My younger brother Zhuge Liang

Chapter 445: Using the Hu People's Cattle and Horses to Fight the Hu People

"Zi Yu is truly a genius... In previous years, we had to spend copper coins to buy cattle, sheep and horses from the Hu people, but the Hu people simply wouldn't sell them that much. They had extra copper coins but nowhere to spend them. They would only sell cattle and sheep based on the amount of salt and iron they needed. Once they had enough salt and iron, they would continue to raise the remaining cattle and sheep."

"Now, with a 'cattle and sheep futures contract' and the bright prospects we have painted for the Hu people, they will directly sell all their surplus cattle, sheep and horses to us. From now on, as long as we transport more copper coins from the south, we can continuously obtain hundreds of thousands of additional cattle and sheep every year."

"The food shortage problem of the people in Youzhou will probably end now. Even if most of Jizhou is in the hands of Cao thieves, and there is no surplus grain in Jizhou to sell to Youzhou, we, the people of Youzhou, will not be afraid of starving."

Less than a month after Zhuge Jin's new policy on Yuyang Border Market trade and cattle and sheep futures contracts came into effect, Mi Zhu fully witnessed the power of this method.

In his opinion, being able to buy enough cattle and sheep with money was a great achievement that was previously unimaginable.

The commercialization level of the Hu people is much lower than that of the Han people. Originally, many things could not be bought even with money. The Hu people like to stock up goods so that they feel safe.

Zhuge Jin's method of controlling the Wuhuan in the three counties and other grassland tribes has surpassed the effect of the appeasement in the Liu Yu era.

Such a benevolent policy, no other civil servant who took the conciliatory approach had been able to achieve in the 400 years of the Han Dynasty. Zhuge Jin had unknowingly created an unprecedented achievement in the civil governance of the naturalized Hu people - of course, he was very self-aware and had added a qualifier to this achievement, that is, "civil governance".

Compared with those physical annihilation martial arts that rely on killing all the Hu people, Zhuge Jin's achievements are not suitable for comparison for the time being, because the routes are too different. What Zhuge Jin wants is to try to win over those tribes that can be embedded in the Han supply chain and gradually become unable to extricate themselves, and completely sinicize them culturally.

If there is a powerful leader among the Hu people who makes the tribes unify their steps and refuse to cooperate with the Han Dynasty, Zhuge Jin's strategic planning will be useless. That is to say, the grassland is also divided now, and the tribes have no common leader, so the Han court can use commercial inducement to seduce them to cooperate with each other, so this thing can be done.

There is no absolute distinction between using civil and military forces, it’s just that the environments in which they are applicable are different.

……

The more than one month adjustment period of the border market passed in a flash.

The autumn harvest season in Youzhou is about to arrive, and the Han people are generally busy.

Because a considerable portion of the land in Youzhou is planted with winter wheat, the time from the summer wheat harvest to the beginning of winter is not enough to grow another season of staple food, so the wheat fields are mainly planted with a season of bean pods from June to October. After the beans are completely harvested in October, winter wheat will be planted again and harvested in the summer.

This production structure makes the autumn harvest in Youzhou not as busy as in the south. In addition to harvesting beans, they also harvest millet and sorghum. After these grains are stored, the food shortage problem in Youzhou can be further solved, allowing the military and civilians to spend the winter safely and survive the spring famine next year.

The trade in cattle and sheep at the border market is becoming more and more prosperous, and it is estimated that it will continue to thrive until October. With the new border market policy this year, the Hu people have become more active and will definitely sell more sheep before the snow falls in winter, so as to better save fodder for the winter.

Mi Zhu has been very busy for more than a month. The original Yuyang City was not big enough to accommodate so many industries. Mi Zhu had to organize local merchants and craftsmen transferred from the south by their Mi family to build a series of continuous workshops outside Yuyang City.

Originally, the small-scale peasant production in the Han Dynasty did not have slaughterhouses at all, and slaughtering cattle, sheep and pigs was done by individual butchers in a scattered manner. Now there is a demand for centralized processing of hundreds of thousands of heads, so slaughterhouses came into being.

Mi Zhu hired thousands of Wuhuan workers to work as butchers. Every day they would kill endless cattle, sheep and pigs.

The Wuhuan people originally made their living by either herding or working as mercenaries. Some of them learned farming from the Han people, but they never had the opportunity to engage in other technical hired work.

This is the first time that Wuhuan people have been hired as technical workers on a large scale. As long as they have good skills, they can get higher wages than Han people - this is indeed a case of specialization. When Mi Zhu rates wages, he does not consider race, but only work efficiency.

Some Hu people have been slaughtering cattle and sheep for half their lives and have superb skills, so it is no wonder that they are paid high wages.

Some Wuhuan butchers were so smooth in butchering cattle and removing bones that dogs would cry and flies would slip when standing on the bones after scraping the meat. Such people could even earn hundreds of coins a day, which was equivalent to the income of a mercenary for half a year in a month.

Of course, those who have mastered the skills to this level are usually one in a hundred, and most butchers only earn 20% to 30% of their wages, or even less.

Some of Mi Zhu's subordinates felt that the wages were too high and reported this to Mi Zhu. They thought that how could a butcher, who did such a menial job, earn more than an ordinary mercenary cavalryman?

Mi Zhu insisted on doing so, and taught them earnestly: "Giving this price is also to encourage those Wuhuan people to work hard and spend their time practicing their skills. Don't just look at how much we pay them, but also look at how much money they can save and earn for us every day.

These people have to slaughter and cut up several cows or dozens of sheep every day, working day and night. If their skills are a little lax, they will waste one or two pounds of meat after removing the skeleton of each cow, which means dozens of pounds a day. Aren't these dozens of pounds of meat more valuable than the two or three hundred coins of labor?

You paid him such a high wage, and you always asked him to do the butchering and bone removal improperly. If he didn't do it well, you would reduce his wage. This way, Hu Ren would work hard to do a good job. "

After hearing this, the managers under Mi Zhu were completely convinced and never mentioned the issue of suppressing Hu's wages again.

In this way, another effect of Mi Zhu's subtle pursuit gradually emerged.

Since they heard that they could earn more as butchers for Han merchants in Yuyang Border Market than as hired cavalrymen, many Wuhuan people no longer practiced martial arts, horse riding and archery, and pursued military service to earn money as their only way out in life. Instead, they began to practice how to butcher an ox and remove bones and cut meat.

As the Hu people's career advancement channels and career pursuits became more diversified, the Wuhuan people became less warlike than before. In the long run, they would inevitably be more easily controlled by the Han people.

Throughout July, every slaughterhouse in Mi Zhu was packed with people. At first, only the Wuhuan people came to look for work. In August, the lonely Southern Xiongnu and Xianbei people also came here to look for jobs.

Some people don't speak Chinese well, and because of the language barrier they can't be managed by the people in charge, so they are turned away.

The Mi family's Chamber of Commerce didn't pay attention to these small problems at first. After all, they came to make money, not to take on social responsibilities. The Xiongnu and Xianbei people didn't speak Chinese well and were not worthy of being employed. What did this have to do with them?
……

However, as it was mid-August, Zhuge Jin once again "looked back" and came to inspect the border city of Yuyang, and he keenly discovered this small problem. The day after Zhuge Jin came back to inspect, he saw a group of unsuccessful Hu people who came to seek employment around a newly gathered slum in the north of Yuyang City. Those Hu people stole the bones that were prepared for composting in the slaughterhouse and boiled them with river water to eat.

Of course, Zhuge Jin immediately realized that these Hu people who had found no work were definitely an important factor of social instability, so he quickly found Tian Yu, who was in charge of the management of Yuyang and the border market, and asked him to send someone to inquire what was going on.

Of course, Tian Yu did not dare to neglect it, and immediately conducted a thorough investigation, and then reported the situation truthfully as soon as possible:
“Reporting to the princes, some of the Xianbei people who were scattered or suffered disasters fled to Yuyang on their own. They heard that they could live a comfortable life and earn some extra money by being butchers in the border market of Yuyang, so they spontaneously tried their best to come here.

Our border inspections are already very thorough, but they can only restrain large groups of armed Hu people and prevent them from entering the border at will. However, it is still impossible to strictly manage the scattered civilians who do not carry weapons.

There are too many workers in Yuyang and they are in a hurry to recruit them. Some of the Hu people have changed their hair into buns and turbans, pretending to be Han people, so they are difficult to control for the time being. "

Zhuge Jin was a little angry: "This is not the key! There is nothing wrong with letting people in. Yuyang is in need of people. The key is to manage them well after letting them in. These people have hands and feet, but they have nothing to do after they come. There must be a reason."

Tian Yu broke out in a cold sweat and replied cautiously and quickly, "I have also asked someone to ask. First, there are indeed too many people coming, but the slaughterhouses are not built fast enough. In addition, the market has only been open for more than a month, and the beef and mutton sold every day have almost all been processed in time.

Rich businessmen who run slaughterhouses can select the best butchers to hire, and those with poor skills will not be hired, nor those who cannot speak Chinese. Most of the people here cannot speak Chinese, and a few of them just don’t have good skills.”

After hearing the details, Zhuge Jin could only sigh at the rough management of the ancients.

If any official had any idea of how to attract investment and solve employment problems, wouldn't he rush to prepare the supporting facilities when seeing this situation?

But there is no way. The people of the Han Dynasty have never had a tradition of mercantilism. It has been so many years, and it cannot be reversed in a short time.

Zhuge Jin, with the courtesy of a "service-oriented government", admonished Tian Yu in a heavy tone and asked him to tell Mi Zhu afterwards.
"Naturalizing the Hu people is a good policy that has been admired since ancient times. Since you are in this position, how can you be careless? When you see the people in trouble, you should try to solve it. It is rare that so many Hu people want to work for the Han people. If they can't speak Chinese, you should quickly set up a crash course to teach them to speak Chinese!

It is entirely possible to let workshop owners advance a "training fund" to raise funds to set up a public school. After the students finish their studies, they can be sent to any workshop that needs people, and a portion of their first-year wages can be deducted as tuition.

In addition, when collecting money, all major workshops should be required to pay according to the scale of employment, regardless of whether they employ Han or Hu people, and regardless of whether the people they employ have learned the skills and language well. As long as they employ people in Yuyang, they should apportion the money according to the number of people. In this way, no workshop owner will specifically select experienced workers who do not need training. Regardless of whether they hire novice or experienced workers, they must pay this money. "

It was not difficult for Zhuge Jin to think of these things. This has become a basic operation in the service-oriented society of later generations. If a place wants to increase employment and provide supporting services to the unemployed population, there will naturally be public welfare training.

These operations are not difficult to understand, but it was hard for officials in the Han Dynasty to imagine that the government could do this for the people.

Fortunately, Zhuge Jin did not ask the government to pay for this. The money was eventually paid by the local employers in Yuyang, and was distributed according to the number of employees. The government only provided an intermediary management, so Tian Yu felt that it would not be difficult to implement.

Nowadays, anyone who can enter Yuyang Border City to do business or open a workshop can make a lot of money. This is still a vast blue ocean market, and you can make money as soon as you come. In this environment, if merchants pay more for the common interests of everyone and the distribution is reasonable, no one will resist.

Tian Yu immediately consulted with Mi Zhu and within a few days, he refined and implemented Zhuge Jin's suggestions into a set of concrete plans. Within just ten days, the first batch of temporary institutions for "pre-job vocational training" in Yuyang were established.

Finally, these training institutions made some adjustments when setting up the courses. They not only taught the Hu people Chinese, but also taught them some simple skills, such as how to tan and make leather. The Hu people were good at slaughtering and processing beef and mutton, and were also good at making sheepskin coats, but they were not very good at tanning cowhide to make armor.

At that time, the Hu people used cowhide in a rough way, and the leather products they made were extremely stiff, and they only needed to be put on. As for tanning leather, which requires complex chemical reaction processes, the Hu people had no basic knowledge, so they needed training.

With such training packages, another problem discovered by Zhuge Jin during his inspection was solved: the positions for processing beef and mutton are already somewhat saturated, and the extra job-seeking Hu people should be quickly evacuated to new industries such as leather tanning, so as to ensure that everyone who comes has work to do.

Therefore, "Yuyang Vocational Training" not only teaches Chinese, but also teaches other skills needed by local emerging industries besides slaughtering and deboning. The Hu people often have a certain foundation in these skills, but their original working methods are too rough, so they must be trained before they can take up the job.

However, because these people received training coordinated by the government, and were provided with basic food and accommodation during the training period, and given thin porridge to drink to ensure the most basic survival, these Hu people must have paid some price for taking advantage.

If they are willing to stay and work locally after the training, then the problem is simple. The government can, in accordance with the previous agreement, allow employers to deduct part of their wages within the next year to compensate for their previous tuition fees.

The fear is that after these people have learned some skills and Chinese, they change their minds and decide not to work in the border town of Yuyang. Then the training fees coordinated for them by the Yuyang government will be wasted and benefit others.

In order to prevent this situation, these wandering Hu people who could not find work had to provide some guarantees before enrolling in school.

Either you pay for the tuition yourself, or if you can't afford it, you need a family member to guarantee it, and your family member will be detained to do other labor. Only when you finish your studies and work for a full number of years and pay off the "tuition loan" can you regain complete freedom.

If there is no family member to pledge for hard labor, then fellow villagers will be required to guarantee them. If one person runs away after completing his studies, the guarantor will be responsible for paying compensation.

If you can't even find a friend willing to guarantee, then you can only use more traditional methods - if this matter is directly handed over to Tian Yu, he might use the most traditional method right from the start. Zhuge Jin is still relatively kind, so he thought of some additional gentler tricks.

With such a combination of kindness and force, the hidden danger of instability in the border city of Yuyang caused by the influx of a large number of Hu people seeking work was eliminated in the bud.

Even if it's not a complete solution, at least half of the problem has been solved.

In late August and even September, other supporting industries besides slaughtering and pickling meat also started to emerge one after another. I believe that it will not be long before Yuyang will form a complete livestock product industry chain.

The number of Han and Hu people who benefited from these industries also expanded from thousands to tens of thousands, and then to hundreds of thousands.

The phenomenon of looting and rioting by the impoverished Hu tribes after the autumn harvest, which was always rampant in previous years, has been reduced by more than half this year. Those who originally wanted to rob because they couldn't make a living now think about finding a job first.

(End of this chapter)