观点与评论 中文 中英双语 英文 中国的前景已今非昔比 专栏作者 China’s Future Isn’t What It Used to Be 保罗·克鲁格曼 2022年12月23日 HECTOR RETAMAL/AGENCE FRANCE-PRESSE — GETTY IMAGES The world’s two most-powerful leaders have just had very different years. 世界上最有影响力的两位领导人经历了截然不同的一年。 At the beginning of 2022, Joe Biden was widely portrayed as a failed president. His legislative agenda appeared stalled, while economic troubles seemed to guarantee devastating losses in the midterms. What happened instead was that the Inflation Reduction Act — which is mainly a game-changing climate bill — was enacted; the much-hyped “red wave” was a ripple; and while many economists are still predicting a recession, unemployment is still low and inflation has been subsiding. 在2022年初，乔·拜登被广泛描绘为一个失败的总统。他的立法议程似乎陷入停滞，而经济问题似乎令他在中期选举中肯定会遭受毁灭性的 损失。然而与此相反，《减少通货膨胀法案》——主要是一项改变游戏规则的气候法案——得以颁布；曾被大肆宣传的“红色浪潮”只是一股 涟漪；尽管许多经济学家仍在预测经济衰退，但失业率仍然很低，通胀也在消退。 “新冠清零”一夜消 病例激增，中国官方 中国的前景已今非昔 中国放弃“清零”两 失，过去三年的牺牲 新冠死亡数字引发质 比 周后，病毒迅速蔓延 是为了什么？ power. Now, however, Xi has abruptly疑 ended his signature “zero Covid” policy, with all indications pointing to a huge surge in still boasting about his triumph over 1.By contrast, early this year Xi Jinping, 2. China’s paramount leader, was 3. 4.Covid. Indeed, for a while, people commonly heard assertions that China’s apparent success in pandemic management heralded its emergence as the world’s leading hospitalizations and deaths that will stress health care to the breaking point; the Chinese economy seems set to face major problems over the next two or three years; and long-term projections of Chinese economic growth are being marked down. 相比之下，今年年初，中国最高领导人习近平还在吹嘘他对新冠的胜利。事实上，有一段时间，人们经常听到这样的断言：中国在疫情管 理方面的明显成功，预示着它将成为世界上的领导力量。然而，现在，习近平突然结束了他标志性的“清零”政策，所有迹象都表明，住院 和死亡人数将大幅增加，这将使卫生保健的压力达到极限；中国经济似乎将在未来两三年内面临重大问题；中国经济增长的长期预测也被 下调。 China’s future, it seems, is not what it used to be. Why? 中国的未来似乎不再是过去的样子了。为什么？ China’s ability to limit the spread of the coronavirus with draconian lockdowns was supposed to demonstrate the superiority of a regime that doesn’t need to consult the public, that can simply do what needs to be done. At this point, however, Xi’s refusal to make preparations to move on, his failure to adopt the most effective vaccines and get shots in the arms of his most vulnerable citizens, have highlighted the weakness of authoritarian governments in which nobody can tell the leader when he’s getting it wrong. 中国以严厉的封锁来限制冠状病毒的传播，本来是为了证明一个不需要征询公众意见，只需要做该做的事情的政权的优越性。然而，在这 一点上，习近平拒绝做继续前进的准备，他没有采用最有效的疫苗，也没有把疫苗送到最脆弱的公民的手中，这凸显了专制政府的弱点， 在这种情况下，没有人能够告诉领导人他做错了什么。 Beyond the imminent prospect of carnage, China’s long-running macroeconomic problems seem to be reaching a tipping point. 除了即将到来的惨败前景，中国长期存在的宏观经济问题似乎正在达到一个临界点。 It has been obvious for years that China’s economy, despite an awesome history of economic growth, is wildly unbalanced. Too few of the gains from growth have trickled down to households, keeping consumer spending low as a share of gross domestic product. Extremely high rates of investment have filled the gap — but all indications are that investment is running into severely diminishing returns, with businesses ever more reluctant to spend on new ventures. 多年来，尽管中国经济有着惊人的增长历史，但很明显，中国经济严重失衡。经济增长带来的好处很少能惠及家庭，导致消费支出占国内 生产总值的比例很低。极高的投资率填补了这一缺口，但所有迹象都表明，投资回报率正在严重下降，企业越来越不愿在新项目上投资。 China has nonetheless managed to retain full employment — but mainly by promoting an enormous housing bubble. China’s real estate sector is incredibly bloated: According to one estimate it accounts for 29 percent of G.D.P., with investment in real estate as a share of G.D.P. running twice as high as it did in the United States at the height of the 2000s bubble. 尽管如此，中国还是成功地保持了充分就业——但主要是通过推动巨大的房地产泡沫。中国的房地产行业膨胀得令人难以置信：根据一项 估计，它占GDP的29%，房地产投资占GDP的比例是美国2000年泡沫最严重时期的两倍。 This isn’t a sustainable state of affairs. Economists often cite Stein’s Law: “If something cannot go on forever, it will stop.” Exactly how China’s bubble will end isn’t clear — it might be a sharp slowdown, or it might be a period of “low quality” growth that masks the true extent of the problem, but it won’t be pretty. 这种状况是不可持续的。经济学家经常引用斯坦定律：“如果一件事不能永远持续下去，它就会停止。”中国的泡沫究竟将如何结束还不清 楚——可能是急剧放缓，也可能是一段“低质量”增长时期，同时掩盖问题的真实程度，但这不会是好事。 “新冠清零”一夜消 病例激增，中国官方 中国的前景已今非昔 失，过去三年的牺牲 新冠死亡数字引发质 比 然而，真正令我震惊的是分析师们在下调他们对中国经济增长的长期预期。 是为了什么？ 疑 中国放弃“清零”两 周后，病毒迅速蔓延 down their longer-term projections for Chinese growth. 1.What has really struck me, however, 2. is the way analysts have been marking 3. 4. Two caveats here. 这里有两点需要注意。 First, nobody is very good at predicting long-term growth; as the M.I.T. economist Robert Solow famously quipped, attempts to explain differences in national growth rates often end in a “blaze of amateur sociology.” 首先，没有人擅长预测长期增长；正如麻省理工学院经济学家罗伯特·索洛的一句名言，试图解释国家增长率差异的尝试往往以“业余社会 学的狂热”告终。 Second, when measuring the size of national economies, you need to distinguish between the dollar value of G.D.P. and output measured at “purchasing power parity,” which is normally higher in lower-income economies, where the cost of living tends to be relatively low. 其次，在衡量国家经济规模时，你需要区分GDP的美元价值和以“购买力平价”衡量的产出，后者在低收入经济体中通常更高，因为那里的 生活成本往往相对较低。 On the latter measure, estimates suggest that China overtook the United States around 2016. But the dollar measure is arguably more important when it comes to geopolitical influence. So when will China take the lead? 在后者方面，估计表明中国在2016年左右超过了美国。但在地缘政治影响方面，美元衡量标准可以说更为重要。那么，中国什么时候会领 先呢？ Recently Goldman Sachs, which formerly projected China as No. 1 by the mid-2020s, pushed that date back to 2035. The Japan Center for Economic Research, which previously projected Chinese leadership by 2028, then 2033, now says that it won’t happen for at least several decades. Some analysts don’t think it will ever happen. 最近，高盛将这一日期推迟到2035年。高盛此前预计，中国将在本世纪20年代中期成为世界第一。日本经济研究中心此前预测，中国将在 2028年、2033年成为世界领导者，现在则表示，这至少在几十年内不会发生。一些分析人士认为，这种情况永远不会发生。 Where does this newfound pessimism come from? Part of the issue is demography. China’s working-age population has actually been declining since 2015. The Chinese economy can still grow rapidly if it can sustain rapid productivity growth. But China’s policy missteps seem to have reinforced the perception that it’s entering the “middle-income trap,” a widely claimed (although controversial) phenomenon in which some poorer nations achieve rapid catch-up, but only up to a point, and stall out well below the income levels of the most advanced economies. 这种新出现的悲观情绪从何而来？部分原因在于人口结构。自2015年以来，中国的劳动年龄人口实际上一直在下降。如果中国能够保持生 产率的快速增长，中国经济仍然可以快速增长。但中国的政策失误似乎强化了中国正在进入“中等收入陷阱”的看法。“中等收入陷阱”是一 种被广泛认可（尽管有争议）的现象，即一些较贫穷的国家能够快速追赶，但只能达到一定程度，并在收入水平远低于最发达经济体的水 平时停滞不前。 None of this should be taken to detract from the incredible rise in Chinese living standards over the past four decades, nor as a denial that China has already become an economic superpower. But if you were expecting Chinese economic dominance, you may have to wait for a long time. As I said, China’s future isn’t what it used to be. 这些都不应被认为是在贬低中国在过去40年里生活水平令人难以置信的提高，也不应被认为是在否认中国已经成为一个经济超级大国。但 如果你期待中国在经济上占据主导地位，你可能要等很长一段时间。正如我所说，中国的未来已经今非昔比。 “新冠清零”一夜消 病例激增，中国官方 失，过去三年的牺牲 新冠死亡数字引发质 奖。欢迎在Twitter上关注他：@PaulKrugman。 是为了什么？ 疑 翻译：纽约时报中文网 中国的前景已今非昔 比 中国放弃“清零”两 周后，病毒迅速蔓延 1.保罗·克鲁格曼(Paul Krugman)自2000年以来一直是时报的专栏作家。他也是纽约市立大学研究生中心的杰出教授。克鲁格曼因在国际贸易和经济地理方面的成就获得2008年诺贝尔经济学 2. 3. 4. 点击查看本文英文版。 相关报道 “清零”三年：中国人的新冠集体创伤 2022年12月16日 “贸易和平论”的理想真的结束了吗？ 2022年12月14日 中国年轻一代的沮丧与失望 2022年12月13日 中国放松防疫措施后如何复苏经济？ 2022年12月9日 最受欢迎 1. “新冠清零”一夜消失，过去三年的 牺牲是为了什么？ 4. 7. 10. 中国放弃“清零”两周后，病毒迅速 蔓延 中国派出创纪录军机在台湾周边飞 行，北京继续向台美施压 2. 5. 8. 病例激增，中国官方新冠死亡数 字引发质疑 单身中国老年人如何寻找伴侣？ 欢迎参加相亲节目 防疫政策逆转下，中国审查机器 难以平息不满和疑问 3. 6. 9. 中国的前景已今非昔比 中国放松国际旅行限制，取消入 境隔离 那些天生不会感染新冠的人 如何在审查中抗议？一张掷地有声 的白纸 国际 亚太 南亚 美国 美洲 欧洲 中东 非洲 中国 时政 经济 社会 中外关系 港澳台 商业与经济 全球经济 中国经济 交易录 文化 阅读 艺术 电影与电视 体育 风尚 时尚 美食与美酒 生活方式 免费下载 纽约时报中文网 iOS 和 Android App © 2022 The New York Times Company. 观点与评论 专栏作者 观点 漫画 更多 镜头 科技 科技公司 科技与你 科学 健康 教育 旅游 房地产