Han Du was asked this question by Lao Zhu and did not refuse, so he nodded and said. "I think what the Empress said is true. As the saying goes, it is difficult for a rich man to be a man without money."
Before Han Du could continue, Queen Ma suddenly burst into laughter when she heard this. Pointing at Han Du, the smiling branches were trembling, a little out of breath.
Lao Zhu also looked at Han Du with a constipated expression, complaining in his heart, "Can you talk like this?" It is difficult to return a man.
Han Du was confused by Lao Zhu and his wife. Was what he just said so funny? Han Du has not received any professional training. If this is funny, he can't help but laugh out loud.
"Continue, you continue." Queen Ma had smiled enough and regained her composure, waving her hand to signal Han Du.
Han Du nodded, no longer saying that it is difficult for a man, and said straightforwardly: "My thoughts are the same as those of the Queen. The royal family must have its own industry and must operate some fixed sources of income."
"Why?" Lao Zhu frowned and asked in a deep voice.
Han Du gestured to Lao Zhu and said gratefully: "I know that the reason why the emperor does not allow the royal family to intervene in the management is because he cares about the people of the world, thinking that it can be beneficial to the people of the world and reduce some of the burdens of the people. The lives of the people are like this. It will be better."
Lao Zhu nodded silently, that's what he thought. The rise and fall of past dynasties told him that the wealth in the world is countless. If the royal family takes more, the common people will take less. In the end, if the people cannot occupy anything, then chaos will naturally arise in the world.
Lao Zhu also wanted the Ming Dynasty to be prosperous and prosperous for one lifetime or even for eternity. Naturally, he did not want the people to rebel if they could not survive. Therefore, he has always strictly controlled the royal expenses. He even planted tea, rice and other things in the royal garden in order to play a leading role and call on everyone to be diligent and thrifty.
But in Han Du's view, the emperor did not spend his time on making everyone rich, but spent it on growing tea and rice. This was not a waste, but a waste of natural resources.
Lao Zhu was so exhausted that he could only grow enough rice to feed ten people in his lifetime. But if he spent his time on making everyone rich, maybe he could solve the problem of feeding 100,000 people with just a few words.
"But the reality may not allow His Majesty to fulfill his wish." Han Du sighed.
When Lao Zhu heard this, his face darkened, he stared at Han Du and said, "Tell me, keep talking, why can't you let me get what I want?"
Han Du thought for a moment and gave an example, "All walks of life in this world are like cities. Even if the royal family does not occupy them, will these cities remain empty, waiting for the people to occupy them? Obviously not. Well, when the emperor is fighting in the world, he should understand that there will be no city in the world that will be empty for the people to occupy. There will always be someone who dominates. The same is true for all walks of life. Even if the royal family is not involved at all, there will be no one The industry can make profits for the common people, but only officials and wealthy businessmen can make profits."
Han Du's words tore Lao Zhu's beautiful dream into pieces, but he was not angry at all, he just stared blankly into the void.
"The emperor thinks that these officials and wealthy businessmen will be willing to use money to help the people? If they can do this, then there will be no saying that there is no business without treachery."
As he spoke, Han Du's expression changed and became very serious, "On the contrary, I think it is necessary for the royal family to get involved in related industries, at least to grasp the lifeblood of the Ming Dynasty. In Wei Chen's opinion, the lifeblood of the Ming Dynasty is also That is firewood, rice, salt, iron, clothing, housing, transportation, etc. The most basic firewood, rice, salt and iron, the royal family must have in hand."
Empress Ma was overjoyed. She originally thought Han Du just agreed with her idea. Unexpectedly, Han Du was able to control the royal family's industrial management to the point where it became the lifeblood of the Ming Dynasty.
After hearing this, Lao Zhu felt that Han Du was exaggerating, and asked doubtfully: "Is it so important?"
"How come it's not serious? Take rice for example, the grain trading is such a huge profit. And if the grain trading is completely left to the merchants, in order to pursue profits, a situation will inevitably occur. That is, the merchants will be in a good year. It will greatly lower the price of grain purchase, and in famine years it will greatly increase the price of grain sales. Over and over again, the price difference of grain will be more than ten times, or even more. Have you encountered any When there is a famine in a year, the price of food will be dozens of times higher than in a good year. How many people are forced to sell their fields, houses, property, or even their children in order to survive? In any case, as long as the food continues to If it is left to businessmen to run it, the people will always suffer."
Lao Zhu was horrified when he heard this. He had never thought that it was just a grain business, but if it went wrong, something so serious could happen.
Seeing that Lao Zhu was silent, Han Du added another fire, "That's not all. Since they are businessmen, there is no one who doesn't know how to buy low, sell high, and hoard. They can even connect with each other to sell grain in good years. Prices hit the lowest point on their own. In famine years, people hoarded. In order to maximize profits, they obviously had a lot of grain in their hands, but they were unwilling to sell a single grain. Man-made famines caused thousands of miles of desolation and tragic scenes of starvation and death everywhere. .”
"They dare!" Lao Zhu was angry. If it was a catastrophic disaster, then Lao Zhu would naturally have nothing to say. Natural disasters are too common. A small disaster occurs every three years and a major disaster occurs every five years. Lao Zhu is also used to it. But as Han Du said, it would be too much to think that it would cause a catastrophe. No one with a bit of humanity would do such a thing.
But Han Du was not talking nonsense about such a thing, but it could really happen.
Even Empress Ma became nervous about this. She pulled Lao Zhu's sleeves and said, "Han Du is right. Food is indeed one of the lifeblood of the Ming Dynasty. We can no longer let those businessmen run their business. No matter what, Even if it is for the sake of peace and stability in the world, the royal family must get involved in the food trade."
Lao Zhu still had doubts and said in a deep voice: "Then what do you think we should do?"
"I think that the emperor can specify a reasonable price. Well, the price of rice in recent years is usually five to seven cents of silver per load. The emperor can specify a price, for example, six cents of silver per load. As long as If the price is lower than this price, the royal family will begin to purchase grain without limit at this price. Once the price is higher than this price, for example, if there is a famine, and the grain price rises to one or two silver per load, the royal family will start selling grain to stabilize the price of grain. In this way, when there is a good harvest of food, the people will not suffer a loss, because their food can always be sold for six cents of silver per load, and they do not have to worry about being bought for nothing by profiteers at extremely low prices. In times of famine, the people will not suffer either. Worry about running out of food, because even if the royal family buys one tael of silver per load of food, it is still much cheaper for the people than what they bought before. As long as families have some savings, they can rely on the royal food. Wait until next year when autumn turns yellow."
"In this way, although the profits will be slim, the fact that the royal family holds the food in its hands is equivalent to holding the stability of the people of the world in its hands. For the sake of the stability of the world, I think it is very worthwhile."
After Han Du finished speaking, he bowed his hands.
Han Du said this profit Weibo was just a verbal humility. In fact, the profit from making food sounds is not Weibo at all, it can even be considered to be huge. It seems that the royal family purchased grain for six cents of silver per load and sold it for one or two silver cents per load. After excluding labor, storage, drying, etc., a load of grain could only earn two cents. Profit of silver.
This profit is not much, at least compared with those businessmen, it is far less. However, the fundamentals of grain trading are not based on unit price profit, but on quantity. As long as the quantity is large, the profit will be very considerable.
At this time, people consumed a lot of food due to the lack of meat. Take the area around the capital as an example. On average, a person eats about five tons of grain every year. Even this is not enough to satisfy him. He also needs to eat some wild vegetables to make up for it. Of course, the average quantity in the entire Ming Dynasty is certainly not that high, but it is not less than three dans of grain. Even calculated based on three dans of grain, the population of the Ming Dynasty in the 14th year of Hongwu was about 9.04 million households, which is about 40 to 50 million people. Even if you earn three cents of silver from one person, you can earn almost fifteen million silver.
And this is how much money can be earned in about three to five years between good years and bad years. On average, there are several million dollars in income a year.
This is not huge profits. What is huge profits?
Obviously, Queen Ma also knew this. She and Lao Zhu said, "Han Du is right. Making money is the second most important thing. The most important thing is for the peace and stability of the world."
I thought that Lao Zhu would agree to this, but after listening to Han Du's words, Lao Zhu sneered and said: "Your method is just picking up my teeth. I once issued a decree requiring each county to build granaries so that the people can Store the grain in the good years and take it out to eat in the famine years. In this case, why does the royal family need to do this again?"
When Queen Ma heard this, she was suddenly shocked and felt as if a large piece of white money was about to leave her.
Han Du was very calm. Lao Zhu was indeed a strange flower among emperors in history. Countless policies have been formulated. To be honest, it is not easy to find a place where Lao Zhu has not formulated any policies. But this does not mean that there are no problems with the policies formulated by Lao Zhu. On the contrary, the policies formulated by Lao Zhu give people the impression that they are a bit "kill but not bury".
Lao Zhu formulated many policies, which were comprehensive and very useful. However, when it came to the implementation of the policies, they were completely blank. Han Du didn't know why it was like this. Anyway, when Han Du looked at it, he felt that Lao Zhu only knew a little bit about these things. But this shouldn’t be the case. Lao Zhu has never seen anything in the Southern and Northern Wars, so how can he only know the surface?
Putting these thoughts aside for the time being, Han Du smiled and explained to Lao Zhu: "Your Majesty, rats have been born in granaries since ancient times, let alone a county's granary? When people hand over grain to the county, how much grain can be handed over? How much food did you get back?"
Lao Zhu's eyes widened and he asked, "Why is it impossible?"
Han Du shook his head and explained: "Your Majesty, this is impossible. Because it is impossible for no one to take care of the granary. If the grain gets damp, it needs to be taken out to dry, and if the grain is piled for too long, it will become moldy and rotten. Everything is lost. If we can't figure out how to deal with the grains handed in by the people, it will be difficult for a county to support such a thing for many years. Therefore, it is impossible for the people to get back as much grains as they hand in. There will certainly be losses.”
There was no way to refute this, so Lao Zhu was silent for a while. He can't issue a decree and force all counties to cancel all losses. If the food is gone in three to five years, will the court still return the original amount of food to the people? In this case, even if we take over all the county government offices in a few years, we will not be able to fill the shortfall.
"Since there is loss, there are too many articles that can be done here. How much loss is not a matter of a word from the county magistrate? Or 30% per year, or 50% per year. Even if calculated at 30% per year, After those three years, there was not much food left over from the people. If there was a famine during these three years, that would be fine. The people would still be able to get some food back, and understand the importance of storing food in the past. But If nothing happens during these three years, then the people will definitely feel that the food they handed in was wasted. As a result, the people will definitely not be willing to continue handing in food. Over time, this kind of food will The method of storing grain is only in name only for the people."
To put it bluntly, the grain storage policy formulated by Lao Zhu was too rigid, without any vitality, and would inevitably lead to death in the end. And due to the price difference between new grain and old grain, there will definitely be a situation where people hand over the new grain, then sell it, and then take the old grain and put it in the warehouse. Even in the later stages, they didn’t even do the superficial work of buying used grain and taking it to the warehouse. The food handed in by the people will be sold directly. What was originally a good grain storage policy has become a tool for raising rats.
Lao Zhu felt very unhappy when he saw that the food storage method he had worked so hard to come up with turned out to be so ugly and full of flaws in Han Du's mouth. As soon as his thoughts changed, he snorted coldly and said: "The method you said of asking the royal family to collect grain will not work. Since the grain will rot. Then I collect the grain. If I can't sell it in the end, what will happen? Isn’t it just wasted?”
Not to mention that Lao Zhu is still very poor now, even if Lao Zhu became rich overnight, he would not be able to withstand such a toss. The current food preservation methods are backward. Generally, although the food stored for three years is old food, it can still be eaten. However, once it exceeds five years, the food cannot be eaten and will only rot in vain.
