Chapter 171 Expansion into Town 1

"Thanks to the strong support of the General Administration of Agriculture and Forestry, although we are still unable to know all the arable land data in Fengtian Province, it is conservatively estimated that the registered arable land and private land in the province should be more than 60 million mu of arable land. However, on these 6,000 mu of arable land, the State Administration of Finance collects no more than 150 mu of land tax. One hundred thousand taels of silver!" Zhao Dongping continued to say loudly, "The low tax is certainly due to too many private fields, but just based on the number of existing registered fields, the current ratio of taxes collected and total farmland production is also extremely low!"

To be honest, in terms of the land policy in the late Qing Dynasty, Fengtian received 1.5 million taels of silver tax every year. As a contemporary granary in China, the annual field tax of Huguang Province will not be much more than that of Fengtian. If you simply calculate the land production and the taxes levied by the state on farmers, you will find that this proportion is quite low, far less than the agricultural tax in normal countries.

"However, through research, our bureau found that the burden on farmers in the province is extremely heavy. In addition to bearing positive taxes, they also need to bear all kinds of miscellaneous taxes, and this part of local miscellaneous taxes are much higher than positive taxes, and most of these miscellaneous taxes are collected by local governments and cannot be collected into the provincial finance!" Zhao Dongping said this, paused for a meeting and continued:

"According to the discussion of many colleagues in our bureau, if we want to increase the income of land tax and reduce the burden on the people at the same time, the only best way is to ban miscellaneous taxes and various corvée, donations, etc., and directly levy unified agricultural taxes on farmers. In this way, the tax per mu of land will be at least several times higher than before!"

"In addition, considering that the fiscal revenue of local governments and counties used to rely on various miscellaneous taxes, our bureau's opinion is to refer to the previous commercial tax reform, and then allocate a certain proportion to local governments and counties to maintain the operation of local finance!"

The tax reform presided over by Zhao Dongping last year mainly focused on business tax, capital and other miscellaneous taxes. In addition to the traditional consolidation of taxes, the most important thing is to return the power of commercial tax and capital to the General Administration of Finance, which will be collected by the General Administration of Finance in the branches set up by prefectures and counties, and the income commercial tax part Most of them are paid to the provincial finance, and a small part is delivered to local governments and counties.

However, the reform at that time mainly focused on commercial taxation, while agricultural taxation was too restrained, so it was not changed rashly!

While listening, Zhao Dongyun looked through the plan in his hand. Zhao Dongping said that these plans sounded better, but it was more difficult to implement them.

It can even be said that it is more difficult to carry out agricultural tax reform in Fengtian than other provinces. Why? Because Fengtian is not a province in the traditional sense, but a general's jurisdiction, and General Shengjing has full authority to deal with the military and civilian affairs within the jurisdiction.

And one thing must be noted is that there are a large number of flagmen in Fengtian, and naturally there are a large number of flag fields.

In addition, Fengtian, as the birthplace of the Manqin Dynasty, the Qing aristocracy had a large number of estates in Fengtian, not only the aristocracy, but even the royal family had a large number of imperial estates in Fengtian.

Therefore, the land composition of Fengtian Province is relatively complex. It is not mainly composed of Mintian and Guantian in ordinary provinces, but Huangzhuang, Noble Tianzhuang, Qitian, Mintian and Guantian.

If Zhao Dongyun wants to play tax reform, he must be cautious, otherwise it will be easy to attract political enemies to attack and annihilate!

Zhao Dongyun put down the report and said, "According to the existing amount of arable land, the current land tax is indeed outrageous, and it must be changed!"

According to the view of later generations, the arable land in contemporary Fengtian actually far exceeds the official registration number. You should know that at present, the official recorded arable farmland in Fengtian is only more than 40 million mu, but there are more private fields that have not been recorded. Not to mention the official pastures and paddocks that have been privately favored by the exile can be used. Millions of acres to calculate.

The private expropriation of a large number of official land is also a factor that forces the local government to further carry out private claim, pasture and paddock reclamation. Because the ban has existed in name only, and those official land has been reclaimed by the exiles, it is better to simply admit that these fields are included in the account to collect land tax.

In addition, in addition to traditional grains such as wheat and rice, a considerable amount of land is grown on cash crops, that is, "soybeans".

The soybean economy is the main economic pillar of contemporary Northeast China, especially Fengtian. From soybean planting to soybean processing industry, soybean international trade has almost formed a whole industrial chain.

To put it rudely, in Zhao Dongyun's new policy of Fengtian industry and commerce, the soybean industry accounts for more than one-third of it. From last year to now, what industry has Fengtian invested the most? The answer is the soybean processing industry, with more than a dozen large oil presses in just one year.

Even the textile industry, which Zhao Dongyun also strongly supports, can only take second place!

As the source of the soybean economy, only a million tax is collected on fields that produce soybeans a large amount every year? That's bullshit. For this kind of high value-added agricultural products, if you don't collect millions a year, you won't be sorry for your new policy reform!

Therefore, if the agricultural tax is reformed, it is necessary to include a large number of private fields in the official tax form, and it is also necessary to rectify the agricultural tax.

After thinking about the meeting, Zhao Dongyun continued: "Agricultural tax reform is necessary, but the pace should be slower, the process should be milder, and the agricultural tax reform cannot be one-size-fits-all. In order to avoid social turmoil, you can choose a government or county to try first to see what problems will occur, and then how to solve those questions that arise. Question!"

Agricultural tax reform can certainly increase the income of millions of taels of silver, but like all rulers, Zhao Dongyun's first considers the word 'stability'. In the face of commercial taxes and other miscellaneous taxes, he can carry out drastic reforms and implement them by strong means, but in the face of agriculture closely related to farmers He has to be cautious about industrial tax. He would rather slow down the reform process than have any problems.

After all, it is about the livelihood of millions of people in Fengtian Province at this time, and we can't be cautious!

Although Zhao Dongping was warned by Zhao Dongyun, he was approved by Zhao Dongyun and allowed him to choose a county in Liaoxi to carry out agricultural tax reform experiments. If it succeeds, it will be implemented in the whole province next year.

After sending Zhao Dongping away, Zhao Dongyun continued to be busy as usual!

In the morning, after receiving several people to listen to the work report, he originally wanted to have lunch with Li Wan at noon, but Li Wan was probably really angry and ignored him, so he could only hurry to have lunch by himself, and then went out of the temporary official residence to inspect the barracks not far away.

The object of this inspection is not the third town, but the first mixed association in Fengtian!

Since the expansion of Fengtian's First Mixed Association began last year, Meng Enyuan has trained two cavalry battalions with the support of Zhao Dongyun. At present, although Fengtian's First Mixed Association still holds the name of the Mixed Association, it actually has three cavalry battalions, nine infantry battalions and two artillery battalions.

To be honest, this kind of establishment is a little strange. Infantry and artillery battalions are not enough to form a town, but there are more than a mixed association. As for the three battalions, a total of more than 1,800 cavalry units, it is more obvious for a mixed association.

However, Zhao Dongyun also has his own considerations for making so many cavalry. First of all, the Fengtian terrain under his control is flat, which is very conducive to cavalry activities. Second, if Zhao Dongyun wants to train cavalry, he can recruit herdsmen nearby and buy Mongolian horses, etc., which makes it more convenient and faster for Zhao Dongyun to train cavalry.

As the saying goes, since this advantageous resource is available, it will be wasted if it is not used. In addition, Zhao Dongyun still feels that although contemporary machine guns have become popular, the strategic value of cavalry has not been reduced. Anyway, before large-scale equipment of tanks, this cavalry was the only mobile service.

The three words 'mobility' are enough to make Zhao Dongyun and any contemporary army general continue to pay attention to cavalry!

So last year, he began to subconsciously expand the size of the cavalry force, and successively asked Meng Enyuan to train two new cavalry battalions, and then asked Xu Bangjie to build a new cavalry battalion in Fengtian's second mixed association. In this way, by the beginning of 1906, Zhao Dongyun's own troops had reached seven cavalry battalions, a total Nearly 4500 rides.

If all of this is pulled out, you can barely make up a cavalry division!

The development of cavalry is a condition for Fengtian to take advantage of his own advantages, while other Zhao Dongyun did not fall behind. In the second half of last year, Zhao Dongyun's army expansion work mainly focused on Fengtian's two mixed associations.

In the process of expansion, although the core is infantry troops, in fact, the expansion of infantry is the most economical and time-consuming. Since the expansion last year, Fengtian First Mixed Association has had three infantry standards, a total of nine infantry battalions, and Fengtian's second mixed cooperative model has three infantry standards, but its sixth standard There is still one infantry battalion missing, and there are only eight infantry battalions.

Although the expansion of cavalry is more expensive than infantry, the overall difficulty is actually not much. Relying on the recruitment of Mongolian herdsmen and good horsemen in Fengtian Province, as well as the purchase of horses, Fengtian's first mixed association has been organized into three cavalry battalions, and Fengtian's second mixed association has been organized into two cavalry. Camp.

What is really difficult is the artillery unit!

To build a qualified artillery force, a large number of technical artillery and officers are needed. The money alone is enough for Zhao Dongyun to be blinded.

These days, it is necessary to establish an artillery battalion with 18 cannons. If it is equipped with the latest German 75mm 1903-tube retreat cannon, the price of artillery and reserve shells alone will cost hundreds of thousands, plus the cost of recruiting artillery, it will not be taken down without 400 to 500,000!