Chapter 1136: Convince
As the Chinese had always been particular about having many children and grandchildren, they had always favored marrying young. This resulted in a speedy increase in the country’s population.
In the past few years, grain production had increased, and the overall standard of living of the people had improved. The population had increased even faster. Just by comparing the poll tax collected by the Ministry of Revenue in the past ten years, one could obtain a general figure.
Great Qi only had a population of 50 million now, but what about ten or 20 years later?
If not for the poll tax, the population growth would probably be even higher.
The poll tax had always been one of the greatest burdens for the common people. If they wanted to abolish the poll tax, they had to first raise the age of marriage and establish a certain concept of birth control. This was so that after the poll tax was abolished, the common people would not give birth even more aggressively.
Naturally, Mu Yangling would not tell Little Treasure that she was aiming to abolish the poll tax and control the population figures. She only listed a tree-shaped set of data of the tenant farmers in her farm. Using this as a reference, she told Little Treasure about the reproduction ability of tenant farmers with low living standards when there was peace and prosperity in the country.
Little Treasure’s eyes widened as he looked at the tree-shaped diagram on the paper. What was a family of four ten years ago had become a family of ten today. Based on this reproduction speed, 20 years later, this family would add at least 36 more people.
Of course, this speed of reproduction didn’t apply to all families, but if even a tenant farmer with poor living conditions was already like this, what about those well-off families?