Chapter 41: Chapter 41 – Fate of the Rebels

The ministers quietly digested Franz’s words, especially the last sentence. They were tactful people, so no one asked the identity of the “experts” who came up with the suggestion. Since Franz was being discreet with his knowledge of the piece work system, they decided to take his words at face value.

Anyways, he had passed on the credit of the piece work system to the non-existent “experts” and, thereby, to them. In this era, the piece work system would be undoubtedly revolutionary in increasing the productivity of lazy workers.

The piece work system was harmless in comparison to the harsh measures taken by capitalists to crack down on lazy workers. These measures could range anywhere from deduction of wages to being beaten to being killed, especially in faraway mines where lazy workers were outright murdered as a way to deter other lazy workers.

It was obviously impossible for the government to adopt such cruel means. Finance Minister von Bruck’s worry that the government would lose money from state-owned businesses actually stemmed from his worry of the emergence of lazy and wasteful workers on a large-scale.

Similar cases were prevalent in the future: a healthy privately-owned business was sold to the government, and while it created many jobs as the number of employees doubled within a year, the previously-thriving business fell into a deep loss as its productivity steeply dropped. On the other hand, a loss-making state-owned business became a privately-owned business and laid off over 50% of the employees, yet the business’s productivity doubled within a year.

 

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“Now that we have a solution for the unemployment crisis, let us move on to another pressing matter. My Lords, what are your plans for sentencing the prisoners?”

Franz had decided to ignore the nobles and capitalists who took part in the rebellion since most of them had managed to escape. Anyways, they had already received a harsh punishment in the form of confiscation of their titles and property. As for the “frontline leader” of the rebellion, he had already been killed during the fighting, so no trial was needed for him.