After broadcasting the ancient times live, I handed the system over to the state.

This can discourage large merchants from supporting small merchants.

However, it's important to understand that commercial activities are actually different from land transactions.

Many scholars believe that the Market Regulation Law actually hindered the commodity economy, especially after government intervention in the market.

Qin Mincai's view was so-so; he acknowledged the good aspects but wouldn't overlook the bad ones.

Of course, there are positive aspects, namely, it curbs land annexation, benefits merchants, stabilizes prices, increases national fiscal revenue, and increases the income of lower-level officials.

The legislative purpose was progressive, but the use of government power for forced buying and selling, disguised monopolies, and usury prevented the original intention of the Market Regulation Law from being realized.

It also caused considerable damage to the commodity economy.

Qin Min stopped there, holding a piece of chalk, and began to explain the specific situation to the people below in great detail using economic theories from later generations.

He wrote some flowcharts on the blackboard and explained the relationship between each step.

The blackboard above says 'supply' — 'demand'

Qin Mincai started his analysis from this point, saying, "...In fact, as the argument progressed, everyone discovered the essence of the Market Regulation Law. Its essence is a government subsidy that requires long-term government investment of resources. Therefore, it will inevitably become unsustainable in the future and will eventually lead to a situation where the government monopolizes and profits from it."

After Qin Mincai's analysis, the people below also understood the shortcomings of the market regulation law. It could only raise prices when prices were low and scarce, but could not lower prices when prices were high and scarce. In the long run, it was actually similar to the harm caused by the monopoly of large merchants, or even worse.

Those who heard this murmured among themselves, some even gasping in surprise, while others shook their heads in regret.

Next, Qin Mincai explained why the Xining Reform was implemented, its theoretical basis, and its economic policies and guidelines from the perspectives of purpose and ideology.

The analysis is so clear and in-depth that even those who implemented it, such as Zhao Xu and Wang Anshi, might not have had such a thorough understanding.

Furthermore, it is very in-depth, transforming the linguistic descriptions in historical materials into a large number of tables and data, which is something that the ancients were not very good at.

These tables and processed data can more intuitively reflect the economic situation before and after the reform.

Qin Mincai had previously mentioned that the short loan and repayment periods under the Green Sprouts Law led to price fluctuations, and he now provides a detailed analysis of this.

The Green Sprouts Act has four types of lending: borrowing money to repay money, borrowing money to repay a bushel, borrowing a bushel to repay money, and borrowing a bushel to repay a bushel.

The principle of borrowing and repaying money is quite simple: it's the amount you lend out, plus two percent interest, that you get back.

For example, if you borrow 1000 coins, you will return 1200 coins.

Borrowing money and repaying it with a bushel means that if you borrow 1000 coins, it is equivalent to borrowing 40 bushels of grain, and when you repay it, you have to repay 48 bushels of grain.

So how did we get the number 40?

That was calculated based on the lowest grain price in the ten years of bumper harvests, which was 25 wen per dou in that year.

However, if you return 48 dou (a unit of dry measure), and the price of grain drops again that year, then the money you receive in exchange for the grain will actually only be 960 wen (another unit of dry measure) at 20 wen per dou, which is a loss compared to the original amount.

If the farmer received 1920 coins at 40 coins per dou, it means he lost money.

The vulnerabilities are in these places.

Borrowing and repaying money is as straightforward as borrowing and repaying money, there's not much to say about it, but problems can arise from borrowing and repaying money.

Even if everyone is free to choose, other problems still emerge.

The Green Sprouts Act resulted in more of the country's currency going to the farmers. The country began minting large amounts of coins, which then flowed to the farmers. The farmers then used the Green Sprouts Act and the Immunization Act to return the money to the country.

This disrupted the rural economic structure, making the fragmented rural economy subordinate to the national treasury.

But the crisis hasn't actually become apparent so quickly.

"Many people criticize the Green Sprouts Act because it was initially based on the principle of voluntariness, but later it became mandatory. Many scholars attribute the failure to the lower-level implementers."

"Let's now have an in-depth discussion on the organizational governance model of the Green Sprouts Law and see if we can offer any insights."

Qin Mincai is getting more and more excited as he talks, especially after entering this professional field, he feels like he's really getting into it.

However, he was still careful not to reveal too much of his personal opinion.

When it comes to organizational governance structure, Zhu Qinggu doesn't know why he immediately thought of pyramid schemes, probably because their organizational structure is so distinct that it left a deep impression.

However, many places do have very clear organizational and governance structures.

For example, if the dean sends out a request to collect a student's information, he will have his assistant send it to the group chat, and then to the counselor. The counselor will then have the class monitor collect the information, and the class monitor will have the dormitory heads collect the information.

Qin Mincai explained the various levels in detail. In summary, the central decision-making level consisted of Emperor Shenzong of Song, the Ministry of Agriculture, and the Ministry of Regulations for the Three Departments; then the middle level, the local supervisory level, which included the Ministry of Grain Supply and the Ministry of Justice; and finally the lower-level administrative level at the prefecture and county levels…

Qin Mincai analyzed from various aspects, such as the information asymmetry caused by the administrative contracting system and the allocation of control, why the organization's agency would become unbalanced.

Especially after Wang Anshi implemented KPI assessments, a tournament-like system emerged, with everyone competing against each other. Eventually, a blanket ban was imposed: everyone should take out loans, because it was unavoidable!

With each layer adding to the burden and middle-level organizations conspiring, the entire organizational governance structure began to collapse.

After all this, Zhu Qinggu seemed to have figured something out: even when violators were discovered, the central government's punishments were not severe enough, and the entire punishment system was very inefficient.

Therefore, more and more people are knowingly violating the rules.

When it came to the Market Exchange Law, Qin Min's words made Zhu Qinggu unable to hold back his laughter. Fortunately, he covered his mouth, otherwise he would have laughed out loud, which would not have been good.

What Qin Mincai said was—

Market failure is one thing, but government failure is another?

How does the market fail? It's because of monopolistic mechanisms that cause the market to lose its ability to self-regulate.

So how does government fail?

In fact, at the beginning, the reformists also wanted to correct market failures, but they missed the mark here.

They do not intervene in the market's economic entities as holders of public power, but rather compete directly with other market economic entities as market actors.