Revelation! Income and standard of living of Ming officials

When it comes to the income and living standards of ancient officials, many people think that they must be very rich. Such an imagination is mainly influenced by two kinds of literature and historical memory: First, the Tang Dynasty poet Bai Juyi's "Zhumen Wine Smells of Meat", which believes that once a reader becomes an official, he will naturally have a rich income and a rich life; Second, the historical records say that "Tian Lian Que Mo" and "carved beams and painted buildings" concluded that those who were officials must have rich land in their families and have a wide range of houses.

Is this really the case? This may tell the truth about the livelihood of some officials' families, but it is difficult to reflect the full picture of historical truth. If you take the Ming Dynasty officials as an example, there are differences between hot officials and cold officials, rich officials and poor officials, corrupt officials and clean officials, and their income and living standards are also high and low, and the rich and poor are different.

01 / Two major revenue channels for Ming dynasty officials

The income composition of officials in the Ming Dynasty is roughly divided into the following two categories: First, normal income, mainly given to the family; The second is additional income, including normal additional income, as well as gray income and black income.

Ming Dynasty officials were divided into two kinds of withdrawals: true color and folded color. The true color of the payment can be divided into three types: First, "moon rice", which roughly means that each official takes 1 stone per month. This is the basic guarantee for the monthly life of officials. The second is "folded silk rice", that is, folding rice with silk, and the official gives 2 months of each year to fold silk rice, usually 1 horse of silk, and 7 pieces of silver. The third is "folded silver rice", that is, silver folded rice, and 10 months of each year are drawn with folded silver rice.

The number of Ming Dynasty official Lu Mi Feng banknotes was originally determined in the thirteenth year of Hongwu (1380). In the twenty-fifth year of Hongwu, guanlu was re-designated, from the annual feng of ZhengYipin to 1044 stones of rice, all the way to 60 stones of rice per year from Jiupin, which became a generation of customization. The thinness of the officials in the Ming Dynasty can be called the largest in all generations. Judging from the salary, the Ming Dynasty was obviously much lower than that of the Tang dynasty and the five dynasties. According to Yu Shenxing's book "Gushan Bilu", the monthly salary of the Ming Dynasty prime minister (that is, the cabinet university scholar) could not reach half of the five dynasties of the Northern Han Dynasty, which was far from the Tang Dynasty. The salaries of the cabinet university cadets are still so thin, and the salaries of those lower-level officials are even more low. According to Lü Kun's "Groaning Language", the monthly grain of the cangguan is only 1 stone; The money of the eunuch is only 7 taels of silver a year. Such a low official salary, even inferior to the work and food of ordinary yamen service personnel, will inevitably lead to the embarrassment of these lower-level officials who are "not enough to feed."

In order to maintain a decent life for officials, the Ming court had to give officials some additional allowances in addition to the regular salaries. Although in the Ming Dynasty there was no such thing as "raising incorruptible silver", the purpose of these allowances was to allow local officials to "raise incorruptible". The allowances for officials in the Ming Dynasty mainly included the following three items: First, travel allowances, including the "Daoli fee" when officials took office and the "plate fee" for local officials during the Hajj. The number of "Daoli fei" and its rank are roughly 50 taels of silver for the prefect, 35 taels of silver for zhizhou, and 30 taels of silver for zhixian. The "plate fee" of local hajj officials is as much as 100 taels of silver on the long road, and 50 taels to 60 taels of silver in the near distance. The second is firewood and silver. In fact, this "firewood salary" allowance is often more than the official's monthly salary. For example, on September 28, the twenty-first year of the Wanli Calendar (1593), Feng Mengzhen happened to be serving as the Guozijian of Nanjing, and on this day, he received only 1.78 taels per month. As for the "firewood silver", two items were received, of which the rated firewood silver was 3.6 taels, and the winter firewood silver plus the leap month firewood silver totaled more than 13 taels. The third is "giving silver to silver". For example, Li Leren in Fujian province according to the cha si you, as usual, every day there are 3 silver coins, a total of 9 taels per month.

The additional income of officials in the Ming Dynasty was divided into two categories: normal additional income and abnormal additional income. In terms of normal additional income, Ming officials could roughly obtain the following kinds of income: First, gifts from various names in the imperial court, especially from the ministers of the dynasty, received relatively more rewards. The second is to give officials "saving money," which is a subsidized income for officials during the festival. This kind of saving money is also known as "banquet money". Third, local officials can withdraw "groom silver", similar to transportation allowances. Fourth, the official's business trip allowance is equivalent to the official's travel allowance. Fifth, officials were given the right to get the right arch silver from the imperial court and erect arches in their hometowns. For example, after Tang Shunzhi entered the army, he once obtained 100 taels of silver from the local government according to the custom.

There were roughly two types of abnormal additional income for officials in the Ming Dynasty: First, legal additional income. Most of the additional income from the legitimacy of Ming officials came from the communicative reception of gifts in the official field. For example, officials from various provinces who enter Beijing and enter The province is required to give away "Changyi and Changfu", the number of which is sometimes as high as "three or five hundred gold", that is, 300 taels to 500 taels of silver. Second, the additional income from the violation of the law. The additional income of Ming officials who violated the law was obviously quite rich, and it already accounted for most of the income of Ming officials. This type of additional income mainly comes from the following aspects: First, it increases additional income through bribery. According to the custom of the Ming Dynasty, whenever the hajj is held, local prefects and officials at or above the county level "must enter Beijing with one or two thousand gold, send them to the various gates, and make some envoy fees." According to the estimation of The Late Ming Dynasty Chen Zilong's "AnyaTang Manuscript" Volume 10, a Zhi County that only has jurisdiction over a hundred miles, from the identity of the cloth to the official worship of the imperial history and the matter, the cost is at least about a few thousand taels of silver. These unprovoked deficits cannot be paid for by government and county officials, and finally they are made up by paying bribes and so on. The second is to increase additional income through encroachment. Taking Yixing County as an example, according to Tang Shunzhi's revelation, in order to serve the food and drink of county officials, the local people "have a hundred years of gold", that is, they will reach 100 taels of silver per year. The third is to increase additional income through extortion and expropriation. According to the revelation of the holy decree issued by Emperor Mingxianzong in the fifteenth year of Chenghua (1479), most of the internal and external officials who managed the nine gates of the capital and the various pumping factories in Tongzhou at that time did not comply with the law, and took those chai rice and other items that should not have been taxed, "all of them were arbitrarily extracted, or sent people to scatter and stop them, and they took money and property by chance." This is true in Beijing, and the place is no exception. Taking Shaanxi's Xutuo County Kepai vehicles and cattle mules as an example, as many as 300 or 400 vehicles are sent every year, which is converted into silver prices, which is equivalent to the average number of silver in a county. The silver two of these sects eventually fell into Zhi County's private pocket.

02 / Three characteristics of the income of officials in the Ming Dynasty

A careful analysis of the family income of Ming Dynasty officials can be found in the following three characteristics: First, the official salaries are low and thin, and there is an overall downward trend. In the Ming Dynasty, officials first folded rice with banknotes, then folded banknotes with cloth, and finally there were examples of folding silver. It is precisely because the official style has changed from the true color to the folded color that the official salary of the Ming Dynasty is the most inferior compared with the previous dynasties. Especially in the process of actual distribution and withdrawal, because of the "huge number of state uses", the state's financial revenue has been reduced, and the officials have been given, "shi zhun is saved six or seven, and the income is not paid for." Of course, the so-called low officialdom is only relatively speaking. If compared with ordinary people, the income of officials is actually more abundant. For example, a soldier Shangshu, his monthly salary is as high as 60 stones, and a soldier's monthly food is only 1 stone, that is, Shangshu's income is 60 times that of soldiers.

Second, there are some differences in the number of officials' salaries due to their official qualities and regions. Officials of high rank and high rank; The grade is low, and the rice is low. This is the institutional provision. In particular, some officials who were favored by the emperor even took several copies of the qilu because of their part-time jobs. For example, in the first month of the first year of Hong Xi (1425), Yang Shiqi was concurrently appointed as a soldier shangshu in addition to the second position of young fu and cabinet university scholar. According to the will of Emperor Akihito, Yang Shiqi could pay three parts at the same time. Later, due to Yang Shiqi's strong resignation, he changed to withdrawing two copies of Feng Lu. In addition, the Ming Dynasty's officials in the north and south of the two capitals reflected the basic characteristics of the north being high and the south being low. For example, the principals of the various ministries in Nanjing can support 3 stones per month, while the principals of the ministries in Beijing can pay 4.5 stones per month, and the folding is also different.

Third, the additional income of officials is significantly higher than that of basic income. As far as the income of officials is concerned, the officials of the Ming Dynasty are meager, but the additional income is very high. The comparison between the basic income of Ming Dynasty officials who were mainly "Lu Feng" and the additional income obtained by means of "greed", as Cao YuChen said, those who became officials, their Lu Feng "originally limited", even if "officials to Huangtang", such a high official position, a year's salary is only 200 taels of silver. However, by classifying the money and property that was originally prohibited by law for private use as "fire consumption" and "stolen punishment", or by using more "twilight money", that is, many bribes of money, the additional income they obtained obviously far exceeded that of the officials. According to Han Lin's records, after Zhixian Zhishi, he checked his "sac", which was roughly 5,000 taels of silver, plus the "golden color" equivalent to 1,000 taels of silver, for a total of 6,000 taels of silver. Even if you have been an official for 10 years, your salary is only 450 taels of silver. If the 10-year income is taken as the calculation standard, then the additional income of 6,000 taels of silver accumulated by Zhixian County is 1233% more than that of the official, that is, more than 123 times that of the official.

03 / How much did the daily expenses of Ming officials cost?

How much did the daily expenses of Ming officials really cost? This is obviously a question worth pondering. The record of the Ming Dynasty Li Le's "Miscellaneous Records of Observations and Stories" provides us with an example that can be specifically analyzed. When Li Le was in charge of the fujian province and went out to inspect the localities, within a month, the expenses of fish, meat, and vegetables in the government totaled more than 2 taels of silver. This may not include the living expenses of the family. It can be seen that the basic living expenses of a local official to maintain are more than 2 taels of silver per month, and about 24 taels of silver are needed a year. This is only the living expenses of local officials, if it is in the capital, known as the "land of guiyu", all things are expensive, coupled with all kinds of necessary entertainment expenses, the official's family consumption will obviously be much higher. According to Wang Shizhen's "Records of Yao Bu Yao", the consumption of officials in the capital, even if they are quite frugal, requires nearly 100 taels of silver per year; If you are not thrifty, it is as high as 600-700 silver per year. According to Li Yanyan's "Records of the Old Sayings of Southern Wu", a slightly ordinary reader, a family of eight, needed to spend about 50 taels of silver to maintain a year's livelihood in the capital.

There is a misleading prejudice that must be clarified, that is, once you enter the career, you can become rich and prosperous. Not really. In the ming dynasty' group of officials, the phenomenon of the division between the rich and the poor also began to appear. The division between the rich and the poor among ming officials obviously depended on the sublime character of officials, that is, between the big officials and the minor officials, the living conditions were very different. From this, it is the polarization of the family livelihood of Ming dynasty officials: First, the family is rich. According to He Liangjun's "Four Friends Zai Cong", among the groups of officials in Songjiang Province, such as Song Kai, Yu Shi Suen, jiang kai, tao ji, and wu zhe, the chief minister, all of them "accumulated more than 100,000 yuan" in their homes. The family capital is as high as more than 100,000 taels of silver, which is obviously quite rich. Even the new jinshi, either because of their family's original seal or because they catered to the extravagant trend of the officialdom, have lived a luxurious life. Most of these officials already believed that a life of luxury could be sustained through later official careers. In other words, an official's status can be exchanged for a rich livelihood. The second is to clean up the family. Among the officials of the Ming Dynasty, there were indeed many people whose livelihoods were still in a state of poverty. The family livelihood of Ming Dynasty officials was not always a scene of "Zhumen wine and meat smell". According to Tan Qian's "Journey to the North", Xue Guoguan, a cabinet scholar of the Chongzhen Dynasty, was said to be the most extreme of a human subject, but when he was raided, the wealth he confiscated was only "six hundred gold", that is, 600 taels of silver. In addition, the house where Xue Guoguan lived, there were only three living rooms, and the living room was only four, and they were all "worldly property", that is, the real estate handed down from the ancestors. For another example, Wei Dazhong, a member of the Donglin Party, under the general custom of accepting the tricks of rich households in Jiangnan, never accepted donations and strange gifts from others, and from Dengke and even Zhangyuan, his family only had 25 acres of land. As for those Qing officials who are exemplary officials, they are all poor, and the examples are everywhere.

It is worth noting that since the middle of the Ming Dynasty, many new officials have been trapped in a dilemma, and even led to the prevalence of "Beijing debt". Taking guanzheng jinshi as an example, according to Li Tingji's superiors in the thirty-second year of the Wanli calendar (1604), when they were candidates for government, their livelihood was quite "empty", and they even had to "claim loans" to others. As for the officials who were candidates for the last posts in the capital, they were even more destitute, and many even relied on being tailors to survive. In order to repay this debt, after the officials took office, in addition to "peeling off", they could only "borrow treasury silver to pay it off". Ming officials were greedy and bribe-seeking, and even exploited the people for their reasons. There is no doubt that whether it is a poor official, a cold official, or a Qing official, the family livelihood of Ming Dynasty officials can only be called "poverty", but in fact there is a big difference between it and the "poverty" of ordinary people. In other words, the poverty of officials' livelihoods is a relative impoverishment, sometimes even caused by the habit of "crying poor" among literati and doctors. What followed was the internal differentiation of the happy spirit of Ming Dynasty officials: some officials still adhered to the "joy of Kong Yan", did not admire the outside world with poverty, did not move in the middle with wealth, and were able to achieve poverty and happiness; Other officials turned to "full happiness" based on "dissatisfaction" and even abandoned official morality in order to have fun in time.

Source: People's Forum magazine in July, original title: Income and Living Standards of Ming Dynasty Officials

Author: Professor Chen Baoliang, School of History and Culture, Southwest University

EDIT: Shallow

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