Chapter 1960 - The Deputy Directors
Ai Zhixin naturally didn't know the hidden obstacles in this, but he knew how many tricks were involved.
If I agree to let you run this meat cooperative, those pig dealers would become an obstacle, Ai Zhixin thought.
Zhang Yikun's plan essentially meant completely bypassing the existing pig wholesale merchants and switching to a Xu-ji monopoly.
This wasn't that big a deal, really. Old Zhang, as a transmigrator, using his position to secure some benefits for himself was simply human nature. Ai Zhixin was not so unsympathetic as all that. But this matter required caution on his part.
Since ancient times, those engaged in pig wholesale and slaughter had been local "figures." Though they couldn't be called "local gentry," "local tyrants" was certainly apt. Otherwise, why would Liu Bei, when raising an army, have sworn brotherhood with Zhang Fei, a mere "butcher"?
Pig dealers not only controlled the trade, slaughter, and wholesale of pigs, but often also had the ability to monopolize pig purchasing in rural markets. Without considerable boldness and capability, one couldn't do this line of work.
Naturally, with the Executive Committee's power, straightening out these local tyrants wouldn't be difficult—if one looked closely, they had ample justification for being straightened out. The question was: what would be the effect of such straightening out?
Currently, Guangzhou's pork supply was monopolized by these few pig dealers. Now the Executive Committee would use administrative power to strip them of their monopoly and transfer it to this meat cooperative.
In terms of monopoly effectiveness, a semi-public, semi-private monopoly was obviously better—but what about the supply source?
Currently neither Guangzhou's Commercial Trade Bureau nor its subordinate enterprises, nor any meat cooperative, controlled pig supply sources. They also had no existing slaughterhouses or distribution points. If they drove away these "Butcher Zhangs," Guangzhou's citizens would truly have to eat "pigs with hair"—and quite possibly for a period they wouldn't even see pig hair.
Very well then, drive away existing tax sources, create some inexplicable "meat cooperative." Ai Zhixin thought: you, Transmigrator Zhang, are usually so clever, but this time you're confused.
"Old Zhang," Ai Zhixin said slowly, "although the current pig dealer wholesale system has many problems, these few pig dealers' purchasing and sales channels are ready-made. Setting up a new team wouldn't be difficult. However, Guangzhou has several hundred thousand people—pig supply is a livelihood issue affecting thousands of households. If anything goes wrong, this will make Weekly News..."
"Xu-ji and Zhu-ji already account for one-third of the city's meat product sales. There should be no problem."
Ai Zhixin thought to himself: Are meat products and live pigs the same thing?! These are completely different matters.
Honestly, he completely understood Transmigrator Zhang wanting to establish some business for himself rather than relying on the "Transmigrator Foundation" controlled by the Office of Management. Quite a few transmigrators had more or less set up shell companies for themselves, established businesses—making some money riding on others' coattails. As long as it didn't harm the overall interests, some things the Executive Committee would turn a blind eye to. For instance, Transmigrator Lu's Zhang Family Village construction team, which subcontracted projects without taking an extra cent of payment—doing as much work as they were paid for, only that when work was scarce they got priority placement.
But today's matter was different. If mishandled, forget about circulation tax or slaughter tax—it would be hard to say whether even pig supply could be guaranteed.
If the meat cooperative took over pig wholesale rights, the original pig dealers might not dare to resist, but neither reason nor sentiment dictated they would hand over their past purchasing channels. A meat cooperative couldn't establish its own purchasing channels in the short term—the result was predictable.
Ai Zhixin thought for a moment. "Have you reported this to Mayor Liu?"
"This is just a small matter in commercial circulation. Does it need reporting?"
"Old Zhang, let's not beat around the bush." Ai Zhixin had originally thought to put him off first, then kick the ball to Liu Xiang and let him hit a soft wall. After thinking about it, he decided it was better to speak plainly. "Let me just ask you one thing: once this meat cooperative is established, even if Guangzhou's consumption doesn't increase at all, it needs to guarantee a supply of at least 200 pigs daily, not short a single day. Is there a problem?"
"There... shouldn't be..." This question somewhat caught Zhang Yikun off guard. He was starting to lose his composure.
"So, this newly established meat cooperative can ensure pig supply doesn't run out?" Ai Zhixin nodded. "I'm at the Finance and Tax Bureau. If pigs run short, it's just a few taxes less collected. For the Commerce Bureau, ensuring city supply is the top priority... Especially now with currency reform underway, material supply is being watched very closely. As long as we can ensure this meat cooperative's pig supply doesn't run out, I have no objections—after all, this is work in the circulation domain."
Pigs weren't like other materials—the Executive Committee had nowhere to ship them from. Various regions' pig supplies weren't even sufficient for themselves. As it was, transmigrators still felt supply was insufficient, that there was too much fish in the protein supply for workers and soldiers.
Zhang Yikun's face suddenly went blank. Instantly he recovered and said, "Well then, no rush, no rush. I was just providing a proposal for reference."
"How to reorganize and manage the circulation domain is work for your Commerce Bureau. We just provide some suggestions from a taxation perspective."
After seeing Zhang Yikun off, Ai Zhixin breathed a sigh of relief. How could Old Zhang suddenly become so confused at a critical moment! He didn't care what to do with those pig dealers in the long term, but in the short term they still needed to be kept—rushing to eliminate old commercial circulation channels before new systems could replace them was very dangerous.
Actually, if it were just about setting up a "meat cooperative" to monopolize Guangzhou's pork retail business, that wouldn't be out of the question. With currency reform currently being pushed, the more commercial circulation channels the Executive Committee could control the better—this would effectively enable market intervention. But trying to swallow the entire pig purchasing-wholesale-retail circulation chain in one gulp—that ambition was too big. Ai Zhixin thought to himself: forget about partial ownership shares, even if they made me the largest shareholder of this meat cooperative, the behind-the-scenes boss, I wouldn't dare touch this.
He had a general grasp of the pig dealers' situations, and problems were quite numerous. However, whether to nationalize them or "jointly operate and transform" them wasn't within his management scope, and Ai Zhixin had no intention of getting involved—he only wanted to successfully collect taxes.
After handling several accumulated documents, a telegram from the Finance Province that had arrived today caught his attention. Opening it, he found that Wang Qiyi, Deputy Tax Commissioner for Guangdong Province and Deputy Director of the Guangzhou Municipal Finance and Tax Bureau, along with Zhang Xiaoqi, Taxation Research Fellow for Guangdong Province and Research Fellow for the Guangzhou Municipal Finance and Tax Bureau, would depart today to take up their posts in Guangzhou.
"This couple is finally coming..." Ai Zhixin let out a long breath.
Wang Qiyi and Zhang Xiaoqi were a married couple. In the old timeline, like Ai Zhixin, both came from tax work backgrounds. However, they had always worked in front-line collection and management. These two had even concealed their professional identities, using a "computer science major" to fool the Executive Committee, and had long worked in administrative positions managing their own little lives. Over these years, besides the daughter they'd brought from the old timeline, they'd had twin daughters. Many transmigrators envied them to death...
Although for certain politically correct reasons, the term "pure blood" wasn't generally used within the Executive Committee, in everyone's hearts they still regarded transmigrator children who were "brought from the old timeline with automatic seats" or "born in the new timeline to two transmigrator parents" as having higher value as marriage prospects.
These two had been living leisurely, managing their little family. Even during the major "land tax reorganization" in Lingao, they had stayed completely silent. If Wang Qiyi hadn't inadvertently shared some professional opinions on grain tax collection on the forum one day and been "exposed," who knows if they would have kept up the pretense. From then on, the couple went to work in the finance sector doing tax work.
Before Ai Zhixin came to Guangzhou this time, the Finance Province meeting had already decided to arrange all three personnel with tax expertise from the Finance Province to Guangzhou—one director and two deputies in an overstrength configuration. Of course, these three transmigrators were responsible for tax work throughout Guangdong Province, so the actual workload was substantial enough. More transmigrators specializing in accounting and auditing would be transferred in the future for reinforcement. For now, their main task was to establish the tax system.
Truth be told, when the appointment was announced at the meeting, the expressions on the Wang couple's faces weren't exactly enthusiastic. Understandable: they had many children, and entrusting all the kids to others while going to Guangzhou to take up their posts was indeed worrying. Fortunately, Wang Qiyi's final statement was quite resolute, which put Ai Zhixin at ease.
However, after Old Wang made his statement, Zhang Xiaoqi had privately approached Ai Zhixin asking if she could temporarily work in Guangzhou for just two months after arriving.
"Director Ai, you know our family has three daughters. The eldest is already at junior high age by old standards. This is a crucial time for girls, and I really don't dare leave for too long."
Everyone knew about the Wangs' three daughters, especially the later-born twin sisters whom everyone adored. They were just starting kindergarten now. Ai Zhixin could understand this mother's feelings, and since the next phase of concrete work in Guangzhou would especially rely on Zhang Xiaoqi's extensive front-line experience, he readily agreed.
Unexpectedly, Ai Zhixin had been in Guangzhou for months as advance team while the Wang couple was still in Lingao not moving. Zhang Xiaoqi was "training personnel"—that was understandable given the severe shortage of tax personnel. But Wang Qiyi was alternately "doing research," "top-level design," "communicating with various departments"... Finally when they said they were about to depart, the plague broke out in Guangzhou. With traffic control inside and outside Guangzhou, naturally the Wang couple couldn't come either—they weren't doing administrative work or serving as medical or epidemic prevention experts; coming would have been pointless. Ai Zhixin could only send them a telegram telling them to "focus on training tax cadres."
He had previously sent the full text of his designed tax plan back to Lingao for discussion and approval by the finance sector. This time when the Wang couple took up their posts, they should bring the final approved plan—
(End of Chapter)