After the construction of the railway track from Weihaiwei to Beijing began, time seemed to have accelerated, and steel industries in various places sprang up like mushrooms after a rain.
Steel production capacity more than tripled within a year.
At the same time, Yinreng also began to encourage ordinary people to invent and established a patent office under the Ministry of Industry.
As long as the things made by ordinary people are evaluated to be useful to the country and the people, they can obtain a patent certificate from the Patent Office and receive rewards from the Patent Office.
As for the amount of the reward, it depends on how effective those little gadgets are.
In addition, the cement road starting from the capital also began to radiate to official roads across the country.
In this day and age there are no overweight trucks, and the quality of cement is very good. As long as protection against thermal expansion and contraction is done well, the service life of cement roads will be greatly extended.
But the country spent a huge amount of money to build the road, and the money in the national treasury shrank by half in just one year.
However, the businessmen doing business below made a lot of money.
Yinreng began to find ways to take money from the merchants.
Nowadays, all merchants have business licenses, so Yinreng's idea of having any evil intentions with them was quickly rejected by him.
Even if he can charge more money after obtaining the business license, it is a one-time deal. If he wants to charge, he will charge the biggest share.
Thinking of the tall city walls of today's cities, Yinreng planned to collect money from transportation.
Yinreng found Yinsi, and the two of them stayed in the Qianqing Palace to discuss for a long time before they finalized the details of the transportation tax.
Yinreng immediately issued an order requiring all counties and prefectures of the Qing Dynasty to set up transportation management bureaus and set up checkpoints on the canal and official roads. As long as goods were transported in these two ways, taxes had to be paid.
When goods are loaded onto trucks and shipped out of the city, they must obtain a certificate from the Transportation Administration Bureau, which is an alternative "letter of introduction."
The letter of introduction must have the official seal of the Transportation Administration, the type and quantity of the goods, and the signatures and seals of the person issuing the certificate and the merchant to facilitate traceability.
However, the checkpoints on the official roads and the ports on the canal only recognize certificates and not people.
If the source of the goods is a village, then you need to find the nearest township to issue a certificate, and then go to the county government to get it stamped.
Goods without certificates are considered smuggled and the government has the right to confiscate them.
The amount of commercial tax is linked to the category and profit of the product itself.
Goods consumed only by high-ranking officials are subject to the highest tax, which is 35% of the gross profit.
Goods related to people's livelihood are subject to the lowest tax, which is 10% of the gross profit.
The imperial court was unable to calculate labor costs very accurately.
Yinreng found Yin'er and asked his men to work overtime to compile a list of goods costs and profits.
This list is updated every quarter, and the group of professional talents under Yinzhen have also successfully made a living from the state.
He became one of the earliest civil servants in the tax bureau.
Once the government decree was issued, merchants throughout the Qing Dynasty were completely stunned.
This...how did they start to wield the knife against them?
The merchants were dissatisfied and protested, and even secretly united to put pressure on the court.
Among them, the most cheerful ones were the great imperial merchants.
They had been living a very comfortable life, but the imperial court suddenly took away 35% of their gross profit. How much was their net profit?
If they really have to pay this transportation tax, their annual income will be reduced by at least half!
What's the difference between this and robbery?!
Merchants, represented by the imperial merchant Wang family, blocked the contact point of the Ministry of Internal Affairs in the outer city, clamoring to see the emperor.
As for Fan Shengjin, the head of the imperial merchant Fan family, he was hiding in the crowd, quietly observing the development of the situation.
Because of the Fu Shou Paste, their family had been deprived of their authority over the grain route by Emperor Kangxi. After being severely damaged, other imperial merchants who had previously competed with his Fan family soon began to encroach on the Fan family's property.
So Fan Shengjin has no good feelings towards the people around him.
Even... I hope they will suffer a serious blow.
Fan Shengjin thought of the series of events caused by the Fu Shou ointment and sighed inwardly.
After his father returned to the Fan family, he quickly figured out the cause and effect of the incident. In the end, the whole family agreed that it was the Fourth Prince and the Ninth Prince who exposed the matter.
Even if the Fan family wanted to take revenge, they were too busy with the turmoil of the year to spare any energy to trip up the Fourth and Ninth Princes.
The Fan family finally recovered, and the new emperor ascended the throne...
Now that the Fourth Prince and the Ninth Prince are both in the limelight, they don't even have the courage to hang around them, let alone take revenge.
Thinking of this, Fan Shengjin sighed deeply.
Once this transportation tax is implemented, the Fan family's wealth will probably shrink significantly...
Yinreng knew that this would happen when the merchants united to resist.
But he was so busy all day that he had no time to deal with these people.
So he instructed the newly appointed chief steward of the Imperial Household Department to handle the matter.
He also made his attitude clear: if you still want to do business in the Qing Dynasty, you must abide by his rules.
Those who do not want to abide by the rules can leave the Qing Dynasty and go to other countries.
The court will never stop it.
After the chief steward of the Ministry of Internal Affairs expressed his attitude, the merchants who had been making a lot of noise fell into silence.
Among them, some people even planned to bring up their ancestors' contributions to the Qing Dynasty and use moral kidnapping to deceive Yinreng as soon as they met him.
However, their mistake was that Yinreng had no intention of meeting them from the beginning to the end.
The merchants were silent for a while, and the head of the Wang family spoke first with a grim expression.
"Ever since the imperial army entered the pass, we've never fought a war without donating money and grain. Now that the world is at peace, the emperor is cutting off our escape route. How can this be justified?"
In this kind of situation, as long as someone takes the lead, the rest of the people will follow suit.
"That's right. The money and grain that my Tian family donated to the court alone amount to several million taels of silver. The court can't just take the money and not acknowledge it, right?"
"My Song family has also donated a lot of money!"
"A 35% gross profit margin is too high. Does the Emperor really not care about the lives of us meritorious families?!"
…
"Master General, please give me an explanation!"
Seeing the uncontrollable anger on everyone's face, Bao Chong, the chief steward of the Imperial Household Department, didn't even bat an eyelid. He just sat on the chair and sipped his tea quietly.
After everyone had been arguing for a while, they realized that Bao Chong was behaving like this and immediately felt that they were being ignored. They became furious and some even wanted to rush to Bao Chong and intimidate him with force.
"Bang!"
The guard behind Bao Chong fired a shot directly at the floor.
The anger on everyone's faces froze.
He stared blankly at the guard who fired the shot.
Bao Chong put down the teacup in his hand at this time, stood up and looked at the group of merchants.
"I still say the same thing. If you don't want to do business in the Qing Dynasty, the emperor and the court won't force you. Master Wang and Master Tian, you have donated a lot of money and grain to the court, but haven't you received corresponding benefits from the court?"
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