On The Economic Life Of The Han Dynasty

In the transformation situation between the Qin Dynasty and the Han Dynasty, the salary-using tradition of intellectuals confronts troubles and conflicts. According to this, intellectuals of that time did some adjustment conforming new salary-using attitude and orientation.The special salary-using attitude concludes:being government officer is not for salary; the salary is not for self; the share of salary. The thrifty tendency of literati in salary using depends on the society tradition of refrain from luxury and uphold frugality. The conforming of this tradition is not just casual relationship between"Shangxing"and "Xiaxiao" but also experienced the long historical development process from spontaneous action to conscious activity, from "Zhuyishang" to "Zhuyixia" and from calling to fashion. This is the result of the participation of all people from each class in society including imperial family, literati, officers and normal people. As another important earning source, the rewarding behavior is not only the result of the special dynasty and theory background, but also for realistic economic and political reasonability. At the same time, it conforms some characteristics in the operation process, becoming the unique tool of the highest governer. The literature materials for the time has the specific clues about the salary of officers with different levels, the amount examples of the prices of cereals and clothes and the grain supply recording. These show the salary situation of the officer families in different aspects. The medium farmer of the time can maintain adequate food and clothing, continuous reproduction and gain some profits. Compared with income of the Han Dynasty famers, the Ming Dynasty officers and the Han Dynasty officers, it is shown clealy that the Eastern Han Dynasty’s officers with level higher than "六百石" earn less and the officers with level lower than "六百石" earn more than the officers of Western Han Dynasty. The Han Dynasty officers with level less than "二百石" have the half-farmer character. The Han Dynasty officers of low level earn the salary which is less than the Ming Dynasty officers who have the acknowledged obviously low salary.