K. This is the 1st working draft of vol. VI. It still ... - From Marx to Mao

454 MAO TSE-TUNG
is the primary foundation for our finances and supplies. It provided
three-fifths of all finances and supplies during 1942. Thus our primary
financial work consists of properly carrying out the distribution
of the fruits of production in the public sector. We have already
discussed this question at length as a supplementary factor
when dealing with the public sector of the economy and there is no
space to say more about the details here. It can wait for further
studies. Now we must discuss the second foundation for our finances
and supplies — the portion obtained from the people, namely grain
and tax. There is also the question of economizing. This is related
to what we get from the people and what we supply ourselves. It is
a question related to the whole of the resources we already possess
FROM MARX
TO MAO
and to the correct distribution and use of the funds for running our
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undertakings. Therefore, it is an important financial problem. The
grain question referred to here is the grain tax alone and not all grain
problems. This is part of the tax system. However, since it is related
to all the needs of the army and government, and to the relationship
of 80 to 90 per cent of the people of the Border Region
with the Party, the Eighth Route Army and the government, it is worth
specially setting it aside from the general question of taxation and
dealing with it first.
More than 90 per cent of the 1,400,000 people in the Border
Region are peasants. Landlords NOT and FOR merchants make up less than 10
per cent. Over half of these peasants have obtained a share of land
and the other half have not yet done so. Why are we striving to the
utmost to enable COMMERCIAL
the peasants to develop agriculture? In the first
place our aim is to enable the peasants to grow richer and improve
their life. Secondly, we want the peasants to be capable of paying
grain tax to help meet the needs of the War of Resistance. There is
also a third reason DISTRIBUTION
which is that we want the peasants, after obtaining
a reduction in rent and in interest rates, to develop agricultural
production in order to be able to pay part as land rent to the landlords,
and thus to unite the landlords with ourselves in the War of
Resistance. We must only do one thing to achieve these three aims
and that is strive to the utmost to enable the peasants to develop
agriculture. The more agricultural production develops and the
greater the amount of agricultural and subsidiary products tile peasants
harvest each year, then the less the amount of grain tax paid to
the government becomes as a proportion of their total harvest. We
propose to levy an annual grain tax of 180,000 tan beginning in 1943.