Fu Shanhe

Chapter 112 Copper Coins
As the news of the elimination of redundant officials spread, countless officials became busy, and for a while the homes of all important officials became bustling.

In the early days of the Dayu Dynasty, the total number of civil and military officials was no more than 20,000.

Up to now, the number of civil servants alone has exceeded 50,000, and together with military generals, the number has directly exceeded 100,000.

Due to the increase in the number of government offices or the increase in departmental workload, more than 10,000 new positions were created.

The increase in this group of officials is the result of the continuous strengthening of imperial power.

Theoretically, the Dayu Dynasty only needs 40,000 officials to ensure the smooth operation of the organization.

Compared with the existing number of officials, one can imagine the extent of the bloated staff.

When they heard that the court was going to lay off officials in idle departments, few of them remained panicked.

Not going to the yamen for a year or two will not affect the operation of the department.

If they are not considered redundant officials, then there are no redundant officials in the world.

Considering the overall situation, everyone will support it as long as it doesn't affect them.

The cabinet's plan was good, but the situation changed when it came to implementation.

After all, Dayu is a society based on personal relationships. Officials in the capital received the news first and took action in advance.

There were people asking for favors everywhere, and in addition to persuading dozens of elderly officials to retire.

The cabinet's layoff plan encountered obstacles as soon as it was implemented in Beijing.

There are policies and measures to counter.

What the court wants to cut are redundant officials, so all you have to do is make yourself no longer a redundant official.

Communicate with your superiors and refine the powers and responsibilities within the government office.

If we give those who are idle something to do, the problem of redundant officials will no longer exist.

By making the process a little more complicated, even a cold government office can become busy every day.

Those are the people who actually do the work, and the increased business volume is mainly due to their responsibility of finding faults on the sidelines.

In order to keep their official positions, officials who usually did not go to the yamen also began to go out early and return late every day.

For a time, all the government offices in the capital were busy. Regardless of whether they were busy doing useless work or not, there was indeed no idle person in the government offices.

It looks like a vibrant place, except for the officials who are working there.

With a bunch of old men pointing fingers at people, the already low work efficiency becomes even lower.

Layoffs in the capital were blocked, but the Ministry of Personnel still had to complete the tasks assigned by the cabinet.

There were more than 160 prefectures, 200 states, and 1,000 counties in the Dayu Dynasty. If one official was cut from each of these states, prefectures, and counties, the cabinet's tasks would be overfulfilled.

But theory is just theory after all. No one is willing to do a job that offends people.

No one wants to stand against the bureaucracy. Taking collective responsibility is equivalent to no one taking responsibility.

Yangzhou Prefecture.

The sensational event of laying off redundant officials spread from the central government to local governments, and Yangzhou was also affected.

As a provincial capital baptized by war, Yangzhou does not have the problem of redundant officials, but it cannot withstand the surge in the number of officials applying for transfer.

Everyone knows that someone will definitely suffer from this fire started by the cabinet.

Unable to continue to live a life of idleness and waiting for death, officials with connections have been seeking real jobs to avoid becoming unlucky ones.

Yangzhou Prefecture, which was suffering from a serious shortage of staff, was filled up as soon as possible.

This was the case with the government office, and the Yangzhou camp was no exception.

Generally speaking, there is too much uncertainty in newly formed camps like the Yangzhou Camp.

Coupled with a strong chief officer, everyone knows that there is no money to be made, so few officers are interested.

Except for a few former members of the Five Cities Army who had a good relationship with him and chose to stay and develop, most of the officers were in vacancies.

Li Mu had never applied to the court to fill the vacancies in military officers, because he wanted to take advantage of the time difference to cultivate as many confidants as possible.

Unfortunately, plans cannot keep pace with changes, and personnel appointments in the military must also abide by the rules.

Only a few people can reach the top overnight. Most people follow the steps and climb up step by step from the bottom.

Even though he had the credit for quelling the rebellion, his cronies were only promoted to small flag and general flag positions.

He had originally planned to wait a year or two, then promote the promising talents among them to trial centurions, and then have them act as centurions to handle military affairs.

As you move up to the ranks of middle-level military officers, the court's management of personnel appointments becomes stricter.

As a lieutenant general, Li Mu only has the right to recommend, and he still needs the approval of the Ministry of War or the Grand Marshal's Office.

After reaching the rank of a hundred households, it is almost the ceiling for ordinary people.

If you want to move up further, you must either be born into a noble family or win military merit on the battlefield.

You have to get one of the following: be the first to climb the ladder, kill the general, break through the enemy's formation, or seize the flag.

The sudden change filled the vacancies in the army at once, and Li Mu's painstaking plan was shattered.

No one can tell what impact the addition of a group of generals with unknown abilities will have on Yangzhou.

There is no point in being dissatisfied, because the Yangzhou Camp is the imperial army, not his personal army.

“Mr. Lan, the imperial court has sent so many people here at once, I’m afraid it will affect the command!”

Li Mu hinted vaguely.

Generally speaking, this kind of messy work is done by the military strategist.

As a head coach, it seems too petty to personally get involved in ostracizing his subordinates.

“Sir, it is not appropriate to act rashly at this time.

Most of those who can be transferred here at this time have some connections.

Maybe it won't be long before someone greets you.

If you rashly push people away, you may easily offend the people behind them, so it is better to wait and see.

For those who like to idle away their time, let them continue to do so and arrange for someone to handle military affairs on their behalf.

If you have ideals and ambitions, you can use it for now.

Rely on those who are capable and use those who are incompetent with caution.

The food and wages are in your hands, and you are the one who recruited and trained the soldiers. A few outsiders cannot cause any big trouble.

If you like them, keep them for a few more years. If you don't like them, wait two or three years and recommend them for promotion and leave.

It won't offend anyone, and it won't affect your control of the army." Lan Linjie persuaded tactfully.

He was really not good at manipulating people, especially excluding a group of court officials, which was full of risks.

The military is also bound by laws and regulations. Unless the general has committed a serious mistake, the commander cannot punish him for no reason.

Essentially, the imperial court transferred generals from outside to have the purpose of checking and balancing power.

"Forget it, let's do this first!"

Li Mu said helplessly.

There is a shortage of talented people under my command, and no one is capable of taking on important responsibilities.

The only one who is somewhat decent is this master.

However, Master Lan's main talent lies in handling internal affairs, and he is not good at giving advice.

The group of direct descendants that he trained were all rough guys with strong limbs but simple minds.

Let them fight and chop people carelessly, and don't make things difficult for them when giving advice.

If you can learn all the commonly used Chinese characters within the next year, you will be considered to be very motivated.

The real top talents are either in the officialdom or on their way to entering the officialdom.

Li Mu tried to recruit people, but was embarrassed to find that all the applicants were poor scholars.

Influenced by the times, the lower the level of scholars, the more seriously they were poisoned by the Four Books and Five Classics.

Thoughts are locked in cages and the perspective on issues is very limited.

Unless you can break this perception, no matter how talented you are, your room for growth will be very limited.

Decades of inherent cognition obviously cannot be broken by a few words, and you can only rely on yourself to explore it slowly.

The biggest reason why talents emerge in troubled times is the collapse of the traditional order. Everyone’s inherent cognition is broken, and the thoughts that were bound by the ruling group are released.

After the episode, Li Mu once again devoted his energy to military training.

He has thought it through clearly. It would be fine if the newly appointed officers were obedient, but if they were restless, they would be given "key training."

He trained according to the most stringent standards and he didn't believe that those pampered guys could withstand the hardship.

……

On top of Xiaocang Mountain.

Today is a good day for harvest. After going through several processing steps, the first batch of copper is officially smelted.

Looking at the copper ingot in front of him, Li Mu showed a long-lost smile.

Copper smelting technology has been around for thousands of years, and by the Dayu Dynasty the process had become relatively mature.

After copper is smelted, the next step is to process it into copper coins, and the whole process is completed.

Although the imperial court had issued clear decrees prohibiting private minting of copper coins by the people, these laws had long been in name only.

By now, the main force in minting copper coins is no longer the government, but the literati and officials from all over the country.

The proliferation of private money has led to bad money driving out good money.

This resulted in a significant drop in the court's coinage income, and the official minting office even suffered losses.

In order to make up for the deficit, the quality of official coins minted by the court also declined.

The vicious cycle made the coinage industry of the Dayu Dynasty a mess.

It’s all caused by profit. The copper coin casting technology is too simple and the profit is too huge.

Compared to selling copper directly, the net profit increases by at least 50% after it is minted into coins.

"How many kilograms of copper can this copper mine produce per month?"

Li Mu asked with concern.

“In reply to your Excellency’s words, according to the current progress, we can smelt about 5,000 kilograms of copper every month.

If the mining scale is expanded in the future, the output can be further increased.”

After hearing the craftsman's answer, Li Mu was dumbfounded on the spot.

Although I had expected that copper production would be low, I didn't expect it to be so low.

The monthly output is 5,000 kilograms, not 5,000 tons. He even suspected that there was something wrong with his ears.

According to the official coin-making regulations of the Dayu Dynasty, one pound of copper could produce 160 copper coins, and about 200 pieces could be produced for private coins sold on the market.

Five thousand kilograms of copper can only produce 800,000 to 1 million copper coins, which is equivalent to 800 to 1,000 taels of silver.

If it was profit, Li Mu would accept it.

The problem is that this is just the output value. After deducting the production costs, the net profit is only about five or six hundred taels.

It is indeed huge profits, but the production capacity is too touching.

It is obviously impossible to expect to get rich overnight by relying on copper mines.

“You have done a good job, and we will strive to continue to work hard to increase production capacity.

Each craftsman received one tael of silver as a reward, and the master craftsman received two taels.

In the future, everyone will receive, in addition to the basic monthly salary, an additional productivity bonus.

Every time production capacity doubles, our income increases by 20 percent.”

Li Mu then started drawing small cakes.

The current huge profits are based on the premise that labor is free.

If labor costs are taken into account, the mine's profits will be greatly reduced.

With low income, the treatment naturally cannot be very good.

Of course, the main reason is that the current production capacity base is too low and there is too much room for growth.

Not to mention doubling the production capacity, even increasing it tenfold or a hundredfold is very possible.

If the Dayu Dynasty had not been short of copper, this small-scale mining would have been completely uncompetitive.

"Thank you for the reward, sir!"

The old man hurriedly bowed and thanked him.

……

(End of this chapter)