Chapter 299: Rent and Interest Reduction
The forty years of Jiajing have finally passed.
With finances so tight this year, Emperor Jiajing, who had been practicing Taoism for many years, suddenly became ordinary and ordered the inner court to organize the Aoshan Lantern Festival, which had been suspended for many years.
The so-called Aoshan Lantern Festival means lanterns tied up to look like Aoshan. It was a royal Spring Festival celebration in the Ming Dynasty.
Looking at the bustling Dengshan Mountain, the emperor rarely smiled.
Since last year, Emperor Daojun, who used to be "invulnerable to cold and heat", has felt the fear of aging and death.
Even the emperor who dominates the world is still powerless in the face of death.
Death is the greatest justice that nature treats everyone.
Emperors and generals will die, and ordinary people will die too.
Emperor Jiajing felt the shadow of death, and he became more and more afraid of the empty palace.
His wife died, the heir he carefully cultivated in his middle age died, and his childhood friend Lu Bing also died.
Yang Tinghe and his son, who were against the emperor, also died, and Xia Yan, who helped him deal with Yang Tinghe during the ceremony, also died.
The emperor felt lonely, and looking at the mountain-like lantern festival, he finally had a hint of human fireworks.
But behind this lively Aoshan Lantern Festival, there were so many lantern-tying artists who were forced to starve to death, and how many naked people were driven to the streets just for the excitement, and finally froze to death on the roadside.
The officials still sent congratulations to the emperor, but the situation in the court had changed.
Yan Maoqing, who was inspecting the Shipping Department of Fujian City, left the capital for Fujian when the Lantern Festival was over.
Yan Shifan took in a concubine from the tenth house later in the year.
Yan Song's body was getting older. He could no longer hear clearly, and his eyes were almost blind. He had to be supported when he walked. The emperor specially ordered that he could ride a sedan into the palace to do cabinet work.
Li Zhi did not follow Fang Wanghai home for the holidays.
During this period, Li Zhi did not attend classes at the Nanjing Imperial College. Instead, he continued to travel in Nanzhili, and he also gained a lot of knowledge.
During his travels, Li Zhi met a good friend, Liang Ruyuan of the Taizhou School.
Speaking of it, it is also the tenacious ability to tie up the historical timeline. Under the influence of Su Ze, Li Zhi did not join the Taizhou School.
He had been helping Fang Wanghai and Su Ze, but after Fang Wanghai was gradually marginalized, Li Zhi began to travel around South Zhili.
Some time ago, Mr. Yan Jun, Wang Gen's direct disciple, gave lectures in Yancheng, attracting a large number of scholars to come and watch.
After Yan Jun organized the Yanding people to resist taxes in Yancheng, he became famous in South Zhili. He then moved to Huai'an, Yangzhou, and Taizhou and established several mutual aid societies and craftsmen's societies.
Yan Jun also used his reputation to successfully negotiate with workshop owners or government-run workshops to improve the treatment of these craftsmen and employees.
As a result, Yan Jun's reputation greatly increased. He also gave many lectures to spread the knowledge of grassroots mutual aid.
Li Zhi and Liang Ruyuan met when Yan Jun was giving lectures, and they hit it off immediately.
Yan Jun gave lectures, and all of a sudden, various groups sprung up like bamboo shoots after a rain in the Huaibei area north of the Yangtze River.
The situation in Jiangnan is somewhat different from that in Jiangbei.
Under the influence of Su Ze Tiangong Academy, Jiangnan is now full of various workshops, especially the two industries of cotton textile and silk textile. Originally, the workshops in Jiangnan were very dense. Driven by new technologies, some larger ones have Private workshops appeared.
For example, in the Xu family's cotton textile workshop on Chongming Island, the second son of the Xu family also had business acumen. After discovering that his looms were lagging behind, he immediately dismantled all the looms and ordered Tiangong looms. The mule machine in the opening.
After using the mule machine, the production efficiency of the Xu family's weaving workshop greatly increased, and the Xu family's cotton production increased tenfold!
The reason why it didn't continue to grow was not because of productivity, but because the Xu family didn't have enough cotton.
Not only the Xu family, but also the Taicang Wang family and several noble families in Nanjing all made money by opening workshops.
The big families made a lot of money, and the small families also made a small amount of money. Within a few years of the spread of new technologies, the prosperity of Jiangnan reached a new level.
Relying on the cotton cloth business, the Xu family has accumulated a lot of wealth. While meeting the military needs of Liaodong, the Xu family is also organizing caravans to sell cotton cloth to the north.
A strange scene occurred next.
The Xu family, who had been at odds with Su Ze in Songjiang Prefecture, actually reached cooperation with Su Ze on the matter of trade. They rented a fleet from the Shanghai Anti-Japanese General Corps to participate in northern trade.
Among the three industries Su Ze stayed in in southern Zhili, the training courses at Tiangong Academy were basically completed. Several new industrial technologies had spread, and it was impossible for the government to ban these workshops.
Newspapers may be banned by the government at any time, but as long as movable type printing technology exists and the sales network is still there, with the Ming government's control over local areas, banning newspapers is not as good as banning them. Su Ze can continue to do it as long as he wants to. .
Only the Shanghai Anti-Japanese and Anti-Smuggling Corps is sensitive and the most difficult to retain.
In fact, as Fang Wanghai gradually lost power, more forces focused on the Shanghai Anti-Japanese and Anti-Smuggling Corps.
Nowadays, there is an endless stream of trading ships docking at the ports of Shanghai County. There are mainly several routes.
On the route north to Dengzhou Port, the cotton cloth from Songjiang Prefecture was transported to Dengzhou Port through maritime trade, and then sent to Liaodong by the imperial court's sea-going ships at Dengzhou Port.
The trade from Dengzhou to Liaodong was approved by the imperial court, and the imperial court soon tasted the benefits of sea transportation.
Compared with road transportation, shipping losses are smaller and the volume transported at one time is larger.
Nowadays, Liaodong's ordnance, grain, grass, and cotton-padded clothes are all transshipped in Dengzhou.
Sometimes the cotton-padded clothes from Songjiang Prefecture don't even need to change ships, they just go north to Liaodong to transport the goods.
The ships from Jiangnan exchanged cotton cloth for salt in Dengzhou and then brought them back from Shandong.
Various specialties from Liaodong, such as fur and ginseng, also appear on the docks of Dengzhou. These products can be sold at high prices in Jiangnan.
Other fleets transport silk from Jiangnan to Fuzhou. This route has almost tied up the entire silk industry in Jiangnan.
One proof is that when the Japanese pirate turmoil was serious in the 40th year of Jiajing, the silk sales in Jiangnan almost collapsed. Now the gentry in Jiangnan are more concerned about the progress of the Japanese pirates in Fujian, even more than the Fujian people.
The only good news is that after the Spring Festival, Ryukyu ships have already arrived at the port, and some of the silk that was squeezed last year has begun to be exchanged for silver.
The new navy force in Fuzhou began to escort the Ryukyu tribute merchant ships, and Fujian began to purchase silk again. The two trade routes, one south and one north, turned the Shanghai Anti-Smuggling Corps' wharf into a chicken that lays golden eggs, and became the meat and potatoes coveted by both the local government and the Six Ministries of Nanjing.
In order to protect this port, Su Ze also used many methods.
For example, some "Japanese pirates" will appear in the Yangtze River Estuary. These Japanese pirates will intimidate ships departing from other ports, and will also deliberately sail in the Yangtze River Estuary, so that all the people in Nanzhili dare not dismantle the Anti-Smuggling Corps.
The other one is that Su Ze also cooperates with the big families in Jiangnan and negotiates with them for relatively low port prices.
These big families also want to build their own ports. For example, the Xu family of Songjiang Prefecture built a dock on Chongming Island.
Unexpectedly, the water suddenly rose in October last year, submerging the Xu family's wharf, and the Xu family lost a large part of their investment in Chongming Island.
Moreover, these big families also discovered that a pier that is safe, can dock sea-going ships, and is not affected by sea waves is such a rare place!
Many families searched the coastline of Jiangnan and found that only Shanghai, a lumpy place, was a natural harbor.
This Su Ze's vision is too vicious!
The second son of the Xu family, who hated Su Ze the most, also admitted that Su Ze was a genius!
Moreover, port construction and port management are also technical tasks. Sometimes building a terminal yourself does not seem to be as cost-effective as renting a terminal.
In this way, the Xu family of Songjiang Prefecture, the Wang family of Taicang, and even several princes of Nanjing became partners of the Shanghai Terminal. Su Ze allowed them to dock at the port almost free of charge, and also provided escort services at the Yangtze River Estuary. On the contrary, We will firmly hold Shanghai, an important port, in our hands.
However, these Jiangnan gentry were not without their troubles. As the scale of the workshop expanded, new opposing forces emerged among the employees.
Compared with farmers who depend on the land and dare not resist the oppression of landlords, hired workers resist much more frequently and the intensity of their struggles is much higher.
Sun Wei, the labor leader who has recently become famous in Jiangnan, organized a work stoppage of 5,000 cotton textile workers in Jiangnan later this year.
Sun Wei's stoppage protest came at a very good time, just when shipping in Fuzhou was smooth and various cotton textile workshops began to complete orders.
The wave of work stoppages directly blinded these workshop owners. Sun Wei led the employee representatives of each workshop to negotiate with the workshop owners, demanding increased benefits, reduced working hours, and more labor protection supplies to protect workers' safety.
In the end, Sun Wei's work stoppage was successful. Employees in cotton textile workshops throughout Jiangnan received a salary increase, but their working hours were not reduced, and labor protection supplies were provided by the employees themselves.
But this is also a good result. Sun Wei wrote three articles in a row in "The Alert" to introduce the legality and rationality of the work stoppage, the necessity of salary increases and his experience in struggle. The sales volume of these three issues of "The Alert" became The three issues with the highest circulation to date.
During this period, the biggest news in the entire Jiangnan cultural circle were Sun Wei's three articles in the "Alert" and the two rebuttal articles by workshop owner Wang Yuanqing in the "Alert".
Wang Yuanqing and Sun Wei were both classmates at Tiangong Academy. After graduating from Tiangong Academy, Wang Yuanqing inherited his family's cotton textile workshop and used a water-powered mule machine to make his workshop bigger and stronger.
Wang Yuanqing and Sun Wei were good friends, but their positions became increasingly tit-for-tat. Such debates had happened many times. Although Wang Yuanqing also called on the workshop owners to increase wages and improve the benefits of their employees, he stood on the side of Confucian business ethics. From a perspective, it is more of a moral advocacy and suggestion.
The scholars in the south of the Yangtze River gradually shifted their discussions in teahouses, restaurants, and academies to the issue of business ethics from romantic and snowy nights.
In fact, this is normal. Since the release of "Tiangong Kaiwu", the Jiangnan region, where the handicraft industry was originally developed, has been ignited.
Landowners who had read the book began to try to set up workshops. After all, with so many industries in "Tiangong Kaiwu", there were still many ways to make money.
Most of the families who could study were from modest families. Soon these families discovered that, unlike collecting rent, running a workshop really required someone with some skills to do it.
In the era of agrarian economy, landlords only need to sit at home and collect rent. They have to deal with their tenant farmers. There is not much to do. The son of the family only needs to study peacefully.
But setting up a workshop and operating an industry can make more money than renting it to tenants for farming, but it requires management and marketing, which all require a lot of talent.
So a strange phenomenon occurred in Suzhou. Those idle second-generation ancestors were called back by their families to take care of their family's property.
The Evil Young Gang, which was once prominent in Suzhou, was dismantled in such a dramatic way.
These evil young men go home to manage the workshop. They are all their own children, so of course they should feel more at ease.
The development of the workshop has also increased their income. They can make more money by going back to manage the workshop than wandering on the streets. Moreover, they can have so many employees to manage them, which naturally gives them a greater sense of accomplishment.
The Bad Young Gang collapsed in this way, and as industry and commerce began to develop, the topic of discussion naturally began to shift to this aspect. The debate between Sun Wei and Wang Yuanqing became the hottest topic in the entire Jiangnan.
However, Li Zhi had heard Su Ze talk about these topics many times.
Now he and Liang Ruyuan are on the way to Beijing together.
"Brother Zhu Qian, why did your Cuihe Tang fail?"
"It was all because of this old thief Yan Song!"
Liang Ruyuan studied under Wang Gen, and later returned to his hometown of Yongfeng, Jiangxi, and opened Cuihe Tang.
The so-called Cuihetang is in the form of a family, "managing the governance of the clan, including weddings, funerals, taxes and servitude, everything depends on whether it is appropriate or not." Later generations described Cuihetang as a utopian social experiment, but in fact Cuihetang
was Hetang is no different from the clan autonomy from ancient times to the present. It is just a stronger form of clan autonomy by convention.
However, the social practice of Cuihetang is now bankrupt. The Feilong Rebellion recently broke out in Jiangxi, and the imperial court increased taxes in Jiangxi.
However, Yongfeng and Yan Song's hometowns in Fenyi were in the same prefecture, so the government imposed heavy taxes on Yongfeng, but exempted them on Fenyi.
Liang Ru was not strong enough and wanted to lead Cuihetang to resist the tax, but the clan members did not dare.
Some tribesmen were afraid of being implicated and withdrew from Cuihe Hall.
In fact, three years after Cuihetang was implemented, there have been many quarrels over food distribution and various trivial matters such as weddings and funerals. This time, the tax resistance was just the trigger, and Liang Ruyuan's several years of hard work were just gone. .
Liang Ruyuan hated Yan Song even more. This time he came to the capital to plot against Yan Song.
Of course, he did not tell Li Zhi about this, and Li Zhi thought Liang Ruyuan was going to the capital to give lectures.
at the same time.
In Changningwei just after the New Year, Su Ze convened a meeting with the village chiefs and large households in the villages under Nanping County.
The theme of this meeting has been sent to the participants in advance, and the theme is also very clear-"Reducing rent and interest, and jointly fighting against Japanese pirates."
(End of chapter)