Speaking of the problem of the Ming Dynasty, in fact, it is still relatively complicated, but one thing is certainly true, the Ming Dynasty has always been in a state of financial constraints, especially in the middle and late Period of the Ming Dynasty, the financial problems were exposed very obviously, for example, after Emperor Wuzong of Ming came to power, the marriage country could not come up with enough money, and later if it were not for Zhang Juzheng's change of law, the Ming Dynasty might not be able to survive.
The Ming Dynasty sea ban
More and more stringent economic conditions, so that the Ming Dynasty must also pay attention to trade, the Ming Dynasty will often adopt the strategy of sea ban, the earliest is Zhu Yuanzhang began to implement the sea ban, do not let the people go to the sea to fish trade. Although the Ming Dynasty had a grand event of Zheng He going to the West, most of their time was a sea ban, and the Song Dynasty had developed a very developed trade before that, even the Yuan Dynasty attached great importance to maritime trade.
Through these trades, material exchanges were constantly carried out, and a lot of wealth was won for the country, but the Ming Dynasty did not do so, in fact, the productivity of the Ming Dynasty was still quite developed, and many commodities could also be favored by Western countries, and the Ming Dynasty did not always prohibit overseas trade.
During the Longqing period, some passes had been opened, and later Zhang Juzheng changed the original monetary system through reform, and silver began to flow in in large quantities, which also played a great help to the private trade, which allowed the Ming Dynasty to obtain a lot of fiscal revenue, which was also of great help to alleviate the contradictions in the middle and late periods. However, the Longqing switch was only a temporary matter and could not continue to be implemented, and Zhang Juzheng's reforms, after his death, were gradually abandoned by Wanli and others, and in the later period, Chongzhen could not even get out of millions of taels of silver, which also led to the demise of the Ming Dynasty.
If overseas trade was developed, could the Ming Dynasty avoid extinction?
In fact, at the official level, the Ming Dynasty has always carried out overseas trade, but in the private sector, there are too many restrictions on overseas trade, and it is rare to completely relax. If the Ming Dynasty can carry it out, truly liberalize trade, and vigorously develop sea trade, will the Ming Dynasty be able to avoid extinction? I think it is impossible, in fact, the demise of the Ming Dynasty is related to their financial problems, but this problem cannot be solved.
According to the statistics of the "History of Ming", we see that in the middle and late Ming Dynasty, the average annual fiscal income is about 3 million taels, which is indeed too little, in addition, the Ming Dynasty will also levy grain as a tax, equivalent to more than 20 million taels per year. This level is not bad, but compared with the Song Dynasty and the Qing Dynasty, the financial revenue of the Ming Dynasty is still too small. After all, taxes such as grain could not be directly cashed in, and the Guanning army that supported Liaodong in the late Ming Dynasty poured out the wealth of the whole country.
Then the introduction of sea trade, this income can naturally increase the tax of the imperial court, whether it is official operation, or private trade, the imperial court can obtain a lot of benefits. But even if this is done, the Ming Dynasty can not avoid the end of the destruction because of no money, Chongzhen is not lucky enough, he himself is also very dead, in vain to send the Jiangshan out, the Ming Dynasty was actually not so destroyed at that time, but there was no money to appease the localities, resulting in the peasant army running rampant everywhere, the imperial court spent all its efforts to raise the army of Liaodong, the lack of money to the impact of the country, will still lead to the demise of the Ming Dynasty.
If this is the case, why is it still said that sea trade cannot solve the problem of the demise of the Ming Dynasty?
First of all, we must look at why the Ming Dynasty only has this little tax, when Zhu Yuanzhang founded the country, he learned the lessons of the previous dynasty, he wanted to give the people a good living environment, so he stipulated that the peasants would never be given, his decision, directly led to the Ming Dynasty's overall agricultural tax is quite low, coupled with the Ming Dynasty has been plaguing their displaced people problem, in fact, a large number of people have not cultivated well on the land, even if it is such a small agricultural tax, it is also decreasing.
The Ming Dynasty for the commercial tax is even less important, if the sea, it must be counted into the commercial tax, the Ming Dynasty commercial tax rate is quite low, in the case of not opening the sea, mainly to salt, tea, business tax and the like. In the early reform of Wanli alone, their commercial tax income was more than 3 million taels, and in contrast, the Song Dynasty alone obtained tens of millions of taels of income from salt and tea taxes, and the Song Dynasty shipping brought more income to the country, which the Ming Dynasty could not compare.
The commercial tax of the Ming Dynasty actually belonged to the point of being close to non-existence, and after the establishment of the Ming Dynasty, the government did not attach importance to the commercial tax. Therefore, even if the Ming Dynasty opened the sea, due to the management of commercial taxes, the implementation could not be done, and a large amount of income from shipping could not be put into the national treasury. Taxes that may have been levied by sea don't really have much silver.
Why is there such a problem? The most important factor is the monopoly of the Ming Dynasty, the Ming Dynasty has always had overseas trade, but those are some landlord bureaucrats, the imperial relatives of the official trade to dominate, they through these trades, for themselves to earn a lot of money, the early Zheng He navigation, brought a lot of money are in the pockets of these imperial relatives and relatives themselves.
The Ming Dynasty had a more unique system, that is, the gentry did not have to pay taxes, which led to a large number of officials and gentry landlords in these areas in the southeast who earned a lot of money every year, but they did not have to hand it over to the national treasury, even if the imperial court really could not get by, forcibly levied, and could not get much money from their hands.
And these people are in the southeast coast and other places, they have long held overseas trade, even if the Ming Dynasty completely liberalized these trades, it is bound to let these people account for the majority, the famous Longqing switch, obviously there is a large amount of silver inflow, the result of the national treasury is not much income, but the private sector to form a silver fever, the market suddenly appeared so much money, the country actually did not receive much money, this is too incredible.
In the final analysis, these people are still in line with the interests of the civilian class, and the officials in charge of shipping taxation are themselves people of this class, and they and the people behind them will suck blood through these trades, and there is very little silver left to reach the national treasury. The imperial court has not been able to collect taxes from them, and for a long time, the imperial court has not been able to establish an effective commercial tax system, and it is also unable to increase the tax rate, after all, these civil servants have the right to speak in the imperial court, and the emperor cannot touch their interests at will.
In addition, due to the implementation of the policy of sea prohibition in the early Ming Dynasty, this led to the prevalence of smuggling. When the Ming Dynasty was established, there were already a large number of pirates in the southeast coast and other places, they mainly in Shuangyu, they chose to smuggle goods, like Japan and many countries in Southeast Asia, there were a large number of pirates, and the Ming Dynasty coastal areas had a large number of officials and businessmen colluding with these pirates to join hands to seek a large number of benefits.
When Longqing switched, the smuggling atmosphere once overwhelmed the legitimate trade, obviously it was a merchant ship protected by the government, after going to sea, it was necessary to rely on these smugglers, and the imperial court repeatedly tried to crack down on smuggling, but it was always impossible to crack down, because the imperial court was like many imperial relatives and state relatives, they were the biggest leaders in smuggling, and they earned more money by relying on these smugglings. Opening the sea will affect their interests, even if they are forced to open up, they will increase the intensity of smuggling, relying on the advantages of long-term smuggling, and constantly crowd out legitimate trade.
Therefore, the Ming Dynasty could not completely liberalize sea trade, and even if it was completely liberalized, the income from overseas trade could not be too high, and most of it would fall on the heads of these officials and businessmen. As for how the Ming Dynasty should solve its own tax problem, there is no good way, because the early determined system, to the back of the civilian class completely grasped the power of the dynasty, if you want to completely overthrow this system, it is bound to touch the ming Dynasty's ruling foundation, which will have a great impact on the rule of the imperial court, so any emperor, even if he wants to increase taxes, there is no way to change the system, change the tax strategy, they will be very resistant, which is something that no emperor can bear The primary goal of the feudal regime was to ensure that its rule was not in problems.
References "Myashi"