Q: I watched "Qingpingle" in the past two days. Please edit to talk about the GDP of the Song Dynasty. According to statistics, it accounts for 80% of the world economy. Is it true?
文 / 言九林
There are many sayings about the GDP of the Song Dynasty in the Chinese world.
The most common are two. One said that the GDP of the Song Dynasty accounted for 80% of the world, and the other said that it accounted for more than 60% of the world. Some "slightly more rigorous" articles and works combine the two and say that they account for 60%-80% of the world.
These two data are not credible.
"Accounting for 80% of the world", the source is no longer available, and there is no academic and historical basis. Its widespread dissemination is related to the CCTV "Hundred Schools Forum" a program about Song History. In the show, the narrator introduced this data and was positive about it.
"Accounting for more than 60% of the world" is a misunderstanding.
British economist Angus Maddison, in his book "Millennium History of the World Economy", there is a statistic calculated using purchasing power conversion, which is believed to be around 1000 AD (which coincides with the Northern Song Dynasty in China). During the period), the GDP of Asia (excluding Japan) is 78.9 billion international dollars, and the GDP of the entire world is 116.8 billion international dollars. The former is equivalent to about 67% of the latter (see the figure below).
Some people take it for granted that Asia, which does not include Japan, is mainly the Northern Song Dynasty, so there is a saying that "the GDP of the Song Dynasty accounted for more than 60% of the world."
As everyone knows, the above table in the text is just a brief table.
In the "Appendix B" of the book, Madison has a more detailed statement-he divided the "Asia (excluding Japan)" area into China, India and other Asian countries (regions) ) Three parts.
According to this attached table, China’s GDP scale is 26.55 billion international yuan, which only accounts for 22.7% of the world’s GDP; India accounts for 28.9%.
Another thing to note is that Maddison’s statistics are "China", not "Northern Song Dynasty". In his book, he determined the population of China around 1000 AD as 59 million. It is generally believed that the population of the Northern Song Dynasty in 980 AD was approximately 32.5 million; of the 59 million, apparently the population of Liao, Xixia, and Dali were also included.
That is to say, if Maddison’s calculation is used as the basis, then, around 1000 AD, the proportion of the total GDP of the Northern Song Dynasty in the world is less than 22.7%.
In addition, Madison also has a data comparison on "Per Capita GDP". Through purchasing power conversion, he concluded: In 960 AD, when the Northern Song Dynasty was founded, China's per capita GDP was equivalent to US$450 in 1990, slightly higher than that of Europe during the same period.
is shown in the figure below:
Unfortunately, because it cannot bring the pleasure of blood pressure, Maddison’s data is rarely cited by Chinese intellectuals. The most widely spread statement is the unfounded "North Song Dynasty GDP per capita reached US$2280."
Of course, China started to count GDP in the 1980s. Maddison’s above statistics are an academic estimate made under conditions of very inadequate data, not precise calculations. There are also many scholars who disagree with Maddison's data, but these disagreements will not deviate from 22.7% to 60% or even 80%. The latter cannot be historical facts, but only myth .
In fact, to judge whether the living environment of a dynasty is friendly to the people, there is no need to use concepts such as GDP invented by later generations. The traditional fiscal and taxation system is enough to start with.
In the founding of the Northern Song Dynasty, the taxes paid by the people were actually very high. Zhu Xi said, "At the beginning of the ancestor's business," there are many things that cost money, and the burden on the people is "heavier than the previous generation". Compared with the previous generation, it has reproduced a lot.
During the two Songs and three hundred years, this situation has never been changed. During the Song Renzong era, Bao Zheng said in the memorial: The tax account of the world has not changed much, but the fiscal revenue of the court has more than doubled. Why? It is because the imperial court spends more and more money in recent years, so it has begun to play "changes" and "heavy rates", that is, tax increases in disguise. He asked Song Renzong: "Every day, how poor is there?" When tax increases every day like this, when is the end?
What Bao Zheng said is mainly agricultural tax. The core motivation for tax increases is to feed a huge group of imperial troops and officials. The number of the Forbidden Army in the Northern Song Dynasty was more than 378,000 in the Song Taizu era. By the Song Renzong era, it was as high as 1.25 million (including some local Xiang forces). The contemporary Ouyang Xiu issued the "Seven to eight hundred thousand soldiers, Not to be used by seven to eighty thousand people" with emotion. As for the number of officials, 195,000 redundant officials were cut in 1001 alone; the number of those who have not been reduced is far more than those who have been reduced. In order to feed these nearly two million people, the Northern Song Dynasty’s finances were too early to make ends meet. The income and expenditure calculation of Song Zhenzong’s Tianxi reign was: total expenditure of the world was 150.8501 million, total income was 126.7552 million, and a deficit of 25 million.
During the Song Injong era, Minister Jia Changchao said to the emperor such shocking words:
"I governed a county near Gyeonggi. Three thousand forbidden troops were stationed in the eup, and 10,000 were reserved. The people’s taxes are barely enough to supply them, and the money for the festivals and celebrations has to be spent from the inner bank. Jianghuai sends more than 6 million shi grains to the capital each year, but the import of Jianghuai in a year barely covers the country’s one month’s expenditure. The army occupies two-thirds and excessive food occupies one-third. There is no savings in the state treasury. The world has been without incident for a long time. wealth is neither hidden in the state treasury nor private . Once there is a natural disaster There is war, what should we do?”
There are three thousand forbidden troops, and ten thousand taxpayers can barely support it. Calculated on the basis of 1.25 million forbidden troops, it would take 4.2 million taxpayers to feed them alone. According to the statistics of Song Renzong’s Jiayou eight years (1063), there were only 12.46 million taxpayers in the world. Taking into account the frequent mobilization of the Forbidden Army, the existence of the local Xiang army, and the relatively affluent people in Gyeonggi, it is speculated that the 只 army will consume about half of the taxpayers’ taxation , Not too outrageous.
In this situation, the reason why the Song Dynasty was able to establish a country for three hundred years was because it adopted a different policy in business from the previous generation. Not only did it no longer suppress business, but it even had some mercantile colors. For most of the Song Dynasty, fiscal revenue from industry and commerce exceeded agricultural taxes from acres.
But this does not mean that the Song Dynasty has a good business environment.
"Prohibition income" is the largest commercial income of the Northern Song Dynasty government. The so-called "prohibition of negotiation" is a state monopoly. There are many specific ways to monopolize, either the official property is sold by the official, or the government controls the supply of goods and sells the sales license to private merchants, or private production is allowed, but it must be sold to the government and then sold by the government to the private sector. There are also many types of monopolized commodities, including at least table salt, wine, tea, alum and incense.
The Song Dynasty government implemented the above-mentioned monopoly policy very strictly. Qing Dynasty historian Zhao Yi commented that in the matter of alcohol monopoly, "not as good as the Song Dynasty", and the past dynasties are no better than the Song Dynasty. The typical evil government of salt monopoly occurred in the sixteen states of Yanyun. After the Lianjin eradicate the Liao Dynasty, the Northern Song Dynasty took back part of the sixteen states of Yanyun, and then implemented a new salt law in the area. One hundred and twenty catties of Wende Salt", that is, 11.6 You can buy 1 catty of salt for your money; the Northern Song Dynasty officials immediately activated the salt monopoly policy after taking over the place, "every catty to two hundred and fifty pounds, Or two hundred and eighty literary feet", will raise the salt price to 250-280 literally a pound , which is exactly the same as beforeMore than 20 times.
imposes business tax on private industry and commerce, which is comparable to the amount of "prohibited income". Except for the exemption of agricultural implements and grains from time to time in famine years, almost all items in the production and life of Song people are taxed. Taxes are levied on building a house, taxes are levied on marrying a wife and daughter, and even when going to study abroad. When passing the tax card, the copper and iron money that you carry with you are also taxed. Only paper money is generally not taxed, because the Song Dynasty government likes it very much. Issue paper money at will to solve your own financial difficulties.
In the Southern Song Dynasty, the situation got worse. The court began pre-collection, pre-borrow agricultural tax -pre-collection means that the government will collect this year’s tax and grain as soon as the seedlings are planted; pre-lending is to collect the tax and grain of the next year, the following year, and the following year. At that time, people described the nature of this kind of advance loan as borrowing or not repaying it. If this official borrowed, the next official would never admit it, and it would never say that there would be no grain collection in the next year or the next. There are also many types of commercial taxes, such as total production money, diced silk, diced salt money, folded money, monk free diced money, market money, weighing money, fine wine money, vinegar money, paper money, tax sauce Money, money for fist... Ma Duanlin, who wrote "Tong Kao" in the Song and Yuan Dynasties, said that although he is a witness of the times, he "cannot be ubiquitous, nor can it be ubiquitous." There are too many names for tax collection, and it is true. I can't list them; there are many taxes, I have never heard of them.
During the Song Xiaozong era, a Southern Song merchant who was dying to death, has habitually called the taxing ports and checkpoints everywhere as the killing "field" . Yancha Port in Chizhou is the "big dharma field", Huangzhou in Hubei is the "small dharma field", and Ezhou in Hubei is the "new dharma field". These courts will fabricate non-existent goods for merchants and order them to pay taxes. If they don’t follow suit, it will be difficult to do business here in the future. This method had a name at the time, called "virtual drinking"; Unauthorized changes to the prices and quantities of merchants’ goods and forcing them to pay more taxes are called "spending money." The court promoted paper money in policy, and the court forced merchants to pay taxes with copper coins. If the copper coins were insufficient, they would be detained at low prices to offset them. This method is called "Zhena"; ...
and above are the true living conditions of the Song Dynasty people.
Note
Angus Maddison, "Millennium History of World Economy", Peking University Press, 2003, p. 16.
Ibid., p.259.
Angus Maddison, "The Long-term Performance of China's Economy: 960-2030 AD", Shanghai People's Publishing House, 2008, p. 19.
Zhang Bangwei, "There is no need to beautify the Zhao Song dynasty-Suspects on the peak of the Song Dynasty", Journal of Sichuan Normal University (Social Science Edition), Issue 6, 2011.
Wang Shengduo, "The Financial History of Song Dynasty", Zhonghua Book Company, 1995, pp. 32-33.
"Song History" Volume 179 "Shihuo Zhi. Accounting".
"Three Dynasties Beimenghui" Volume 24.
Chen Zhen, "Song History", Shanghai People's Publishing House, 2016, pages 584-585.
