Increased wages and changing status of Gyeong-juin in the late Joseon Dynasty

This paper reexamines the characteristics of Gyeong-juin, which has been reviewed in terms of commercial history, in terms of the bureaucracy and tax administration. Previous studies have explained that in the late Joseon Dynasty, Gyeong-juin caused strong resistance from peasants by generating predatory profits through exclusive commercial activities and loan sharking. However, Gyeong-juin had to pay to government the taxes of each town on behalf of the local officials and they also had to burden the expenses of local scholars to stay in Seoul. Considering this, I think there are some points that the role and status of Gyeong-juin should be reevaluated.Although the wages of Gyeong-juin were included in the Daedong-tax with the enactment of the Daedongbeop, the roles imposed on Gyeong-juin went beyond the liaison task between the central and local regions. The Gyeong-juin of each province, staying in Seoul, had to meet the complex and diverse demands of the new local official, the central officials, and the local scholars who were connected to them. In principle, the expenses that Gyeong-juin spent while performing the role had to be paid for compensation by local, but it was not easy for the Gyeong-juin to get back them in the absence of a separate local budget items. To improve this, the Gyeong-juin earned intermediate profits by lobbying local officials to include his wages in local budget and increased interest income through the usury. The central government cracked down on Gyeong-juin who caused the problem with the usury, while strictly warning the government offices that exploited the Gyeong-juin excessively, allowing the Gyeong-juin to continue serving in bureaucratic and tax administrations.In short, despite the fact that the Gyeong-juin’s exploitation of peasants had been steadily pointed out as social contradictions since the peasants’ uprising, the Gyeong-juin were able to survive until the early 20th century because they were indispensable to the bureaucracy and tax administration of the Joseon Dynasty.