China and the liquidity trap

                                           中国和流动性陷阱

I liked this David Leonhardt article about the China-US economic relationship. But I do have a problem with this passage:

我喜欢David Leonhardt 这篇关于中美经济关系的文章，但是我对以下这段有点疑问：

The most obviously worrisome part of the situation today is that the Chinese could decide that they no longer want to buy Treasury bonds. The U.S. government’s recent spending for bank bailouts and stimulus may be necessary to get the economy moving again, but it also raises the specter of eventual inflation, which would damage the value of Treasuries. If the Chinese are unnerved by this, they could instead use their cash to buy the bonds of other countries, which would cause interest rates here to jump, prolonging the recession.

当今最明显的令人不安的情形是，中国人可能决定他们不再想购买美国国债了。美国政府最近为拯救银行和经济刺激开销了很多,这可能对拉动经济再次增长是必要的。但是它也引发了最终可能通胀的担忧, 这将给美国国债价值带来损失。如果中国人已经对此气馁了, 他们可能转而使用他们的现金，去购买其他国家的债券, 这将使得国内利率上升, 延长衰退时间。

 Um, no. Right now we’re in a liquidity trap, which, as I explained in an earlier post, means that we have an incipient excess supply of savings even at a zero interest rate. (By the way, I’ve had a chance to see the transcript of the PEN/ NY Review event, and I don’t think I was misrepresenting Niall Ferguson’s position.)

哦,不是这样。现在我们陷入了一个流动性陷阱，这在我此前的一篇文章中解释过,它意味着我们即使在零利率的时候, 也将会遇到一个早期就过剩的储蓄。(顺便说一下, 我刚看到了PEN/ NY事件, 我并不认为我错误地表达了尼尔.弗格森的立场。)

In this situation, America has too large a supply of desired savings. If the Chinese spend more and save less, that’s a good thing from our point of view. To put it another way, we’re facing a global paradox of thrift, and everyone wishes everyone else would save less.

在这个情形下, 美国自愿储蓄提供的供给太大。如果中国人消费更多储蓄更少,  从我们的视点来看，这是一件好事。换句话说，我们正面临一个全球的节俭悖论, 人人都希望别人储蓄得少一些。

Or to put it a third way, the argument that a reduction in China’s dollar purchases would be contractionary for America because it would drive up interest rates is equivalent to the argument that fiscal expansion is contractionary for the same reason — and equivalently wrong.

再换句话说，中国减少购买美元会推动利率上升给美国带来收缩效应，这个观点，等同于财政扩张会推动利率上升产生收缩效应的观点------两者也同样都是错误的。

But what if China doesn’t spend more, but just reallocates its reserves from dollars to, say, euros? The answer is, that’s also good for us: a weaker dollar will help our exports, at Europe’s expense.

但如果中国不再花更多的钱, 而将外储配置从美元转至欧元等资产会怎样？答案是, 那将对美国有利: 更弱的美元将帮助我们的出口, 但欧洲会受损。

One of the things I tried to tell the Chinese was precisely that the old co-dependence no longer exists. For now, at least, their dollar purchases are an unalloyed bad thing from America’s point of view.

有一个事情我正好想告诉中国人, 旧有的共同依赖已不再存在。现在, 至少从美国的视点来看, 他们的美元购买行为是一个纯粹的坏事情。

[此贴子已经被作者于2009-5-27 1:12:24编辑过]