Liu Che looked at the King Lou Fan who was kneeling in front of him.

The meaning of him and his Loufan tribe, to Liu Che, was that they were probably similar to Shenzhen at the beginning of the reform and opening up in later generations.

It is the first stone to cross the river by feeling for the stones.

To be honest, Liu Che didn't have much confidence.

After all, such a thing has never happened before.

Although there were newcomers later, when the newcomers played this trick, the world at that time was already a world where machines were prevalent.

Therefore, the success of latecomers does not have much reference value.

At most, I can refer to one or two.

"Cotton...whaling...salt...medical..." These words flashed through Liu Che's mind one by one.

Today, Shangjun and Daijun are the two poorest and most difficult places for the Han Dynasty.

The cotton planting industry is developing in full swing.

Last year, the imperial estates and official fields of the royal family in these two counties were almost completely filled with these imported magical plants.

The cumulative planting area has expanded to nearly 10,000 acres.

Cotton output reached nearly 700,000 jins.

Now, they have all been recovered into the Shaofu's warehouse.

Liu Che is very sinister.

He announced to the people who farmed the official fields for him that one pound of cotton was equivalent to four pounds of corn.

If converted, it seems that the farmer uncle has made a lot of money.

Because the corn yield per acre in Shangjun and Daijun has been cheating since ancient times.

The average corn yield here is only about one and a half stone per mu.

Even, in many places there is only one stone.

The barren land, backward farming methods, and backward water conservancy facilities made it a world-famous "poor county" during the Qin and Han Dynasties.

The Han law specifically stipulates: If the land in the upper county is bad, two stones of cud and three stones of rice should be put into it.

Cuo is hay, while millet is straw.

This shows that in the eyes of the rulers, grass does not even grow much in Shangjun!

In order to avoid forcing farmers away, they had to compromise and announced that they would reduce the proportion of levy in Shang County to take care of the local economy and people's livelihood.

In actual operation, especially since Emperor Taizong of the Han Dynasty, the Han Dynasty pursued a policy of light corvee and low taxation in order to rest and recuperate.

Shangjun simply exempted many miscellaneous taxes including the millet tax.

After Liu Che came to power, he simply announced: The land in Shangjun is evil and its people are working hard. I am very sympathetic to it. The edict exempts people from cultivating rice and adds to the war.

Anyway, that place can't collect much tax on manuscripts.

It costs hundreds of thousands of dollars a year.

Moreover, the Liu family has actually confiscated this tax from them for more than ten years.

Rather than retaining this name, it is better to use it to win over people's hearts.

As for regular service and transfer service, considering the difficult people's livelihood in the local area, Liu Che naturally had no choice but to exempt them in order to maintain the local people's livelihood and economy and encourage fertility and development.

Otherwise, given the size of the local population and the situation of the land, Liu Che suspected that once the local people, especially the lower class people, were sent to do corvee labor, one family would soon be in trouble or even desperate.

This will force them to stick together.

Then a big family is formed.

Rely on the protection and strength of the family to survive.

However, the big family is the social model that Liu hates and dislikes the most.

It is the kingly way for one man to control a hundred fields with a narrow mouth and five mouths.

Because from a big family, aristocratic families will be born, and aristocratic families will produce powerful people, and powerful people will eventually evolve into powerful families.

In order to encourage people to separate their families, have children and raise offspring.

Liu Che could only choose to exempt himself from the two types of corvee that were most harmful to the people in the area.

In these two matters, Liu Che behaved as he advertised, loving the people as his own children.

However, when it comes to cotton.

Liu Che's face immediately changed.

When it comes to exploitation, it can be said that there is no bottom line.

One pound of cotton is worth four pounds of corn.

With this policy, it seems that the farmer uncle has made a lot of money.

To be honest, if made in Han Dynasty, one stone would be four jun, and one jun would weigh thirty kilograms.

One stone is equivalent to one hundred and twenty kilograms.

The local corn yield per acre is only one stone and a half, which is one hundred and sixty kilograms.

Today, Liu Che offers a price of one pound of cotton for four pounds of corn.

In the previous two counties, the average cotton yield per mu was around 60 to 80 kilograms.

Even if the worst yield is calculated at sixty, they can still get three stones of corn in return. If they are lucky and the yield per mu is eighty kilograms, they can get four stones of corn in return.

This kind of return rate is already higher than the yield per mu of most northern counties, and it can even compete with that of a sacred land like Hedong.

But the actual situation is not like this.

First, they have to pay rent.

Now, the only places that can grow cotton are Liu Che's own imperial village and official fields.

The so-called Huangzhuang and Guantian were actually taken by the Liu family from powerful landowners and officials in the past few decades using various means.

The land of criminal officials and lawless powerful people was confiscated and turned into the Liu family's imperial estate.

The Liu family then took these lands and rented them to landless people, which were called fake fields.

In history, Emperor Wu launched a campaign to seize countless fields, and the tax on the fake fields even exceeded the income from the field tax!

Today, the fake land tax rate stipulated by Liu is about 50%.

Only in Shanglinyuan, the tax rate for fake land is an extremely favorable 30%.

The reason is very clear. If the land in Shanglinyuan is rented to the people, the people will know that it is Liu's grace. Moreover, it is right under the emperor's nose, with eunuchs and cronies supervising it, so there will be no problems.

In local areas, where the mountains are high and the emperor is far away, fake land is given to the people, and the tax rate is too favorable. It is easy for local powerful people to collude with officials to take these lands as their own, and then act as second-rate dealers and sublease them to farmers to make profits from it.

In other words, in addition to having to pay taxes and serve in the military as usual, these people who rented fake land had to pay half of their income against the rent tax.

Half of the income flew away in one fell swoop.

The actual income of farmers is already very little.

Therefore, in reality, the local farmers who grow cotton for Liu Che are still living in poverty.

However, compared with the past, it is slightly better.

From eating bran and drinking water, I have developed to being able to eat a few full meals occasionally.

However, this is still irrelevant.

Moreover, in fact, corn is much easier to service than cotton.

Once the corn is planted, you can leave it alone and only turn over the soil occasionally to water and catch insects.

But cotton is different. Cotton requires a lot of water for irrigation and more careful care.

For the same 100 acres of land, the whole family may have to work hard for several days during sowing and harvesting of corn.

But cotton needs careful care and observation every day.

In terms of input ratio, cotton requires at least three times as much energy and sweat as corn.

But the actual income of farmers is actually the same as this.

It is obvious that Liu Che adopts a typical capitalist attitude toward the cotton industry.

And it’s the attitude of a sweatshop capitalist.

The purchase price he gives farmers is essentially the same as Foxconn's.

I'll give you a basic salary of 1,500 yuan a month, and then a salary of 5,000 yuan at the end of the month. It seems like a pretty high salary.

But you are actually on the production line 12 hours a day, 30 days a month.

The reason for this was that Liu Che actually had no choice.

Cotton is destined to be an industrial product.
To be continued...