Chapter 451: The City of Nocturnal Nights
Chapter 441: The City of No Night
Christmas Eve 1868, it was a memorable day, a night that kicked off a new era for mankind.
August is an ordinary citizen of Vienna, the changes in Vienna over the years, another overwhelmed, as if in a dream.
With the children at home, looking at the bright street lights, this is the best gift of Christmas.
“Father is this an electric light, why is it so bright?”
Hearing his son’s question, August didn’t know where to start. There was no internet in this era, and the dissemination of knowledge all depended on books.
Even though August’s education was not low, his specialty was not the right one. As a doctor, he does not need to study the electric light, naturally, he could not answer this question.
Not only him, not many people in Vienna know why. Vienna is not an industrial city, there are engaged in this research studio, but there is no factory to produce such products.
Vienna is a landlocked city, but also the capital, a collection of political centers, financial centers, cultural centers, scientific research centers, educational centers in one.
With so many titles attached to it, it really can’t add another industrial center. Otherwise the soaring population is capable of crushing this beautiful city.
From Franz’s succession to the present, only twenty years, Vienna’s population has tripled, and is still growing at a high rate of 8%.
This is obviously not natural growth, if the natural population growth rate is this fast, then the unification of the world is not a dream.
Even with the closure of the factories, as the capital of two empires, Vienna still had a huge influx of people every year.
Population growth was the driving force behind the city’s development, and to this day, Vienna is the most prosperous and beautiful city in the world, bar none.
Per capita income has jumped to the top of the world’s list, and Paris and London can’t match it, although their economies are also very advanced, but the large number of workers pulls down the average.
This is the reason why Vienna was able to take the lead as the city that never sleeps. The people of Vienna have been able to afford the cost of lighting in a way that other cities have not been able to.
Electricity was not cheap in these days, as long as the middle class and the rich could afford it. An average worker’s yearly income was not enough for the power company to open an account.
Since the breakthrough of the large-scale generator technology in 1866, power companies have been springing up in Austria. If any city doesn’t have an electric company, it must be a small city.
Now every city in Austria with a population of more than 100,000 has a power company settled in, or at least a branch.
As a new energy industry, the Vienna government has been supporting, and now is the golden time for power companies to encircle the land.
Unfortunately, the cost is still high, and it has not been possible to realize universal penetration. The biggest obstacle to the popularization of electricity is not the cost of power generation, but the cost of wires, or copper and rubber.
Even if the utilization rate is low, how can a kilogram of coal generate one degree of electricity? Coal in Austria is not worth much, and power generation is not picky, so any coal can be used.
The cost of generating electricity alone is no more than five groschen per kilowatt-hour, but when delivered to the home, the price of a kilowatt-hour of electricity becomes eight shillings, a full 159-fold increase.
(1 rupiah = 100 shillings = 10,000 groschen).
It can’t be helped that the number of users is small and the cost of wires is high, plus the amortization costs naturally go up.
The most direct benefit of the new energy development is: in the economic crisis of a depression, Austria’s copper refining industry and rubber industry growth against the market.
Numerous enterprises in the relevant industry chain benefited from this, and at least 500 million guilders were driven to the market, contributing to the strength of Austria’s economic recovery.
Touching his son’s little head, August lovingly said, “This problem, I don’t know, I need my little scientist to personally study it.”
Vienna’s academic atmosphere is still very strong, scientists in Austria’s social status is very high, especially out of Franz this keen to give scientists knighthood after the emperor, but also sought after by all sectors of society.
Of course the knighthood is not so good to get, every year there is not always a quota. Franz is a realist, before seeing the results, even if it is blown out of proportion, he will not pay attention to it.
It didn’t hurt that it still didn’t stop the populace from being enthusiastic. August was no exception, always directing his son’s interests toward scientific research.
Apparently, the little guy wasn’t so bought in, shaking his head a bit and saying, “No, the lab is too boring. How can it compare to galloping across the world, my ambition is to become a great soldier.”
Looking at his hand-waving son, August could only accept this reality helplessly. Not being a schoolteacher, wanting to become a scientist was too difficult, becoming a soldier was also a good choice.
The tradition of the German region was strong, and becoming a great soldier was the goal of most people.
Don’t look at August as a doctor, he had actually been a soldier, only to have retired.
In the universal military service system, basically every adult male, enters the military service. Men who have not served in the military are easily discriminated against in society.
Nowadays, the service rate in Austria is still as high as 95%, and the remaining five percent is naturally a remnant. Ordinary people, even if they cannot enter the regular army, will enter the reserve.
It’s not just an obligation, it’s a right for everyone, legally defined: every citizen has the right and duty to defend the country, and the right to military service is one of the civil rights.
It’s not Franz’s pot, it’s the core of the Austrian constitution that dictates this: rights and duties are equal.
Failure to perform military service also means failure to fulfill the right and duty to defend the country, and naturally the loss of political rights, including a range of social benefits.
The social benefits are not large enough to see much of an impact yet, not in the future.
Unemployment assistance and pensions are now on the agenda. Napoleon III set the precedent and Franz had to follow suit.
Just as Austria was the first to enact labor protection laws, they are now standard in all European countries, including the Russian Empire.
In this respect, the proletariat in Europe is still very strong in battle. Everyone is very active in fighting for their rights.
The main reason for the delay in the passage is the burden on business. To increase these two expenditures, it is natural that taxes will have to be raised, or else there will be no money to pay for what?
Napoleon III will lose the throne is not surprising, later generations buckle in his head, most of the hat is false, the real reason is only one: capitalists bitter Napoleon III for a long time.
Socialist emperors come at a price, and are definitely not something to be glossed over in the history books. Whether it’s remodeling Paris or improving the welfare of the working class, all of this takes money.
Economic growth increased tax revenues, but it was also accompanied by increased spending. When Napoleon III succeeded to the throne, France had a deficit of 1 billion francs.
Now, not only has the deficit been wiped out, but there is still room for workers’ benefits, which can’t be paid for by printing money.
The problem can be seen in the changes in taxation before and after his accession to the throne. Orléans dynasty period of big capitalists bear the payment of taxes, less than one percent of the fiscal revenue, now has more than thirty percent of the fiscal revenue.
Whether it is unemployment assistance or retirement pensions, the money comes out of the capitalists’ pockets.
Just by looking at the establishment of the two central banks of France, the Crédit Agricole and the Crédit Chattel, as well as the establishment of the Crédit Agricole in Paris and in the provinces, one can see how much meat was cut out of the pockets of the financial capitalists.
Not forgetting the lessons of the past, Franz was doing the same thing, and even going further. Only the Austrian capitalists were not able to fight, and politically they were suppressed to death by the nobles.
In order to reduce the pressure, Franz was irregularly integrating the big capitalists. No matter how much power they had, when these people became part of the ruling class, their class position changed.
It was impossible to expect them to take the rights they had acquired through hard work and share them with their former bourgeois companions.
Capitalists and capitalists are naturally opposed to each other, and competition has torn this group apart. As long as monopoly consortia are not allowed to emerge, this group will not have the strength to fight against the government.
……
The Christmas Eve of 1868 left a shocking scene in this era, when the “city that never sleeps”, a scene that existed in science fiction, became a reality in Vienna.
The telegraph was one of the greatest inventions of the 19th century, and thanks to its high speed of transmission, the news “Vienna = the city that never sleeps” grabbed the front pages of European newspapers the following day.
The following day, the news of “Vienna = City of Night” grabbed the front pages of European newspapers. This Christmas, the European public saw only one “City of Night”.
Electric lighting has long appeared in the European continent, but let a city light up, many people do not even dare to think.
In fact, Vienna is not all lit up, only the installation of street lights, many residents are still home oil lamp lighting.
Newspapers naturally will not explain these issues in detail, a direct pass, so that everyone in Europe take for granted that Vienna has popularized electric lighting.
Small countries to watch the fun on the line, everyone’s mind is good, Vienna was originally the richest city in Europe, the first to become a city that never sleeps is also very normal.
Fell in the eyes of some people will be different, for the British and French people in this era, this will not be able to tolerate.
London
(End of chapter)