The Road Ahead

Currencies worldwide are freely floating. Based on current exchange rates, one Geflagp can be exchanged for 2.2 Federal Sols. The hourly wage of 68 Geflagp is roughly 1.5 yuan per hour.

Ten hours is fifteen dollars. If you can work the full month—in a place full of opportunities and development, there is never a shortage of job opportunities. If all businessmen abide by this rule, then a hardworking worker in the Amelia Region can earn about four hundred and fifty dollars a month, which is twice the average income of the Federal Working Class!

In fact, the difference between the two countries can be seen by looking at the wage levels. Some people in the Federal do not think that the Federal is necessarily worse than the Gefra, but if you look at the salary levels, the difference is obvious, at least in terms of the economy.

The mayor nodded slightly, but did not speak, waiting for Lin Qi to continue.

Lin Qi chuckled. "Then let's turn it around. Do you know how much a worker in Nagaril needs to be paid a day?"

The mayor shook his head. He had never been to Nagaril and knew little about the country before this diplomatic event.

Lin Qi uttered a number that made his pupils dilate slightly. "One dollar, one Federal Sol. Just one Federal Sol can hire a Nagaril worker to work for you for twelve hours. If you give them a decent lunch and dinner, they'll work even harder."

"If we hire 10,000 workers from Nagaril to work in the Amelia Region, we will pay between 400,000 and 500,000 in wages and expenses each month, but we will be able to earn at least 4 million. After deducting some expenses and additional costs, we will have a net profit of about 3.5 million."

Although Lin Qi's tone remained unchanged, the mayor still sensed a hidden allure in it. Perhaps he misheard, but he was tempted.

"Nagaril has a population of 200 million. If we could get all of them out of there, we could earn 80 billion every month..."

call...

The mayor straightened his chest, his breathing becoming heavy and rapid. Eight hundred billion!

Although he knew this was just an ideal state and that it was absolutely impossible in reality, he was still shocked by this impossible number because, theoretically, Lin Qi's words did not have much of a loophole.

It's not that there are no loopholes, but at least the Amelia Region doesn't need so many people to work; they only need a portion of them.

But the world doesn't only have markets and jobs in Li Ya; there are other places too.

About a minute later, the mayor finally calmed down and began to ask questions, "Since there is such a market, if we can do it, others can do it too!"

Lin Qi smiled slightly and took out the Kolef Kolef Wo Delike had given him.

This kind of consumable product cannot be used up in one go. Any high-end Kolef will have its own independent reusable outer packaging, and this one is no exception.

Looking at the pale gold coat, the mayor found Lin Qi increasingly pleasing to the eye.

The intoxicating aroma made even the mayor's mouth water, and Lin Qi miraculously produced another one for him, saying, "This is Wo Delike's private supply. I shamelessly asked him for it."

The mayor wanted to decline, but he accepted it anyway. Sometimes, the value of a solid-color cigarette is not in how much it costs, but in what social class the person who smokes it can access.

The mayor is neither a graduate of the Saint and Harmony Society Alliance Colleges nor a member of the Saint and Harmony Society; he needs this little cutie more than anyone else.

After experiencing the top-tier Kolef, and with the mayor praising Wo Delike from thousands of kilometers away, their conversation returned to the main topic.

"You're absolutely right. If we can do it, others can do it too, and that's precisely why we're pushing for diplomatic relations with Nagaril, even at the cost of going to war..." Lin Qi took a deep breath and exhaled with a hint of enjoyment, "...one of the reasons!"

"As long as we can defeat Gefra's Royal Navy in naval battles, no one will touch our cake."

After listening, the mayor sighed. He had never thought there was such a layer to this story before, which showed that there was still a lot he didn't know. This made him soften his tone and lower his attitude.

"So how do we address the issue of public opinion? The sale and use of slaves are illegal worldwide, even in Gefra."

People often think that monarchical states must be backward and feudal, with all sorts of ugly and dark phenomena, but that's not actually the case. Although Gefra was a monarchical state, it was not backward.

On the issue of slavery, Gefra stood with the world, spontaneously resisting the capture, sale, and use of slaves.

"I told you, this is labor export..." Lin Qi said casually, "We will recruit workers from Nagaril under the name of Labor Company. The rulers of Nagaril will help us because they will have shares in our Labor Company ..."

At this point, the mayor was basically done with the discussion, but he didn't interrupt Lin Qi, which was basic courtesy.

"We promised to send these locals abroad to work, and in addition to them receiving a decent wage, a portion of the money would be used to subsidize the government. At the same time, the Ruling Class would also benefit, and no one would object."

"As for slaves, that's utter nonsense. Everyone is free and has an independent will. If they don't want to continue, they can go back or leave anytime they want. We are not evil slave traders; we are just merchants."

The mayor nodded noncommittally. "So how can we give back to the businesses and people here?"

His tone began to have a hint of inquiry, "If it were just us making money, I believe no one would give their money away to others for no reason, and neither would you, right?"

"Of course, this is what I'm going to talk about next: using Nagaril's workers to feed the Federal's workers."

In Lin Qi's plan, simply exporting Nagaril's labor force was not a long-term sustainable plan, because these laborers could only perform the simplest and most basic manual labor.

They lacked proper education, were unfamiliar with new production methods, and had no idea how to use machinery to alleviate some of their necessary production burdens.

But the Federal workers understand that they know how to use machines and advanced production methods, and that the presence of Federal skilled workers allows these Nagaril workers to create more value.

Two Nagaril workers can support one Federal worker. The entire Sabine City has a population of only 800,000, but only 30,000 to 50,000 people actually need to work. These people can easily be overwhelmed by the countless Nagaril workers.

In addition to sending workers abroad to provide technical guidance, some Nagaril workers could be brought in to help Federal factories regain competitiveness.

Lower wages translate to more cost reductions, freeing up more profit margins and making products more competitive.

Don't be fooled by the fact that many foreign goods are being dumped into the Federal government and are eroding the lifeline of Federal factories.

But as long as the costs and prices come down, it will be easy to defeat these foreign products. At least there is a part of the cost that they cannot cut back on, namely the shipping costs.

This is also an advantage of local enterprises. The products they produce can be put on the shelves for sale directly. After reducing labor costs, which are also the biggest cost, they have less shipping costs, lower prices, and still maintain a reasonable profit. Some enterprises can easily be brought back to life.

At that point, it won't be foreign countries dumping goods in the Federal, but rather the Federal dumping its goods abroad.

This is also the most unique aspect of light industry and processing industry—workers' wages account for a large part of the profits, and it is something that cannot be eliminated.

Once labor costs can be reduced, light industry and processing industry will experience a tremendous boom.

Listening to Lin Qi's detailed and meticulous plan, the mayor believed that these were definitely not things that could be thought of overnight. Lin Qi must have had a complete plan long ago, and even promoting the establishment of diplomatic relations with Nagaril was part of his plan.

This is not impossible. Did anyone mention these things before Lin Qi went to Nagaril?

No, these were all done by this young man.

The mayor skillfully concealed his astonishment and slight horror. He extinguished the Kolef in his hand, put it into the built-in sterling silver cigarette holder, and looked at Lin Qi. "Is there anything I can do?"

"Guidance!" Lin Qi said with great certainty, "When conditions allow, people may not dare to be the first to cross the border, but we should encourage them to do so."

"At the same time, we also need to get people to accept the concept of moving from small workshops to small factories!"

As Lin Qi's small workshop system gradually expanded in Sabine City, some families rented Lin Qi's sewing machines and borrowed money from Lin Qi to buy raw materials to start production.

For each designated item produced, they can receive a reward ranging from ten to fifty cents.

At first, many people thought this approach wouldn't work, and people were clearly not used to this production model. But in fact, those who thought it wouldn't work were proven wrong.

Lin Qi's Family Workshop model was very popular. Everyone could do the math and figure out that if they worked hard, they could earn more money than before, so why wouldn't they do it? Although there were still Labor Union collecting management fees and assigning orders, Lin Qi believed that one day these family workshops would kick the Labor Union aside.

The first step was to begin hiring Nagaril's laborers to produce for them! A new counter-current production trend was brewing!