At the beginning of the Western Han Dynasty, the population was seriously insufficient. What method did Liu Bang use to double the population quickly?

After Liu Bang established the Han Dynasty, when he counted the population, he found that the population was seriously insufficient, so Liu Bang ordered the collection of single female tax, that is, women who had reached the age of 15 and were still unmarried must pay the single tax to the state. Through this law, the population of the Han Dynasty quadrupled in just ten years.

Since ancient times, the people have been the foundation of the country. After the establishment of the Han Dynasty, it was found that during the statistical period of Qin State, the population loss was particularly serious due to the construction of tombs, the Great Wall and the Epang Palace, and the long-term civil strife at the end of Qin Dynasty made the population loss even more serious. When the Han Dynasty was founded, there were not many mature men who could defend the frontier of the Han Dynasty, so it was very dangerous for a country to have no one to defend the frontier of the motherland.

In this case, Liu Bang introduced a policy to promote population growth as soon as possible, which is the single woman tax. According to the law, if a woman in the Han Dynasty marries at the age of fifteen, she has to pay taxes, one year 120 yuan. What is the concept of $120 equivalent? In the Western Han Dynasty, going to 200 yuan at 100 was equivalent to buying food for a family of five for one month. Many ordinary people are not rich, but generally starve and freeze. If they have to pay the tax of 120 yuan for their unmarried daughters, it will undoubtedly add insult to injury.

As a result, many families quickly betrothed their daughters when they were approaching the legal age of marriage, so as to reduce the family burden. Many families have reached the age of marriage before women can choose men, and they are hastily married off. Even if the man is a bad guy, or an old man, or he already has a wife at home, he is a concubine. The woman's family doesn't think so much at all, as long as she can get married. This did greatly promote the population of the Han Dynasty, but it was women who suffered in the end and let them live in compromise all their lives.

Through such a policy, Liu Bang did quadruple the population in more than ten years, which enabled the Han population to be supplemented, thus solving the situation of shortage of border guards.