Chapter 544: Find a way to create a role model. Labor force cannot be wasted!

Chapter 544: Find a way to create a role model. Labor force cannot be wasted!

In this era of war and turmoil, the number of women of marriageable age was alarmingly high. Many of them had their husbands killed in battle, and such tragedies were common. What's worse, those women who lost their husbands had to raise their families and children to survive, with elderly and frail elders to take care of and young and ignorant children to feed.

There were not many Qin people originally living in the southern border, but the number of women was quite large, and the ratio of men to women was roughly close to one to one.

One of the important reasons for this is the 300,000 troops stationed in the southern border, all of whom are men in their prime. As Gao Yao's sphere of influence continues to expand, this balance is gradually broken, and the ratio of men to women begins to become seriously unbalanced, leaning more and more towards women.

In order to meet the needs of war, the Qin Dynasty recruited a large number of civilians, and the princes in various places also recruited soldiers to strengthen their armies. In areas with better conditions, the age limit for conscription is usually set between fifteen and forty years old;

However, in some places, the so-called princes had expanded the scope of conscription to those between the ages of 13 and 45 due to the shortage of soldiers. This age range was so wide that it almost covered more than 80% of the male population of the Qin Dynasty. As a result, after each fierce battle, the number of male participants would be greatly reduced, and the population structure became increasingly unbalanced.

During the five years of Qin Shi Huang's reign, the population of the entire Qin Dynasty basically reached 2600 million, which was a very good number. Qin Shi Huang had regulations that adult men must get married and have children within a certain period of time, otherwise it would be illegal.

This policy was implemented shortly after Qin Shi Huang ascended the throne. From the perspective of the time, this policy was somewhat inhumane, and even regarded marriage as a law. But from another perspective, it also greatly increased the population.

When Liu Bang established his regime in the early Han Dynasty, the population had dropped sharply to 1300 million. Among these 1300 million people, more than % were women and children. This shows how devastating the ancient battlefield was for men. In other words, among the million people, every man could have two wives and still be wealthy.

If we remove some of the old and young, even on average each man is worthy of three wives. The fundamental reason for the policy of polygamy has never been to satisfy so-called selfish desires, but a way to enable the country to quickly accumulate more new forces.

Although Gao Yao occupied the southern border and developed vigorously, he was still a remote and isolated state in the early stage. There were not many people under his command in the early stage, and even less than the population of Baiyue. Although Gao Yao had been collecting refugees and accepted both men and women, he could not change the situation of more women than men. Moreover, because of Gao Yao's intervention, the coalition forces of princes that had been constantly fighting with the court army actually ended the existence of Prince Gao of Xianyang, the second emperor of Qin, nearly a year in advance.

This has led to the fact that the entire world has actually entered an era of warlords ahead of schedule, and compared to the original situation in history, the conflicts are actually greater.

The mysterious Yi Xiaochuan's move of enfeoffment of kings actually further intensified the chaos among the princes. Some people accepted it, some did not want to accept it, some were treated as puppets, and some of the original rebel forces could actually be merged together, but the mysterious Yi Xiaochuan's title of enfeoffment of kings caused some people who could have become princes to be rejected by the rebels.

After all, accepting this statement and being crowned a king is equivalent to acknowledging the legitimacy of the Qin Dynasty in disguise, so their rebellion itself is unorthodox. In addition, the court's 300,000 troops came out in full force, with no intention of suppressing the princes from all over the country. This situation is completely different.

Originally, with the imperial army's pursuit, many teams with only two or three thousand people had to start looking for their own backers and seek refuge with more powerful princes for protection. But without these 300,000 troops, it would be too difficult to gather these people. Without external pressure, the rebels would fight against each other more often, and the wars of a few hundred people would turn into a war of a few thousand people, and then to tens of thousands of people.

The dead were almost all males, which further exacerbated the situation. Gao Yao's army now had a population of over 10 million, but the number of males over 15 years old only accounted for a little over 2 million of them. The rest were basically the elderly, the weak, women and children.

Gao Yao had a lot of troops under his command. After the war, the four major legions were expanded and basically maintained at 50,000 to 60,000. After all, there were reserve troops, plus some local garrisons, as well as special arms such as cavalry. The number of troops basically reached 300,000. In addition, there was a navy of 100,000.

As for the rest of the older ones, as long as they are not officers, they can go home and live a good life. Even so, it will take time to alleviate the gender ratio problem. What Gao Yao really cares about is the nearly two million ordinary female laborers who have been left idle.

That's why Gao Yao came up with this idea, to set up a benchmark product for women. In other words, it can also be understood as allowing women to do business, sell goods, or even do other jobs. If these two million people can be used, the development of the entire southern region will inevitably be accelerated. However, such women are indeed not easy to find.

If it were peacetime, maybe he could find someone to make do with, but it was very difficult at this time. He couldn't find a suitable candidate at all. In the end, Gao Yao decided to work together. After some consideration, he decided to look for some women with both moral integrity and talent.

It's just that Gao Yao's order was indeed good, but once the order was issued, the officials in the southern territory who received the news became excited. What is Gao Yao's identity now? The prime minister of the southern territory. Of course, most people know that the so-called prime minister is just a cover, and Gao Yao is the real lord of the southern territory.

At this time, Gao Yao's subordinates naturally wanted to figure out why Gao Yao suddenly wanted to find a woman with both talent and virtue. However, most people basically came to the same conclusion, that is, Gao Yao wanted to expand his backyard.

It's not the fault of these subordinates to think this way. Gao Yao has been too calm about women in recent years. Although he has women, their status, position, and number are far from enough.