth of the Yangtze River and the Pearl River have already begun to emerge.

Take Shanghai, for example.

Shanghai County, Songjiang Prefecture, was upgraded to become a municipality directly under the jurisdiction of the Ming Dynasty, and its administrative status was comparable to that of a province.

From the beginning of the third year of liberation, the county was abolished and the city was promoted.

The population began to skyrocket from just 70,000 to 80,000.

Until now.

There are more than 600,000 people.

The rate at which the population is swelling is staggering.

Moreover, there is a large influx of new labor force into Shanghai every day.

It is foreseeable that in the next ten years, Shanghai, located at the mouth of the Yangtze River, will inevitably become an unprecedented super city with a population of millions, and become the most populous city in human history!

And now this Shanghai is not the same as other cities.

There are no walls.

The city expanded along the banks of the Yangtze River.

The originally low county seat of Shanghai has completely disappeared.

Instead.

It is a large number of reinforced concrete buildings.

At the same time, it is also one of the most developed cities in the world - perhaps compared to the current Shanghai, that is, Guangzhou, which developed relatively early.

But obviously.

Guangzhou's development potential is not as good as Shanghai's.

The contiguous industrial zones and a large number of factory owners who were originally based in Guangzhou have chosen to settle in Shanghai.

From the mouth of the Yangtze River to Chongqing.

A golden waterway runs through it.

The Wanshi ship can drive all the way from the mouth of the Yangtze River to the river port in Chongqing without changing ships.

On both sides of this waterway is the most densely populated and wealth-intensive area of the Ming Empire.

Technological progress, population gathering, and the three major agricultural provinces of Hunan, Hubei, and Sichuan are the backing.

Shanghai, Zhongdu, Wuhan, Chongqing.

Several large cities are connected along this waterway.

It has become a large market and one of the driving forces for industrialization.

And these days, the time and place are favorable, and everything is concentrated in the Yangtze River estuary, in Shanghai.

The whole of Shanghai is no longer a hundred miles of foreign fields in history, and it is a pity that it did not give birth to a culture of overseas style and comprador culture.

Because now in Shanghai Beach, it is no longer the merchant ships and warships of the great powers of China that come from afar, laden with industrial goods, enter the interior from the mouth of Shanghai, and dump all over China.

Rather, there are rows of towering chimneys emitting black smoke.

The industrial products of the Ming Empire will be sold all over the world from here.

A large number of chimneys are billowing smoke, polluting the Huangpu River into a black, stinking ditch.

It is also showing the magic of the industrial age.

The large-scale production of machines driven by the steam engine has increased the productivity of labor to an extent that is difficult to achieve.

With the domination of the Ming Empire, especially the planning and construction of the southern railway network, the railways connecting several large cities have begun to operate, and at the same time, a large number of people have poured in and concentrated, plus the subject countries of the Ming Empire have no concept of tariff protection for the Ming Dynasty.

For example, Japan, Korea, and Annam are all countries with populations of more than 10 million.

There are also countries such as Myanmar and Siam.

and India.

The surrounding market alone has a population of at least 300 million.

Plus the population of 400 million people in the Ming Empire.

Sixty percent of the world's population was completely open to the industrial products of the Ming Empire.

There are no tariffs, and even the threat of pirates has been reduced to negligible under the constant sweep of the Ming Empire's navy.

Driven by the two major markets at home and abroad, a large number of factories have risen at the elevation, and at the same time, these businessmen and landlords who dare to invest their funds in industrial production have become rich rapidly.

In the north of Shanghai, a large number of beautiful villas have been built.

They are the mansions of factory owners, traders, and senior managers.

Railroad tracks are laid on Shanghai's main roads, and horse-drawn trains run through the city.

Meanwhile.

South of Shanghai.

The first generation of industrial workers in the Ming Empire.

But living in dire straits.

The narrow slums are just south of the factory area, and the local landlords have converted the farmland into buildings, which are divided into cubicles, and the rents are quite cheap, attracting workers in the factory area.

At this time, to the north of the slum, there is an industrial area.

Jardine Matheson came to Shanghai three years ago to invest and build a factory.

At this time, Wu Dunyuan, the owner of Jardine Matheson, who was already significantly richer, was wearing a very fashionable Taoist birch suit, and he did not have a crown on his head—in fact, all the workers in the factory demanded that they not have a crown hair.

Because long hair is too dangerous in big machine production.

The workers did not have a special person to comb their hair and put their hair around their heads, as they did with the dignitaries, in case they were wrenched in by the machine.

There have been many similar incidents in Guangzhou.

So.

It was now explicitly required in the factories that any worker had to shave his hair short before he could work in the factories – which of course became a point of attack on Xinxue by Confucian scholars in newspapers like Junzibao.

People still have braids in the Qing Dynasty.

It's good that you have a Ming Dynasty.

Even the braids are not left directly, and the hair is shaved short, what does it look like.

However, the voice of these Confucian scholars is getting lower and lower.

Wu Dunyuan is very politically aware, and he took the initiative to shave his hair.

With a tiger head on crutches, he took a Westerner to visit his factory.

"Mr. Kant." Mr. Wu pointed to the workers who were being searched at the gate of the factory and spoke to the tanned Kant.

"These are the workers on the morning shift, and they've already gotten off work."

In recent years, Kant has been inspecting the eastern countries, going to Korea, Japan, Annam, Siam and other places.

Then I went to Guangzhou.

Then I went to Shanghai.

He was already planning to write an Oriental experience called "Journey to the East".

A detailed record of these years, the Ming Empire from its birth to its rise in the process.

The impact on the Ming Empire, as well as on the countries of the East.

Yes.

Kant was already planning to return to Europe.

Since he went to the East with Zhu Daohua in 1789, it is now 1797 AD.

Exactly eight years.

It can be said that it is an eye-opener in the East.

And now, after a few years of wandering around and returning to the south where the wealth of the Ming Empire gathered, Kant found that what he had seen and heard in the previous years was about to be overthrown again.

this country.

It's going too fast.

Are they being searched? ’

Kant frowned slightly.

Such a scene is really a bit unsightly.

The workers who had been on the night shift were left from work and had to be searched in such a dignified way.

This industrial mass production has brought great wealth, however... It may also cause deep suffering to many people.

These workers are obviously oppressed.

"Yes, you can't do it without a body search, you don't know, the factory produces yarn, how expensive this cotton yarn is, it is inevitable that some workers with unclean hands and feet steal the goods from the factory and sell them, and you can't do it without a body search!"

The line was lined up in two rows.

A line of male workers and a line of female workers.

For the working people of this era.

Being searched by an employer is not a personal insult.

But if it's a male foreman touching the female worker's body.

Guaranteed to die.

The workers were dressed in short-sleeved ragged clothes, and most of them were barefoot.

The face is not good.

The face is yellow and thin.

Apparently he didn't eat well.

And among the male and female workers, there are also child laborers!

As in historical Britain.

Child labour is also practiced.

The Ming Empire under Emperor Zhu was not a beacon country with social welfare that was too good to be envied.

It is a country full of exploitation and injustice, where the gap between the rich and the poor and the inequality of human status can be seen everywhere.

Of course, there was no compulsory education in the Ming Dynasty.

Although the Ming Royal Education Group and the Ministry of Education of the Ming Dynasty are formulating plans to establish a nationwide coverage of primary and secondary schools.

Ready for the next five years.

Establish five university clusters in five major cities: Guangzhou, Shanghai, Zhongdu, Beidu and Wuhan.

As the five major educational centers of gravity in the east, west, north and south.

As you can imagine.

In the future, the students around these five cities, as well as the provinces in which they are retreated, will surely be blessed.

And one thing is for sure.

For example, Henan, Shandong, and other provinces with large populations, and there are places that have not reaped any policy benefits.

In the future, the university entrance examination will definitely be very papery.

This damn historical inertia.

In addition, 3,000 primary schools and 800 middle schools will be established throughout the country.

Although the plans are ambitious.

But obviously.

Compared to the "baby boom" caused by medical advances in the Ming Dynasty, there will be more than 100 million school-age children in the next decade.

3,000 primary schools and 800 secondary schools.

It's a drop in the bucket.

The number is just too small.

Scarcity is expensive.

In addition, the private school that learns the Four Books and the Five Classics is not fragrant now.

Society has generally begun to embrace new forms of education.

More and more wealthy people are choosing to send their children to new schools.

Even the princes and princesses went to school in the royal primary school in Zhongdu, so of course the nobles in Zhongdu also had to follow in the footsteps of Emperor Zhu and send their children to be classmates with the princes, princes, and princesses.

Now that the new style of education is starting to gain popularity.

That free era is over.

So now primary and secondary schools have to charge fees.

Tuition fees are not expensive.

But it is not something that ordinary working-class and ordinary peasants can afford.

"Is the pay low?"

Kant asked, frowning as he looked at the apparently malnourished workers.

He found the factories to be quite clean.

That was the only advantage he saw when he came to the factory area.

But what Kant didn't know was.

When Wu Dunyuan heard that the emperor's friends were coming to visit the factory, he specially asked people to clean it inside and out to make it look very clean.

"Low? How can it be low? Mr. Kant, the average male worker in my factory here can get this amount for the most ordinary monthly salary! ”

Wu Dunyuan held out five fingers.

"Five bucks?"

Kant paused for a moment.

"That's right! Five yuan, you can exchange it for fifty jiao, five hundred, you can buy more than 100 catties of rice! There is also night shift compensation for those who work the night shift, and there are red envelopes during the New Year's holidays, how can it be low! ”

Wu Dunyuan shook his head and said, with a painful expression on his face.

Red envelope?

Kant squinted at Wu Dunyuan.

How much can you Cantonese people give for red envelopes.

This little bit of money is also counted.

What a vampire.

In the six years of the liberation, Wu Dunyuan, a large capitalist who had made a total of 1 million yuan in net profits through trade, shipping, textiles, and other industries, felt pain at this time by giving each worker a monthly salary of five yuan.

This capital.

Sure enough, she was pregnant from head to toe.

It's not too much to say he's a vampire.

An ordinary male worker earns five yuan a month.

Working 12 hours a day, the daily wage is about 0.16 yuan a day.

When converted to pounds, it is about 0.5 pounds.

This level of wages is actually higher than the wages of workers in the city of London.

"What about child and female workers? How much they earn. ”

"Female workers are two-thirds of the wages of male workers, and child workers are two-thirds of women's wages, whether in Shanghai or Guangzhou."

Wu Dunyuan introduced it happily.

He actually likes to use child labor and female labor.

In his own words: "Where child labor can be used, women will never be used, and where women can be used, no men will be used." ”

"Is it easy to recruit? There won't be a strike? Kant asked.

"Good move! It's too good to recruit people now, too many people have entered the city this year, strike? Let's go, it's a big deal to recruit another batch."

Wu Dunyuan was not afraid of a strike at all.

As long as the skilled workers in the factory can be stabilized, the workers on the assembly line can be recruited at will.

(End of chapter)