Han’s Son is Not a Slave

However, when Zhou Shixiang happily told Song Xianggong about his plan to stabilize prices and accumulate wealth, he was fiercely opposed by the other party.

"This military ticket is just a piece of tissue paper, which is used as money. How can the people recognize it? ... The commander's idea is good, but we also used this tissue paper as money at the beginning of the Ming Dynasty. Treasure banknotes. However, after the treasure banknotes were used, the military and civilians did not recognize it, and the value of the banknotes depreciated every year. In the Hongwu period, the treasure banknotes could always buy a stone of rice, and in the Xuande year, it was not even worth five cents, so when Zhengde The abolition of the banknote method is to use silver and two copper coins.... I know that there is too much money spent on silver now, and the commander has to prepare for the westward expedition. Shuai can’t come up with this method of using paper as money. Although the soldiers and the common people are illiterate, how can they get this piece of paper? ... The commander really wants to push this method, and the hearts of the army and the people will be shaken!”

Song Xianggong's remarks made Zhou Shixiang pour cold water on his head. After careful consideration, it is indeed a bit of a matter of course to implement military tickets, but if military tickets are not issued, how to solve the problem of shortage of money.

Song Xianggong said: "The ancient method of collecting money is to cast money, in addition to levying taxes and exploiting people."

Zhou Shixiang asked, "How to cast money?"

Song Xianggong said: "Of course it is to cast silver coins and copper coins. The silver coins that circulate among the people have different fineness and weight. The commander may wish to recycle these silver coins and copper coins, open a new coin casting factory, and recast the collected silver and copper coins. It is a unified new coin. The coin has money interest, silver seven, tin three, or even silver six tin four. As long as the new money we cast is of good quality and new style, the people will definitely accept it. Once the new money is circulated, it will be It means that if you do nothing, you can earn 30% interest from each newly minted coin."

After Zhou Shixiang heard it, "Yuan Datou" and the one-yuan coin and five-cent coin used in his previous life flashed in his mind. After thinking about it carefully, I immediately accepted this method of casting money, but how to cast this money is difficult again. Yongli will be finished soon, can't I still cast "Yongli Tongbao"?

"Cast Daming Tongbao!"

Song Xianggong saw that Zhou Shixiang was worried, and he told Zhou Shixiang that when the Shaowu regime was established in Guangzhou, the scholar Su Guansheng wanted to make new money to pay for the army, so he called a few officials who had escaped from the Nanjing Ministry of Industry. A group of craftsmen was organized to prepare new money. Unexpectedly, the Shaowu regime was too short-lived, and the Qing army was wiped out in forty days, so the new money was not even made out. The officials and craftsmen of the Ministry of Industry were also arrested by Shang Kexi. After the Taiping army broke Guangzhou, these people fell into the hands of the Taiping army. This group of people had been useless before, and now that they had to decide to cast new money, this group of ready-made people would naturally come in handy.

Zhou Shixiang was overjoyed. With the ready-made money-making craftsmen, it is not difficult to make new money, as long as the amount is sufficient and the style is new. But there is another problem, and that is how to recover the silver and copper in the hands of the people.

This Song Xianggong didn't have any good ideas for a while. After thinking about it, Zhou Shi told Song Xianggong that he still wanted to issue a paper ticket, but the paper ticket was called a food ticket. . In the past, the credit of treasure banknotes was too bad, and using paper as money seemed too whimsical to the common people, but if the food stamps could actually buy food, it would become a convertible currency in disguise.

The Taiping Army is now implementing a series of systems of building villages, building villages, collective farming, and ensuring grain output. Therefore, in addition to the land tax that the people should pay to the government, the rest of the grain must be sold to the Taiping Army first. In addition to keeping the spoils captured by the Taiping Army, the library also has the responsibility of storing food. In other words, the public treasury is actually a combination of grain and silver. In this world, food is the real hard currency. No matter how much money you have, you can't buy food, and if you can't spend it, it's a useless pile of metal.

Zhou Shixiang wanted to issue food stamps, so as to avoid issuing banknotes that could be used as money and not be recognized by the common people, thus causing the Taiping military government’s credit to suffer. You can buy food from the nearest public warehouse anytime, anywhere, and you can buy it for a full kilogram without any deductions. This is related to whether the food stamps can become a currency in disguised form. Therefore, Zhou Shixiang must strictly control it, and at the same time build large and small grain depots in various places to facilitate the people to pay and buy grain and reduce consumption. At the same time, buying food with food stamps is 10% cheaper than buying food with silver money. People are greedy for cheap. As long as they can buy more food with food stamps, most people can choose food stamps and trust them.

As long as the Taiping Army has enough food reserves for officers, soldiers and common people to exchange, the common people will not keep food at home. Grain will go bad after a long time, and it is certainly good to change the public treasury sold to the Taiping Army for money or for food stamps that can be exchanged at any time. For Zhou Shixiang, the food stamps were issued for profit, but in the eyes of the common people, the food stamps issued by Zhou Dashuai were a great virtue, which not only allowed them to earn practical benefits, but also allowed them to reduce the risk of stockpiling grain. After all There is no common people's ability to resist risks higher than Zhou Dashuai, who has tens of thousands of troops.

Few people know that the now widely publicized reincarnation of Grandpa Yue and Dashuai Zhou, the uncle of Xingping, actually started out by robbery. If the risk on his head is too great, Dashuai Zhou will immediately pass the risk on. The Qing court called Zhou Dashuai a thief scholar.

As long as it can be exchanged, food stamp credit will be established, and goods of the same price as food can naturally be used. Over time, the people will give up the silver and copper coins in their hands and use food stamps to buy various living materials. In this link, a large amount of silver and copper coins will flow into the hands of the Taiping Army. The Taiping Army then made profits by casting new money, which could also be used to buy supplies in Qing-occupied areas, and even bribe Manchu officials, so as to achieve the purpose of economic encroachment. In addition, the Taiping Army can also use new money to buy guns and guns in Macau, hire Western technicians, and carry out overseas trade for huge profits. In this way, silver can play a greater value than in the hands of the common people, and it can also make the Taiping Army's finances more abundant. Having abundant finances means sustainable war mobilization capabilities.

After a few battles with the Qing army, the Taiping army won not by how much its combat effectiveness exceeded the Qing army, but by its ability to organize and mobilize many times higher than the Qing army. If it is worse than the Qing army, the Taiping army is definitely not as bad as the Qing army.

Of course, it is absolutely impossible to directly distribute food stamps to the common people. Any new things will be suspected. Zhou Shixiang decided to use the food stamps to pay the military salaries of the officers and soldiers, and then the soldiers and their families would take the food stamps and exchange them at the public treasuries in various places. food. In the early days, when the army was paid, it was not possible to issue all food stamps. Instead, the officers and soldiers were allowed to choose whether they wanted food stamps or money. Tickets instead of money.

As for possible food price fluctuations in the future, there is no need to consider it for the time being. Most of the officers, soldiers and the common people are illiterate, so how can they think so long-term. If food prices fall sharply, it will mean peace in the world. Only when the grain output is high during the Taiping season will the price of food be low, otherwise, the price will be high.

Cheap grain hurts farmers, but Zhou Shixiang is willing to see cheap grain hurt farmers, that means he has succeeded. Cheap food hurts farmers, but it's better than being starved to death and enslaved.

After repeatedly discussing the details with Duke Xiang of Song, Zhou Shixiang decided to divide the public treasuries in two parts into two, and set up two institutions, the Grain Office and the Yinzhuang. The former issued special food stamps marked with the number of kilograms, while the latter was responsible for minting money and taking on the role of a private bank.

Like the grain depot, Yinzhuang can be deposited and withdrawn at any time, and can be paid for deposit receipts or grain receipts. And when the people taste the benefits of food stamps, the savings will naturally decrease. In this way, a large amount of gold and silver can be recovered, so that the coin factory has enough raw materials to cast new money. As long as the food stamps can be exchanged for food at the grain office, the credit of the food stamps will always be strong.

The biggest enemy of issuing food stamps and new money is private miners and counterfeiters. Therefore, Zhou Shixiang issued a strict order at the same time when he established grain depots and silver houses. Anyone who privately minted silver coins and forged grain coupons was a spies of the Qing pirates. Ling Chi and all the adult males in the family were executed, and the rest were all exiled to Qiongzhou, where they could not return if they were pardoned. And encourage non-governmental whistleblowers to report, if it is verified, the whistleblower can be rewarded with half of the whistleblower's property.

Under these strict orders and the joint investigation mechanism of villages, townships, counties, prefectures and provinces~www.NovelMTL.com~ those who dare to forge Taiping military food stamps and private casting can only be on the side of the Qing court, and how to effectively avoid being forged, It is the matter of the officials and craftsmen who have decades of experience in minting coins in the mint. Zhou Shixiang tried his best to instill in them some anti-counterfeiting knowledge he knew in his previous life combined with the reality of this era, and asked the chief envoy Si Yamen to organize rounds of training for officials in various counties. The training content was how to identify genuine and fake food stamps.

Zhou Shixiang hoped to engrave his picture on the newly issued Daming Tongbao silver coin, but Song Xianggong gave him a big glance, saying that you can't rebel!

Zhou Shixiang sneered, and it was indeed a bit excessive to engrave his portrait of Zhou Dashuai on Daming Tongbao. As a second choice, he asked for his own face to be printed on the newly issued food stamps. This requirement is not excessive. The food stamps are only certificates issued by the Taiping Army for the soldiers and the common people to buy food. Therefore, it is not taboo to print his portrait of Zhou Dashuai on the food stamps. However, Song Xianggong kindly advised Zhou Shixiang not to do this. Because it is a very unlucky thing to print the head of a living person on paper. He tried to persuade him, but Zhou Shixiang insisted on printing, but Song Xianggong reluctantly agreed, and asked the painter to come over to paint the head of Zhou Dashuai, and then asked the craftsmen who cast the money to paint the picture, and try to print the best effect.

Blind Li also shouted that the head of the handsome man could not be printed blindly, because it was to save Yang's birthday, but it was Zhou Shixiang's turn to give him a look, and then coldly snorted: "Yan Que knows the ambition of Honghu!" (To be continued.)