原文链接：http://www.economist.com/node/16397110?story_id=16397110
A special report on debt
特别报导：债务
Repent at leisure
后悔莫及
Borrowing has been the answer to all economic troubles in the past 25 years. Now debt itself has become the problem, says Philip Coggan
在过去25年 里，借债已经成为所有经济问题的答案。现在，债务本身成为了经济问题。——Philip Coggan
Jun 24th 2010
2010年6月24日
MAN is born free but is everywhere in debt. In the rich world, getting hold of your first credit card is a rite of passage far more important for your daily life than casting your first vote. Buying your first home normally requires taking on a debt several times the size of your annual income. And even if you shun the temptation of borrowing to indulge yourself, you are still saddled with your portion of the national debt.
人是生而自由却又躲不开债务。在发达国家，相比于投下你的第一张 选票，拥有一张信用卡对于你的日常生活来说是个更为重要的阶段。购买你的第一个住处通常需要背上数倍于你年收入的债务。并且，即使你抵御住了为放纵生活而 借贷的诱惑，你仍然将承担国家债务中的一部分。
Throughout the 1980s and 1990s a rise in debt levels accompanied what economists called the "great moderation", when growth was steady and unemployment and inflation remained low. No longer did Western banks have to raise rates to halt consumer booms. By the early 2000s a vast international scheme of vendor financing had been created. China and the oil exporters amassed current-account surpluses and then lent the money back to the developed world so it could keep buying their goods.
整个20世 纪80～90年代，由于经济稳定的增长，失 业率和通胀率保持在低水平，经济学家们称这段时间为"大稳定"时期，而一个不断增长的负债水平就伴随着这个时期。西方的银行不再必须提高利率来限制消费者 的激增。到21世纪初期，一个庞大的、国际性的供应商融资方式被创造了出来。中国和石油出口国在经 常项目上累积了大量过剩的资金，然后他们将这些钱借给发达国家，以便这些国家继续购买他们的商品。
Those who cautioned against rising debt levels were dismissed as doom-mongers; after all, asset prices were rising even faster, so balance-sheets looked healthy. And with the economy buoyant, debtors could afford to meet their interest payments without defaulting. In short, it paid to borrow and it paid to lend.
那些警告不要增长债务水平的人作为灾难预言者而被解雇了；毕竟， 资产价格增长的更迅速，从而资产负债表看上去很健康。并且，随着经济的复苏，债务人能够不违约的支付他们的利息。总之就是，借了还，还了借。
Like alcohol, a debt boom tends to induce euphoria. Traders and investors saw the asset-price rises it brought with it as proof of their brilliance; central banks and governments thought that rising markets and higher tax revenues attested to the soundness of their policies.
如同酒精一样，债务的增长倾向于导致过度亢奋。贸易商和投资人看 到资产价格的攀升，这似乎证明了他们的英明；央行与政府认为市场的增长与税收证实了他们政策的稳定性。
|
The answer to all problems seemed to be more debt. Depressed? Use your credit card for a shopping spree "because you're worth it". Want to get rich quick? Work for a private-equity or hedge-fund firm, using borrowed money to enhance returns. Looking for faster growth for your company? Borrow money and make an acquisition. And if the economy is in recession, let the government go into deficit to bolster spending. When the European Union countries met in May to deal with the Greek crisis, they proposed a €750 billion ($900 billion) rescue programme largely consisting of even more borrowed money.
所有问题的答案好象是"更多的负债"。心情沮丧？那用你的信用卡 去大血拼，"因为你值得拥有"。想快速发财？那去为私营公司或者对冲基金工作，用借来的钱增加回报。为你的公司寻找快速的增长？去借钱并提高收益。并且如 果经济不景气，那么让政府赤字化运营以支持政府开支。当欧盟国家5月份处理希腊危机时，他们提出了 一份7500亿欧元（9000亿美元）的拯 救计划，该计划甚至包括大量借来的钱。
Debt increased at every level, from consumers to companies to banks to whole countries. The effect varied from country to country, but a survey by the McKinsey Global Institute found that average total debt (private and public sector combined) in ten mature economies rose from 200% of GDP in 1995 to 300% in 2008 (see chart 1 for a breakdown by country). There were even more startling rises in Iceland and Ireland, where debt-to-GDP ratios reached 1,200% and 700% respectively. The burdens proved too much for those two countries, plunging them into financial crisis. Such turmoil is a sign that debt is not the instant solution it was made out to be. The market cheer that greeted the EU package for Greece lasted just one day before the doubts resurfaced.
债务在各个层面上都在增长，从消费者到公司，从银行到整个国家。 债务影响了各式各样的国家，不过根据麦肯锡全球机构的研究发现，在十个成熟经济国家，平均来说总的债务（包括私营与国营部门）占GDP的份额是从1995年的200%上涨到2008年的300%（见图表一中的国别分析）。对冰岛和爱尔兰来说，债务占GDP的 份额令人吃惊的分别上升到了1200%和700%。 这样的负担充分证明了这两个国家深陷金融危机之中。这样的混乱局面说明债务不是一个直接解决问题的方法，恰恰是遭遇的问题。在疑虑浮现以前，市场仅仅为欧 盟的拯救希腊的方案欢呼了一天。
|
From early 2007 onwards there were signs that economies were reaching the limit of their ability to absorb more borrowing. The growth-boosting potential of debt seemed to peter out. According to Leigh Skene of Lombard Street Research, each additional dollar of debt was associated with less and less growth (see chart 2).
2007年之前，就有迹象表明，整个经济体系已经到达了其吸收更多债务的 能力极限了。债务大量增长的潜力似乎正在消失。根据Lombard Street研究所的Leigh Skene的研究，额外增加的每一美元债务与经济增长的联系越来越小（见图二）。
Stopping the debt supercycle
停止债务的超级循环
The big question is whether this rapid build-up of debt—a phenomenon which Martin Barnes of the Bank Credit Analyst, a research group, has dubbed the "debt supercycle"—has now come to an end. Debt reduction has become a hot political issue. Rioters on the streets of Athens have been protesting against the "junta of the markets" that is imposing austerity on the Greek economy, and tea-party activists in America, angry about trillion-dollar deficits and growing government involvement in the economy, have been upsetting the calculations of both the Democratic and Republican party leaderships.
最大的问题是如此快速增长的债务（这种现象被一个研究组织的银行 信贷分析家Marting Barnes称之为"债务超级大循环"）现在是否已经接近结束了。债务 消减已经成为一个热门的政治议题。雅典街道上的抗议者已经在反对那些要在希腊经济上推行收缩的"市场军阀们"（译注：即压缩政府福利开支），而美国的那些 为政府卷入数十亿亏空和债务增长而愤怒的茶叶党人活动家，已经搅乱了民主、共和两党的领导人对（选票）的计算考虑。
To understand why debt may have become a burden rather than a boon, it is necessary to go back to first principles. Why do people, companies and countries borrow? One obvious answer is that it is the only way they can maintain their desired level of spending. Another reason is optimism; they believe the return on the borrowed money will be greater than the cost of servicing the debt. Crucially, creditors must believe that debtors' incomes will rise; otherwise how would they be able to pay the interest and repay the capital?
要理解为什么债务已经开始成为一个负担而不是一种福利，必须回到 经济学的第一规律。人、公司和国家为什么要借贷？一个显然的答案就是债务可以满足他们的渴望的消费水平。另一个乐观主义的原因是，他们都相信来自债务的回 报将大于债务的成本。重要的是，债权人必须相信债务人的收入会增长；否则，债务人如何支付利息并归还本金？
But in parts of the rich world such optimism may now be misplaced. With ageing populations and shrinking workforces, their economies may grow more slowly than they have done in the past. They may have borrowed from the future, using debt to enjoy a standard of living that is unsustainable. Greece provides a stark example. Standard & Poor's, a rating agency, estimates that its GDP will not regain its 2008 level until 2017.
不过，在富裕世界的某些地方，这样的乐观主义可能放错了地方。随 着人口老龄化和生产力的下降，他们的经济增长可能远远落后于过去的年代。他们可能已经在透支未来，用债务来享受那个已经无法继续维持的生活水平。希腊提供 了一个完整的样本。一个联合国的评级机构，S&P（译注：只查到是联合国下属的一个机构） 预计，希腊要到2017年才能将其GDP恢 复到2008年的水平。
Rising government debt is a Ponzi scheme that requires an ever-growing population to assume the burden—unless some deus ex machina, such as a technological breakthrough, can boost growth. As Roland Nash, head of research at Renaissance Capital, an investment bank, puts it: "Can the West, with its regulated industry, uncompetitive labour and large government, afford its borrowing-funded living standards and increasingly expensive public sectors?"
增长中的政府债务其实是一种庞氏骗局，它需要有人不断的加入来承 担先加入者的负担——除非出现了解围的事件，比如一次技术革命的突破，才能使其继续增长下去。正如一家名为复兴资本的投资银行的研究室主任所说的："西方 世界凭着其常规工业、缺乏竞争力的劳动者和庞大的政府，能通过它投入借来的钱来支撑其现有的生活水平和不断增长的、昂贵的公共部门的支出吗？"
Sovereign default is far from inconceivable. Many people are forecasting that Greece, despite its bail-out package from the EU and the IMF, will be unable to repay its debts in full and on time. Faced with the choice between punishing their populations with austerity programmes and letting down foreign creditors, countries may find it easier to disappoint the foreigners. Defaults have been common in the past, as Carmen Reinhart and Ken Rogoff showed in their book, "This Time is Different". Adam Smith, a founding father of economics, noted in "The Wealth of Nations" that "when national debts have once been accumulated to a certain degree, there is scarce, I believe, a single instance of their having being fairly and completely paid."
独立国家拖欠债务是非常的难以置信的。许多人正在预测，尽管希腊 从欧盟与国际货币基金组织获得了帮助，它也没有能力及时足额的偿还其债务。当面临用紧缩计划惩罚其本国民众还是欺压外国债权人的选择时，国家会发现让外国 人失望要容易得多。正如Carmen Reinhart和Ken Rogoff的书《这个时代不同了》中所说的，违约比过去普遍多了。亚当.斯密 斯，经济学的创始人，在其《国富论》中写道："当国家债务已经积累到某个程度时，我相信，公平的、完整支付债务的例子将是罕见的。"（译注：就是说国债达 到一定程度，国家必然赖帐）
Governments now face a tricky period when they have to deal with the debt overhang, decide how quickly to cut their deficits (and risk undermining growth), and try to distribute the pain of doing so as equitably as possible.
处理高悬的帐务使现在的政府面临一个棘手的时期：需要决定如何快 速的消减赤字（并且要冒经济下滑的风险），而且要尽可能公正的在国民中分摊紧缩带来的痛苦。
Debt is often treated as a moral issue as well as an economic one. Margaret Atwood, in her book of essays, "Payback: Debt and the Shadow Side of Wealth", notes that the Aramaic words for debt and sin are the same. And some versions of the Lord's Prayer say "Forgive us our debts" rather than "Forgive us our trespasses".
债务常常被看成即是一个道德议题，又是一个经济议题。Margaret Atwood在她的随笔集《支付：债务和财富的影子边缘》中写到：在Aramaic语中，债务与罪恶是同一个词。在某些祝祷文中，"免除我的债务"比"赦免我的罪过"更多。
The Live 8 campaign in 2005 tried to shame developed nations into forgiving the debts of poor countries, particularly in sub-Saharan Africa. Economists have developed the concept of "odious debt" in which citizens should not be forced to repay money borrowed by tyrannical or kleptocratic rulers. Interest payments on debt are often regarded as an onerous burden placed on the poor; interest is seen as an unjustified reward for capital, a concept that goes back to Aristotle and is implicit in the Christian idea of usury. Islam forbids it altogether. The book of Deuteronomy suggested a debt amnesty every seven years, which survived into later Jewish custom.
2005年的"Live 8"运动试图使发达国家感 到羞愧并免除贫困国家，尤其是撒哈拉南部国家的债务。经济学家创造了"可憎债务"的概念，即那些国家的公民不应当被强制支付由其独裁者或者盗窃国家的统治 者所借的债务。债务利息的支付对于穷人来说也常常被认为是沉重的负担，利息被视为资本不当得利的概念，其实是回到 了亚里士多德时代，而基督徒则认为这显然就是高利贷。伊斯兰教则完全禁止借贷利息。晚近时期，犹太人还遵守着《申命记》中每七年进行一次债务赦免的风俗。
But conventional morality has not always been on the side of the borrowers. Some regard debt as the road to ruin and the failure to repay as a breach of trust. In the 18th and 19th century debtors in Britain were often thrown into jail (as in Charles Dickens's "Little Dorrit"), though Samuel Johnson spotted the flaws of the practice: "We have now imprisoned one generation of debtors after another, but we do not find that their numbers lessen. We have now learned that rashness and imprudence will not be deterred from taking credit; let us try whether fraud and avarice may be more easily restrained from giving it."
不过通常的道德观念并不总是站在借款者一边的。有些人认为债务是 通向毁灭之路，并且拖延偿还则破坏了彼此的信任。在18到19世 纪的英国，负债者常常被投入监狱（象狄更斯小说《小多莉》所描写的），虽然Samul Johnson指 出了这种方式的缺陷："我们已经一个接一个的将负债者投入监狱，但是我们并没有发现负债者的数量在减少。我们现在知道了，借贷这种轻率行为并不会被阻止； 让我们试试，欺诈与贪婪是否可能比给予更容易被制止。"
Movable morals
变动的道德观
In the past 100 years the moral battle has moved in favour of the debtors. Bankruptcy is no longer stigmatised but simply regarded as bad luck. When consumers borrow beyond their means, the blame is laid on lax lending practices rather than irresponsible borrowing. Governments have encouraged more people to become homeowners and thus to take on debt. And defaulting on one's debts has become much less cumbersome; in the current housing slump many American homeowners have resorted to "jingle mail", dropping their keys through the lender's letterbox and walking away from their property.
在过去的100年 中，道德观已经转向支持负债者。破产不再被视为可耻的而仅仅是运气不好。当消费者的借贷超出他们的收入时，人们更多的是责备宽松的出借行为而不是不负责任 的借贷。政府已经鼓励更多的民众通过借贷而拥有房产。而且拖欠债务已经变得不再那么麻烦了；在当前的房市萧条中，许多美国房产业主采取了"叮当邮件"的做 法，即将房门钥匙邮寄给债权人然后离开房屋。（译注：断供并搬离）
In business, a few failed directorships are a sign of entrepreneurship rather than incompetence. America's Chapter 11 process allows the managers of companies to remain in place and the business to be protected from its creditors. The number of companies with safe AAA credit ratings has collapsed as more have acted on the theory that a debt-laden balance-sheet is more efficient (because interest payments are tax-deductible in most countries).
在商界，一些失败的商业项目被视为企业家（冒险）精神的象征而不 是不称职的表现。美国《破产法》第十一章允许公司的经理人待在他的位置上继续经营（并将所得用于清偿财务）而免于债权人的（直接清算）。许多按照资产负债 表越是负债累累，其运营越有效率的理论（因为在大多数国家，利息的支付是可以免税的）运行并具有安全的AAA信 用评级的公司的数量已大幅减少。
The recent crisis has also diminished belief in the judgment of the financial markets. The role of banks in the credit crunch and the cost of the financial sector bail-out has undermined the idea that the markets assess risk fairly and rationally. Instead, higher borrowing costs are seen as the result of unscrupulous speculation.
最近的危机也导致了对金融市场判断力的信任大幅降低了。借贷危机 中银行的角色，以及金融部门红利的开支已经破坏了认为市场风险评估是公正和理性的这个理念。取而代之的是将高额借贷的成本视为不道德的投机行为的结果。
The role of sovereign credit-default swaps (CDS), a way of betting on the likelihood of a country's failure to repay the money it has borrowed, has proved particularly controversial. Southern European nations, which have been at the heart of the recent market turmoil, have been quick to blame an Anglo-Saxon conspiracy, brewed up by hedge funds, credit-rating agencies and even newspapers like this one, for unfairly pushing up their borrowing costs. The German government moved to ban short-selling of government bonds and some CDS transactions last month. As Charles Stanley, a stockbroking firm, cynically puts it, EU nations are saying: "Please fund our lifestyles, but don't hold us to any commitments."
独立的信贷违约掉期（一种打赌一个国家拖延支付其所借债务可能性 的方法。译注：详见http://zh.wikipedia.org/zh-cn/%E4%BF%A1%E8%B2%B8%E9%81%95%E7%B4%84%E6%8E%89%E6%9C%9F）的角色尤其富有争 议。处于当前市场混乱核心的南欧国家已经很快的指责存在一个盎格鲁-撒克逊阴谋，其背后的对冲基金 与信用评级机构正在浮现出来，甚至报纸也喜欢报道这个不公平推高了他们借贷成本的阴谋。上个月，德国政府开始禁止卖空政府债券和部分信贷违约掉期交易。查 尔斯史丹利股票经纪公司冷冷的嘲讽此事，认为欧盟国家正在告诉市场："请为我们的生活方式提供资金，但不要指望我们给出任何承诺。"
Why it matters
为什么出问题？
If a husband borrows money from his wife, the family is no worse off. By extension, just as every debt is a liability for the borrower, it is an asset for the creditor. Since Earth is not borrowing money from Mars, does the debt explosion really matter, or is it just an accounting device?
如果丈夫问妻子借钱，家庭情况不会恶化。延伸一下，正如每笔债务 对借款人来说都有归还的义务，对借出者来说就是资产。既然地球并未向火星借钱，帐务的膨胀真的是问题吗？抑或仅仅是一个会计记账问题？
During the credit boom of the early 1990s and 2000s the conventional view was that it did not matter. Not only were asset prices rising even faster than debt but the use of derivatives was spreading risk across the system and, in particular, away from the banks, which had capital ratios well above the regulatory minimum.
在20世 纪90年代和21世纪早期的帐务膨胀阶段， 普遍都认为这不是一个问题。不仅资产的价格上涨的速度远高于债务，而且金融衍生品的运用使得风险在金融系统中散布开，尤其使得风险远离银行，这就使银行的 资本比率远高于常规的最低值。
The problem with debt, though, is the need to repay it. Not for nothing does the word credit have its roots in the Latin word credere, to believe. If creditors lose faith in their borrowers, they will demand the repayment of existing debt or refuse to renew old loans. If the debt is secured against assets, then the borrower may be forced to sell. A lot of forced sales will cause asset prices to fall and make creditors even less willing to extend loans. If the asset price falls below the value of the loan, then both creditors and borrowers will lose money.
然而，债务的问题就是需要被偿还。单词"credit"的拉丁语词根不会白白的是"信任"。如果债权人对他们的债务人失去信任，他们将要求归还现存的债 务或者拒绝延期老的借款。如果债务是用资产担保的，那么借款人可能被迫出售资产。大量被迫出售的资产会导致价格下跌，而这就使得债权人更不愿意将债务延期 了。如果资产价格跌到所借款项金额之下，那么债务人与债权人都将损失金钱。
This is particularly troublesome if the economy slips into deflation, as happened globally in the 1930s and in Japan in the 1990s. Debt levels are fixed in nominal terms whereas asset prices can go up or down. So falling prices create a spiral in which assets are sold off to repay debts, triggering further price falls and further sales. Irving Fisher, an economist who worked in the first half of the 20th century, called this the debt deflation trap.
当经济滑向通货紧缩时，这就特别的麻烦了，就像发生在1930年代的全球性通货紧缩和1990年代日本的通 缩一样。债务水平在财务报表中是固定的，而资产价格却能上下波动。结果，不断急剧下降的价格造成要通过出售资产来还债，然后引起更大的价格下降与更多的资 产被出售。20世纪上半期的一个名为Irving Fisher的经济学家称这种现象为债务通缩陷阱。
Another reason why debt matters is to do with the role of banks in the economy. By their nature, banks borrow short (from depositors or the wholesale markets) and lend long. The business depends on confidence; no bank can survive if its depositors (or its wholesale lenders) all want their money back at once. If banks struggle to meet their own debts, they have no choice but to reduce their lending. If this happens on a large scale, as it did in the 1930s, the ripple effect for the economy as a whole can be devastating.
另一个造成债务成问题的原因与银行在经济中的角色有关。银行本质 上是短期借款（从储户或批发市场）而长期放贷。这样的业务依赖于信任；没有哪家银行在其所有储户（或者大出借人）要求其立刻还钱时还能够生存（译注：银行 若被挤兑则必死）。如果银行遇到自身的债务而抗争时，他们没有什么选择，只能降低放贷数量。如果这种情况在一个很大的规模上发生，比如象在1930年代那样，那么整个经济的连锁反应就必然是毁灭性的。
Both of these effects were seen in the debt crisis of 2007-08. Falling property prices caused defaults and a liquidity crisis in the banking system so severe that the authorities feared the cash machines would stop working. Hence the unprecedented largesse of the bank bail-out.
所有的这些后果在2007-08年 的债务危机中都出现了。资产价格的下滑导致了如此严重的债务拖欠与银行系统的清偿危机，以至于官方担心取款机将停止运行。结果，银行却支付了前所未有的巨 额奖金。
Hyman Minsky, an American economist who has become more fashionable since his death in 1996, argued that these debt crises were both inherent in the capitalist system and cyclical. Prosperous times encourage individuals and companies to take on more risk, meaning more debt. Initially such speculation is successful and encourages others to follow suit; eventually credit is extended to those who will be able to repay the debt only if asset prices keep rising (a succinct description of the subprime-lending boom). In the end the pyramid collapses.
Hyman Minsky，一位自从其1996年 过世后变得越来越流行的美国经济学家曾经争辩说，这些债务危机是资本主义制度与经济周期与生俱来的。经济繁荣时期就会鼓励个人与公司去冒更大的风险，也就 是更多的借债。起初，这样的投机是成功的，也鼓励了更多的人加入投机；最终，债务将达到只有资产价格保持继续上升时那些人才能够偿债的地步（简单的描述就 是：次级抵押贷款的繁荣）。最后，金字塔垮了。
In the aftermath of the latest collapse it is clear that the distinction between debt in the private and public sector has become blurred. If the private sector suffers, the public sector may be forced to step in and assume, or guarantee, the debt, as happened in 2008. Otherwise the economy may suffer a deep recession which will cut the tax revenues governments need to service their own debt.
很清楚，最近的这次崩溃的后果就是私营部门的债务与公共部门的债 务之间的区别变得模糊了。正如2008年所发生的事情一样，如果私营部门遭创，公共部门可能被迫涉 入并承担、或者担保债务。否则，经济将面临很深的衰退，这就将造成政府税收的减少，而政府需要这些税收收入来支付政府自身的债务。
If the Western world faces an era of austerity as debts are paid down, how will that affect day-to-day life? Clearly a society built on consumption will have to pay more attention to saving. The idea that using borrowed money to buy assets is the smart road to riches might lose currency, changing attitudes to home ownership as well as to parts of the finance sector such as private equity.
如果西方世界为了支付债务而面临一个节衣缩食的时代，那对现在的 日常生活将有何影响？显然，建立在消费之上的社会将不得不更多的关注储蓄。用借来的钱购买固定资产是成为富翁的聪明方法的观点可能不再流行，对于拥有房产 以及加入金融部门获得私人股份这些事情的态度也都发生了改变。
This special report will argue that, for the developed world, the debt-financed model has reached its limit. Most of the options for dealing with the debt overhang are unpalatable. As has already been seen in Greece and Ireland, each government will have to find its own way of reducing the burden. The battle between borrowers and creditors may be the defining struggle of the next generation.
这篇特别报导将要强调的是，对于发达国家，这个债务-金融模式已经到达了它的极限。大部分解决高悬的债务的方法都是苦涩的。正如已经在希腊和爱尔兰所看到的，每个 政府都将不得不寻找自己的方法去消减负担。这场在债务人与债权人之间的战争可能给下一代人定义了奋斗模式。
Orignal From: A special report on debt 特别报导：债务
没有评论:
发表评论