Northern Dynasties Imperial Industry

In the middle of January, Li Tai returned to Huazhou City with Daxingtai Yijia. He didn't even have time to celebrate the Lantern Festival. He was about to take office and take over a series of new ministries.

"Those with lower rank and higher rank are deeply grateful to see Duke Xihe and learn that Duke Xihe has been appointed as the consul of Xizhitang!"

In the Xizhi Hall of Tai Mansion, a group of subordinate government officials entered the hall and saluted Li Tai.

Li Tai looked down and saw old acquaintances such as Pei Han, Xue Shen and Huangfu Fan. He suddenly felt happy, waved his hands and said with a smile: "You don't need to be polite, you must know my style. Please take a seat and discuss business matters." Let’s talk about old times later.”

As he expected, Daxingtai appointed him as the Shangshu of the Taifu, mainly to be in charge of logistics and equipment matters. The Taifu Shicao, Tian Cao, Kai Cao, Waibing and other Cao Cao were all placed under his management. The Shicao managed the craftsmen. Tian Cao and Tian Cao manage Ji Tian, ​​which is an important productivity and production material management organization. Kai Cao and Waibing are responsible for the storage, transfer and distribution of materials.

There are more than a dozen subordinate officials of various Cao Cao. In addition to a few people who worked with Li Tai before, others include Zhao Su, Wang Zizhi, Da Xixi, etc. who are in charge of the Cao Cao and join the army.

Among them, Zhao Su once supervised the transportation of grain and grass when Dugu Xin attacked Luoyang in the third year of Datong to ensure that the army was in sufficient supply. He was praised by Yu Wentai as the "Master of Luoyang". Now, in addition to serving in the Tai government, he also serves as the governor of Huashan County under the rule of Huazhou. He is a capable official with very impressive qualifications and talents.

Prince Zhi was born in the Wang family of Jingzhao and once served as an official in Qinzhou. After the Battle of Liangzhou last year, he returned to the country and joined the government as a secretary to join the army and also led the field and Cao to join the army. Naturally, he and Li Tai were old acquaintances.

Da Xixi was a native of Xianbei. He followed Emperor Xiaowu to enter the Pass. He was a talented man with both civil and military skills. Because of his good family background, he was summoned by Daxingtai to serve as a lieutenant in the Taifu and led foreign soldiers and Cao Cao.

All the members in the hall are not young, even Da Xixi, who is relatively young, is already in his thirties.

But now they all have to obey the orders of young Li Tai in the hall, and the scene seems a bit funny. Several subordinate officials who have not had much contact with Li Tai are naturally a little embarrassed and uncomfortable. As for those people who had known and worked with him for a long time, such as Pei Han and Xue Shen, although their faces were still full of enthusiasm, they actually felt uncomfortable in their hearts.

I recall that when Li Tai first entered the Bafu, their colleagues in the department could still show off their seniority and give guidance to the younger ones. Although Li Tai was promoted step by step because of his continuous suggestions and suggestions, he was still considered acceptable. within the range.

Now that they meet again, both Li Tai and Guanjue have reached the peak of their civil and military skills and have completely left them behind. They are no longer on the same level as each other. Even though Li Tai treated them kindly and was not arrogant, this sense of disparity also made people feel uncomfortable.

Li Tai looked at these old colleagues who were still staying put, and couldn't help but secretly lament that he was lucky that he did not choose to stick to Taifu. Although staying in Taifu would make his work and life more comfortable, it would also impose greater restrictions on people. , it is difficult to get access to core resources, and it is extremely difficult to be trained as a trumpet Su Chuo, and it is absolutely difficult to obtain the prominent meritorious position he has today.

Putting aside these inner feelings, after everyone met and exchanged greetings, they went into the prelude in order according to the level of their respective affairs.

As Li Tai listened, his brows gradually wrinkled and he began to have a headache involuntarily. The reason is also very simple, it just sounds too bad. In short, there is a huge gap in material demand in all aspects, but the accumulation is so-so, and it is completely like a state of having no rice to cook.

The reason for this situation is naturally due to the poverty that has always characterized Bafu. Especially last year, Su Chuo became seriously ill and unable to take care of things since the middle of the year. Without this person who knows how to live within his means and is in charge of financial expenses all year round, The big housekeeper made the financial situation of Ba Mansion even worse.

Regardless of people or things, when you have them, they may seem ordinary, but when you really lose them, you will feel precious. Without Su Chuo's spending plan, last year's Xianyang Dayue spending more than doubled compared to the previous year, which naturally made the already stretched Bafu finances even worse.

Moreover, due to the attack by the Eastern Wei army, the troops from all sides did not disperse immediately after the parade, but remained in a state of assembly until the end of the year.

When the armies gathered here, it was not convenient for them to eat in the countryside, and they also needed the Bafu to coordinate and dispatch relief supplies. As a result, almost all the states in the pass emptied their treasury and gritted their teeth to lose food and grass. It is estimated that they will have to spend the next year Yin eats maoliang.

Of course, one very important reason why Bafu's consumption has been so huge in the past year is that in the past two years, Li Tai has been buying large quantities of grain, which has kept the price of grain at a high level. .

Although the Bafu does not need to buy food from the market, the insufficient surplus of private food also increases the cost of obtaining food and grass, and it needs to use the inventory of other items to exchange warehouses with the state and county governments. After a lot of trouble, although the Bafu army did not cross the river to fight, the supplies consumed in the past six months were not much worse than during the war.

When the Eastern Wei army retreated from Yubi, they abandoned a considerable part of their supplies, but they were all collected and divided by the Yubi City defenders and the locals in Hedong. No matter how shameless Dahangtai was, he would be embarrassed to order them to hand over these trophies.

Li Tai did hand over a batch of supplies, but they were not basic consumables. They were all high-end cloth, gold and silver goods and could not be used directly.

There are several important issues before us right now. The first one is that the production departments such as Gongsetian, Zhongtian and Huazhou's official villages and towns, which are in charge of Tian Cao, are in urgent need of grain, tools, cattle, etc., if they cannot be solved as soon as possible. If everything is ready, it will delay the upcoming spring plowing. If it affects this year's harvest, the situation will definitely be more difficult.

The second more important one is the Foreign Soldier Cao. The Foreign Soldier Cao is responsible for the military affairs of the state and county, mainly dispatching, distribution and supplies.

Now that the military crisis in the Eastern Wei Dynasty has been resolved, there is no need to gather people from these states and counties anymore. Of course, they must disperse the states and counties as soon as possible to reduce the pressure on the Bafu center to raise the army.

In fact, as early as last year when the Eastern Wei Dynasty just withdrew its troops, the Taiwan government issued an order for the troops to retreat. However, until the New Year, there were still many troops stranded between Huazhou and Yongzhou. The first reason was because they did not have enough supplies to go on the road. The second is that Bafu will not pay back the money he owes.

After the autumn harvest in October, the Bafu ordered the armies to transfer materials from their respective hometowns to supplement military needs. After all the leases from all parties were transferred to the Bafu, they would return them uniformly, which could be used as a place for the armies to return home. Consumable supplies.

But even though the rent adjustment was collected, it was like peeing in the desert, and the land was gone without even getting wet. The powerful commanders and generals couldn't get the supplies they had paid for in advance, and they didn't have the money to travel back home. Naturally, they couldn't leave even if they wanted to, so they could only continue to waste it here.

But even if it continues like this, it seems that the Bafu will not have a large amount of money and grain income before this year's autumn harvest, and it will be difficult to pay off the advance one by one. And because they were worried that the armies would mutiny and cause trouble due to hunger, they had to plunder and squeeze out some supplies to distribute to the armies, and they were not allowed to make trouble.

Although there are other problems, relatively speaking, these two problems are the most serious at the moment. The solution to these two problems is very simple, as long as you have money and things, but the tricky part is having no money and things.

Since he had not worked in Bafu for a long time, Li Tai had hardly experienced the feeling of poverty. But now that he returned to Bafu, the familiar feeling came back in an instant.

As the saying goes, a broken boat has three thousand nails, but as it is used here in Bafu, it means that although this broken boat does not have a single nail, it is still quite enjoyable to surf.

Although Bafu has no money, it does not mean that the entire Kansai is still impoverished. Take Li Tai himself as an example, the food he has now can support Bafu for a year. The powerful people in other realms may not be as wealthy and powerful as him, but they must all have strong family backgrounds.

As long as some of these assets can be collected, it will be more than enough to tide over the current difficulties. But the problem comes again, how to search? Even Li Tai himself is unwilling to donate his family's wealth to help Bafu tide over the difficulties, so how can he expect others to destroy his family and help him out.

Seeing that everyone was helpless, Li Tai didn't have any good ideas for a while. After all, he had not been a poor man for a long time.

But the things on the desk today were all urgent and needed to be solved. After thinking for a while, he came up with two ideas. The first is for the Bafu to send envoys to various states and counties to check the surplus materials in the warehouses, and then sell these surplus materials to the people in exchange for urgently needed materials.

At present, all taxes and tributes collected are in kind. In addition to basic general supplies such as grain and silk, there are also various other miscellaneous materials. Due to various reasons, they are stored in official warehouses all year round. If you want to take stock of them, Selling is also a considerable income.

But the problem is that these local treasury surpluses are generally attributed to administrative costs and official welfare. Once they are reviewed and inventoried, they may be resented by local officials. Moreover, if customization is formed, it is very easy for corruption to breed. Local officials will collude with local wealthy families to turn high-value materials into cheap surplus and sell them.

The second is to sell land. Although land is not as valuable nowadays as it was in later generations, land resources in some key areas will always be scarce and non-renewable. Selling some land with extremely high added value to the private sector is also a way to alleviate financial pressure in the short term.

These lands include, but are not limited to, mountains and swamps rich in natural resources, thoroughfares, water and land resources, etc. Their development rights and usage rights are sold to private parties through bidding.

The mined copper, tin and other metal materials are purchased directly by the government. The operating rights of some transportation hubs also include the responsibility to undertake transportation tasks assigned by the government. As long as effective supervision can be formed, a healthy public-private balance can be maintained. state.

Of course, Li Tai has been thinking about this latter idea for a long time. When he was hoarding food last year, he was planning to cooperate with local wealthy families to build a logistics network covering the entire Kansai region, but he found it very difficult when it was actually implemented.

First of all, the local customs and customs are different in different places. Specifically, the character and moral character of each powerful person are also very different. Some are relatively easy to talk to, while others are greedy and domineering and refuse to share local resources with others.

If you negotiate and compromise according to local conditions in every place you go, the efficiency will be extremely low. It is estimated that Lu Du, like Li Tai, has used his power to seize power. Maybe this matter has not been completed yet.

Therefore, it is better to cooperate with the government. At least the government has unified rules and restrictions, and the political resources at his own disposal can also provide certain assistance.

For now, if this matter is promoted as a decree that the government will focus on and implemented, there will naturally be no need to worry about local officials abusing their powers and arbitrarily increasing the burden.

This kind of cooperation does not need to last too long. It only needs two or three years to be established and operational. After that, it can be maintained even if it leaves the government. There is no need to worry about someone else taking over the government after Li Tai is no longer in office.

When the members heard this idea proposed by Li Tai, their eyes lit up and they all joined in the discussion.

This kind of policy of the government giving benefits to the people and getting what each other needs is not new. For example, the suzerain governor system implemented in the early Northern Wei Dynasty and the subsequent three-chief system both gave up the administrative power at the grassroots level in exchange for local powerful and wealthy people. support for the rule.

Similarly, even if the government does not rent out and sell these land resources, local powerful people are actually sealing off mountains and rivers and reaping huge profits. If a system can be established to manage situations outside of these laws, this behavior will not be abolished, but the government will also participate in sharing the benefits. The pressure this will bring to society is actually far less than simply squeezing small farmers. .

As the chief officer, Li Tai only proposed a direction of thinking. Naturally, he would not plan and verify the specific details. What kind of plan will be formed in the end still needs to be discussed and adjusted by these subordinates.

When he saw everyone gathered here and discussing, he stood up again and motioned for them to continue discussing this matter and that he would not interfere too much.

Although this is a convenient way for him to continue to strengthen his control over Kansai's local resources, he does not intend to lower the price too low. After all, it is a policy plan that covers the entire Kansai. If it is implemented and cannot achieve a goal, The result of convincing the public is obviously unjustifiable.

While his subordinates were busy discussing, Li Tai ordered his subordinates to order a sumptuous dinner from the public kitchen of Taifu to reward the subordinates, but he himself had no time to stay here to dine.

Because in addition to the Minister of the Taifu, he was also the new Commander-in-Chief of the Rear Army. Based on the principle of two bowls of water, after meeting a group of government officials here in Zhitang, he had to go to the military city outside the city to meet them. Those generals of the Central Military Commission.

The complaints from his subordinates here in the Tai Mansion gave him a headache. He hoped that the soldiers in the military city outside the city could give him a pleasant experience and enjoy the joy of having great power.