Chapter 94 Initiatives

However, since Chongzhen ceded power to him, Yu Xiaotian has deeply explored the current situation of Daming's officialdom, and found that Daming's officialdom is indeed rotten. There are piles of bad debts everywhere, and no one can explain the current reserves of the treasury in various places.

So Yu Xiaotian had to order the Metropolitan Inspectorate to send personnel to go out of Beijing to various places to check the storage of grain and silver in local treasury.

In addition, in July, Yu Xiaotian personally proposed three major measures, one is to cancel the original increased assessment tax in various places, and first fundamentally reduce the heavy burden on people in various places.

The second is to announce the opening of the sea ban, choose the coastal Songjiang, Ningbo, Quanzhou and Guangzhou to restore the city's shipping departments, fully liberalise the sea ban, allow merchants to carry out sea trade, and establish a tax collection system, formulate tax collection methods, and increase fiscal revenue by collecting taxes, and collect taxes collected by municipal ships established in various places. Jin, without leaving a place to use, is directly included in the large library of the imperial household department.

This is the only one. Yu Xiaotian is expected to pilot it in the first year. The market companies in these four places can collect at least 3 million taels of silver. If they operate properly and the appointed personnel are successful, they will get 4 to 5 million taels of silver in the first year, which is just like playing.

And he no longer regards the sea as his forbidden, and the Weitou Bay of Quanzhou Prefecture has also been officially handed over to the municipal department for management. Anyway, he has become the actual ruler of the Ming Dynasty, and it is meaningless to continue to regard these things as his private property.

The third is that Yu Xiaotian proposed to completely abolish the tax-free policy enjoyed by those nobles and dignitaries in the Ming Dynasty for hundreds of years, clean up the land area, and implement the system of apportioning them into mu, so as to reduce the burden on ordinary people at the bottom of the previous level, and start to levy taxes on those powerful and relatives who have enjoyed tax-free for a long time. Fu.

The first two are acceptable, but once the third opinion put forward by Yu Xiaotian was put forward, it was immediately opposed by the collective opposition of vested interests in the government and the opposition.

This motion put forward by Yu Xiaotian can be said to have touched their vested interests most fundamentally. These people have finally obtained these benefits by lying on the credit books of their ancestors or by studying as officials. Now Yu Xiaotian wants to take them away at once, of course, which will certainly make them very unhappy.

In the past, many of them did not have to pay any taxes to the court at all, but now if Yu Xiaotian implements this system, they will no longer enjoy the benefits of tax exemption. They have to pay a large amount of tax to the government and the court every year, which is equivalent to paying money from their pockets. How can they agree?

This time Yu Xiaotian is equivalent to stabing a hornet's nest. Even if it was collectively opposed and resisted by officials and powerful officials from all over the world, the memorial of the book scolding Yu Xiaotian can be said to be a torrential rain, almost drowning Yu Xiaotian.

Yu Xiaotian looked at the mountains of these memorials to resist the opinion he put forward and sneered. He had already prepared for this kind of thing. These moths lying on Daming to enjoy are now touched by his vested interests. Of course, they will not agree easily and will definitely resist.

In this case, he is not polite. Yu Xiaotian ordered the Ministry of Household to forcibly implement the plan he proposed, regardless of whether those in power in the locality agree or not, just continue to implement it.

In addition, he ordered to start the establishment of a tax department under the Ministry of Household, which is responsible for tax collection across the country. Each government sets up an institution directly dispatched by the Ministry of Household. The person in charge is called the tax envoy, which specializes over the collection of taxes in various places and strictly follows his requirements to re-establish the land. Qingzhang, re-establish the amount of tax collection in various places.

This matter can't be done in one word. Before entering Beijing, Yu Xiaotian had arranged someone to study this matter. It can be said that he has been working hard for a long time and has fully predicted the resistance that may be encountered.

When he threw out this system, he had already considered the possible situation, so he prepared a group of people in advance to be responsible for the implementation of this matter.

However, if you want to fully implement this system immediately within the whole territory of Daming, it is undoubtedly not a matter that can be done overnight. To establish this tax department under the household department alone, it needs to mobilise a lot of manpower. In addition, there are not many places across the country that listen to his control. Many local governments treat him at present He actually controls the court and holds a wait-and-see attitude. Even if he forcibly implements it, these local governments will not easily comply and follow his requirements.

So this also needs to be solved by force next, and Shandong, which is the closest to Beijing, has become the pilot of tax collection reform this time. The other is Yu Xiaotian's nest in Fujian.

The reason why Shandong was chosen as the first trial place is that since Yan Jizu led his division north and was captured by the Yu family army, the governor of Shandong has been missing. Over the years, the whole Shandong has first encountered the Denglai Rebellion, and then encountered Jiannu's southward entry, making the whole Shandong closer to the north. The local social structure has been greatly damaged.

In the northern Shandong region, it turns out that many upper-class social structures such as rich families and powerful people have suffered the most damage. In addition, Yu Xiaotian's layout in Shandong in advance has also made his forces penetrate into all parts of Shandong and have been deeply rooted, so in Shandong, There is no doubt that the temporary resistance of this system will be relatively small.

So Yu Xiaotian selected an official named Zhang Changfang from among the officials and asked him to go to Shandong to replace the governor of Shandong after Yan Jizu.

Zhang Changfang is less than 40 years old. She used to be a very ambitious court official. She worked as a small official under the household department, but this person was very knowledgeable. She had a good relationship with a sea wolf in Beijing before. She often walked around and found that Zhang Changfang was a very thoughtful person through communication.

And he is very dissatisfied with Daming's current land annexation and addition strategy. He believes that Daming has accumulated too much ills over the past 200 years, especially the land annexation of local powerful, which has made the people miserable. These people enjoy the tax-free policy and do not provide any little to the country. Financial support is also adsorbed in places like moths, constantly absorbing people's fat and ointment.

Therefore, the current chaos in Daming is inseparable from the current land annexation. The ordinary people at the bottom can't make a living under the continuous addition of the court, but they can't touch any interests of the powerful in these places at all. The benefits are occupied by them, which is unlucky. But those are the most ordinary people, which is one of the causes of the chaos in the world.

In addition, natural and man-made disasters have caused the exiles in the northern provinces to rise and cause chaos in the world.

These arguments of Zhang Changfang can be said to be more in line with Xiaotian's views, so after Xiaotian entered Beijing, the insiders of the capital introduced Zhang Changfang to Yu Xiaotian.

Yu Xiaotian also valued Zhang Changfang and took time to have a long talk with him. He found that this person was indeed quite far-sighted, looked at things more thoroughly, and was a useful person.

So this time when arranging the governor of Shandong, Yu Xiaotian exceptionally promoted Zhang Changfang and sent him to Shandong to serve. Before leaving, he specially summoned Zhang Changfang to open up the situation in Shandong and implement this new tax system first.

In addition to being a little worried about Yu Xiaotian's bold approach, Zhang Changfang is also quite eager to try. Yu Xiaotian's ideas and practices are much more radical than his previous ideas. If it can really be implemented, it will avoid many heavy burdens on ordinary people. At that time, considerable taxes were also added to the imperial court.

However, if you want to really implement this policy of spreading into mu, it is estimated that there will be great resistance to cancel the preferential policies that local dignitaries have enjoyed for a long time.

After listening to Zhang Changfang's worries, Yu Xiaotian sneered: "These people have been enjoying it for too long! While enjoying the huge benefits brought to them by Daming, they did not bring any rewards to Daming, and they were domineering in the local area.

It's time to deal with them! Just do it. I'll give you soldiers and horses. If someone refuses to comply, just kill more. Presumably, after these people have enough blood, no one will dare to jump out and object!"

After listening to Yu Xiaotian's words, Zhang Changfang couldn't help but feel a little chill in her heart. She thought that Yu Xiaotian was really a god. After all, he was born as a martial artist and was good at doing things with knives, but this is also good. At this time, if his wrist is not hard, it is really difficult to walk. Since Yu Xiaotian let him If he kills people, then he will just take care of it. What's more, Yu Xiaotian told him clearly, gave him soldiers and horses, and helped him suppress it.

Nowadays, who doesn't know the strength of Yu Jiajun? If someone really dares to resist, what is there to be afraid of as long as Yu Jiajun as his backing?

So after Zhang Changfang got the edict, he immediately took two battalions of Yu's soldiers out of Beijing and rushed to Jinan Prefecture to take office.

Some people wrote a biography for Zhang Changfang in later generations, saying that there were folk rumors that Zhang Changfang was the first fierce dog in front of Yu Xiaotian. Yu Xiaotian ordered him to go to Shandong to implement a new tax collection system. This man was very hard. After taking office in Shandong, he immediately began to reform the local tax system and spread clear land everywhere.

In this way, some big people on the ground in Shandong immediately quit. They thought that it was the past. They had the final say in the place. Even if they went to the court, there were people who protected them, especially some imperial relatives, who were used to being arrogant, even if he We know that Yu Xiaotian is in charge of the court, but at least the world is still surnamed Zhu, isn't it? These people are all relatives of the emperor. Do they want to bow to the foreign surname?

So these people were very awesome. Some of them beat the officials sent to the Qingzhang land, scolded and drove them away, and even some of the little officials who let the domestic slaves beat them to death on the spot.

(Special thanks to eastflowing friends for their rewards!)