Chapter 10 Lecture 2 Tang Dynasty-3

3. Economic System of the Tang Dynasty Now let's talk about the economic system of the Tang Dynasty, the main thing is to talk about land tax first.The land tax system in the Tang Dynasty was called "rent", "yong" and "tiao".The rent is the land allocated to the people for cultivation, and it is still returned to the government when they are old.During the period of granting the land, they are required to bear a considerable amount of rent.This is a land equalization system, inherited from the Northern Wei Dynasty.The equal field system is different from the ancient well field system. The well fields belonged to the feudal nobles, while the equal fields belonged entirely to the central government, that is, the country.The average field is the well field under the county system, and the well field is the average field under the feudal system.When it comes to the rent, it is only one forty tax, which is more favorable than the one thirty for the Han Dynasty. "Yong" means servitude, which is the voluntary labor of the people to the country.In the Tang system, each person served 20 days a year, which was reduced compared to the 30 days a person served in the Han Dynasty. "Tiao" is a kind of local product tribute. People from all over the country must contribute to the central government with their local products. Generally speaking, only silk and linen fabrics are expropriated.In the book of Mencius, there are three items: the levy of corn, the levy of cloth and silk, and the levy of hard labor.Since China is an agricultural country, the people's economy naturally depends mainly on the land.In the Tang Dynasty, the most important purpose of Zuyong's preparation was to produce for the people, so that everyone had land and could supply grain to the country.Those who cultivate the fields are naturally strong men, so they can spare time to serve the country voluntarily.If you have a family and a farm, you naturally have a family. The most important household industry in an agricultural society is silk weaving and linen. It is not a disease for the state to collect part of his surplus.In the Tang Dynasty, the rent-yong adjustment was generally lighter than the quota in the Han Dynasty, and it can be said to be a system of light corvee and low tax.Moreover, the items of rent and adjustment are clearly defined, and there is rent only when there is a field, there is mediocrity when there is a body, and adjustment when there is a family.The highest purpose of this system is to enable the pregnant man to have a land and a home at the same time, so the government will feel that it is easy to bear and not feel painful to levy such a small amount of tax.This is where the Tang system is better than the Han system.

However, this system, counting from the equalization of land in the Northern Wei Dynasty, was not maintained for a short period of time, and its implementation was not thorough.Because the Northern Dynasties and the early Tang Dynasty, all parts of the country were distributed by the wealthy families of the first family, and they still owned a lot of land.Even an incomplete land equalization system cannot last for a long time.After a period of implementation, it was completely destroyed.According to history, the implementation of rent-yong modulation depends on the rectification of accounts.The population register of the early Tang Dynasty was extremely complete.From the child's birth, to his adulthood, and even his old age and death, it is all recorded.At that time, the household registration book was called Ji, and the national household registration was divided into nine classes according to economic conditions.This household registration book also needs to be made in three copies, one for the county, one for the prefecture, and one for the household department.The government's rent adjustment is all based on household registration.The account is a booklet for young men, and the number of lessons for next year is scheduled this year. This is a mediocre basis.In the Tang system, accounts were made every year, and registers were made every three years.The adult booklet is remade once a year, while the household registration booklet is remade every three years.Weigh one at a time, because it can be used to compare with the books of the previous period.In the Tang Dynasty, prefectures and counties often had to keep five ratios, and the household department often kept three ratios. If so, the local government could check the change of household registration for young men for 15 years, and the household department could check for nine years.This work is quite troublesome.There is a change in the household registration, and the land is granted (the land is granted at the eighteenth year of the Ding year, and the old man is returned to the official at the age of sixty). In such a large country, it is common to investigate, register, modify and proofread frequently, and there must be no negligence or ambiguity.This must have a kind of spiritual power to maintain, otherwise it will not be easy to last for a long time.Moreover, the Tang Dynasty soon embarked on a bright era of peace, security, prosperity, and prosperity. People can't help but feel that small loopholes are irrelevant.The old man in a certain family is over sixty, his name has not been canceled, and the children have grown up, and no new members have been added.Those who have been granted new land will still fill in the old man's name.These laziness and sloppiness are inevitable.However, these are the biggest reasons for the failure of Zuyong modulation since then.I am afraid that there are not too many household registrations, too few acres of land, and insufficient distribution of land, and the rent adjustment system has already collapsed.This is a kind of slack in personnel affairs.As for the local rich and powerful families cheating in it and hindering the progress of this system, that's not to mention.That is, as far as the account system is concerned, it can be seen that the implementation and continuation of each system must require a corresponding dedication to moral will and service loyalty.Otherwise, you can't use the law alone, even if the law is good and beautiful, it will be in vain.Moreover, any system must interact with other systems.Therefore, the establishment of a system is by no means a system that can be established alone.Let's talk about this system, its intention is quite similar to the so-called modern planned economy.This needs to be taken care of and planned by the people of the whole country, every family, and every young man.In modern times, large-scale use of scientific statistics, convenient transportation, flexible voice, and easy printing, still feel difficult.In ancient times, transportation was inconvenient, government organizations were simple, paper was expensive, and writing was inconvenient. These were all big problems.Under such circumstances, the household registration gradually becomes disordered, and this system cannot be implemented.As a last resort, it was changed to a two-tax system.The system of renting and mediocrity in the Tang Dynasty can be said to have ended the ancient economic tradition of equalization of wells and fields, and the two-tax system has pioneered the free economy since then.

The two-tax system in the Tang Dynasty began in the first year of Tang Dezong Jianzhong, and was planned by Yang Yan, the Minister of Finance at that time.Since then, until today, China's land tax has generally followed this system.Because the tax is collected twice a year in summer and autumn, it is called two taxes.The most notable difference between this system and the regulation of rent and mediocrity is that, according to the people of the Tang Dynasty, the two-tax system is "the household has no owner and guest, and the residence is the book".This means that when you move to Hubei from Jiangsu, you are also like a Hubei native. Regardless of whether you are a host or a guest, as long as you live in this place today, you will be added to the household registration book of this place.If this is the case, the migration of the population will be relatively free.It is also said that "there is no such thing as a single person, and the difference between the rich and the poor is the difference."This means that as much land as you have, the government will charge you as much rent.If so, all kinds of burdens such as compulsory labor are also liberated.This cannot but be said to be the benefit of this system.However, the government no longer grants land, and the private sector merges freely. Therefore, the two-tax system breaks the ancient Chinese tradition of well fields, king fields, equal fields, and rent adjustments.After such liberation, until the Qing Dynasty, the land was allowed to be bought and sold freely and merged freely.Compared with the ancient system, this system also has its shortcomings.According to the general opinion at that time, the three items of Zuyong Modulation were clearly divided, and now they are merged together. Although the procedures are simple, they have been used for a long time. With labor, it is inevitable to add new items.And these new items, which already exist, have only been collected in the two taxes. Now adding this item is equivalent to doubling the collection.This is the disadvantage of unclear tax items, and more importantly, it is the aspect of rent regulation in this system.The land tax system in Chinese history has been from the well field system to the rent adjustment. The rents in all parts of the country are determined by the government and have always been equal.For example, the Han system stipulates that the tax is one for thirty, and the Tang system is equivalent to forty and one tax. This is equal in all parts of the country, and everything is the same.But the two-tax system abolished this tradition, that is, the spirit of collecting land rents in the same prescribed amount throughout the country.In the old system, a fixed amount of land rent was stipulated first, and then the government collected according to the amount, and then used the collected land rent as the financial source of the government's annual expenditure. This can be said to be a system that lives within its means.However, the land rent stipulated in the two-tax system seems to be based on expenditure.At that time, Yang Yan's custom was based on the land rent income of the year before the custom, that is, the 14th year of Dali, the emperor's reign, as the standard to stipulate the amount of levy in various places in the future.In this way, the government's collection procedures are much simpler and less troublesome, and can avoid the trouble of investigating and counting the number of cultivated land and household registers every year, but the disadvantages caused by it are great.Because in this way, it becomes a rigid regulation, apportioned everywhere, and there is no longer a uniform rent and tax rate across the country.

Let me give a concrete example.According to Lu Zhi's memorial at that time, the minister went on a mission and traveled, seeking benefits and illnesses. He secretly knew that there were originally 400 households in Changyuan Township, Weinan County, but now there are only more than 100 households.There used to be 3,000 households in Yixiang County, but now there are only 1,000 households.Other counties are about the same.Visiting and searching for accumulated disadvantages begins with equal sharing and fleeing households.Among the ten families, most of them fled, and five families had to pay taxes.It's like throwing stones into a well, but it doesn't stop at the end.This is because of the creation of the two-tax system, because the previous account system was confused, and it was urgent to sort it out, so the actual land rent income of the government was stipulated based on a certain year, and the local governments were asked to follow this quota. Rent is collected annually.If the household registration of a certain land is reduced due to certain circumstances, and the reclaimed land becomes deserted, the government still allocates the mandatory amount of collection to the existing reclaimed land and houses for collection.As a result, the barren land paid a heavier rent. As Lu Zhi said, five families shared the burden of ten families. Wouldn't this double their rent out of thin air?As a result, the poor in that land became poorer and had no choice but to continue fleeing. The situation was that one or two families would share the burden of the original ten families, and this one or two families would eventually become extinct due to bankruptcy.

On the other hand, if those fleeing households moved to rich townships, the number of household registrations in rich townships would increase, and more land would be opened up for cultivation.But the tax amount of that township has also been rigidly stipulated, so the apportionment is relatively lighter.According to this situation, it is bound to cause land rents in different parts of the country to vary greatly, and with the economic situation of each place, the poor will become poorer, and the rich will become richer.This is why the two-tax system in the Tang Dynasty seriously affected the economic ups and downs of various parts of China and reached a very different situation.Although there have been edicts such as fixed rents for three years in the two-tax system since then, generally speaking, since the establishment of the two-tax system in the Tang Dynasty, it is a very obvious fact that all parts of China no longer have equal land rents. ah!

The two-tax system of the Tang Dynasty stipulated that rice should not be collected but currency, so farmers had to sell their rice and exchange it for money to pay taxes.If so, the businessman can do it up and down, and the peasants will lose a lot.Let me give another example.According to Lu Zhi at the time, the amount of fixed taxes is all calculated in money.When paying taxes, it is often accompanied by silk.In the past, a bolt of silk was worth three thousand two or three hundred wen, but now a bolt of silk is worth one thousand five hundred wen.To lose one, now it is more than two.According to Li Ao 40 years later: In the first year of Jianzhong, the two taxes were initially established, and it has been 40 years since then.At that time, a piece of silk was worth four thousand dollars, and a bucket of rice was worth two hundred dollars. If the taxpayer lost ten thousand dollars, it would be enough for two and a half bolts of silk.Today, a piece of silk costs no more than 800 yuan, and a bucket of rice costs no more than 50 yuan.The tax households who lose ten thousand will get twelve bolts of silk.What's more, he supervised his money and sold it cheaply?It is still eight bolts of silk, which is three times higher than that at the beginning of the founding of China.This procedure of converting land rent into currency has also continued from the two-tax system to the present.The most important thing is that the government sacrificed an economic ideal that has been traditional in history, that is, the ideal of equal land distribution, for the sake of the convenience of fiscal revenue and expenditure and expropriation procedures.Since the implementation of the two-tax system, the government has allowed the free transfer of private farmland and lost the spirit of producing for the people.The result will naturally lead to land annexation, inequality between the rich and the poor, the cultivator cannot have his land, and the exploitation of the landlord will be rewarded.

In short, the change of this system is the biggest change in China's land tax system, which is a major item in the changes in China's economic system and land system from ancient to modern times.The two-tax system ended the first half of the land tax system in history, and in the future it can only be modified slightly along this system and continue to be used.Although this cannot be said to be an inevitable trend in history, there are indeed various conditions that are tempting and forcing this major change.The economic and cultural foundation of Chinese history has always been placed in the countryside, not in the cities.The feudal aristocrats in the pre-Qin period and the family status of the great families before the Tang Dynasty gradually changed again after the middle Tang Dynasty.There is neither feudalism nor family status, and urban industrial and commercial capital, in the traditional Chinese history, has never made it the main cultural lifeline.A generation of scholar-bureaucrats and intellectuals can also retreat to the countryside to become a small landlord, and rural culture also obtains its nourishment from the small amount of economic concentration.If the society after the mid-Tang Dynasty still strictly enforces the system of granting land according to the rank, it will force the intellectuals to leave the countryside, and the Chinese culture will also change rapidly.This point is enough to explain why the two-tax system in the mid-Tang Dynasty could be implemented until the end of the Qing Dynasty.

Now if we compare the economic and fiscal policies of the Han and Tang dynasties, we can see exactly the opposite trend.In the Han Dynasty, Emperor Wu created the salt and iron policy, which was to control capital, prevent the people from getting too rich, and impose a restriction on the upper echelon of the economy.The lower classes are poor, but the government doesn't notice.It is always said that the land rent in the Han Dynasty was very light, but the farmers did not benefit, and there were still many poor people, who were even forced to sell into slavery.The government's light corvee and low tax only take advantage of the middle landlord class.The main intention of the Tang Dynasty's economic policies was to keep the poor from living among the people.The most important spirit of Zuyong's adjustment is not only to lighten corvees and thin taxes, but especially to focus on making production for the people.As for the rich at the top, the government doesn't care.In the beginning, business was free and there were no taxes.And every poor person, the government tries to grant land, so that they can enjoy a life above the standard.To put it simply: It seems that the Han Dynasty controlled capital at the upper level of society, while the lower level had no power to manage it; the Tang Dynasty paid attention to the lower level of society, and the state planned distribution, while allowing the rich people at the upper level to develop freely.In this situation, it seems that people in the Tang Dynasty were more clever.He can allow you to be too rich, but not let you be too poor.This is more similar to the free economy of modern Britain and the United States.The people of the Han Dynasty seem to be not very wise. They only pay attention to not letting you get too rich, but there is no way to prevent the ordinary working people from falling into too poor.However, this only means that the ideals of economic policy in the Han and Tang dynasties were different, and it was limited to the early Tang Dynasty.Later, the rent-yong system collapsed and changed to a two-tax system, and tea and salt were also taxed one by one, which was similar to that in the Han Dynasty.As for the salt and iron policy in the Han Dynasty, it started when Emperor Wu conquered the Xiongnu and used troops abroad. In the Tang Dynasty, the destruction of rent and mediocrity and the rise of taxes on tea and salt were also due to Xuanzong's first expansion of territory until Dezong. In the era, the use of troops abroad caused military riots and frequent civil wars. In short, military disasters caused changes in the economic system, and the Han and Tang Dynasties were no different.