Fox of France

Chapter 427 , Countermeasures

Although Napoleon took some measures, the economic situation in Europe as a whole continued to deteriorate. Once the bank had problems, none of the other industries could escape. Various factories have also begun to experience the problem of broken capital chains. So the air quality in Paris suddenly improved, and the sky suddenly turned blue. Because in Paris, most of the factories were either underutilized, closed their doors, or even went bankrupt.

A large number of factories went bankrupt, which immediately caused a large number of workers to lose their jobs. To be honest, the living conditions of French workers are considered good in the whole of Europe. But even so, it is impossible for most workers, especially those unskilled workers, to have much savings. Once they lose their jobs, they will immediately face the problem of having nothing to eat. Some factories can't even pay the workers severance pay, they can only let them take some unsold leather shoes from the warehouse and go to the street to jump off the building for a big sale.

As for skilled workers, their income is of course higher, so that they often have a little savings that look good, and some people are even thinking about how much life annuity they can exchange for with these savings. However, during the economic crisis, banks also had major problems, and a large number of banks went bankrupt, so some of the original "middle class" became paupers almost overnight. The so-called "middle class" who look glamorous are almost all naked when the economic tide recedes.

The large number of unemployed people immediately made the law and order in Paris worse, and there were endless thefts and robberies.

The executive government immediately took measures, announcing the issuance of a batch of special national bonds, and called on patriotic businessmen to buy them enthusiastically. Rothschild immediately announced the purchase of special national bonds of at least three million francs. The Bank of Rome even bought 40 million francs of special national bonds in one go.

After the Bank of Rome bought these national bonds, Napoleon took the money to buy a large amount of food from the Veterans Union, and formulated an emergency food distribution plan according to household registration. In the city of Paris, people with registered legal status can receive a little food for free every day. Of course, this amount of food is impossible to feed the whole family, at most it can keep them from starving to death soon. But such a benevolent government is also rare in French history. Therefore, the entire French people are more and more closely united with the ruling government with Napoleon at the core.

"So to buy people's hearts, you can't just let the people live well. People's hearts are and will never be satisfied, they will always want more. On the contrary, if you let them get stuck from time to time, then just need Taking out a few things can make them appreciate Dade. Well, how do you say it? The icing on the cake is not as good as the snow? Well, so Napoleon, you have to remember that if there is no snow, we have to artificially snow from time to time... "When Napoleon showed off to Joseph that his approval rate had risen to nearly 100%, Joseph said to Napoleon.

"You're right, Joseph. But are you sure we won't get away with it? After all, the industrial losses are too great." Napoleon asked again.

"The economic crisis is inevitable. It is independent of human will." Joseph said, "Remember the political economy I told you?"

"Remember. What you said was really eye-opening," Napoleon said.

"This thing must be kept secret. We can't let people see it, understand?"

"Nonsense, how can we keep this horrible thing a secret? Compared with it, Machiavelli is as innocent and pure as a silly girl." Napoleon replied.

What Joseph taught Napoleon was actually not complicated. It was nothing more than an analysis of how overproduction was inevitable under the conditions of a market economy.

"The total price of all commodities in the whole society is equal to the total wages paid for the production of these commodities in this society plus the total profits obtained by enterprises or business owners. As long as the total wages and total profits are not fully invested in consumption, then The total demand must be less than the total supply, and the goods must not be sold. Once there are goods that cannot be sold, producers will reduce wages, lower wages, and demand will shrink further, and then accumulate like this, which is the situation today .Joseph, your explanation is really good. But now, our loss is also great." Napoleon said.

"Wealth and poverty are relative. We lose a lot, and some countries may lose even more. As long as their losses are greater than ours, it is our victory. This is like playing chess. You still expect that a pawn can be defeated without dying." Kill each other?" Joseph laughed, "Besides, we discussed the principles of dealing with the economic crisis together before, do you still remember?"

"It's nothing more than seizing new markets to increase demand. Or eliminate part of the supply, preferably others' supply, so that they can give us the market. Well, the second method, the most direct means, is war. But Joseph You don't seem to be looking forward to the war very much," said Napoleon.

"I just hope to go to war after being more certain. I don't want to get caught up in a security war." Joseph said, "The situation of the British is worse than ours. We started this crisis, and the harvested wheat is all into our granary. Hehe, many of them are British wheat. With this wheat, we can still maintain it by means of welfare. But the British who have all the wheat taken away by us, they can Do you want to pay us benefits like this?"

"It's not impossible." Napoleon said, "but if they really plan to play like this, we can last longer than them. What's more, we can let them spend money in other places. We will Some unemployed people are recruited into the army to expand the size of the army, and then we use these troops to do some public works. It can be regarded as cash for work. On the other hand, our sudden expansion of the army will surely scare the British to death. We have to expand the army quickly, and then, wouldn’t they have even less money?”

Napoleon had the confidence to do this. This confidence comes from the fact that a lot of British wheat has been harvested in the market. During the railway mania, many foreign capitals invested in French railways, and there were also many British capitals. Now the wheat is in Napoleon's granary. But there is another thing that gave Napoleon more confidence, and that is gold from North America.

In the original history, in 1847, a very serious economic crisis occurred, which almost shook the entire capitalist world. And brought a series of political consequences: the French rebuilt the republic; the Prussians used uprisings to force the king to establish a parliament; and in Austria, when the revolutionary people shouted, Metternich fled in panic in a woman's attire. Of course, these are just appetizers, and more importantly, even more terrible: in 1848, a brand new political party issued its own programmatic document-"Communist Manifesto"! And openly called for the use of revolutionary means to bury the entire capitalism.

The revolutionary situation was great, the revolutionary forces...but the revolution of 1848 suddenly disappeared, not even as a result of reactionary repression, but because of the discovery of open pit gold mines in San Francisco in 1848.

These gold mines are located far away from the Emperor Tiangao, and the burial is shallow. Mining is convenient, so even the poor can go to gold. This is the history of the gold rush. At that time, if a merchant ship was parked in a North American port, the captain would find out early the next morning that his ship could no longer sail because all the sailors had resigned and went to pan for gold.

According to the thinking of some Confucian masters, gold is a thing that "can't eat when hungry, and can't clothes when cold", and it is of no great use. But in a market economy, this is not the case. Because gold is naturally currency, and what is currency? Money is demand! If the gold falls into the hands of the rich, at most it is used to build a gold coin swimming pool; but most of the gold diggers are poor people, and the gold in their hands is real purchasing power. So because of these open-pit gold mines, the economic crisis was alleviated or even eliminated, and the revolution naturally ended without a problem.

Today, these gold mines are under French control and are mined secretly under the watchful eye of the French Gold Troops. In the hands of the French government, there is a large, unknown gold reserve. But these golds still belong to the country, and this gold can be used to carry out infrastructure construction all the time. By the way, the owner of this gold has changed from theoretically the entire French people to a military-industrial complex and become sacred and inviolable. of private property. Relying on this batch of gold, Napoleon could tell other countries, especially the British, without hesitation: "You must be the first one who can't hold on to welfare!"

Of course, it’s not time to use those gold yet, at least we have to wait until the British can’t hold it anymore and have to create tariff barriers, and then the French will fight back with tariff barriers. Otherwise, if you give benefits to those people here, they will use the benefits you gave to buy British goods. Isn't that like spending money to help the British?

In later generations, Amei Youkan’s auto industry once encountered a problem of declining sales. In order to help the auto industry, Amei Youkan gave benefits to car buyers and provided particularly cost-effective car loans. Then, Amei, the consumers you see first go to receive welfare benefits, and then go to buy cheap and high-quality Japanese cars.

Or maybe Ou Meng in later generations also lent money to the common people for a lot of benefits. He originally expected the common people to buy products produced in Europe. Unexpectedly, those common people are not good people. Rabbit Country" products will explode, but once I got the benefits, I still bought things from the little rabbits, and then said: "It smells so good!"

Therefore, in the absence of tariff barriers, if the benefits are distributed indiscriminately, they may make wedding clothes for others.

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