Looking at the figures in the accounts, Sun Miaoqing felt as if she were looking at a mountain of gold. According to the accounts alone, there were over 600,000 taels of silver.
She admired herself for how fast she was making money!
Price increase, it absolutely has to be a price increase, we have to use scarcity marketing tactics too!
“You did a great job. The Emperor said we were just making a small fuss, but I’ll show him. What small fuss? We can make tens of millions of taels of silver a year.”
An Lingrong exclaimed in surprise, "Ten million taels of silver? Isn't that a bit too much?"
"The imperial court's annual tax revenue is only 60 million taels of silver. Can Hengzhiju really sell that much?"
Sun Miaoqing said, “Why not? The vast majority of the wealth of the entire Qing Dynasty is in the hands of the upper class. The poor people at the bottom not only have to bear the most taxes, but are also exploited at every level.”
"Even if you work yourself to death farming and the weather is good and the harvest is plentiful, how much money can you save? And the commercial tax is pitifully small, with the likin tax being only one in a hundred."
"And how could any business that can grow big not have someone backing it up? Those ministers always talk about scholars, farmers, artisans, and merchants, but who doesn't have a few shops held by nominees?"
"Don't even mention ten million taels, these people can come up with several more ten million taels."
(The likin was a commercial tax in the Qing Dynasty, established during the Xianfeng era, and was only one percent. However, the rate varied depending on the region and the goods sold, ranging from approximately one percent to twenty percent. No information was found regarding commercial taxes during the Yongzheng era, but logically, it should have been less, not more.)
An Lingrong said, "Sister is right. Businessmen make far more money than farmers. When my father was in the spice business, he was under the protection of the county magistrate at the time."
"But with such a low tax rate, doesn't His Majesty have any sense of fairness?"
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