When Wu Qi took the emperor's order and prepared to go south to Jianghuai, the player Jiang Lun met Li Yan.
"Your Highness, I have a proposal to make the country rich and its military strong!"
Jiang Lun looked at Li Yan nervously. This policy was compiled by him with great difficulty based on his professional knowledge. He waited in line for two days before he got the chance to be interviewed by Li Yan.
Li Yan allows players to contribute their own plans. If the plan is well written, Li Yan will reward the players with some contribution points.
If the plan is well written, Li Yan will even let players try out his plan.
Since Cui Tao has been promoted to the Marching Sima of the Bafu through continuous advancement.
This guy Cui Tao shows off his title of Marching Sima all day long, which arouses the collective red eyes of the players.
The players also wrote plans one after another and frantically gave Li Yan suggestions.
Li Yan has been meeting with players every day these days and is numb to hearing their suggestions.
It turns out that most players are keyboard warriors, and there are very few players who can really make useful suggestions.
For example, Jiang Lun, a former player, gave Li Yan advice to develop industry.
Of course Li Yan knew about developing industry, but when asked how the player wanted to develop industry, the player started to wonder.
It's just that Chelulu said that he wanted to build more factories.
I also know that I want to build a factory! But with the current technology, what kind of factory can be built?
You should get me an assembly line!
However, this is not outrageous. There were players who told Li Yan that a Senate should be established and all the players should be given the title of Senator.
Good guy, Roman orthodoxy was in the Tang Dynasty, right?
Li Yan asked his bodyguards to kick out this unreliable player, and immediately ordered the system to monitor this player. If he followed Rome's example and tried to assassinate Caesar, then he would kick this player out of the game quickly!
Now Li Yan has been meeting with players for three days and has very few reliable suggestions. At this time, his head is swollen and he weakly meets Jiang Lun.
To make a country rich and its army strong, almost everyone who makes plans would say this. Li Yan waved his hand and asked Jiang Lun to get to the point quickly.
Jiang Lun cleared his throat and said, "Your Highness, wealth is the most important thing in the world."
Li Yan nodded. He had put down the rebellion of the Anyang, Yang and Wu families a while ago and rewarded Mo Lijun afterwards. Li Yan gave away all the money he had collected from the players' pockets during this period.
Only then did Li Yan realize that his body ached. No wonder the war was said to cost money. The reward of only 500 Mo Lijun had already wiped out Li Yan's savings.
But if the reward cannot be paid in full, then according to the "tradition" of the Tang Dynasty, it would be relatively mild to besiege the Bafu armed forces to ask for wages.
There are too many emperors and generals who have failed because of insufficient rewards. Others have worked hard for you, so you must give adequate rewards and pensions after the war, otherwise no one will work hard for you in the future.
Now Li Yan is also worried about finances. Although players do not need to pay wages, the Guazhou governor's office also needs to eat.
The Lingwu court has issued an edict, allowing all the vassal towns to raise their own salaries. In the future, Li Yan's territory will become larger, and he will have to bear the expenses of the yamen.
Li Yan became interested and said to Jiang Lun: "But Guazhou is exhausted and the people have just regained some strength. Can't we raise taxes now?"
Jiang Lun shook his head and said: "The strategy that I propose to Your Highness is to enrich the country without increasing rents!"
"Is there such a good method? Tell me quickly!"
Jiang Lun immediately said: "Specialized in iron!"
This suggestion seemed somewhat reliable. Li Yan asked: "How to specialize in iron?"
Jiang Lun said: "This franchise is not to allow the imperial court to control all the blacksmith shops, but to control the iron factories!"
"Control the iron works and sell the steel to merchants at a higher price."
"The imperial court does not need to control all the blacksmith shops and steel factories, it only needs to hold the raw material of iron ingots in its hands."
"Today, the smelting cost of the Dashuixia Iron Plant is enough to crush any smelter in Datang, and the quality of the steel produced by the Dashuixia Iron Plant is far better than any smelter."
"Ironware is used by both rich and poor. Farming tools and kitchen utensils are indispensable at home."
"Building factories and purchasing machinery will also use a lot of steel, so adding taxes directly to the price of iron is a fair and effective tax collection method!"
Li Yan asked: "It's effective. The lonely king can understand it. Why is it fair?"
Jiang Lun said: "Since ancient times, land tax has been the most difficult to collect. This tax needs to go to every household and be collected from the hands of every household. Not only is the cost huge, but it will also breed a lot of corruption."
Li Yan nodded. No matter how good the land policy is, it needs to be implemented by people. As long as it is implemented by people, there will be loopholes.
Even though Li Yan was very successful in his campaign, as long as he left Guazhou, the land of these common people would return to the hands of the powerful in a few years.
Jiang Lun said: "If taxes are added to steel, anyone who buys iron is equivalent to paying taxes to the court. The poor buy less, and the rich buy more. This is a kind of fairness."
"The biggest advantage is that as long as His Highness controls the iron factory, he will be able to collect the iron tax without having to go to the fields to collect taxes from every household."
After Jiang Lun finished speaking, Li Yan immediately smiled. This is a good idea!
The smelting efficiency of Dashuixia Iron Works is very high, and the steel ingots produced are low-priced and of high quality.
Although Jian Xia said that these steel materials are not enough to make cannons, they are enough to make iron tools for daily use and to make machines.
As long as Li Yan controls the iron factory and adds an iron tax to the price of the iron ingots he sells, he will continue to receive tax revenue from the steel trade!
This method is great! And it is highly executable. Jiang Lun’s plan is the best strategy Li Yan has obtained recently!
Li Yan immediately came down and said to Jiang Lun: "Jiang Lun, can this iron tax be more than the rent collected by Guazhou?"
“Guaranteed nothing more!”
Li Yan understood what Jiang Lun meant. He wanted to establish a state-owned steel company and use the important role of steel in daily life to collect taxes from the people through steel supplies.
In fact, in that parallel world, many countries insisted on state-owned steel until modern times. It was only after the steel industry gradually became marginalized and no longer the lifeblood of the country that they relaxed the state-owned steel industry and allowed private investment in the steel industry.
As early as the Han Dynasty, the Han court discussed the issue of state-owned salt and iron, and recorded the entire debate into a book called "On Salt and Iron", which profoundly discussed the pros and cons of state monopoly.
The discussion in the Han Dynasty actually continued the "official mountains and seas" proposed by Guan Zhong in the Spring and Autumn Period. The government controlled the ore in the mountains and the salt in the sea, so that it could extract wealth from the people and support the court.
With the development of the times, the demand for steel will inevitably increase further, which will bring endless financial resources to Li Yan.
"Okay, here's the order! A Railway Bureau will be established in Guazhou, and King Jiang Lun will appoint you as a member of the army in Bafu. You will know the affairs of the Railway Bureau and be fully responsible for the collection of iron taxes in the future!"