New Shun 1730

Social consciousness always lags behind social existence.

A drastic change or war will accelerate social consciousness to keep up with social existence.

Dashun's expedition to Southeast Asia and his intervention in the Russian coup in Europe were the military drums that gave birth to this kind of social consciousness to keep pace with the times.

Dashun's foreign strategy requires a group of enemies with good brains, or at least a group of enemies who realize that "the times have changed."

Otherwise, methods such as intimidation and deterrence will not work.

This is just like George Anson who came to Lingdingyang before. He was a standard person whose understanding of society was backward. The ocean supply lines are tens of thousands of miles apart, Dashun's battleships have begun cruising, and one-third of the sailors in his own fleet have died of scurvy. Under such circumstances, the Centurion is still operating in the Lingding Ocean. Niu coax, isn't this because you don't realize that "the times have changed"?

How to deal with this kind of person? Normal thinking is completely useless.

Of course, after the Nanyang Incident and the Russian coup, European countries have gradually begun to change their understanding of the world structure.

The British East India Company was the first to be affected by this impact.

But, it's not enough.

Now, Liu Yu used another way to awaken the anxiety in the British East India Company.

This is forcing the East India Company to think divergently and create new ideas, and not to rest on its laurels.

Not only must Fazakle be anxious, but Fazakle must also pass on this anxiety to the board of directors of the East India Company and any shareholder who invests more than 500 pounds.

If you don’t want to lose money or go bankrupt overnight in the future, it’s best to change your thinking and look at where there are profit growth points in Asia east of the Cape of Good Hope.

For example... somewhere south of the Snowy Plateau and west of Nanyang?

For example, the company's profit growth point should be focused on tax collection in a wealthy place, rather than pure trade?

If a person has no long-term worries, he must have immediate worries.

How far is far?

Liu Yu This is the anxiety of the trinity of far, middle and near.

Recently, there is an unresolved opium incident.

In China, Dashun has opened up Sino-Dutch cooperative trade, which will naturally suppress competitors.

Far from it, the technological explosion caused by technological exchanges will eventually make pure East-West trade unprofitable.

Naturally, this kind of guidance has advantages and disadvantages.

Leading to India also means that the Luzon issue may not be resolved until decades later. This anxiety will inevitably lead Britain to abandon Luzon and instead concentrate its efforts on India. I wouldn't hold such a hot potato in my hand.

As a potential quasi-ally of the "Anti-British Alliance", Spain would not be able to do anything in a short time if Britain really returned Luzon to Spain.

But these pros and cons, in the long run, are not a problem. Now that Nanyang has conquered and India has surrendered, it is only a matter of time before Luzon is left alone overseas.

Whatever is gained, something is lost.

Under the guidance of this anxiety, Fazaklei in front of Liu Yu really began to think deeply.

Although there is always a voice in my head reminding Fazaklai:

Be careful, be careful! The man in front of you is a devil. His words cannot be trusted. He has deceived many people. Think of Ceylon immigration, think of the Sino-Russian border negotiations in the Russo-Swiss War, think of the collapse of the Dutch East India Company!

However, besides this voice, there was another voice reminding him:

Yes, the man in front of you is a devil, but he is the snake in the Garden of Eden, and he is not relying on lies. The Dutch East India Company did not accept the Ceylon immigration plan, so what? But they didn't dare to massacre, and they refused to give relief. The result of the great uprising was that Dashun sent troops in advance. The immigrants from Ceylon allowed the Dutch East India Company to live for three to five more years and earn millions more taels of silver; Russia did not What about accepting border negotiations? The Russo-Russian War broke out. If he really refused to accept it, wouldn't Dashun send troops to march westward?

These two voices kept echoing in his mind, making Fazaklei feel more and more nervous and frightened.

The man in front of me is very easy-going and has a good temper. Although he just scolded his mother for half an hour because of the opium problem, he is still inviting him to tea in a polite manner. This man is not cruel, nor does he take pleasure in killing people or fighting.

But there is a power behind this person that makes people inexplicably fearful when they are against him.

unknown.

Fazaklai thought to himself, every word you say seems to be a lie.

But behind every truth you say, it's not the purpose you really want.

However, every truth you say makes us think for ourselves, and in the end we can always achieve what you want.

What exactly are you going to do?

Unable to figure this out, Fazakle was still feeling uneasy.

Moreover, what is even more unsettling is that at the beginning, I was instinctively wary that what Liu Yu said might be a lie and contained some kind of conspiracy. However, after I was instinctively wary, and thought about it seriously, I felt that every word was true. Irrefutable and rational truth.

When Fazaklai was nervous, he couldn't help but drink a few more sips of tea to moisturize his throat that was dry due to nervousness.

After thinking for a long time, Fazakle finally asked: "Your Majesty, your words are undoubtedly very reasonable. From your perspective, or from the perspective of you being a senior national official and cabinet member, you think The direction is beyond reproach.”

"But, I still don't understand, what is this and your sincere purpose of taking the 'Navigation Bell' as our goal?"

Liu Yu still did not answer, but asked: "Have you read a book? It was written by you British people."

"It's called "The Golden Book of the Most Perfect State and the New Island of Utopia, both useful and interesting."

Of course Fazaklai knew, and he could also be sure that Liu Yu was not using the navigation bell to find the Utopia Islands. This was something only romantic dreamers would do.

The person in front of me is not romantic at all.

So he nodded, indicating that of course he had read the book.

But he only said that he had read it, but did not express any political views or opinions on the book.

Liu Yu quoted a sentence from it in a soothing tone.

"Sheep were originally very tame and didn't want much, but now they have become very greedy and vicious, and they even want to eat people. They want to destroy our fields, homes and cities."

After quoting this sentence, Liu Yu said with a smile: "We in China have played earlier than you. Village communities and other things were disintegrated earlier; the well-field system and other things have been over for two thousand years. There is no public land to be enclosed. , and there is no so-called public land in the village. The hierarchical distinction between gentlemen and common people has long existed in name only.”

"Our Chinese dynasty has always implemented the most standard land private ownership system. Since the disintegration of the land equalization system in the Tang Dynasty, land can be bought and sold and leased freely, and the state cannot interfere."

"Of course, we don't have the traditional land rents of your village communities. Tradition is worthless in the face of monetary interests. We proved this a thousand years ago, and your recent land enclosure movement also proves this."

"I assume you must be deeply impressed by the landless peasants wandering the streets of London? Of course, you have the Poor Law."

"From the issue of the Poor Law, we can see the major differences between China and the UK on some issues."

"This will help you understand China, what it is, and what it needs to do to exist, so as to avoid many misunderstandings between us."

Through the issue of the Poor Law, he gradually brought the problem to the land issue.

In other words, it led to huge differences between Britain and Dashun on the issue of "anti-annexation".

Britain began to impose a poor tax in the 29th year of the Jiajing reign of the previous dynasty.

This is a standard asset tax that is levied based on the amount of land, real estate, and industry. The total assets determine the amount of poverty relief obligations.

From an economic point of view, this tax and this poverty relief system are actually a kind of regulation that "encourages mergers."

For example, a farmer with 100 acres of land would have to pay a poverty tax of 10 taels of silver.

A farmer with 10,000 acres of land must pay a poverty tax of 1,000 taels.

So, who helps the poor?

Naturally, it is impossible for the relief to go to the farmers and small producers. They pay taxes.

But to help the poor.

In theory, only those who have no job or whose wages are too low can enjoy poverty relief subsidies.

Originally working on a farm, the wages were certainly higher than the minimum wage stipulated in the Poor Law.

However, it is clear that farmers would choose to lower wages to a point where the Poor Law wages were even lower.

For example, if you originally worked on a farm and earned 5 silver coins a month, the Poor Law fixed a monthly salary of 4 silver coins before you could receive poverty relief subsidies.

The farmer took a look and thought, isn’t this simple? I reduced the salary to 3 yen a month. Workers can receive 3 yen in wages per month, and can also receive 2 yen in bread subsidy, rent subsidy, etc. for the poor.

Hello everyone. Hello everyone.

What does this mean?

For big farmers, big industrial owners, and big bourgeois, this is a cycle of taking off your pants and farting: the poor tax I paid was ultimately adjusted through wages, which meant that I didn’t pay at all. I just pay half of the wages I should pay to the employees in the form of wages and the other half in the form of poverty relief subsidies from the government.

For yeoman farmers, small landowners, and small handicraft practitioners, this is not just taking off their pants and farting: I am a yeoman farmer, so I cannot hire people to work specifically, but I still have to pay the poor tax.

Obviously, what is driving this?

What drives it is the bankruptcy of homesteaders and the bankruptcy of small craftsmen.

What was promoted was the expansion of farms, the annexation of land, and the defeat of small handicraftsmen by handicrafts.

What drives them is that the bottom class is trying their best to have children, and then the wages are getting lower and lower, and they either have to work or be indentured slaves.

Today, the United Kingdom is preparing a new round of reform of the Poor Law, but the direction of the reform, from the perspective of economic principles, is still to "encourage mergers, encourage industrial industry, eliminate small farmers, and eliminate small producers."

In turn, Dashun is actually brewing a tax law reform.

However, judging from the "eleven tax" treasury and local tax sharing reform that Songjiang Prefecture is planning to trial, Dashun's tax law reform is actually a reform to "suppress mergers."

Through a clear tithe tax, the apportionment, local additional payment, corvee labor, etc. on the peasants, small farmers, and small producers will be cut off.

The impact of this reform was actually on the gentry, because they had the legal ability to avoid paying taxes and avoiding forced labor.

In other words, the country used to collect at least about 100 million taels of tangible or labor-based tax revenue every year, of which 25 million taels of national tax and land tax were evenly distributed according to the land; and the remaining 75 million taels of local taxes were actually all paid on On the body of homesteaders and small farmers.

Now, in theory, if the tax law is promoted nationwide, the total land tax in the country will be set at 70 million taels, and the national treasury will still take 25 million taels as before, and the remaining 45 million taels will be returned to the local areas. However, the total tax amount of 70 million taels is evenly distributed on the land across the country.

This makes it less likely for self-cultivating farmers to go bankrupt, the small peasant economy is more stable, the model of men farming and women weaving is more durable, and it is more resistant to shocks and natural disasters.

The difference between the two tax law reforms is also a manifestation of the biggest difference between Britain and Dashun.

No matter which emperor of Dashun, at least at the starting point, he would never dare to implement the policy of "encouraging mergers" and "encouraging small farmers to go bankrupt".

Of course, what will happen if it is implemented is another matter.

Liu Yu and Fazaklai said that the Celestial Empire had already completed the enclosure movement, which is not completely nonsense. After all, Chen Sheng and Wu Guang "farmed for hire" rather than "tenant farming". If there was no village public land and well field public land, and it was all private land, how could it be enclosed? Who did the public land of the pre-Qin village community belong to?

However, it can be understood that agricultural technology progressed rapidly but industrial technology did not meet the standards. In the end, this step was completed, but the progress in industrial technology was not enough to allow cities and factories to accommodate so many people, but agricultural technology had already reached the level of Europe in the 16th century, so the tenancy system and small peasant economy were finally developed. It also prompted the Confucian magic reform that emphasized benevolence and righteousness, and the restoration of well fields became a reactionary under the agricultural technology level of the Han Dynasty.

It should be said that if the British enclosure movement continued, but there was no pressure relief in America and industrial progress, the population continued to surge, and sooner or later it would have to reach the stage of small farmers and tenancy.

This is a compromise, giving the huge population at the bottom a way to survive that is almost just not starving to death, otherwise it would be a life-and-death struggle. The Diggers movement during the period when Britain chopped off the king's head had already shown this trend.

Liu Yu talked about the difference between them, in fact, he wanted to send a signal to the British government through the British East India Company, and let the British government "understand" China better.

It even seems like a euphemistic gesture of goodwill. It seems that due to the existence of France, it is difficult to say it too clearly.

This can be called "opium punishment diplomacy".

As the saying goes, under the raging fire and blooming flowers, the crisis is right in front of us.

Dashun is carrying out a huge Huai River control project that costs tens of millions of taels; Dashun has to consider domestic reforms and solve many domestic problems; Dashun's armed neutrality is absolutely sincere armed neutrality, because Dashun has no spare energy to continue to expand before solving the domestic crisis.

Of course, he can't say it so bluntly, so he has to raise the issue of the navigation clock - so that Britain can make a logical judgment: Dashun's purpose of going to Southeast Asia is to obtain an immigration area to solve domestic land problems and to get a springboard for immigrants to the southern hemisphere mainland.

In view of the existence of the equatorial doldrums, it is necessary to rely on ocean currents, which requires the use of islands in the eastern Pacific to make a triangular jump.

The Pacific Ocean is vast, the islands are small, there is no continent, and the lack of a navigation clock cannot accurately find the longitude, so there is no way to triangular jump.

This thing, the island is not the American continent, no matter the longitude, just sail, you will always get there.

The island is slightly off the latitude, and the longitude is unknown, maybe a storm will blow it to America, and there is no way to jump.

Liu Yu is of course talking nonsense. His hope for immigration to the southern hemisphere is on the future "Dashun version of the South China Sea and Mississippi Company, but with real gold", but this egg is very round in front of the British East India Company.