Wang Mang, who is known as a crosser, does have many unexpected reform measures. It is precisely because of his forward-looking ideas that everyone thinks that Wang Mang has traveled from the modern era.
It is precisely because his reform concept is too advanced, so Wang Mang's reform eventually ended in failure. So how exactly did he reform? Did it offend a lot of people?
1. The nationalization of fields prohibits private trade.
1. Nationalization of land.
During the Western Han Dynasty, the fields were always privatized, the nobles and local tycoons occupied a large amount of land, and ordinary peasants could only work for the landlords and powerful people, and generally did not have land themselves.
After he came to power, wang mang ordered that the land under the world should be re-divided, and the land should be divided according to the method of the well field system, that is, the family divided nine parts of the land, one of which was cultivated for the imperial court, and the remaining eight were planted for themselves.
If there are eight brothers in the family, they can be given nine hundred acres of land, of which one hundred acres are for the imperial court. The acres here are hundreds of steps for acres, but not the current acres.
If there are less than eight men in the family and more than nine hundred acres of land, the excess land must be distributed to the surrounding neighbors. This seems to be quite good for the common people, but for the nobles and local tycoons, it is a painful blow.
2. Private trading is prohibited.
In addition, Wang Mang also said that this field is all owned by the imperial court and is divided by the imperial court for everyone, so everyone has no property rights, only the right to use, so the people are not allowed to buy and sell in private.
In this way, no one dares to occupy other people's fields privately, which is actually a way to protect the people. But at the same time, it is also hurting the interests of the aristocratic group.
Since they are all harming the interests of the aristocratic group, these people must be opposed. Some of the more daring ones simply led troops to rebel against Wang Mang, and for this reason there was also a lot of discussion within the imperial court, all of which advised Wang Mang not to do so.
Finally, three years after the edict was issued, Wang Mang had to choose to give in, not only abolishing the well field system, but also no longer prohibiting the purchase and sale of field property, which was a complete failure.
2. Balance prices and handle official loans.
1. Wujunguan and Shiping.
Wang Mang once set up five equal officials in several large cities across the country, and their character was to balance the price of goods in the market. There is a price standard issued by the government, called shiping. If the price is lower than the market level, then let the people buy and sell each other, if the price is higher than the market level, then sorry, the five average officials will run to control the price and buy and sell at the price of the market level.
At the beginning of the order of the world's public fields and wells, there was also the auspiciousness of Jiahe, and it was stopped by thieves. Nowadays, the name is changed to Tianxia Tian, wang tian, and slaves and slaves are known as private subordinates, and they are not allowed to sell and buy. Its male mouth is not surplus eight, and those who have crossed a well in the field are divided into surplus fields to the nine ethnic neighborhood township parties. Therefore, there is no land, and now the recipient of the field, such as the system. Those who dare to have a non-Ida sacred system, who cannot confuse the people, throw themselves into the four races, and use the imperial charm, such as the story of the emperor's ancestor Kao Yu Emperor. --- Book of Han
This is a very good idea, at least in the market to control the price. But how do the people at the bottom do it? This is difficult to say clearly, because there are policies at the top and countermeasures at the bottom.
The five equal officials are also people, and since they are people, it is impossible to be 100% fair. Therefore, since their power is so large, it will form a huge chain of interests.
For example, the five average officials of a market collude with the merchants to deliberately raise the market level of the goods, so that the merchant can earn more money, and then he will share a part of it to the five average officials, so that they can all make a profit.
2. Official loans.
The people lacked money in their pockets, and Wang Mang also took it into account, so Wang Mang set up an official lending institution. If the people went through sacrifices, funerals, or small business, if they did not have money, they could borrow money from the imperial court.
Among them, the sacrifice borrowed money needs to be repaid in 10 days, which is interest-free. Funeral loans can be repaid within three months, which is also interest-free. Only those who do small businesses need to pay ten percent interest every year.
But the problem was that the money for the imperial court's loans fell into the hands of local officials, who would not necessarily follow Wang Mang's instructions.
When the people come to take out loans, the gang can say that they have no money, but they will deposit the money in other banks and open a loan business with relatively high interest there, so that the money earned will go into their pockets.
Whether it was balancing prices or dealing with loans, Wang Mang actually trusted these local officials too much. This was a very undesirable thing, so his policies also failed.
Three or four currency reforms ruined Wang Mang's regime.
Why did Wang Mang perish? Many people say that it is because he cannot defeat Liu Xiu, but in fact, this statement is one-sided, because winning or losing on the battlefield is not the most important factor in determining the demise of a dynasty.
Wang Mang's failure of currency reform led to the economic collapse of the new dynasty, and the people were not living well, and the new dynasty was completely ruined. Wang Mang carried out a total of 4 currency reforms, all of which failed.
1. Increase the casting of large money, deed knives, and wrong knives.
After emperor Wu of the Han Dynasty minted five-baht coins, the five-baht coins were basically stipulated as standard circulating currency. The weight and value of this currency are comparable, so it is loved by the common people.
Mang could not do it with coins, and repeated the book that "the people take food as their life, goods as their capital, and the eight governments are headed by food." Treasure goods are heavy, small use is not given, all light are burdened with trouble, light and heavy have different products, then use convenience and folk music", so the treasure goods are five products. --- Book of Han
However, after Wang Mang came to power, on the basis of the five baht money, he added three currencies: big money, the right knife and the wrong knife. In this way, there are more base currencies in the market, and they are in different forms, which is very unfavorable to the circulation of money.
2. Abolish the five-baht coin and knife coin and issue treasure goods.
Obviously, Wang Mang's first reform was a complete failure. To this end, Wang Mang simply scrapped the five-baht coin and the sword coin, and used treasure goods as circulating currency instead.
The so-called treasure goods refer to 28 currencies such as money goods, gold, silver goods, turtles, shell goods, and cloth goods. We are very tired just by looking at it, and no one wants to use it at all, because it is troublesome to convert and it is very inconvenient to use.
3, only left a small money worth one and a large amount of money fifty two.
Ordinary people do not believe in the 28 currencies introduced by Wang Mang, and they all want to trade with five baht in private. As a result, Wang Mang ordered that private minting of coins be prohibited, and even objects such as bronze and charcoal could not appear in the home.
Even if the punishment was very strict, Wang Mang's new policy could not be implemented. To this end, Wang Mang could only think of other ways, he abolished 28 currencies, leaving only two currencies worth one and big money fifty.
4. Replace small money and big money with cloth and goods springs.
At this time, it has been 14 years in the park, and there is still one year that Wang Mang's regime is over. At this time, Wang Mang was still thinking about reforming the economy.
He abolished the small money worth one and the big money fifty that he had left behind. Instead, two currencies, cloth and goods, were introduced. Unfortunately, the proportion of the value of the currency is very unreasonable, this reform is to replace the good currency of five baht with a relatively inferior currency, and in 15 years, the currency has been changed 4 times in a row, and the people really have not tossed enough.
Summary: The main reason for the failure of Wang Mang's reform is that he is too idealistic.
Wang Mang is a person full of ideals, and the things he looks for must be done in a way. For this reason, Wang Mang is indeed more desperate on the road of restructuring.
However, his reforms were seriously divorced from reality, and in the end not only offended the aristocratic clique, but also completely offended the people, and it is no wonder that he finally lost the world.
Reference: Book of Han