In the Song Dynasty, there was no law or order.

Zhao Jun suppressed dissidents in the Political System Institute, suppressed the Lu Party and the Wang Party, and consolidated his power.

Just as the first item of the Qingli New Deal to rectify the administration of officials was resolutely completed, the New Year of the second year of the Qingli period arrived as scheduled.

In the spring of the following year, after the performance evaluation system started in February last year, a year later, under the combination of sticks and carrots, the middle and lower-level officials no longer resisted.

The reason is very simple.

Although the performance evaluation system made them work harder and more tired, the performance bonus was really good.

Again, although there were various subsidies in the past, the subsidies of senior officials were paid out every year, but the middle and lower-level officials were not necessarily paid out every year, and their income was often deducted, and their income was unstable.

After the performance evaluation of the performance evaluation system came down, although the subsidies dropped sharply every month, the performance was paid out as expected, and the income was much more stable than before.

Therefore, in the case of actual benefits, the middle and lower-level officials are more and more accepting of the existence of the performance evaluation system.

In contrast, the senior officials are a little uncomfortable.

Because the performance bonus is essentially a weakening of the previous subsidies, senior officials have the most subsidies, so their income naturally drops sharply. Even if they complete the monthly tasks and get performance bonuses, they are not as much as before.

This means that the new policy actually weakens senior officials above the third and fourth ranks, and takes advantage of them to subsidize lower-level officials. This will not cost the treasury too much, but it will hurt them.

Therefore, many senior officials have complaints.

But senior officials are only a minority after all. Compared with tens of thousands of officials in the whole Song Dynasty, their voices are too small, and they are controlled by the Political System Institute, so they naturally can't make any waves.

As the winter snow of the New Year passed, in the spring of 1042 AD, under the auspices of Fan Zhongyan, the second chapter of the Qingli New Deal began.

First of all, in politics, the construction of the entire framework has been completed.

With the Political System Institute as the center, formulate the direction of national development, coordinate various departments, and subordinate various departments, formulate development plans for their departments, and urge lower-level institutions to implement them.

The local government passed the system of performance evaluation, and the local county magistrate was responsible to the state, the prefect of the state was responsible to the road, and the four departments of the road were responsible to the court.

The system was passed down layer by layer, which improved the execution and administrative efficiency.

In this way, the bureaucracy was rectified, a large number of corrupt officials were found, and many official parasites were dealt with, making politics more and more clear since the first year of the Qingli period.

In agriculture, a large number of heavy taxes and levies were abolished to reduce the burden on farmers, and corvée labor was reduced. The main corvée work was done by local wing troops and imperial troops. The main idea was to "emphasize agriculture and sericulture" and "reduce corvée labor".

In diplomacy, it maintained good foreign relations with Liao, Xixia, Goryeo, RB, Dali and other countries, communicated with each other, and did not prohibit trade exchanges, which greatly promoted the development of foreign trade.

In terms of social system, it started earlier than the north and recognized the status of patriarchal management under the semi-feudal system, but it must be carried out in accordance with the laws of the court. It was not allowed to set up courts privately, and the personal freedom of clans could not be restricted. Concubines and children enjoyed the same land rights, inheritance rights and education rights.

In science and technology, the Invention Institute was established to refute the useless theory of invention and creation, and encourage private innovation and invention. Once the invention patent was determined by the Invention Bureau, it was promoted by the court and a large amount of reward money was given.

In culture, it advocated diversity, encouraged the creation of drama, novels, paintings, sculptures, ceramics, poems, songs, etc., and promoted the simple and easy-to-learn Henan Mandarin, which is commonly known as the Northern Tongyu as Mandarin.

At the same time, it actively innovated clothing, decorations, and handicrafts. Zhao Jun even developed comfortable clothes such as cotton coats stuffed with cotton in linen and silk short sleeves for summer.

There was no restriction on women's thoughts. It was advocated that women could read and go out to play. Except for not being able to be officials, other things were similar to men, without too many restrictions.

This was originally allowed in the Northern Song Dynasty, so it was not surprising.

In education, official schools were officially established across the country, divided into three levels of schools: county, state, and road.

Corresponding to elementary school, junior high school, and high school respectively.

The funding for each school is about 100-200 guan, and students who pass the assessment are admitted for free. For those from poor families, the local government will give preferential treatment to poor students and reimburse their food expenses.

If you can graduate with excellent grades in Lufu School, you may be able to go directly to Bianliang University, which was just established by the Ministry of Education this year.

Bianliang University is very powerful. The teachers there are all experts and professors at the level of research institutes and enjoy official treatment. For example, the chief priest of Bianliang University is affiliated with the Ministry of Education, and he is also the fourth rank like the chief priest of the Imperial Academy.

The rest of the teachers are also from the fourth rank to the seventh rank, such as the Northern Song Dynasty mathematician Jia Xian, the alchemist (chemist) Wan Zhichen, the astronomer Yan Su, etc.

After several years of development, the mathematics, physics and chemistry courses in elementary and junior high schools have cultivated a large number of students.

Since Zhao Jun left the palace in the Jingyou year, the Political System Institute has established several schools in Bianliang to conduct educational pilot projects.

There are only two training directions for these schools, one is normal Confucian cultural education, and it is mainly patriotic and ideological education.

The other is mathematics, physics and chemistry education, conducting research on numerology, physics and chemistry.

Not only did Zhao Jun bring elementary school and some junior high school mathematics, physics and chemistry textbooks, but he also actively studied the mathematics, physics and chemistry knowledge handed down from ancient times.

The science subjects in our country in ancient times were not bad, but they lacked the intermediate argumentation part and the prime minister's summary.

Therefore, the Political System Institute established a research institute, summoned many talents in numerology, the study of things, and metallurgy, and conducted systematic guidance, summarized the laws, and formed a complete theory.

Such as optics and mechanics in "Mo Jing". The Pythagorean theorem and geometry in "Zhou Bi Suan Jing". Positive and negative numbers, equations, square roots, etc. in "Jiu Zhang Suan Shu".

In the past, the government and the court would not do such things, but now they are very active. Under the strong promotion of the government, human and material resources have been gathered, and the archaeological research on previous scientific and technological achievements has made rapid progress.

Therefore, after Zhao Jun's sorting and induction, he finally completed a set of basic education suitable for children in the Song Dynasty.

Elementary school is still six to twelve years old, mainly learning characters and mathematics.

Between the ages of twelve and twenty, it is Confucianism and mathematics, and the level is about the level of elementary school to the second year of junior high school in later generations. After all, Zhao Jun is not unable to teach the knowledge of the third year of junior high school, and there is no textbook at all.

Other high school and university knowledge is available.

For example, the "Jia Xian Triangle" invented by Jia Xian belongs to the problem of summing high-order arithmetic series, and the "increase, multiplication and expansion method" belongs to the numerical solution of high-order equations, all of which are at the level of high school and university.

But for ordinary people, basic mathematics is enough.

As long as mathematics education is popularized, there will naturally be more people who devote themselves to studying mathematics in the future, who will be admitted to Bianliang University, concentrate on studying mathematical theories, and slowly complete the mathematics of later generations one by one.

In terms of economy, a progressive commercial tax system will be implemented.

That is, in the future, taxes will no longer be set according to the value of goods, but will be collected according to the total sales of goods. The more you sell, the more you will collect, and the less you sell, the less you will collect.

This is obviously done to protect the interests of small and medium-sized merchants. After all, the price of goods fluctuates, and the risks of buying and selling are also great.

Once you hoard goods and cannot sell them, or the market price fluctuates, the selling price is lower than the cost, and you sell at a loss, it will be a blood loss for small and medium-sized merchants.

However, in this way, it is bound to cause serious problems of tax evasion.

In the past, if the tax collection was calculated based on the total value of the goods, the tax department only needed to set up checkpoints at various major traffic routes to collect taxes, which was simple, crude and effective.

But now who knows how much you have sold and how much the sales volume is?

So the court reformed the tax system again this year. The agricultural tax is still the two-tax system, and it is divided into national tax and local tax. After the tax revenue comes up, a certain amount of tax will be divided according to the proportion and handed over to the local government as local tax, and the rest will be handed over to the national treasury as national tax.

As local finance, local tax will be used for local development, such as paying salaries to officials, building schools, roads, water conservancy facilities, establishing local industries, promoting economic and agricultural development, etc.

The national tax draws part of the imperial army to form a tax troop, and the local national tax department and the central national tax department coordinate to supervise, strictly investigate and recover tax evasion.

For example, if a businessman wants to buy and sell goods, in addition to going to the Industrial and Commercial Bureau to apply for a business license, he must also go to the National Tax Bureau to register the value of the goods. After the sale is over, he will go to the National Tax Bureau to pay taxes according to the proportion.

The taxation departments that originally set up checkpoints along the way are no longer used for payment, but for checking whether there is a registration with the State Taxation Bureau and whether the value of the goods is similar to the registered value.

That's not all. After the goods are sold, the taxation department will check the accounts, verify and finally determine the taxes, etc.

The whole process is basically the same as in later times.

But the disadvantage is also obvious, that is, the more complicated the procedure, the more room for operation.

On the contrary, the taxation that is directly calculated by the value of the goods is much stronger than the current process in terms of efficiency and execution.

But you can't have your cake and eat it too.

The previous method was a huge blow to small and medium-sized merchants. Once the goods fluctuated greatly or suffered other unexpected losses, the merchants would go bankrupt, which seriously hit the enthusiasm of the merchants.

Now this process protects the interests of small and medium-sized merchants. Even if the goods are not sold, at least there is no need to pay additional taxes, which is much better than before.

So the new method will test the efficiency, execution and integrity of officials.

For this reason, the new law of the court stipulates that taxation is linked to the wages of local finance and tax personnel, and at the same time, tax evasion is severely dealt with, and the degree of crackdown is comparable to that of the Imperial Tax Bureau in later generations.

The last policy is about auditing.

Starting this year, the Audit Department will check the national population, measure cultivated land, and audit the public funds spent by county offices.

After the local tax system was reformed, a county had public funds. The whereabouts and approval of these public funds must be approved by the local audit bureau and the local censorate. Once it is found that public funds are embezzled or the whereabouts are unknown, they must be questioned.

This can also be regarded as prevention.

For a time, the reform was in full swing.

However, when the summer tax revenue came up in July of the second year of the Qingli period, the Political System Institute was a little restless.

Because after the reform this year, agricultural and commercial taxes have dropped significantly.

Last summer and autumn, agricultural tax revenue was 36.32 million guan, commercial tax and levy revenue totaled 52.49 million guan, foreign trade revenue was 14.94 million guan, and total revenue was 103.75 million guan.

As a result, agricultural tax plummeted to 8.19 million guan this summer, commercial tax and levy revenue fell to 17.52 million guan, and only foreign trade revenue increased significantly, to 11.29 million guan.

Summer taxes are usually higher than autumn taxes, because agricultural and commercial activities are also mainly concentrated in the spring, summer and autumn seasons. Therefore, according to the Ministry of Finance's estimate, this year's tax revenue may be less than 60 million guan.

This is obviously unacceptable when the three-redundancy problem has not yet been solved and the financial expenditure is increasingly huge.

On July 8, during the daily meeting of Chongzheng Hall, Lu Yijian reported this issue to Zhao Zhen.

It is late summer and early autumn, the weather has not turned cold yet, it is still a bit hot.

Except for the main door, all the windows in Chongzheng Hall were open. A towering tree grew by the window next to Zhao Zhen's desk, and it actually grew into the house in one night.

Zhao Zhen couldn't bear to cut off the branch, so he simply kept the window open from now on.

The soft sunlight shines in, filling the room with warmth.

Lu Yijian took the report handed over by the Ministry of Finance today and said: "Your Majesty, fiscal expenditures in the first half of this year reached 48.96 million yuan."

"Among them, there are more than 1.18 million people in the imperial army, 24.33 million guan, and a salary expenditure of 8.74 million guan."

"2.37 million yuan was spent on school construction across the country, 4.89 million yuan was spent on repairing rivers, roads, bridges, and Yellow River management in various places, and the royal court spent 4.89 million yuan."

He reported a lot eloquently, and finally said: "This is only the expenditure in the first half of the year. The second half of the year will not be less than here. The tariffs are more erosive than before. However, the income in the first half of this year is only 37 million yuan, and I may not be able to make ends meet." ”

Zhao Zhen frowned, looked at Zhao Jun and said, "Dasun, I'm afraid it won't be good if this continues."

"It's wonderful."

Zhao Jun said with a smile: "I originally thought it would be lower, but I didn't expect it to be 37 million yuan. This shows that the Song Dynasty has greater potential."

Lu Yijian said displeased: "I can't make ends meet anymore. Is this a good thing?"

"Actually, it's a good thing. The country still needs to maintain a certain fiscal deficit. Otherwise, will so much money go moldy in the treasury?"

Zhao Jun said: "There are still more than 100 million in the national treasury now, which is the wealth of the people. It is the right thing to spend it as soon as possible."

Song Shou rolled his eyes and said, "You should have no money if you work with the imperial court?"

"I'm not saying that it's a good thing that the court has no money, but what I want to say is that you only see the decrease in income in front of you, but you can't see that the Song Dynasty has become better."

Zhao Jun also took out a notebook from his arms and said: "Guan, this is the report of the Audit Bureau and the Imperial City Department of various places. Starting from this year, a nationwide census of population and land has been conducted, and a large number of hidden properties have been found. Next year, these reports will be released." People also have to pay taxes.”

"In addition, landowners and farmers responded positively. They were willing to register the hidden property and their households. Are they dedicated? No, the court lowered taxes and told them that once they were found to have hidden property, If you hide your property, you will be severely punished.”

He continued: "So after weighing the pros and cons, if you hand over the hidden property, the tax will be greatly reduced than before, so naturally you have to choose to explain it clearly. In this way, the Song Dynasty will become healthier and the future will be bright. ”