There was a system under which money payments were substituted for the old-fashioned and vexatious method of carrying on public works by drafts of forced labourers; and again another under which warehouses for bartering and hypothecating goods were established all over the empire.
Of all his innovations the most interesting was that all land was to be remeasured and an attempt made to secure a more equitable incidence of taxation.

The plan was to divide up the land into equal squares, and to levy taxes in proportion to the fertility of each.

This scheme proved for various reasons to be unworkable; and the bitter opposition with which, like all his other measures of reform, it was received by his opponents, did not conduce to success.

Finally, he abolished all restrictions upon the export of copper, the result being that even the current copper "cash" were melted down and made into articles for sale and exportation.

A panic ensued, which Wang met by the simple expedient of doubling the value of each cash.