User:Pjwoodard/sandbox

Farming and land tax
During the massive population growth in the Qing dynasty and increasing demand from peasant and military populations for grain, the Yongzheng emperor launched a grain campaign in which he incentivized officials in local and provincial governments to compete in buying land meant specifically for farming. The Yongzheng emperor offered officials 5-10 year tax holidays in which they were free from paying taxes. This campaign led to more than one million new acres of farmable land. While these campaigns led to more food and land for the population to use for farming, it also led to officials lying about the amount of farmable land they were contributing in order to win the tax holidays. These tax holidays also pushed the burden of paying the taxes elsewhere.

Local Charity
A growing number of orphaned children or poor families came with the massive Qing population growth. The Yongzheng emperor sought to remedy this by mandating that orphanages (also called poor houses) be built in every county. These were funded not by local, provincial or high level government but privately funded and maintained. These orphanages existed less to help the local population get out of poverty and more to model how wealthy officials should act towards the impoverished populations.

Gentry Privileges
The Kangxi Emperor passed a law that allowed for scholars that had passed the Civil Service Examination at any level to bypass punishments from the legal system. Instead of legal repercussions for crimes, criminal officials were instead recommended to the county education commissioner for counseling.This led to corruption among officials, in an attempt to stop this the Yongzheng emperor made it illegal to offer privileges to officials going through the legal system. This did not last long as the Qianlong emperor reinstated legal privileges for officials that had passed the Civil Service Examination shortly after becoming emperor after Yongzheng.

Tax Privileges
In the mid 1720s Qing empire, complex levels of tax hierarchies put in place by the Kangxi emperor existed to separate the population into different tax brackets. Households with government officials were in privileged tax brackets that brought with it tax exemptions for not only the immediate family in the household but also extended family members. The Yongzheng emperor removed these privileged tax brackets as he saw the local gentry as competition to the throne. Just like the legal privileges that passing the Civil Service Examination offered, soon after the end of the Yongzheng emperor's reign, the Qianlong emperor quickly reinstated the privileged tax brackets.