【09.06.20 新闻周刊】嘿，普通消费者——中国的消费者救不了我们

深深的红

【中文标题】嘿，普通消费者——中国的消费者救不了我们
【原文标题】Hey, Small Spender——Chinese Consumers Can’t Save Us
【登载媒体】新闻周刊
【来源地址】http://www.newsweek.com/id/202862
【译者】深深的红
【翻译方式】人工
【声明】本翻译供Anti-CNN使用，未经AC或译者许可，不得转载。
【原文库链接】http://bbs.m4.cn/thread-175377-1-2.html
【译文】

Are Chinese consumers ready to save the world by finally taking theirplace alongside profligate American shoppers? A glance at the salesnumbers seems to indicate they are. While U.S. consumers stayed homefretting over their depressed home values and depressing brokeragestatements, their Chinese counterparts hit the stores. Retail salesjumped 15.2 percent in China in May, as home and car sales soared. Evenwith exports collapsing—down 26.4 percent in the past year—China'seconomy may grow by as much as 8 percent this year. To some experts,that is evidence that the country's booming middle class is driving arecovery.

中国的消费者已经做好准备站在大手大脚的美国消费者旁边拯救世界了么？从销售数字上一眼看上去好像是这样。当美国的消费者为他们令人沮丧的房产价格和投资状况烦恼时，中国的消费者却在商店购物。五月份，随着房屋和汽车销量的猛增，中国的零售额增加了15.2%。即使上一年出口雪崩了26.4%，今年中国的经济增长仍可能达到8％。对一些专家来说，这说明该国正在成长中的中产阶级正在引导一场复兴。

It's a scenario that should warm the hearts of Chinese manufacturersand McDonald's executives alike. But it's misleading. The big spenderdriving the Chinese boom is not the individual—it's the government. Andno government can spend as freely right now as China's Communist Party,with its nearly $2 trillion in reserves and unchecked budget authority.Beijing's stimulus plan amounts to 4 percent of GDP, double America's 2percent, and China didn't have to resort to foreign borrowing.Government investment is up over 30 percent since the beginning of theyear—spending on rail lines and roads has more than doubled in the pastyear. Subsidies are multiplying, as central and local governments pumpmoney into idle factories and retraining workers. Governmentlending—and the party's strong suggestions that banks should lendmore—is helping apartment sales surge, as are new real-estate tax cuts.The state is even handing out vouchers directly to consumers for cars,refrigerators and other products.

这个情节应该会让中国的制造商和麦当劳经理之类的人欣慰，但它却有误导之嫌。促进中国繁荣的大消费者不是个人而是政府。当前没有那个政府能像中国共产党那样自由的使用资金。它有两万亿美元的资金和毫无限制的立项权利。北京的刺激计划动用的GDP的4％，而美国只用了2％，并且中国不需要依靠外债。从年初一来，政府的投资增加了30％以上——在铁路和公路方面的投资是去年的两倍强。补助金成倍增长，与此同时中央和地方各级政府将自己注入停产的工厂并重新培训工人。伴随着新的房地产减税政策，政府贷款——党还强烈建议银行增加贷款——正帮助住房销售上涨。国家甚至直接给汽车、冰箱和其他产品的消费者发放优惠券。

China's overall recovery is real, and that's good news for most othereconomies in the world. But the government's largesse is obscuring thedegree to which China still depends on subsidized exports to America.The global downturn is hitting hard in places like Guangdong province,a southern factory hub that produces about a quarter of China'sexports. There, five-star hotels stand empty, while job centers forlaid-off migrant workers are full. On a recent evening, the Pearl Riveritself seemed dimmer—many of the garish light displays that usuallyblaze from waterfront inns and restaurants had been turned off "to saveelectricity," says Su Caifang, deputy director general of the GuangdongForeign Affairs Office. "We're still very export-dependent, especiallyon America," says Su.

中国的整体复苏是真是的。这对世界上大多数其他经济体是好消息。政府的大力资助掩盖了中国依然依赖于受补贴的对美出口的程度。全球性的衰退对类似广东省的地区伤害很大。广东是南方的工业中心，大约四分之一的中国出口产品的产地。在那里，五星级宾馆没有住客，而为失业农民工服务的职业介绍所却挤满了人。今日的一个傍晚，珠江看起来都黯淡了——临江的小旅馆和饭馆“为了省电”而熄灭了耀眼的灯饰，广东省外事办公室副主任苏才芳说。“我们依然非常依赖出口，尤其是美国。”她说。

It's an honest admission, one that undercuts all the talk about amiddle-class Chinese consumer poised to take the place of Wal-Martmoms. Local officials from around the Pearl River Delta like to talkabout how they are now traveling inland to Hunan or Sichuan province tosell their own countrymen the consumer electronics, jewelry, cheapclothing and shoes that they once sent abroad. Yet sales are a drop inthe bucket compared with the enormous market outside China. There's asense that the U.S. market will take years to rebound—and may neverreach its former spendthrift glory—while the Chinese market will alsotake a long time to reach critical mass. "Even before the financialcrisis, we knew we needed to move beyond the U.S. market," says AllanS.K. Lam, vice general manager of Hua Jian Group, a shoe manufacturerthat makes much of what you see in stores like Nine West, Kenneth Coleand Coach. "But it's going to take at least five years, perhaps eveneight years, to develop the Chinese domestic market in an importantway."

这是一个中肯的说法，由此可见所有那些关于中国的中产阶级消费者已经准备好取代沃尔玛“妈妈们”的说法并不可信。珠江三角洲一带的官员们喜欢谈论他们是如何进入内陆，到湖南或四川去，将他们原本出口的消费性电子产品、珠宝、便宜的衣服和鞋子卖给他们自己的同胞。但其销量与广大的海外市场相比不过是沧海一粟。有种意见认为美国的市场需要数年才能恢复——而且可能无法像从前一样挥金如土了——而中国市场也需要一段长时间才能发挥作用。“即使在经济危机之前，我们就知道应该向美国市场之外发展，”Hua Jian集团——一个鞋类制造商，你在Nine West，KennethCole和Coach等商店中见到的很多是他们生产的——的副总经理Allan S.K.Lam说，“但是吧中国国内市场发展到一个重要的程度，将会需要至少五年，也许甚至八年的时间。”

It will take much longer than that for the Chinese to rival Americansas consumers: Chinese incomes are about one tenth those in America, andtotal consumer spending in dollar terms was about $1.7 trillion in2007, compared with $12 trillion in the U.S. Meanwhile, the individualsavings rate in China is 30 percent, compared with less than 5 percentin the U.S. The reason: most Chinese get no pensions and have to paycash in advance for health care. In China, saving for a rainy day isserious business.

中国人作为消费者要与美国匹敌将需要更长的时间。中国人的收入只有美国人的十分之一。2007年中国人的总消费额按美元计算是一万七千亿，而美国是十二万亿。与此同时，中国的个人储蓄率是30％，而美国则少于5％。原因是大多数中国人没有养老金，而且在需要看病是必须先付款。在中国未雨绸缪是很重要的。

Locals in Guangdong know the situation is more precarious thangovernment figures make it seem. "I've talked to a number of factoryowners in the area and they tell me that if they can't get more ordersin six weeks, they may go out of business," says Ding Li, director ofthe Center for Regional and Corporate Competitiveness Research at theGuangdong Academy of Social Sciences.

生活在广东的人知道现状比政府数字显示的更脆弱。“我和这里的很多工厂老板谈过，他们告诉我如果在接下来的六个星期里拿不到更多的订单，他们就得关门了。”广东社科院地区和企业竞争力研究中心主任Ding Li说。

Of course, the government can always spend more. Just look what it'sdone in Shenzhen, a Pearl River Delta city, 60 miles away. Thirty yearsago, it was a paddy field. Then, Deng Xiaoping decided to turn it intoa manufacturing center, which today has an economy nearly half the sizeof Hong Kong's. Most recently, the government announced that China'sversion of the NASDAQ will be based there, spurring more newdevelopment. Many of the hyper-air-conditioned shopping malls,mock-Disney weekend resorts and nonsmoking coffee bars there were builtby OCT (Overseas China Town), one of the earliest government-ownedreal-estate operations. Since 1985, the company has developed $8.7billion worth of real estate. Still, on a recent evening, both Westernand Chinese chain restaurants were nearly empty.

当然，政府总是可以多消费一些。来看看从前它在深圳的举措。深圳这座城市距离珠江三角洲60英里。30年前，这里还是一片稻田。后来，邓小平决心将其建成制造业的中心。今天，它的经济规模约为香港的一半。最近，政府宣布中国版的纳斯达克将以这里为中心，这条消息刺激了更多的新发展。许多带空调的购物中心、仿迪斯尼的周末游乐场和禁烟的咖啡屋是由OCT（海外中国城）兴建的。这是最早的国有不动产操作之一。1985年一来，这家公司已经开发了价值八十七亿美元的不动产。但最近，在傍晚无论西式还是中式的连锁餐厅仍几乎空无一人。

China has successfully executed this sort of stimulus strategybefore—during the Asian financial crisis of 1997–98, and also after thedotcom bust in 2001. But in both those cases, government money was aBand-Aid, meant to buy time while the global economy (and exports)recovered. It worked well then, but this time around, things aredifferent. There are signs of economic recovery in the U.S. and, to alesser extent, Europe, yet Chinese exports to those markets are stilldropping. That means that jobs for the 20 million Chinese workers whohave been laid off may not come back, either. UBS bank estimates thatthe ranks of the unemployed may grow by another 15 million this year.

中国曾经成功地操作过此类的刺激策略——在1997至1998年的亚洲金融风暴之前和期间，以及2001年互联网泡沫破灭之后。但在上两种情况下，政府投资只是阶段性目标，用以换取时间直到世界经济（和出口）恢复。这种方法从前很有效，但这次的情况不同。美国有经济恢复的迹象，欧洲也有较低程度的恢复，而中国对欧美市场的出口仍在下滑。这表示两千万失业的中国工人也许不能重返岗位。瑞士银行估计，今年的失业程度可能会再增加一千万。

Optimists point to Beijing's power of the purse. "The Chinese CommunistParty is now the world's most liquid financial institution; there areno fiscal constraints," says Andy Rothman, a respected China bull atCLSA in Shanghai who predicts 7 to 9 percent growth next year. Mosteconomists agree that autocracy has its advantages in the midst of acredit crunch, since there are no political or legal obstacles tospending. As an executive at one of China's largest state-owned banksputs it, "The government told us to lend—so we did!"

乐观主义者强调北京的财力。“中国共产党是现在世界上最灵活的金融机构，他们不受任何财政束缚。” AndyRothman，这位来自上海里昂证券，受人尊敬的看好中国的人说。他预计明年有7－9％的增长。大多数经济学家承认专制体制在信贷紧缩的时候有其长处，因为在消费时没有政治或法律上的障碍。就像中国最大的国有银行之一的以为经理所说，“政府告诉我们放贷，我们就这么做了。”

China is beginning to create a social safety net, which would givepeople more confidence to spend instead of save. A few months back,Beijing passed a $124 billion national health-insurance plan, to bedelivered over three years. Yet as Morgan Stanley Asia chairman StephenRoach points out, that's less than 50 bucks a head in China: "justpuny." Meanwhile, China's social-security fund has only $82 billionunder management, less than $100 per worker. Economists believe thenumber should be doubled, and that China could afford to do it. YetBeijing has been talk-ing about bolstering the social safety net since2006, with little action. Even the Chinese are skeptical about PremierWen Jiabao's boast to deliver universal health care by 2011.

中国正在兴建一个社会福利网络，这将给人们信心以消费代替储蓄。几个月之前，北京通过了价值1240亿美元的国家医疗保险计划，预计在三年内到位。但正如摩根斯坦利亚洲主席StephenRoach指出的，落在每个中国人头上还不到50美元，“实在太少了。”与此同时，中国社保基金辖下只有820亿美元，平均每个工人不到100美元。经济学家认为这个数字应该加倍，而中国有能力承受。虽然北京从2006年起就一直谈论加强社会安全网络，却鲜有实绩。即使是中国人，也对温家宝总理要在2011年实现全民医保的豪言表示怀疑。

Of course, increasing affluence would also help encourage consumerspending—the per capita GDP in China is still only $2,000. But thatwould necessitate moving away from low-end manufacturing towardproducing global Chinese brands. Right now most exports are merelyassembled in China rather than designed there, which means most of theprofit—and the big salaries that would support shopping sprees—still goabroad. Throughout Guangdong, officials and factory bosses alike areworking toward designing and producing more sophisticated finishedgoods, but the statistics tell a different story. Some 60 percent ofproduction in the region is still low-end component assembly. So untilChina becomes an advanced export power, most of the economic greenshoots will be pushed up by the state.

当然，正在增长的财富有助于鼓励消费者花钱——中国的人均GDP仍只有2000美元。但这需要从低端的加工制造业过渡到创造中国自己的国际品牌。当前，大多数的出口产品只是在中国装配，而不是在那里设计。这意味着大部分利润——能用来挥霍的高额工资——仍流向国外。整个广东的官员和工厂老板正致力于设计和制造更加复杂精细的产品，但统计数字反映出另一个事实。这一地区60％的生产仍是低端的零部件装配。所以，在中国成为高级的出口力量之前，大多数的经济萌芽将是被国家催生的。

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