Chapter 1751 – Jiang Pengji’s Strategy
Feng Yi said, “I believe the Lord has had this intention for a long time.”
Feng Zhen shot a glance at his bear of a son.
Indeed, this kid was no longer the pride he once had; he had transformed into Bear Son Feng Yi!
Feng Yi quietly asked, “Father, if I may be so bold, how do you think the Great Xia and Dongqing could fall?”
Feng Zhen’s brows knitted together; the bear son’s question was quite profound.
“If a prosperous dynasty is to last, it must avoid tripping over the same stone twice.”
Feng Zhen stared at his son with a look that was out of the ordinary, remaining silent for a long time, which made Wan Xiuer, the observer, fidget in her seat.
After a while, Feng Zhen sighed and said to his son, “If you have any ideas, speak up.”
Feng Zhen’s guess was not wrong; Feng Yi’s secret letter had indeed reached Jiang Pengji’s hands.
The content of the letter had only been seen by her and Wei Ci.
“Great bamboo produces good shoots; what good deed did Feng Zhen’s wastrel of a son do in his past life to deserve such a son?” Wei Ci carefully folded the secret letter, brought over an oil lamp, and set it aflame. The orange flame surged up fiercely, quickly engulfing the letter, leaving nothing but ash behind. “Wen Zheng and the Eldest Lady from the Huaiyu family are also remarkable; given time, they will surely have a seat at the court…”
Jiang Pengji chuckled, “This indicates the education at Golden Scales Academy is successful; Feng Yi and his peers are the best proof.”
Under the relatively open educational model at Golden Scales Academy, these students had a broader perspective than anticipated, subtly touching upon the intricacies of Jiang Pengji’s chess game. While their inherent talent played a role, their education was equally significant.
Wei Ci inquired, “Does the Lord mean… as Feng Yi and the others said…”
Jiang Pengji replied, “Those kids… Heh, they’re still young. Their bold guesses only hit the mark about thirty percent.”
Due to the constraints of the time, very few scholars dared to pin the blame for national downfall on issues like taxation, the gentry, or land consolidation.
Why?
Because most scholars came from noble backgrounds, questioning such issues would mean denying their own class and harming their interests.
It was rare for Feng Yi and his friends to break out of their confines; such awareness was hard to come by.
Wei Ci asked, “What does the Lord plan to do in response?”
Jiang Pengji chuckled, “Arrange some marriages; let them know what’s up.”
She had spent so many years laying this groundwork, and it wasn’t time to show her fangs yet.
Because the game she was playing challenged entrenched interests that had persisted for hundreds of years, impacting the fortunes and fates of too many people.
What were the roots of the national downfalls of Great Xia and countries like Dongqing?
Unequal distribution of class interests.
The few held ninety percent of the resources, how could society not be in turmoil?
The rise and fall of dynasties was merely a reshuffling of resources.
If Jiang Pengji wanted the future dynasty to continue enduring, allowing the common people to enjoy prolonged peace, she needed to work towards a more equitable distribution of resources. A fair distribution meant that those occupying ninety percent of the resources would have to share.
No one was a saint; the gentry, as beneficiaries, would certainly resist.
Jiang Pengji had to find a way to alleviate land consolidation, which fundamentally struck at the core interests of this class. Not to mention, she had established Golden Scales Academy and vigorously promoted education, directly challenging the gentry’s monopoly over education—how amusing! If you trace back, the noble gentry had once started as powerful landlords.
They exchanged political investments and maneuvers for political and economic privilege.
Through generations of maneuvering, they gradually infiltrated the central power from local authorities, solidifying their stance and seeking more voice.
They banded together, quickly enlarging their ranks, annexing countless lands, enjoying a variety of privileges, and eventually carving out the renowned families of the future.
With a finite cake of resources, if they wanted to enjoy a greater share, they had to kick down anyone attempting to scramble up for a piece.
Thus, monopolies in officialdom and culture emerged.
Jiang Pengji knew that solely depending on violence, killing, or crushing wouldn’t suffice to disrupt this monopoly.
Without this group of gentry, even the rising commoners would become the new ruling class, endlessly cyclical, with no end in sight.
Don’t think just because commoners suffer disdain from the gentry, they will represent the broad populace and fight for their interests.
Commoners will only strive to climb upward, enter the gentry ranks, and naturally transition into a new exploiting class.
Therefore, what Jiang Pengji truly had to contend with wasn’t just the gentry but also the new aristocrats from commoners.
Golden Scales Academy and the promotion of cultural education aimed to break the cultural monopoly, while the future introduction of the “civil service examination” was to disrupt the monopolization of officials. Of course, the audience in the broadcast room also said the “civil service examination” had its pros and cons; Jiang Pengji still needed to study it further, aiming to integrate the exam systems from the past Federation into a new one that would adapt to this era…
At the very least, she wanted the lower-class common people to see hope for changing their fates.
As long as the source of officials was broadened, it would inevitably impact the gentry’s monopoly, and this new class would decrease the original cake owned by the gentry. But Jiang Pengji not only had to guard against the gentry but also this new aristocracy. Therefore, finding a reasonable way to control them and narrowing the gap between them and common people was of utmost importance.
As this issue surfaced, reforming the taxation system became unavoidable.
The existing taxation system opened floodgates for the gentry, making them richer and making the poor even poorer. The speed of land consolidation escalated. In the end, all the land in the hands of the common people flowed into the gentry’s clutches, completely tilting the resource balance.
In other eras, one could consider raising taxes for the wealthy class and setting high estate taxes to keep the gap between the rich and the poor from widening too much. But in this era, don’t even think about estate taxes; it was difficult to implement high taxes against the exploiting class.
After all, the ones making the laws were precisely the wicked exploiting class!
If she did that, even her confidants might turn against her. She wasn’t that reckless; instead, she needed a new approach—lightening the burden on the people while creating income for them, simultaneously achieving the goal of dismantling the rich through subtle means.
The current taxation system was certainly unfeasible; it was one of the aides to land consolidation.
Compared to the gentry and common folks, the latter were the weak ones, struggling to hold onto their lands.
Jiang Pengji decided to implement an all-encompassing policy, nationalizing all land to curtail land consolidation.
Rather than saying it was nationalized, it would be more accurate to say it belonged to the “royalty.”
This required a firm hand.
So far, Jiang Pengji had done well; where she struck, she plundered without mercy.
On this basis, she would merge all the miscellaneous taxes related to land taxes, reducing the government’s tax workload and minimizing the complexities, which would also lessen the risk of tax evasion. The common people would lease varying sizes of land from the government based on their household numbers, and land taxes would be based on their annual harvests—more cultivation meant more tax, and less cultivation meant less.
“If this decision gets out, wouldn’t the gentry and commoners collectively go into an uproar—”
Jiang Pengji pondered for a moment before picking up her pen and writing a letter to Feng Zhen.
For the sake of her son’s life, the guy who boarded her pirate ship better not think about getting off!
