Dai Zhou has been very annoyed recently.

It has been three months since he took office as Minister of Revenue. The year is approaching, and the court's various expenses have not decreased but increased. Money is spent everywhere, but the court still owes so much foreign debt. Many foreign debts are about to expire, but the court cannot afford them.

The fiscal withdrawal budget for next year, which had been completed long ago, has not been completed yet.

He was the Minister of Revenue, and he was the chief financial officer of the court. His predecessor was Ma Zhou and Li Chao, who were all recognized as financial managers. Although Dai Zhou took up this important position, he was actually not very good at economics.

Dai Zhou, who is now in his fifties, became an official in the Sui Dynasty in his early years. Later, he served as Wang Shichong at the end of the Sui Dynasty. After returning to the Tang Dynasty, he became the military officer of the King of Qin. After the Emperor's Office, he served as the Right Chief of the Shangshu and the Shaoqing of Dali. He also served as the Minister of Personnel and the Minister of Personnel and presided over the selection of officials.

In the court, he was trusted by the emperor.

He is honest by nature and speaks straightforwardly. However, he is indeed not a good director in economics and finance.

Especially when Li Chao and Ma Zhou were the Minister of Revenue, they were also given the title of Pingzhang in the Secretariat of the Secretariat and were prime ministers. It was naturally more convenient to be prime ministers as the Minister of Revenue.

But now he has not been able to become the prime minister, so he is extremely restrained in the Ministry of Revenue and is not so tough when speaking.

As the Minister of the Ministry of Civil Affairs, his greatest responsibility was to manage the money bags for the emperor. Not only did he have to keep the money bags well, but he also had to find ways to make the money bags bulge.

But in fact, after three months of his tenure, his wallet was already deflated, and his fiscal accounts were still a shocking deficit.

After carefully looking through the financial year list, Dai Zhou almost wanted to hang his seal and resign. This official position was too hard, and the court spent so much money everywhere. The army was expanded in the north and south yamen, and the army in the south yamen was fine. He worked as a soldier in his spare time in farming and wartime, but when he was not fighting, the expenses of the period and training were not high.

But the Beiya is a permanent army, and now the Beiya has a total of 60,000 permanent army.

It sounds like an empire such a large Tang Dynasty, it seems that there are not many people with 60,000 standing troops. But in fact, the cost of raising 60,000 standing troops is much higher than the usual cost of the 740,000 local soldiers after the expansion of the Nanya government.

The left and right Yulin Army had 20,000, with 14 infantry and 6,000 cavalry. The left and right Shen Ce Army had 20,000 cavalry, 16,000 light cavalry, and 4,000 heavy cavalry. The only four thousand heavy cavalry was enough to cost more than 20,000 infantry.

The left and right Shenji Army has another 20,000 or 20,000 firearm troops. Infantry, cavalry, artillery, and artillery are all equipped with firearms. These new firearms have higher equipment costs, especially artillery and a cannon, which are all above a small infantry unit.

Armor, armour, war horses, muskets and cannons, plus food, grass, military pay, various rewards, etc., these 60,000 people are simply bottomless black holes. No sound can be heard if they spend money in it.

The 60,000-yuan army was on the regular basis and had to be transferred to the border areas in batches. This rotation was similar to the war, and the expenses were greatly increased along the way.

There is also war.

Tubo and Goguryeo successively requested surrender, which was considered a temporary resumption of war. But the emperor asked him to prepare money and grain for the Western Expedition. Although the emperor gave up the idea of ​​personally exploring the Western Regions and saved a lot of money, the court would still initiate a coalition force such as Tuyuhun, Xueyantuo, Xi, Khitan, etc., and the court would have to send out one army, and the expenses were still very large.

Furthermore, the imperial court's Nine-Border Fortifications continued, and at the same time, it was planned to build fortresses in Hetao, Yanbei, and western Liaoning to stabilize these places, and the expenses were another large sum.

There is also immigration, another bottomless pit.

In order to stabilize the border and reduce the problem of large populations and small land in the Central Plains, the imperial court has developed large-scale immigration to all sides. In these immigration plans, the imperial court needs a lot of subsidies.

There are also water conservancy construction and road construction in various parts of the Central Plains...

Money, money, a penny stumps the hero.

If you don’t take charge of your business, you don’t know how expensive your food and rice are.

Money is needed everywhere, and all departments report it to ask for money.

But where did he ask for money?

The imperial court's population and household registration have indeed increased sharply, but most of the more populous people were hidden households and slaves who used to rely on powerful landlords, Taoist temples. These people were either landless people who had tented land or slaves. They had no land and no property, and now most of them went to the four sides to open up and settle down.

They had no money at all, and the court had to give them money to settle down and borrow money to settle down and buy farm tools and seeds. In order to calm their hearts, the court had already issued an edict that these immigrants had opened up and reclaimed land, and the court did not collect their taxes for three years.

It will take at least three to five years to see tax growth for these newly registered populations.

The imperial court has made great investments in promoting education and building schools in various places.

Dai Zhou has really cut all the places where he can make money.

But the court's expenses next year are still unknown.

But many foreign debts are about to expire, and now they cannot pay them back.

"It's already reached such a serious point?"

In the imperial study, after hearing Dai Zhou's report, Li Shimin's face looked ugly. He had indeed said that he would not manage the finances for the time being and the crown prince would be regent. Dai Zhou insisted on seeking a meeting and said that the matter was urgent.

He just didn't expect that things were so difficult.

Two years ago, the court's condition was even more difficult. At that time, internal and external troubles, especially the disaster that swept the entire north for more than two years, almost caused the court to collapse at that time.

But the court survived it because it was so difficult.

He remembered Li Chao again. At that time, at that time, at that most difficult time, it was Li Chao who helped him overcome the difficulties.

"Is there no way to increase revenue and reduce expenditure?" Li Shimin asked.

"The gap is very big!" Dai Zhou said truthfully.

“How old?”

Dai Zhou thought for a while, "At most, by next spring, we will not be able to pay the imperial guards or the salaries of all officials. The subsidies for immigrants cannot be extracted, the water conservancy and road construction in various places cannot be extracted, and even the funds for Imperial College, martial arts halls and local officials and schools cannot be extracted......"

"In fact, the imperial court still has a large amount of foreign debt that cannot be repaid when it expires. If we are a business bank, we will go bankrupt next year." Dai Zhou said a new word, bankruptcy. This is a saying in the business world today. If a business bank is insolvent, it is called bankruptcy.

The court is going to go bankrupt.

Li Shimin covered his forehead with his hands.

It's really painful.

"What about the income of the imperial court?"

The court's income is also quite large now. After Li Chao's various open source sources, the rent-independent tax has increased a lot, and the land tax and household tax have been added, which has basically doubled the taxes of the court.

What's more, there are industrial and commercial taxes, such as salt, wine, tea, iron, etc. The imperial court also has large foreign trade groups, which can make a lot of money every year.

Why are you so poor that you are going bankrupt?

"Your Majesty, you have been using troops in recent years and it has cost a lot of money. After a war, it has been spent on tens of millions of yuan. In addition, the previous disaster in the north has already used up all the savings of the court."

To be honest, Dai Zhou's biggest gain was that he had been the Minister of Revenue for three months was that he had a new understanding of Li Chao's ability. He didn't know how Li Chao made the court survive. In such a difficult situation, he could still bring the Tang Dynasty over.

Originally, the situation should be better than that time, but he really had no choice. Li Chao thought of all the solutions that could be thought of, such as salt, iron, tea, wine, sugar, and other monopoly, and even created salt-inducing tea, and issued salt-tamped tea and other stocks to raise funds. He also organized many official trade groups to conduct large-scale trade with surrounding countries to make money for the court.

At that time, he also rectified Buddhism and Taoism, and also made a lot of money and land to come, which greatly alleviated the wave.

I borrowed a lot of money by issuing bonds and other means.

In fact, it is to tap into the potential, or to eat the money.

"I still have about two million guan in my inner treasury, you can take it." Li Shimin said.

"Your Majesty, this is also a drop in the bucket." Dai Zhou said.

Li Shimin was silent. When he was in martial arts, the imperial court's annual income was only a few million yuan, but he could still live. Now two million yuan is a drop in the bucket.

"What advice do you have?"

Dai Zhou hesitated, "I suggest that we should continue to increase revenue and reduce expenditure, first of all, cut off the imperial guards of the Northern Yaya. If half of the troops are disbanded and the six troops of the Northern Yaya retain 30,000 people, then at least three million guan can be saved in a year. If the magic weapon is directly cut off, we can save another one million guan."

"If the firearm monitor is also laid off, you can save a lot in a year."

"In addition, I think that the Northern Imperial Guards will no longer pay military salaries, but will only divide land for them. After the Northern Imperial Guards will be divided into land. After these lands are distributed to them, the court can arrange people to rent seeds or hand them over to their own families to cultivate. In this way, the court will no longer pay military salaries to them and save a lot of expenses."

"Also, compared to raising the army, the cost of war is greater. The court should suspend all military use plans, including the plan to send troops to the Western Regions, and suspend military spending. In addition, the construction of castles and beacons in the Jiubian Defense Plan, and the construction of military forts in Hetao, Longnan, Yanbei, western Liaoning and other places should also be suspended......"

Dai Zhou's plan to reduce expenses is to start from the military.

Cut down the imperial guards of the Northern Yaya, quit the Shenji army, firearm supervision, stop the construction of defensive fortifications in the border areas, suspend all military use plans, etc., and even stop paying the military pay for the imperial guards of the Northern Yaya...

One by one, it can really save a lot of money.

In fact, you can save tens of millions of dollars a year.

But the more Li Shimin heard, his brows became more and more frowned.

The Tang Dynasty was today because of its importance to military preparations. No matter how hard life was, it would not have abandoned its own martial arts. When Li Chao was in the court, he even offered to expand his army to 800,000, and actively developed a firearm unit, established a firearm supervision, and built a firearm production line.

The Tang Dynasty also established a regular standing army.
Chapter completed!