在中国古代，卖官鬻爵并不鲜见。追溯起来，首开卖官先河的乃秦始皇嬴政。不过，古代封建王朝连天下都是皇帝的，卖个“官儿”算啥？秦汉时期，买官卖官名气最大的当属曹操的父亲曹嵩。当时已继袭了老爸曹腾“费亭侯”封号的曹嵩，为了“侯升公”，居然用两吨半黄金买了个太尉当！东晋以后，官员多头戴乌纱帽，演变到明代，“乌纱帽”一词便成了官员代称，卖 官因此被民间讥为“卖纱帽”。

秦始皇首开卖 官先河——“缴粟千石拜爵一级”

中国封建时代买 官售 官应该自秦朝始。秦始皇时，有一年因飞蝗成灾，秦始皇下诏书，将向天下公开出售爵位：“凡百姓缴粟千石，可拜爵一级”。这意味着每缴纳1千石粟，可以授予爵位1级。

在这个基础上，我们可以推算出，如果以现在的小米价格来计算，那么所需的小米量将会非常庞大。如果以每斤3元人民币来算，每年的收入约为23.86万元，这对于当时的人来说是一个极其高昂的价格。

汉武帝 sells official positions for a price of 2 kilograms of gold per rank——The eighth-level official position "Lei Qin" costs 31 million gold coins

During the reign of Emperor Wu of Han, the currency policy was strong, and buying officials no longer accepted grain but only money.

According to the "Shuǐ Huǒ Zhì Xià" in the "Han Shu", in the sixth year of Emperor Wu's reign (123 BC), the government opened up a sale of martial arts titles. At that time, there were 17 levels in total, but they only sold to level eight officers called "Lei Qin". This title was actually empty; buyers did not care much about it; therefore, they tried to give them real positions by granting them with offices equivalent to five great officers.

The price was one million gold coins per rank; so buying an eighth-level Lei Qin position would cost thirty-one million gold coins. Since one gold coin is equal to ten silver coins and one silver coin is equal to ten copper coins or mace, this means that thirty-one million copper or mace are required for this purchase.

If we convert these prices into today's standards using current market values for grain and metal currencies, then selling officials during Emperor Wu's reign would be quite expensive indeed!