Economic+and+Social+Change;+Gentry,+Commoners,+Soldiers,+and+Mean+People+(735-738)

(MR) __**Working Classes**__ (MR)
 * Economic and Social Change; Gentry, Commoners, Soldiers, and Mean People (735-738)**
 * __Privileged Classes__**
 * Scholar bureaucrats and gentry occupied the most exalted positions in Chinese society
 * the gentry were slightly lower than the scholar bureaucrats
 * Scholar-Bureaucrats had things in common with gentry: from gentry ranks and with a gentry society (DW)
 * they functioned as intermediaries between the imperial government and local society
 * they wore black gowns with rank insignia
 * Addressed with honorific terms and fair legal treatment (DW)
 * received favorable legal treatment and couldn't be witnesses in legal proceedings
 * did not have to pay taxes and were immune to corporal punishment (KH)
 * most gentry used their land for income and also operated pawn and rice shops
 * their primary source of income was the government service which only they had access to by virtue of their academic degrees
 * resided in cities and towns
 * There were three classes below the gentry: peasants, artisans/workers, and merchants
 * the biggest class was the peasants, they were regarded as the most honorable because of their work and they provided food for population
 * peasants were classified as day laborers, farmers, and petty landlords (KH)
 * artisans and workers had higher income than peasants
 * were usually employees of the state or of gentry and merchant families
 * Thought of themselves as self-employed people (KH)

__**Merchants**__ (MR)
 * Merchants were at the bottom of the three classes
 * Moralists looked upon them as unscrupulous social parasites (DW)
 * had little legal protection
 * got support for their enterprises through bribery or profit-sharing arrangements
 * merchants provided their sons with education to prepare them for government examinations
 * this could lead to a promotion to the gentry status
 * Chinese did not adopt policies to strengthen merchants and state (DW)

__**Lower Classes**__ (KH)
 * Members of the military force and "mean people" were beyond the Confucian social hierarchy
 * Confucians thought of the military as a wretched but necessary evil
 * Confucians attempted to avoid military dominance of society by placing civilian bureaucrats in high government positions
 * "Mean people" included slaves, indentured servants, prostitutes, entertainers.