The seventh year of Tianfu (942):
In the spring of this year, there was a severe drought across the country, accompanied by a severe locust plague. This locust plague lasted for more than a year. "Locusts in all states in the world damaged the fields, eating all the grass, trees and leaves." The crops were harvested.
The drought and locust attacks one after another caused a large number of people to flee and starve to death everywhere. In the area west of Tongguan, the mortality rate of hungry people was as high as an astonishing 80%! (Starvation deaths were particularly severe in Kansai, with seventeen or eighteen dead)
In June of this year, Shi Jingtang passed away. It is precisely because of this round of disasters that "Jin Zuo has declined since then."
4. Economic reform
After entering Luoyang, Shi Jingtang quickly and succinctly liquidated the "Li Congke Group" and only punished the "three evil people", among whom was Li Congke's money bag - Zhang Yanlang.
But soon, Shi Jingtang regretted killing Zhang Yanlang, because there were very few people who were proficient in the accounting system, and the huge court could not find a suitable candidate to "judge the third division".
Finally, after a month of searching, Zhou Gui, the envoy of the Imperial City, was finally allowed to take on this important task.
Sang Weihan set a tone for Shi Jingtang, which was to coax the Khitans and promote production. The Central Plains Dynasty has an amazing ability to heal itself. As long as the external environment is relatively stable and production and operations proceed in an orderly manner, it will surely overcome the difficulties and achieve rejuvenation.
Therefore, Shi Jingtang's series of good governance are developed around this core idea. After a period of recovery, the level of social and economic development has caught up with the "prosperity of Ming Dynasty".
Under this circumstance, Shi Jingtang opened the "agricultural ban", which allowed private citizens to make agricultural tools privately.
In the feudal period, there was a saying that "an inch of iron is a soldier." All kinds of iron tools had to be reported to the government for record to prevent anyone from using farm tools to make weapons and armor. In certain historical periods, the supervision of folk iron tools reached outrageous levels, such as five households sharing a kitchen knife.
Dare to open up farm tools and allow people to freely forge iron tools, which shows the government's full confidence and the vigorous economic development.
In a rapidly developing economy, strict control over the means of production will seriously retard economic development.
During the Tianfu period, as Shi Jingtang continued to promulgate policies such as tax cuts and exemptions, releasing labor, and encouraging land reclamation, there was a serious shortage of production means. Therefore, Shi Jingtang kept pace with the times and lifted the ban on farm tools, which promoted economic recovery. and rapid development.
Lifting the agricultural ban is not the craziest thing. Shi Jingtang's craziest move, and the most criticized move by the world, is the lifting of the "money ban", which allows private private currency creation.
The government allows the private sector to print counterfeit banknotes... This is the appearance, and it is also the most misunderstood part by people.
After being open for more than half a year, the "money ban" was declared invalid, and private coinage was banned again. This was also used as strong evidence by later generations of scholars, criticizing Shi Jingtang for not understanding finance and being messy.
not that simple. It is very possible that we have wronged him.
When I talked about Gao Pian's collapse of the Xichuan economy in the previous article, he mentioned "short-term money" and then extended some common sense in finance, such as "money shortage". With the vigorous development of the economy and the rapid operation of the financial market, "money shortage" is an inevitable result, and "short money" is equivalent to the government using government credit as collateral to issue "shadow currency" and create virtual currency out of thin air.
With the economic recovery during the Tianfu period, in the third year of Tianfu (938), the problem of "money shortage" intensified. At the same time, the Khitan's economic exploitation of the later Jin Dynasty also exacerbated this financial dilemma.
The Khitan set up a "Huitu Service" in the Central Plains to take charge of the trade between the Khitan and the Central Plains, which is equivalent to the overseas office of the Ministry of Foreign Trade today. At that time, foreign trade was mainly led by the government, and special exchanges such as "sale markets" were set up in border areas to be responsible for trade with foreign nations.
Foreign missions usually drive cattle, sheep, camels, and foreign trade commodities to trade with Central Plains merchants in such exchanges, especially bulk commodities at the national level. In this way, the central government can stabilize prices and protect the domestic economy. Order, and the ability to control the loss of strategic materials, achieving multiple goals with one stone.
When the Khitans supported Shi Jingtang and established the Later Jin Dynasty, this situation changed. The dominance was lost from the Central Plains Dynasty and was instead dominated by the Khitans.
The Khitan's establishment of the Huitu Service in the Central Plains was an economic invasion of the Central Plains dynasty, which seriously affected the Central Plains dynasty's foreign exchange control, thereby affecting the Central Plains' financial order. The Central Plains became an economic semi-colony of Khitan.
The official in charge was named "Huitu Envoy". At the beginning of the establishment of the Later Jin Dynasty, Khitan appointed Qiao Rong as the Huitu Envoy. Qiao Rong was originally a general of Heyang Ya, and he surrendered to the Khitan along with Zhao Dejun, Zhao Yanshou and his son. The Fujian goods mentioned earlier were seized by the Later Jin Dynasty. The Khitan interfered unreasonably and ordered Shi Jingtang to release the Fujian envoy. Qiao Rong was responsible for transporting the detained goods to the Khitan.
In fact, the "Huitu Envoy" is probably equivalent to the "Comprador" in the late Qing Dynasty. On the surface, he is a trade official, but in fact he is the vanguard of economic aggression. Because what they maintain is not a fair trade order, but the interests of the Khitans. When necessary, they will even harm the sovereignty of the Central Plains Dynasty.
The setting up of the Huitu Service allows the Khitan to seize the wealth of the Central Plains without any hindrance, and at the same time dump a large amount of inferior goods to the Central Plains, buying low, selling high, and buying and selling by force.
Currency, exchange rate, etc. are the high financial frontier of a country and must not be controlled by external forces. Kill people invisible and destroy the country without a shadow.
Under the Khitan's greed for blood, the Central Plains dynasty suffered a serious shortage of currency and copper for circulation.
In this regard, Shi Jingtang came up with two ways.
One is the "forbidden copper utensils".
Folks are prohibited from melting copper coins and casting bronze vessels. This can slightly alleviate the "money shortage" problem. But this is a temporary solution rather than a permanent solution, because the root cause of the "money shortage" is the rapid economic development and the Khitan's economic aggression, not the common people casting copper coins into bronze vessels.
It's just scratching the surface, but the results are not good.
So, the second move was to open up the "money ban".
In November of the third year of Tianfu (938), an edict was issued, allowing people to make copper coins privately, with the inscription "Tianfu Yuanbao". As long as the common people have copper, they can cast their own copper coins. As long as they have "Tianfu Yuanbao" written on them, they can be circulated and have the same value as the currency issued by the imperial court.
In December, another edict was issued, ordering all people in the world, whether private or government, to encourage the casting of bronze coins, such as bronze statues in temples.
Half a year later (July 939), an edict was issued to stop private casting. The reason is that there are always unscrupulous people who want to harm me, and the people always make "counterfeit coins", doping copper coins with lead, tin and other impurities, and the copper coins minted are very thin, so they are banned.
