In November of the fourteenth year of Jianwen.
Braving the cold wind and snow, Zhu Yunwen returned to Beijing again, faced the ministers, and announced an exciting news:
In five years, the world will flourish.
Many years ago, Zhu Yunwen set six standards for a prosperous age in terms of people's surplus grain and wealth, official warehouse reserves, official smelted iron quantity, culture and education, and military strength.
Benefiting from the fact that the imperial court did not disturb the people, the people were required to pay corvee money, and taxes were relatively light, as well as the overall good weather in recent years, the people at the bottom of the Ming Dynasty have basically got rid of the dilemma of not being able to afford food.
According to the documents from various prefectures and counties, as well as secret visits and secret investigations from various places, Zhu Yunwen made a preliminary judgment that the Ming Dynasty was not far away from its prosperous age.
In ordinary households in small counties, more than 70% of ordinary people have food reserves for more than a year, more than 90% of people have food reserves for more than half a year, and less than 10% of the households are either orphans or widowed, or their families are in trouble, and the mainstay of the family is missing due to illness.
It is no longer unusual for people to have a surplus of wealth in their hands. While farming, men do some work. It is common for families to have a surplus of four to five guan in a year, and even as few as two guan. Benefiting from the progress of local infrastructure and water conservancy projects, there are also many work opportunities for local people. .bμν.
The four-level system of social studies, county schools, government schools, and the Imperial College was established. In particular, the Imperial College basically replaced the imperial examination, allowing social education at the bottom to gradually flourish. The compulsory primary education and the promotion of literacy made ordinary people's families full of white-collar workers. Let's talk about dreams again. The child's literacy can be regarded as achieving this goal. After all, the child will become a Dingkou sooner or later.
As for the goal of the official iron smelting output of more than 10 million jins, it has already been exceeded. In the 13th year of Jianwen, the official smelting iron output even reached 260 million jins. This year, the official smelting iron output exceeded 30 million jins. It's a done deal.
As for the goal of making the enemy fearful when the army is strong, it is difficult to say, because the enemy no longer exists, so there is no such thing as being fearful or not. The indicators of military strength have been established in war after war.
The six principles of the prosperous times have basically been realized except for a few people who are short of food reserves.
Zhu Yunwen was not in a hurry to announce the arrival of the prosperous age, nor did he allow the court documents to discuss the prosperous age, because in Zhu Yunwen's view, the Ming Dynasty was still not considered wealthy, even though some scholars and people already felt that life was better.
On the New Year's Day of the fifteenth year of Jianwen, Zhu Yunwen made a strong statement that he would spend five years to overcome difficulties, help poor people, and create a prosperous Ming Dynasty.
This is the first time that the Ming Dynasty set the prosperous world in a specific year.
The people of the Ming Dynasty finally saw a clear timetable for the prosperous times, which was five years later in the 20th year of Jianwen!
In order to achieve a prosperous age, Zhu Yunwen ordered the Ministry of Household Affairs, local provinces, prefectures and counties to take poverty alleviation measures. For those whose families are in difficulty, who have lost the ability to work or are poor due to illness, after review by the Ministry of Household Affairs, the Supervisory Office, the Security Bureau, etc. They will be exempted from corvee service and taxes for a certain number of years. If the family is really in need, they will be provided with food according to the standards of the almshouse to support their survival.
In February, Xia Yuanji, the Minister of Household Affairs, entered the Wuying Hall and reported: "After preliminary calculation, the two taxes totaled more than 43 million yuan in 14 years, and the commercial tax was 20.37 million yuan, which exceeded the first limit. 20 million guan of money was collected, nearly half of the two taxes, and the salt, iron and tea monopoly tax amounted to 11 million guan. Last year, the total tax revenue reached more than 74 million guan, which was less than that of 13 years ago. A fourteen percent increase.”
Zhu Yunwen took the document, looked at each data carefully, and nodded slightly: "In the forty-six years since the founding of the People's Republic of China, we have finally achieved something."
Xia Yuanji smiled and said: "It is said that the Song Dynasty was the richest. If you look at the history books, from Xining to Yuanfeng years, the wealth was only more than 60 million yuan."
Zhu Yunwen stood up and walked out from behind the desk: "The wealth in the Song Dynasty was completely different from the wealth in the Ming Dynasty. In the Song Dynasty, salt, iron and tea monopoly taxes accounted for a lot of the wealth, commercial taxes were extremely heavy, and private taxes did not account for the majority. .In the final analysis, behind the prosperity of the Song Dynasty, farmers could not afford to pay taxes, and businessmen and rich people supported the prosperity."
Xia Yuanji recognized Zhu Yunwen's point of view and said sternly: "The imperial court's tax on the people has been growing steadily. On the one hand, it is the increase in the number of acres of land cultivated, and on the other hand, it is the increase in population. The policy of restraining land annexation has achieved remarkable results, and it has also guaranteed The people now have fields to tax."
Zhu Yunwen put his hands behind his back with a smile on his lips.
Self-written article
From the fourth year to the seventh year of Jianwen, the imperial court used a large amount of manpower to complete the census in the shortest possible time, and ensured the authenticity of the census through body-photo stickers and body-photo badges. The result that year was more than 71 million people.
By the fourteenth year of Jianwen, in seven years, the population of Ming Dynasty had increased by more than 12 million, and the population had reached more than 84 million. The improvement of people's lives has brought about great enthusiasm for "having babies". Nearly two million babies are born every year. This growth rate is astonishing.
In less than ten years, the population of Ming Dynasty will exceed 10 million.
Zhu Yunwen smiled and said: "Population growth is a good thing, but it is not always a good thing. If the population grows too fast without corresponding countermeasures, it will easily lead to too little land per capita in some places, which will lead to problems such as famine. The Ministry of Household Affairs needs to start as soon as possible. Take out population density maps of each province and prefecture, and appropriately divert immigrants to overpopulated places such as Shanxi, Shandong, Henan, Jiangsu and Zhejiang."
"The Northeast has been developed well in recent years. It has been named Xiaojiangnan, the granary of the Northeast. But if you look carefully at its population, it is less than 800,000. How can such a small population afford a granary land? In my opinion, we might as well go to Guandong again , increasing the population there to at least 1.6 million."
Xia Yuanji took a deep breath. This number of immigrants was indeed too large. However, given the imperial court's experience of many immigrations and the credibility of the immigration policy, immigration may not be unfeasible. .bμν.
The population in the Northeast is indeed too small. Although the winter is long and cold, it is rich in resources. The Ministry of War even wants to open a new shipyard in Liaodong Bay to specialize in building iron ships, forming a pattern of North Liaodong, Middle Jinling, and South Guangzhou.
However, just using captives to mine does not have continuity. For example, 70,000 captives were transported from Dingyuan Province to the Northeast. These 70,000 captives will not be registered as citizens of the Ming Dynasty and are not included in the household registration of the Ming Dynasty. These captives had previously Without a wife and children, not to mention, when I arrived in Ming Dynasty, I could only mine in the Northeast until I breathed my last breath.
In other words, the captives will not create more population for the Ming Dynasty. In ten or fifteen years, when the captives are used up and used up, the Ming Dynasty people will still be needed to mine, and this will require immigrants. Without a sufficient population base, it will It is impossible to recruit more people to go to the mines.
Planning ahead, this is the right time to immigrate.
Xia Yuanji responded: "It is necessary to immigrate to the Northeast again, but Your Majesty, according to the calculations of the Imperial Academy of Mathematics, if the population continues to grow, the population of the Ming Dynasty will probably exceed 40 million in a hundred years. By then, the Northeast will The population is also large, so how should we deal with it?”
Xia Yuanji felt flustered when he thought of such a huge population.
If Emperor Jianwen hadn't ordered people to bring in potatoes, sweet potatoes and other high-yielding crops, if the Ming Dynasty's population had increased to 40 million, countless people would have starved to death in the event of a natural or man-made disaster. This would have been an unprecedented disaster.
At present, the Ming Dynasty can still afford to support a population of 40 million, but in another hundred years, the Ming Dynasty will not be able to support it.
Xia Yuanji did not dare to expect that the Ming Dynasty would last for ten thousand years. It had never happened since ancient times. However, there was still hope for the national destiny of the Ming Dynasty for three hundred years. However, if the population problem was not solved, the national destiny for three hundred years would be impossible. It would even be impossible after two hundred years because of the population. There is too much arable land per capita, and major crises occur due to successive natural disasters.
Zhu Yunwen stared, walked out of Wuying Palace, and looked at the blue sky.
In the next six hundred years, there were still many famines. Even during the period when the red flag was flying, there were still three years of natural disasters. At that time, many, many people died.
But in the next few decades, although there will be various natural and man-made disasters, there will be no major famine or food crisis. At its root, there is a very key factor, which is the emergence of hybrid rice, among which there is a saint named Yuan.
Chinese people, China raises itself.
However, Zhu Yunwen didn't know whether the Imperial College would be able to find the secret of hybrid rice and form an industry in one hundred or two hundred years. A large population is proof of strength, but at the same time it is also a burden to the Ming Dynasty, which is dominated by small-scale peasant economy.
Thinking back to two hundred years later, Zhu Yunwen shook his head bitterly: "Two hundred years from now, I don't think we should consider such a distant thing. The descendants of future generations each have their own missions and their own wisdom. In my opinion, population It cannot increase so fast because the population will be eliminated in batches.
Leave home. "
Xia Yuanji looked at Zhu Yunwen in shock and asked, "What does the emperor mean by immigrants from outside the country?"
Zhu Yunwen nodded slightly and said solemnly: "The times are changing. In some places, if the Ming Dynasty does not occupy them first, it will become a subsidiary of other countries. I don't want to see this situation."
Xia Yuanji looked at Zhu Yunwen deeply and finally nodded.
The voyage around the world discovered many unknown territories, and also saw countless wild places, South America, North America, the arctic cold places in the north, and a series of islands in Central America, the Pacific and other places...
Xia Yuanji found that his worries were unfounded. The local population of the Ming Dynasty increased so much every year, and it was not a big deal to send out 20,000 to 30,000 people. However, these 20,000 to 30,000 people could open up territory for the Ming Dynasty and leave a foundation.
This also means that the population migration in the next hundred years of the Ming Dynasty will show two phenomena. One is that the population from densely populated counties within the mainland moves to sparsely populated places, and the other is that the population from the mainland moves to the sea and settles in other islands or other places. above the land.
North America only gave half to King Yan. There are still countless people who can go to the north. The land in South America is not impossible to farm. There is also fertile land near the Nile River in Africa. The Mamluks are not good at farming. The Ming Dynasty can send people to farm. …
If the tree is moved, it will die, but if the person is moved, it will live.
It's such a simple truth, you really don't need to worry about it.
