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Text 1041. The Tang Dynasty in Western Eyes (2)

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    In recent years, the Tang Dynasty gradually began to resume trade and business exchanges with Western countries. Some Western businessmen who were unwilling to be second-rate traders also came to the Eastern Datang Dynasty, and they all settled in Chang'an.  As for these Western businessmen, they can say more or less, and they are mainly people from the Eastern Roman Empire.  Therefore, with the same culture and race, they were able to take the initiative to form a group and then set up a club specifically to receive Westerners.  And they, Western businessmen, get together from time to time to discuss business coming to their door and talk about some interesting things. Anyway, it is a place for businessmen to exchange business.  And this situation is actually normal, after all, humans like to stick together.  Just like when the Chinese later went abroad, they spontaneously formed Chinatowns as a gathering place for Chinese people.  The same is true for people from other countries. As long as they go abroad, they will find ways to contact people in their own country and then help each other together.  Of course, this must be done when there are enough overseas Chinese. If there are not many overseas Chinese, it will be another matter.  Of course, this also changes with regional differences.  If they are from the same country, then people from the same province will stick together.  If you go abroad, you will become a group of people from the same country.  Even if people on earth one day go into the universe, then all human beings on the earth will unite.  So this group of Westerners came to the East, and they were mainly people from the Eastern Roman Empire, so they could naturally gather together.  And now they are discussing matters about the Tang Dynasty. After all, they are too impressed by this Eastern Empire.  "We are now in the capital of this ancient empire, called Chang'an. When I was in Rome, I never thought that there would be such a huge city in the world. And when I was in the Roman Empire, I just heard  It is said that the population of our capital, Constantinople, reached its peak a hundred years ago, reaching 500,000, but it is now declining because our officials cannot manage such a large population at all.  It¡¯s already 800,000, and if it doesn¡¯t take more than ten years, it will probably exceed one million. It¡¯s really hard to imagine how this ancient country in the East can manage a city with a population of one million!¡± This guy is right.  In fact, Constantinople in the West actually already has hundreds of thousands of people. Almost a hundred years ago, it had a population of 500,000.  However, they later restricted the development of the population because the officials in Constantinople simply did not have the ability to manage a population of millions.  The pressure on their population of half a million is already great, so they have to release the population and finally gradually reduce the population.  But Chang'an is different. Chang'an can actually manage a population of more than 500,000. Even the city of Chang'an is still devouring more and more people.  Obviously, he won¡¯t give up even if it¡¯s less than one million.  So this is what everyone is amazed about, because the Chinese can actually manage a city with a population of millions, which is amazing.  And they have no idea that this is actually related to China's bureaucracy. Although many people will criticize the ancient bureaucracy in later generations, to the ancients, most dynasties of China's bureaucracy were at the forefront of the world.  Forefront.  China's bureaucracy is actually a great invention of China, which has evolved and become increasingly perfect over thousands of years.  Many people criticize ancient bureaucrats.  But that was because they enjoyed the benefits of a more advanced bureaucracy in later generations, so they looked down on the ancient bureaucracy.  However, it cannot be denied that China has a better bureaucracy at the same time.  Because of a good bureaucracy, China's urban management can reach its peak.  A city capable of accommodating millions of people.  "It is rich in products and has many things that we in the West need. We need almost everything. Porcelain, silk, tea, and countless other things that we need, and these things are in short supply in the West. And the food output in the East  It is also very high. All kinds of food and daily necessities are also very complete, which is much better than in our Roman Empire. As long as you have money, you can buy many things, and you almost don¡¯t have to worry about not being able to buy them.  The life of an ordinary person here is almost comparable to that of a small aristocrat in the West. Every common person has his own land and can produce his own land.  There is not much land at all!¡± This merchant from the Roman Empire also saw that China was rich in products, but his contemporaries in the West did not have them. In fact, this was the trade gap between the West and the East.  The West needs too many things from the East, but the East does not need many things from the West.  The West exchanges all kinds of gold, silver, and luxury gems for silk tea and other things from the East.  In this case, the East and the West have always been in a trade deficit situation, but the East has a surplus, while the West has a deficit.  When?People of this era simply cannot understand the advantages and disadvantages of trade surplus and trade deficit.  In the Tang Dynasty, only Jing Wen could know the pros and cons of trade differences.  But now Jing Wen knows that the trade gap is actually good for him, that is, it can bring a large inflow of gold and silver.  Datang currently adopts the copper standard system, and everything is based on copper coins.  The amount of gold and silver was too small. Although Jingwen also minted some gold and silver coins, these gold and silver coins were still not the mainstream in the market.  It would be best if gold and silver from the West could flow in in large quantities.  Historically, gold and silver could truly be monetized. That was because a large amount of silver continued to flow into China during the Western Age of Discovery. Therefore, silver was later able to be monetized during the Ming and Qing Dynasties.  However, China does not currently have a lot of silver, and if it wants to monetize it, it still needs to be exchanged through a large amount of trade.  And this kind of trade between the East and the West means plundering the gold and silver from the West through trade.  This is something that Jing Wen's superficial economics can see. Anyway, now the trade surplus is still of great benefit to China.  In recent years, Jing Wen not only did not come forward to suppress foreign trade, but also subsidized foreign trade merchants and asked them to bring gold and silver resources to the bank.  (To be continued, please search Piaotian Literature, the novel will be better and updated faster!
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