Chapter 2771 Capital (one hundred and twenty-four)
At this moment, he looked at the scholar in front of him, but he had some doubts. Can this person take on such an important task?
He coughed slightly and asked: "You have always known the relationship between the emperor and the emperor. Even so, I am here to ask you: With the current situation in the world, how should you deal with the emperor's thief?"
This is a proper question. Qian Taichong has done this in his mind countless times.
If it were in the past, he would definitely have advocated "painful suppression". However, after running around the capital these days and talking to "Mr. Le", he has changed his mind.
The imperial court had neither the strength nor the will to "suppress" the Kun thieves. A penny would force a hero to death. This was the case in Zhangzhou Bay, and it was also the case in the capital.
Furthermore, if the imperial court wants to "suppress" them, what can the Zheng family do? With such little wealth as their own, they can't even get out of Zhangzhou Bay. As for those relatives, it would be a good idea to fight them over without taking the money from the thief Kun.
Immediately he said: "The Kun thieves are entrenched in Guangdong and Guangxi, and their power is gradually gaining momentum. If we want to suppress them all at once, the imperial court cannot do it without sending important ministers and deploying heavy troops. But at the moment, the troops are depleted and the pay is low, so it is difficult to raise funds for a while..."
At this point, he slightly raised his eyelids to look at the emperor's expression. Seeing that Chongzhen's expression remained as usual, he knew that he had figured it out well. He boldly continued: "...the only way is to figure it out slowly."
"Oh, how can we figure it out slowly?" the emperor asked.
Qian Taichong was about to present the strategy that he had been thinking about for many days. The previous points, such as training troops, eliminating traitors, protecting armor, etc., were all clichés and nothing new. Only when it came to "raising wages" was it different.
"...Training soldiers is nothing more than paying. The world is troubled, and it is difficult for the court to raise wages. However, the Kun thieves are entrenched in only two provinces, but they are well-paid and have good soldiers. The root cause is that there is industry and commerce.
Benefit!"
Chongzhen had actually heard a thing or two about why Kun thieves had better soldiers and more money. He also knew that Kun thieves "focused on industry and commerce" and "light on agriculture". However, he didn't know exactly what kind of industry and commerce made huge profits. He heard what Qian Taichong said,
I couldn't help but become interested.
Although Chongzhen was not as greedy as his grandfather, his desire for "money" was no less than that of Naizu. There was money everywhere.
No matter what ideas are used to increase revenue and reduce expenditure, the government and the public are complaining. The money spent in vain does not necessarily increase much, and the money spent increases day by day. Due to the sharp increase in expenditures, the treasury of the Ministry of household affairs is in a state of chaos, and the left and right are in dire straits. The post of minister has become one that everyone fears.
Poor. Every time I call the right person, as soon as money is mentioned, there is a deathly silence.
"Tell me, how did this thief get the benefit of industry and commerce?"
Qian Taichong immediately recounted everything he had seen and heard over the years. In fact, why the Kun thief was so wealthy? According to Qian Taichong's understanding, it was because overseas trade was developed and he earned a large amount of silver from abroad every year.
Everyone in the Ming Dynasty understood that overseas trade could make money. However, the court did not gain much direct benefit from it. The reason was that tax management was very backward.
Although there is a tariff, the tax rate is actually very low and the collection method is unscientific. The annual overseas trade volume is several million taels, but the tax revenue obtained from it is very little.
Macau, the window for trade between the East and the West, earned hundreds of thousands of silver for Portuguese merchants every year, while the Ming Dynasty only received a mere "land rent" of a few hundred taels.
Qian Taichong went on to say that Kun thieves have a complete and sophisticated approach to overseas trade. The amount of tax collected for imported and exported goods by sea is adjusted in a timely manner according to market demand. The customs alone can collect a large amount of tax every year. And they use the sea to import and export goods.
Businesses also continued to purchase scarce materials from overseas.
"... When the bandits first occupied Guangdong and Guangxi, food was scarce. They purchased cloth from India and rice from Siam to supply the market and stabilize prices. Therefore, the people in both places were confused by them..."
Just earning a lot of silver doesn't explain why they are so rich - the real reason was actually found out after Mr. Le came to visit him.
That is, the large amount of money obtained by the Kun thieves from overseas trade was not saved and hidden in warehouses and cellars like the Zheng family or other maritime merchants did. Instead, the money was resold and spent to buy various goods from overseas.
Silver itself is not wealth. It took Qian Taichong several days to understand this concept.
"...Gold and silver are not wealth, but are actually exchange items of equal value. Wealth itself is rice, food, cloth, iron, and other things that people need to make a living..."
"If the imperial court can widen the borders and reform tariffs, it will not only be able to collect billions of silver every year, but also purchase weapons and grain from overseas. Even if the harvest is insufficient, a few percent of the imports can make up for official expenses, and there is no need to send additional troops or impose additional taxes.
The common people can also take a breather. It is also a plan to draw fuel from the bottom of the cauldron for the rogue bandits."
"Rice grains are imported from overseas?!" Chongzhen was shocked. Since ancient times, he has never heard of buying grains from overseas to make up for a bad harvest. He shook his head and said, "There are hundreds of millions of people in the country, how much rice grains can a mere Siam produce? The imperial court
How much silver can you have?"
"Your Majesty doesn't know something," Qian Taichong said. "When rice is sold in Siam, Luzon and other places, it only costs one or two coins per stone, including the water fee. It only costs three or four coins to get to Guangzhou. Kun
The thieves can carry as few as 2,000 dan or as many as 10,000 dan in each boat, transporting them day and night in a constant flow. Every year, the rice imported from Siam and Nanyang is no less than a million dan!"
Qian Taichong didn't know how much rice Kun Thief imported from overseas. The specific figure was provided by Mr. Le. To be honest, he thought it was too fantasy, but Mr. Le said that this figure was only an underestimate, not an exaggeration.
Since he wants the emperor to accept his "advice", it's okay to be exaggerated.
Sure enough, a look of surprise appeared on the emperor's face. He muttered: "Sea trade is one, but what about the other?"
"Sea trade is 'merchant', and the second is 'work'." Qian Taichong said, "The thieves often defeat more with less, relying on nothing more than strong ships and powerful guns; all kinds of Australian goods are just ordinary goods.
With a little processing, the price can be ten times or hundreds of times higher. The minister saw that there are a lot of Australian goods in the capital, and a mere box of Australian fire costs twenty or thirty cents. This item can be sold in Guangzhou for only ten cents.
The shop sells it in bulk, and each box only costs two or three cents. It’s like turning stone into gold, how can you not be rich?”
"There is no greater profit than industry and commerce." Emperor Chongzhen nodded and said, "I believe what the ancients said! It's just that what you said is the skill of a thief..."
Qian Taichong hurriedly said: "I am brave enough to propose a plan. I hope the emperor will forgive me."
"What is your crime? But it doesn't matter."
"Learn Kun's skills to defeat Kun!" Qian Taichong prepared this for a long time and finally said this.
At this moment, he felt relieved. He had heard this sentence and similar meanings said more than once by knowledgeable people in both the government and the public. He had also talked about similar words with the main leaders of the Zheng Sen Group.
But this is just their private consensus. Whether it is Liang Cunhou, Qian Taichong, Zai Xiang or others, they are all aware of the resistance they may encounter in the court.
"Kun's skills do have their advantages." The emperor recalled the "Southern goods" that Kun had in the palace, and asked, "But how to 'learn' them?"
When Qian Taichong saw that the emperor was interested in this, he immediately learned what he had learned and sold it, and changed what Mr. Le had said to him in the past.
"Kun thieves value profit over righteousness. As long as there are enough benefits, they will naturally be willing to teach."
These days, Qian Taichong has been thinking about what Mr. Le said, and based on his conversations with Liang Cunhou and other "people who know Kun" in the past few years, as well as the contents of newspapers and books he read about Kun Thief, he made a new guess. Suddenly, he thought of it.
Developed a brand new strategy.
This strategy is no longer about simply introducing technology like setting up a sugar factory, but about fundamentally improving the situation of the Zheng family.
If the emperor wants to support the Zheng family, he must make the Zheng family "useful" again. Just setting up a sugar factory in Zhangzhou Bay can only improve the economic situation of the Zheng Sen Group, but it cannot change the situation of being trapped in the city.
Staying in Zhangzhou Bay, Zheng Sen will have no future. Even if the imperial court is willing to support the Zheng family, under the tight blockade and division of the Kun thieves, it will not be possible at all, and sooner or later they will be abandoned by the emperor.
The only solution now is to jump out of Zhangzhou Bay and seek other development.
Although there is an old saying that "people are cheap when they leave their hometown", but in Zhangzhou Bay right now, all the original branches of the Zheng Group are eyeing the young master and trying every possible means to seize the property. Staying there is just a target of public criticism.
Only when you jump out will you have new opportunities.
Originally, when Zheng Zhilong was alive, he focused on running Taiwan. However, since the Kinmen War, the Zheng family business in Taiwan has been taken away by thieves, and the area is not suitable for development.
"I ask the emperor to open Shanghai as a treaty port, just like what happened in Guangzhou." Qian Taichong reported.
"Open Shanghai as a port?" Chongzhen was surprised.
"Yes, now that Guangdong and Guangxi have been lost, Guangzhou has been captured by thieves. All the revenue from sea trade has gone into their pockets. If a port is re-established in Shanghai and the Shipping Department of Tiji City is re-established, it will be responsible for the foreign ship trade and collect tariffs every year.
The imperial court will receive more than 200,000 taels of tax money!"
"Two hundred thousand taels!" This number made the emperor's eyebrows move slightly. Even for the imperial court, two hundred thousand taels was not a small amount. In the first year of Tianqi, Zhejiang and Nanzhili, the two richest provinces among the eighteen provinces, were dissolved.
Only 3.25 million taels of silver were transported to Taicang, the capital. In the seventh year of the Apocalypse, 370,000 taels of silver were transferred from Guangdong to the capital, and the vassal treasury was completely empty. A Shanghai port can earn 200,000 taels of silver by collecting customs duties from foreign merchants.
Ten thousand?!
But when Zheng Zhilong was alive, it was already rumored that his shopkeepers, stewards, and generals had hundreds of thousands or even millions of properties. After the Anping War, Jin Yiwei secretly went to Fujian to investigate, saying that the Kun thieves came from Anping once
Take away "three million taels of silver".
In this way, a tariff of 200,000 taels a year is not outrageous.
Seeing that the emperor was moved, Qian Taichong boasted about the benefits of setting up a port in Shanghai: Shanghai is backed by the prosperous and prosperous areas of Jiangsu and Zhejiang, and is rich in products, whether raw silk, satin, cotton, utensils, dried and fresh fruits...
…are all “cool goods” favored by foreign businessmen. In addition, the shipping on the Yangtze River is convenient, and products along the Yangtze River can be transported directly down the river to Shanghai for export.