There is even a problem that the taxes collected cannot offset the cost of taxation, so that some places have simply canceled the collection of commercial taxes and made up for it with floating taxes from land taxes. Although Guangzhou's commercial tax has not been abolished, it is still half dead. Instead, there is a local business tax.
After the Japanese pirates were pacified, the Chief Secretaries of Fujian and Vietnam established separate taxation bureaus that were independent of the original commercial tax system of the Ministry of Household Affairs. Tax cards were set up at Qiaotou and Dukou. The tax rates were set by the local government, and the revenue was used to pay for military pay and local defense. This money cannot be handed over to the Ministry of Household Affairs, so the local government is keen on collecting it. However, even if he is keen on collecting taxes, the amount of collection is insignificant in Ai Zhixin's opinion and cannot be compared with the status of a large city with prosperous business like Guangzhou. Especially when he saw that the commercial tax revenue of a town under Guangzhou Prefecture was only 170 taels, he knew that there was a lot of trouble in it. Because the town's "reasonable burden" paid to the Senate every year was 450 taels of silver.
However, Ai Zhixin is not prepared to use this as a breakthrough to increase tax revenue. Commercial tax is actually a cent. Although it is easy to collect and the tax amount is not small, it affects the circulation of goods. He focused on door stall tax, real estate deed tax and wine and vinegar tax.
The stall tax is a commercial tax levied by the local government on permanent shops in the town. Because ancient society did not have a perfect accounting system, the government did not count the shop's sales and profits when collecting taxes. It was basically a fixed amount. Tax. As for setting it high or low, it all depends on luck. Some industries are extremely profitable - for example, a pawnshop only pays a mere 45 taels of tax a year, while a small street shop has to pay a few taels of tax a year.
The stall tax in Guangzhou is collected by the guilds of various trades. For shops that have not formed a guild, the government appoints tooth merchants to pay it on their behalf. It’s easy to see how big the tricks are.
Ai Zhixin looked at the total revenue from door stall taxes in one prefecture and two counties in Guangzhou, and found that he could get about more than 10,000 taels per year - this number is quite good, but it is far less than what he expected.
Real estate deed tax is levied at 3% of the selling price or deed price. However, this tax has not been collected in many places for many years, and the states and counties under the jurisdiction of Qiongzhou Prefecture do not even have collection records. Ai Zhixin discovered that the Guangzhou government has not only been collecting taxes, but also has a very high deed tax revenue. Nanhai and Panyu counties alone earn as much as 2,000 taels from deed tax every year. This is probably because business in big cities is booming, real estate prices are higher, and transactions are more frequent.
As for the wine and vinegar tax, this was a tax inherited from the Ming Dynasty and the Song Dynasty. The wine and vinegar monopoly was a major revenue source for the government in the Song Dynasty. However, the management level of industry and commerce in the Ming Dynasty was extremely low and could not effectively control the production and circulation of wine and vinegar, so this tax was basically in vain.
"The tax burden in Ming Dynasty is not too heavy, but too light." Ai Zhixin said at the Wudaokou New District Financial Work Conference, "The potential is far from being explored, and they are still boasting about the GDP of Ming Dynasty. When it comes to the efficiency of fiscal exploitation, The Ming Dynasty is already a backward country by standard, not to mention compared with European countries, even Japan is not as good as Japan in East Asia."
In Ai Zhixin's view, the Ming government's tax collection efficiency is generally too low, with huge losses in the collection process and serious leakage, fraud and leakage. It is said that a large number of free "slave servants" are used to do things, but the actual hidden personnel costs are staggeringly large.
It is not easy to build your own tax team, especially since this tax team must maintain efficiency while generally ensuring "integrity" - even in the 21st century, there are institutional guarantees, countless regulations and internal control and inspection methods. In modern tax authorities, there are still people who come from poor backgrounds but drive BMWs and live in villas.
It is basically impossible to use the current education and administrative system of the Senate to form a team that Ai Zhixin can tolerate. Furthermore, there are many problems with direct taxation: first, it consumes manpower. Before the agricultural tax was abolished in the past, the administrative personnel costs consumed by collecting agricultural taxes often offset the tax revenue; secondly, it is easy to intensify social conflicts, because the conflicts caused by taxation Even riots, there are many examples at home and abroad in ancient and modern times. Finally, modern taxation is based on the modern financial system, but the industrial and commercial households in the Ming Dynasty still used the four-pillar settlement method, and smaller shops even only had running accounts.
To implement the new tax law, the accounting system must be changed, businessmen must be accustomed to not paying cash overnight, and forcing them to use bank notes for transactions instead of using cash directly... This does not happen overnight. But tax collection is urgent.
If a simple approach is adopted, it is "reasonable burden" that they have implemented in the past. That is, the Senate proposes the total "burden", and then the taxpayers hold a meeting to discuss and each self-report their share. This method of collection has the least resistance. Now that Guangzhou has established the Federation of Industry and Commerce, this method can easily produce results. But Ai Zhixin believes that this was a cheap measure taken in the past when they lacked political organization.
If such an approach is adopted, then the various tax rates set by the tax authorities will be meaningless, because either the tax amount collected is lower than the tax rate and the benefits are directly transferred to industrial and commercial households; or the tax rate is higher, then the tax rate becomes " apportionment”. Increased the burden on taxpayers.
The biggest problem is that once such an approach is adopted, it will inevitably go through the Chamber of Commerce and Industry and various industry associations, which is equivalent to letting these institutions control tax power, which can easily lead to unfair tax sharing and legal tax evasion.
Ai Zhixin believes that although shops in Guangzhou do not have a modern accounting system, most shops adopt the four-pillar liquidation method and have account books for auditing their business conditions. Moreover, in the Ming Dynasty, whether official or private, accounting was basically based on this accounting method. There were many people who knew it, and many ready-made "accountants" could be found for temporary use.
Taking advantage of these characteristics, he decided to adopt the model of "self-reporting and actual payment, light taxes and heavy penalties" to collect taxes. The industrial and commercial households will file the taxes themselves, and the tax department will randomly check the operating income and profits of each store on a regular basis...
Ai Zhixin was looking through the information when several soldiers came in carrying dozens of hard-cover notebooks. A clerk reported: "Chief, this is the "Guangzhou Industrial and Commercial Household Information Collection" that Chief Lin asked me to hand over to you - please sign for it."
These brochures were compiled by the city government based on the lists reported by the Federation of Industry and Commerce and materials collected by the Ministry of Urban Affairs - all "permanent stores with fixed storefronts" are listed in them, ranging from large merchants such as Zhang Zhou to those in the streets and alleys. Grocery stores...have everything. It lists the store's address, business scope, business status, shopkeeper's name and employment status in considerable detail. In addition to the data accumulated by the Ministry of Urban Affairs, the collection of these data relied on a series of administrative work since entering the city: household registration checking, door plate nailing, industrial and commercial registration... Without these early tasks, Ai Zhixin would have relied on the Federation of Industry and Commerce to Apart from apportioning "reasonable burdens", there probably won't be any new tricks to play.
Ai Zhixin has already made a basic plan in his wallet. Generally speaking, he plans to levy three major categories: property tax, circulation tax and stamp tax.
The first column is property tax, which is levied on agricultural land property, commercial land property, giant homestead property, as well as merchant ships, industrial and mining and other related properties. In terms of specific taxes, he plans to levy: real estate tax, urban land use tax, vehicle and vessel license tax, vehicle and vessel purchase tax, deed tax, inheritance tax and slave tax.
The second is circulation tax. The reason for taxation is to maintain the order of the commodity market. Business tax is not divided into specific details. Generally speaking, as long as business activities occur and business income is obtained, all business income is included in the scope of taxation - naturally there is a certain exemption amount and scope. The most important one is to collect from the circulation link of the newly established wholesale market in Guangzhou.
The third is stamp duty, land deed replacement, and contract transactions requiring the legal recognition and protection of the Senate. Taxation objects, ship sailing licenses, trade, land deeds, house deeds, business licenses, equity certificates, and various certificates all require the maintenance of the authority of the Senate.
Finally, there is the local administrative surcharge, which is levied on the circulation tax. Ai Zhixin and Liu Xiang discussed and decided to levy four items: urban cleaning fees, local security fees, urban construction fees and education fees. These four taxes are used by the Guangzhou local government. All other taxes are national taxes, and after they are collected, some will be refunded based on the actual situation.
Since he is not responsible for customs duties, parking tax and tonnage tax, he has not made any plans for the time being. As for the salt and tobacco monopoly, he has no special ideas for the time being, because according to the monopoly practices of the old time and space, it is necessary With a whole team, he can't even improve the tax authorities now, and of course he can't talk about establishing a monopoly system. Therefore, we still adopt the method we adopted during the Lingao period: pay the tax once at the wholesale source, and then distribute it through distributors. As for the monopoly on tobacco leaves and salt farms, this matter is complicated, and the resources that need to be mobilized are not at the disposal of him, the director of finance and taxation.
Ai Zhixin read a few pages of the booklet and basically felt confident. At this time, the city government sent a correspondent: Mayor Liu invited him to a meeting.
"What meeting?" Ai Zhixin had just arrived in the city and had a lot of things on his hands. He had to hold a meeting before his buttocks were warmed up. If it had nothing to do with finance and taxation work, he would be grateful.
"It's a meeting about sorting out the customs industry."
"Tell Mayor Liu that I have too many things on my hands, so I won't come to participate..." Ai Zhixin frowned. I thought that Liu Xiang was also an official and showed off his power, and he had to gather people for a meeting.
"Mayor Liu said that this meeting is related to you." Liu Xiang probably knew that he was not going to go, so he specifically informed the correspondent, "The custom tax issue in Guangzhou will be discussed at the rectification meeting..."
Ai Zhixin immediately changed his mind: "I'll go right away." (To be continued.)
