翻译:Michael
Millions of Americans are currently weathering the effects of a slow economic recovery. Many Chinese, meanwhile, find themselves struggling less to keep their families fed, according to a recent Gallup report.
Nearly 20 percent of Americans say they've had trouble putting food on the table in the past 12 months, up from nine percent in 2008, the Gallup report found. That’s compared to six percent of Chinese respondents, down from 16 percent in 2008.
Though the U.S. economy is technically in a recovery, Americans' incomes have declined more since the recession's end than they did during the downturn. Nine in 10 Americans say they don't expect to get a raise that will be enough to compensate for the rising cost of food and fuel, according to an American Pulse survey.
At the same time, the Chinese middle class has been on the rise since the late 1990s. The middle-class explosion has been most prominent in the country's largest cities and government policies have helped to aid it along. Businesses are responding too: U.S. hotel companies are launching modestly-priced hotel chains in the country in hopes of attracting some of the scores of new middle class travelers, according to The Wall Street Journal.
And while the Chinese middle class is growing, the ranks of the U.S. poor are swelling. The nation's poverty rate jumped to 15.1 percent in 2010, the Cenus Bureau announced last month, as the total number of Americans in poverty grew to 46.2 million.
There's one area where Americans are struggling less: Eleven percent of Americans said they had trouble affording housing in the last 12 months, compared to 16 percent of Chinese, according to Gallup. Still, the share of Americans struggling to find housing is growing; in 2008, five percent of Americans said they struggled to pay for adequate housing.
And the American housing crisis may be getting worse. Half of American mortgage borrowers with good credit may end up owing more on their homes than they're worth, according to a report from Fitch Ratings. Meanwhile home values have fallen more during the current housing crisis than they did during the Great Depression, CNBC reports.
At the same time, Chinese cities are beginning to roll out policies that would bolster local housing markets in defiance of official Chinese policies that aim to curb housing prices, according to Marketwatch.
The Gallup poll's distinction between American and Chinese lifestyles comes after the Senate passed a bipartisan bill targeting what they call Chinese currency manipulation. U.S. critics claim that Chinese officials have undervalued their currency, giving the country a trade advantage and hurting U.S. job creation.
数百万美国人正在经历经济缓慢复苏的影响。与此同时,据最新的一项盖洛普报告,许多中国人发现供养家庭比以前轻松点了。
报告显示,近20%的美国人表示,他们过去12个月在养家糊口问题上已经遇到了麻烦,这个数字比2008年的9%要高。6%的中国受访者表示遇到这样的问题,这在2008年时还是16%。
虽然理论上美国经济是在复苏,但是美国人的收入自从经济衰退结束后比他们在经济低迷时期还要低。十分之九的美国人表示他们不期望获得足以应付食品和燃料成本上升的工资。
与此同时,自20世纪90年代后期以来,中国的中产阶级队伍一直在上升。中产阶级的爆炸式增长在大城市是最突出的,政府政策对其有深远影响。据“华尔街日报”,企业也积极应对:美国酒店公司正在建立一些中等价位的连锁酒店,希望能吸引更多的新的中产阶级旅客。
中国中产阶级数量在增长,美国贫困人口的规模却在扩大。人口调查局上个月宣布,因为美国贫困人口的数量增长至46200000,国家的贫困率在2010年已升至15.1%。
有一个领域,美国人不大费力。11%的美国人表示在过去的12个月他们无力购房,在中国却是16%。尽管如此,2008年,苦苦寻找住房的美国人所占比例不断增长。5%的美国人表示,他们为拥有足够空间的住房费力挣扎。
美国住房危机有愈演愈烈之势。根据惠誉国际评级报告,具有良好信用的半数美国抵押贷款和借款人,最终可能会欠比他们自己房子价值更大的债务。与此同时,在目前的住房危机中,房屋价值下降,降价幅度超过大萧条时期。
与此同时,中国城市开始推出政策,加强当地的房地产市场。这违背中国官方旨在遏制房价过快上涨的政策。
参议院通过一项旨在控告中国操纵货币的法案之后,盖洛普民意调查公布了美国和中国的生活方式之间的区别。美国的批评者声称,中国官员低估了本国货币,增加了该国的贸易优势却损害了美国的就业状况。
该贴已经同步到 小明啊的微博 |