After reading the document in his hand, Lance pursed his lips and put it back.
“Ten thousand,” he said, stating the latest price given in the document.
Yes, ten thousand dollars an acre. If anyone wanted it, they would need to get in line, pay the money, and only then could they get the land.
Mayor Williams showed no expression, but at a time like this, no expression was the most peculiar expression.
Lance sensed a murderous aura in his eyes. He really wanted to kill these people!
“Do you know… what its price was in the middle of last September, the month before last?”
Lance glanced at the document and read out the number on it: two thousand five hundred.
Mayor Williams took a deep breath. “Yes, two thousand five hundred, and now it’s ten thousand.”
“Madmen should be in a mental asylum, not here affecting my plans!”
He added some emphasis to his tone, then coughed a couple of times. He was getting a little emotional.
He took a cigarette from the case, lit it with some annoyance, and took a deep drag. “In the past, I used to secretly laugh at Sidney at home. I laughed at him for being an idiot, for not being able to do this well, for not being able to do that well.”
As he said these words, his expression was a bit exaggerated, accompanied by some hand gestures to deepen his context, so that even Lance could feel the arrogance and mockery he had when he was laughing at Sidney in his room.
His raised hand slowly came down, and his shoulders also relaxed. “But now, Lance.”
“I finally understand. It’s not that he was too stupid, nor that he couldn’t do a good job. It’s that the problem is too big.”
“Even though he was a mayor, and of course I am the same as he was then, the problems we face are also the same.”
“Even if we are all mayors, what we are facing is the entire city’s interest group. We are fighting against them!”
He raised his hand and turned it palm up, pointing at the document in front of Lance. “Actually, not everyone is against me. Some people have not taken the initiative to raise the land price.”
“But when they found that some of the surrounding landowners began to offer a price of five thousand, even if they didn’t want to go against me, at this time they were also standing on my opposite side.”
“Profit has hijacked them. For more profit, they have to stand on my opposite side.”
“Now it’s ten thousand. In a while, how much will it be?”
“Fifteen thousand?”
“Twenty thousand?”
“Fuck!”
All it took was for a portion of the people to create the trend that these lands were worth a lot of money, and those people would hold on to the land in their hands.
Unknowingly, they had become bargaining chips for those interest groups to negotiate with City Hall. They actually knew they had become bargaining chips, but they were willing.
They didn’t need to do anything. They just needed to continue to play their greedy and innocent look, and they could get more benefits. Why “wake up”?
Once the land price rises too high, whether it’s City Hall planning to reclaim these lands, or new investors wanting to invest here, they will have to face huge investment costs.
The trend of consumption capacity in Golden Port City will not increase much just because the land price here has increased.
And the new tax law is about to be implemented. People’s income may have a certain degree of increase, but their disposable part will instead decrease.
Previously, the federal tax law for ordinary people was that those with a monthly income of less than one hundred did not have to pay tax, but the new tax law stipulates that even if a federal citizen has a monthly income of only one cent, he must still pay a tax of 3%!
In other words, according to people’s current income of about forty, they need to pay at least 8% in taxes each month.
If someone exceeds fifty, then it’s even better: 12% is waiting for you.
Under such circumstances, investors in the new district will consider a problem: they have invested so much fucking money in the most basic land. How can they recover these investments and make a profit?
The final result is that people begin to wait and see, his plan becomes ridiculous, and he, like Sidney, becomes a joke in the city, and in the end, has to compromise with the interest group that he was once a part of.
Before he became the mayor, he hadn’t expected it to be so difficult.
After becoming the mayor, he finally felt how much pain Sidney had been in at that time.
Lance shook his head. “It seems this is the only way.”
In fact, the federal government had considered the possibility that capitalists would enclose large areas of land and then do nothing, waiting for the land price to rise to make a huge profit, so they had made many regulations.
For example, how many square meters of buildings to build, how many workers to hire, how much output value to create.
But these things couldn’t stop the capitalists at all. After all, the fact that these bills could be passed meant that they had no objection—
They built simple warehouses on the open land to ensure that there were enough single-story buildings.
They hired some retired old people according to the standard, and only needed to give them one-third of the wages of ordinary people.
As for the output value, taxes, and the like, they had ways to meet the various requirements of City Hall through fake transactions.
To say it was fake… actually, it couldn’t be considered fake. The factory, as a part of the entire “circulation” link, had a large cost and a small profit.
The output value does not include the cost.
If the cost was included, they might even lose money. In the case where the company’s net profit was negative, the tax bureau would be too embarrassed to ask them for tax.
Especially when the land price was under their control, even if there was a little loss, in the face of the huge profits that were about to be generated, it was also acceptable.
Mayor Williams knew these things too damn well, so from the very beginning, he had not thought of using legal means to solve this problem, because it could not be solved.
He could only turn to Lance for help.
Lance scratched his head. “This will make me offend a lot of people.”
He pursed his lips. It wasn’t that he couldn’t do it, but it depended on whether the price was right.
If there was no income, and he just had to offend the entire city, even if Mayor Williams had a good relationship with him, he would not agree.
It was just a good relationship, not his father.
Mayor Williams was obviously also very clear about this. Even if Lance was really his son, he might not be able to do so much for him, so everything was still based on the most naked interests.
“There’s a portion of them who are willing to move, but they have been hijacked by these people with the constantly rising land prices and are passively standing on our opposite side.”
“These people, if we can persuade them, then persuade them. We have no conflict. When they realize that they actually can’t earn so much, they will give up.”
“As for the other part…” he pondered for a moment, “since they are already standing on our opposite side, then let’s just swallow them.”
Lance took out a cigarette. He took a puff, and after the smoke had been filtered through his lungs, it came out of his nose.
He understood what Mayor Williams meant by “swallow.” Along with their lives, their souls, and their property, everything would be put into his stomach.
To put it in a more civilized way, it was to serve them up on a platter.
The expansion of the city represented more opportunities. There were so many new friends who were looking forward to joining this feast, looking forward to being able to sit at the table and enjoy a sumptuous dinner.
Before anyone made new seats available, they could only watch others eat the delicious food with big mouthfuls, and could only find some scraps from the plates that had been taken away.
They looked clear-eyed and acted innocent, but if they were given a chance to also sit at the table, they would become the loyal running dogs of the decision-maker.
They would bite those people more fiercely than anyone else.
Lance nodded. “Since you’ve made a decision, then let’s do it!”
“When do we start?”
Mayor Williams licked his lips. “Wait a little longer. I’ve had James go and talk to them. Before we make a move, I hope we can solve it in a civilized way. If they betray my goodwill, then we can only do that.”
“After the New Year, it should be about right.”
Lance nodded. “Okay, then after the New Year.”
This matter was very crucial. It was also the core of whether Mayor Williams could complete his policy platform. He did not talk to Lance about the issue of the distribution of interests. In essence, he was telling Lance that he would eat first.
No matter how he ate, even if his appetite was good enough, he could eat it all!
This was his attitude, to let Lance eat his fill first.
Lance also didn’t talk to him about any three-seven split. On the contrary, it would make him seem to have no class.
After settling this matter, Mayor Williams visibly relaxed a lot. He took a final puff of his cigarette, and a somewhat embarrassed expression suddenly appeared on his face.
These embarrassments came too suddenly, so suddenly that Lance didn’t even know what had happened, and how to deal with it.
Mayor Williams even laughed awkwardly twice, which made Lance a little unable to stand it. “You’d better tell me what happened. You’re making me a little worried.”
Mayor Williams’s expression was very rich, first embarrassed, then shy, and finally a little bit of a sigh, and in the end, a hint of resentment.
“I really don’t know what to say. Arthur and your…”
“Corinda,” Lance reminded him. The name of this “minor character” would not be remembered by Mayor Williams, even if she was his son’s girlfriend.
In fact, when he brought this up, Lance already had a premonition. He had told Corinda before.
That kid Arthur was not a good choice, because no matter how much they loved each other, Corinda could not marry into the Williams family.
Unless she was Lance’s blood-related sister, otherwise it was simply impossible!
This was no longer a gap between two classes. This was a fucking gap with many classes in between.
The people of the Federation are very realistic, much more realistic than the rumors. Unless Arthur can give up everything he has.
Privilege, inheritance rights, wealth, everything. Otherwise, it would be impossible for him to marry Corinda.
But would he give these up?
Lance stared at Mayor Williams. The latter could only sigh under Lance’s gaze. “He doesn’t know what to say. He broke up with that girl.”
As he spoke, he added emphasis to his tone. “It was an amicable breakup. There were no other problems.”
“But he’s worried you’ll beat him up, so he asked me to talk about this.”
Because Lance was mentally prepared, he didn’t have too strong of a reaction. He just nodded. “The love and hate of young people often rise in an instant and are extinguished in an instant. This is very normal. I won’t beat him up.”
Arthur was still quite afraid of Lance.
Seeing that Lance was not angry, Mayor Williams breathed a sigh of relief. “You can beat him up.”
Lance waved his hand. “I also warned her, but… you know, when love comes, even a city wall is useless, so you don’t have to worry.”
People all say that Mayor Williams’s favorite is his younger son. It seems that this sentence is really not false. He would even personally tell Lance about this kind of thing. This is a clear sign of favoritism.
But it was a pity that Arthur was born too late. Otherwise, the one who would inherit the future of the Williams family would not be James, but him.
Perhaps James was also very clear about this. It was too late to cultivate Arthur now, so he never went against Arthur. On the contrary, he always acted like a big brother, protecting this little brother who always made mistakes.
After leaving City Hall, Lance went for a drive near the naval base. This place had become a bit more prosperous.
The soldiers had initially begun to adapt to the environment here, and the base was also allowing them to move around the surrounding area to a limited extent.
This had made the area around the naval base a lot more lively, and at the same time, there were many more girls standing on the street.
Some were really forced by life. If they didn’t do this, they would have no food to eat. For example, the refugee prostitutes he had organized with Carl.
There were too many people starving on the refugee side. People who have never been hungry will never know how important and happy it is for a hungry person to have a full meal.
There were also some who just wanted to make money more easily.
At the beginning, Lance had rescued the girls from the Red High Heels. Except for a few who already had stable jobs and lives, the others had gone back to being prostitutes.
They couldn’t stand the high-intensity work on the assembly line for eleven or twelve hours a day, and only getting that little bit of money each month.
They had long been used to finding a place to lie down and, with a few feigned cries, earning a month’s income of others in one day.
In the past, Lance had talked about this with a friend. That friend was in this line of work. He had asked, were there any who forced ordinary people to do this?
His friend had told him that there were almost none, because there was absolutely no need.
Everyone has a change of mentality in their hearts. He would recruit many young girls to work in his company.
They were all normal jobs, and the income was okay, but the work was not easy.
At first, almost all the girls had not thought of going a step further, but when they found that they were working their asses off for only three or four thousand a month, while the girls who were willing to take a step forward could get a tip of several thousand a night, they fell into a trap.
You can’t compare. Once you compare, you’re finished.
They would start to consider taking another step forward. After all, it was just going into a room, not really doing anything, and the income could be much higher.
Some people tried to do this, and then they succeeded, as if they had entered another class from one.
In a high-income environment, they began to spend without a plan, began to experience a beautiful life they had never experienced before. They were no longer as innocent as they used to be.
When they realized that as long as they were willing to take another step forward, one or two million a year was a common occurrence, they couldn’t stop.
From the moment they stared into the abyss, they had actually already entered the abyss.
So there was no need for coercion or anything. They would even walk faster than others thought!
Just like at this moment, Lance could already imagine that it wouldn’t be long before sexual transactions would become the mainstream trade here.
Compared to letting ordinary girls do this, he actually preferred to let the refugees do it. At least they really needed the money to maintain their families’ livelihood, not to squander it.
The news of the Federation stationing troops in Golden Port City quickly spread. There were also some reporters who had taken pictures of their daily training. The Dantra Republic, after a period of silence, once again issued a final request.
They demanded that the federal government immediately withdraw its plan to station troops and shut down the naval base in Golden Port City.
But obviously, this was impossible.
This was related to the next stage of the plans of the federal government and Congress. The Dantra Republic then formally announced the severance of diplomatic relations with the Federation, and at the same time warned the federal government that if the federal navy appeared in the waters near the Dantra Republic, they would consider this act a “declaration of war.”
This fierce reaction was just right to satisfy both Congress and the Presidential Palace.
In fact, the federal government was very “arrogant” now. They all hoped that the Dantra Republic would be the one to declare a state of war. This way, “passively responding to the war” could give them a relatively good impression on the public side.
No one likes a warmonger who starts a war, so to start a war, the enemy must be the one to make the first move. This way, they would not have to bear the accusation of “actively provoking a war.”
Next, many people had already thought of it. They just needed to create a “misunderstanding,” and then they could enter a state of war.
Although the storm had not yet come, the sense of oppression from the dark clouds that had already pressed down to a reachable place was already here.
In November, various cities had Department of Defense recruitment points. The enlistment sentiment of the native people of the Federation was not particularly high, but it was different for the illegal immigrants and refugees.
They were all enthusiastically signing up, especially for the army. The number of applicants was very large.
Some people analyzed that the Federation would not send troops to Tanfit, so the army was a safer idea, which made the number of new army recruits explode.
Even near the refugee concentration point in the New Port District of Golden Port City, there were many recruitment points.
But with it, there were also some social activists who were active near the recruitment points. They advocated the concept of “refugees are not consumables” and hoped that their fellow refugees could treat this matter rationally.
Overall, it was of little use, and was considered a sight to see near the recruitment points.
With the arrival of December, the weather was already close to freezing, and sometimes there would be some scattered snowflakes.
After more than a month of fermentation and preparation, the bidding for some government projects in the new city area had already ended, and at the same time, it was facing new problems.
The old industrial district, how to demolish it, and when to demolish it.
(End of a Chapter)