Chapter 538: Food = Labor Force
Chapter 526 Food = Labor
London, affected by the plummeting food prices in the country, the capitalists who had originally contracted with the Russians were not prepared to fulfill their contracts.
An explicit breach of contract is definitely not an option, not only is it against British law, but it also involves diplomatic issues.
Moreover, the grain purchase money was used to pay off the Russians’ domestic bank debts. If they defaulted on their loans, the Russians could legally renege on their debts, and the bankers would not agree to this.
Take rye as an example, the price of rye in the British market now is about 6 to 7.5 pounds per ton, but the contract signed with the Russians agreed on a price as high as 9.1 pounds per ton.
This means that not only can they not make money on this deal, but they have to lose money on it.
Of course, even at £ 9.1 per ton, these capitalists will not lose money. The added value of the products after processing was completed was still enough to offset these differences.
Qualified capitalists, however, are certainly not willing to take this loss, which means they will earn £1.5 to £3 less per ton of rye.
It seems that this figure is insignificant, if it is enlarged to tens of thousands of tons, hundreds of thousands of tons, it is an astronomical figure.
It’s hard to beat the capitalists when they can’t just renege on the debt. This is what MPs do, and guiding public opinion is a good way to do it. In short, it is necessary to find a reasonable and legitimate reason to renege on the debt.
The anti-Russian wave is high, and this is not a good thing for the Gerston cabinet, which has just taken office.
The “pound – gold system” to lay the hegemony of the currency, if this time to force the Russians out, will immediately be knocked back to the original form.
The last government nearly lost the election on the basis of this achievement. If they hadn’t rehashed old scores in time and encouraged the families of soldiers killed in the Anglo-Boer War to cause trouble, it’s possible that Gerston wouldn’t have been able to move into Downing Street.
Casually threw away the newspaper in his hand, Gerston Prime Minister chattered and complained: “Damn the egg, go away are not peaceful, but also left us such a bomb!”
This kind of thing is very common when there is a change of government. Everyone is a member of the Conservative Party and the Liberal Party respectively, and politically they are innately antagonistic, and their identity determines their position.
If you don’t pit Gerston, how can you make your party win in the later general election? If it were easy, Gerston would probably make the same choice.
It was all within the rules of the game anyway, and the mess left behind by Benjamin’s cabinet was perfectly in line with the law. There’s nothing Gerston can do about it except report it in private, and he can’t even blame the last term with this issue.
“Prime Minister, the biggest problem right now isn’t those people out there or that group of MPs, it’s that the capitalists don’t want to perform.
With the current price of food, under the treaty with the Russians, they could be making millions of pounds less per year, which is not a small amount even when spread out.
What’s more crucial is that it’s not just for one year, but for five consecutive years. If something goes wrong in the middle of such a long period, they will be replaced.”
As he spoke, Finance Minister Laluke Lloyd picked up the newspaper on the ground, folded it twice, and then tore it up and threw it into the trash can.
Obviously, he was not as relaxed as he appeared to be. Trying to get the capitalists to back down in the face of interests, this was too difficult.
Even if the government wanted to take action, it couldn’t find an excuse. From beginning to end these people are hiding behind the curtain, and those charging outside are the peasants who have been agitated.
Everyone attributed the plunge in grain prices to the Anglo-Russian grain loan agreement, believing it to be the aftermath of the government’s interference in the market.
Obviously, it was their predecessor’s political achievement, but now they are required to clean up the mess. It is still the kind of work for which there is no credit for doing a good job and for which they will be scolded if they do not do a good job.
After calming down a bit, Prime Minister Gerston sat back on his butt and asked, “What do they want? A breach of contract is out of the question, and right now we still need the Russians.”
The sterling hegemony system had just been established, and the Russians’ gold standard reform, which had only just kicked off, was not able to roll over until they had completely bound the Russians.
This would take at least five or six years of work, and therefore the Anglo-Russian loans lasted for five years, and it was through loans that the London government bound the Russians. You can’t call it a loan, it’s more aptly described as a grain trading contract.
Compared to the huge benefits of monetary hegemony, the losses of these grain capitalists are not worth mentioning. In spite of this political achievement, which was largely taken away by the previous one, Gholston is still going on.
Otherwise the bankers in this country will send him to God. Don’t think that only the United States is in the habit of assassinating presidents, the capitalists in Britain are equally daring.
Only now the British aristocracy still has a certain power, the capitalists have not been able to fully control the government, or roundabout work, this group of food capitalists will not do.
The era of great monopoly is approaching, not far from the time of the capitalists’ great outbreak, and when one consortium after another is established, it will completely enter the era of oligarchy.
Comparatively speaking, the British prime ministers of this era are still happy. When it comes to the age of oligarchy, politics is reduced to a game of capital, and that is the real tragedy.
“They want the government to fund and eat the grain, following Austria’s example of establishing a strategic grain reserve. Theoretically there is no problem, Britain is just an island nation with limited grain production itself, and it is not a big problem to reserve a batch of grain.”
Britannia in this era was at its peak, and wealthy is the best way to describe them.
Even though the London government was already in debt because of the war, they were not panicked at all.
The huge wealth brought by the colonies was enough for them to cope with the situation easily, and they even had money left over to build up a strategic reserve system.
Gerston didn’t object, even though he didn’t see the need for Britain to establish a strategic grain reserve, he wasn’t going to stop everyone from getting rich.
Britannia’s most prosperous era was likewise the most corrupt. Once this kind of big project was pushed forward, it would bring rolling wealth.
Gerston smiled blandly, placing his hands on the table palm facing the sky, “If they can convince Congress to appropriate the funds, I have no problem with it.”
Obviously this is impossible, if there is certainty to persuade Congress to allocate funds, capitalists have long been dry, and will not engage in so many things out.
To put it bluntly, the food capitalists involved have limited voice in the British capital market, and they can’t even represent the food processing industry.
They do have their own people in the parliament, but it is still very difficult to influence the resolution of the parliament. Not to mention, the competition will not let them get what they want.
To be able to create the current momentum is to take advantage of the current social environment. If not for the plummeting food prices in the country, it would not have been possible to organize so many farmers to participate in the march.
Finance Minister Laluk Lloyd shook his head, ”If they were able to convince the Congress, they wouldn’t have come to us. They made a promise to sponsor us with two hundred thousand pounds of campaign funds as long as this plan passes through Congress.
On top of that, there are other benefits. It’s not convenient to talk about the specific details explicitly, it needs to be communicated privately.”
Politics also needs money to support it, and behind every election there are numerous behind-the-scenes deals hidden. If there is only input and no return, who would sponsor it for free?
How would political parties survive if there was no income? Without money to support the campaign team and to brush up public favorability, how can they win the election?
In the face of reality, politicians’ modesty is usually low. Prime Minister Gerston is no exception. Political parties need the support of capital, and the two sides have been intertwined from the very beginning.
……
With the Liberal Party at the forefront, on October 21, 1872, the British Parliament narrowly passed the proposal for the Establishment of a Strategic Grain Reserve.
On October 24, the London government then called off the Anglo-Russian grain loan deal, citing the need to stabilize the domestic grain market.
After some symbolic negotiations, a week later the London government, very reluctantly, bought grain within the scope of the treaty at a price higher than the market price.
No doubt this was all done for the populace. The real reason was still to make amends for the grain capitalists, and the government took over the loss.
The Anglo-Russian deal still went off without a hitch, and Franz was not disappointed. Currency hegemony brought greater benefits, and the London government naturally knew how to make the trade-off.
The only thing beyond surprise was that he did not expect the British to actually build up a strategic reserve of grain. To know that the Royal Navy across the four seas, all over the world there is no country can match it, can blockade Britain’s enemies simply do not exist.
This change is all a small problem, anyway, the ultimate goal was achieved. Although not able to stir up the British-Russian deal, but with the collapse of the international food market, or to make the European countries of agricultural vitality.
In this era, there is no food subsidies, even the taxes can not be less, the government is willing to reduce the agricultural tax, that is the importance of people’s livelihood.
For the big farmers, the agricultural crisis is a good time for mergers, why reduce agricultural taxes? Without these taxes, how can they make the farmers go bankrupt as soon as possible? If the farmers do not go bankrupt, how can they carry out land annexation?
Tax cuts are inevitable, but only after everyone has completed their land annexation, or else they are cutting off their financial resources.
The mass bankruptcy of the European peasants was also what Franz wanted to see, the Austrian colonies were short of people.
He does not want the immigrants from Britain and France, and he does not expect the immigrants from Portugal, Spain and Holland, but the remaining countries can always be hit.
Times are different now, and now that Austria’s rule in the colonies has stabilized, it is entirely possible to absorb some of the foreign immigrants.
Unlike in the beginning, apart from the native and German immigrants, immigrants from other countries, Franz did not dare to accept in large numbers.
He was afraid of being turned against his own people. In the matter of national assimilation, it is usually the case that the more people assimilate the less people, and it is not easy to do it the other way round.
This is also regarded as food for people, equivalent to Austria sold a number of food out, in exchange for a number of laborers.
(End of chapter)