英经济政策重演哈布斯堡的衰落

It is difficult to plough through the Bank of England’s recent inflation report and associated Monetary Policy Committee minutes without being reminded of a slogan current in the last years of the Habsburg empire: “The situation is hopeless but not desperate. Or was it the other way around? In any case, the main message of the report is that the outlook is gloomy and the risks are on the downside, but nothing much can be done about it.

翻阅英国央行(BoE)最近的通胀报告及相关的货币政策委员会(Monetary Policy Committee)的一些会议备忘录，令我不由得想起流行于哈布斯堡帝国(Habsburg empire)末期的那句口号：“情形没有任何希望，但还不算绝望。或许这话应该倒过来说？反正不管怎么说，通胀报告传递的主要信息是，前途渺茫，凶多吉少，而他们束手无策。

I ended my first extended essay on economic policy, more decades ago than I like to think back, by remarking: “The unKeynesian belief of some leading Treasury men that there is little the government can do to secure full employment in the face of adverse world forces is not encouraging. All I would have to do now is to add the BoE, which has become more of an independent influence on policy, to the critique. As the UK is now a much smaller part of the world economy than when I first wrote these words, it should be easier to chart an independent course – but apparently not if you are a British policy maker.

在遥远的几十年前，在我的第一篇关于经济政策的长篇论文末尾，我写道：“财政部一些重要人物存在一种反凯恩斯的信仰——他们认为，面对世界形势中各种不利因素，政府能为保证完全就业所做的很少。这种信仰令人失望。如今，我只想把英国央行也列为这一批评的对象，英国央行已经能够较为独立地对政策施加影响力。如今的英国在全球经济中所占比重已比我当初写下那段话时大大减小，走独立路线按说应该更加容易，但如果你是英国的一名政策制定者，情况显然不是这样。

The growth of real gross domestic product is expected to be below its trend average until well into 2015, even allowing for the much-vaunted Funding for Lending scheme. As we are starting from a very depressed level, output in that year is expected to be below its pre-crisis 2007-2008 level. If that is not stagnation, I do not know what is. I do not claim to have any idea what Keynes would be saying today but I can hear him turning in his grave.

即便将叫好声一片的“贷款融资计划(Funding for Lending)考虑在内，预计英国实际国内生产总值(GDP)增长率在2015年前仍将低于趋势平均值。而由于我们是从一个极端不景气的起点起步的，预计到2015年产出仍会低于危机前2007年至2008年的水平。如果这还不是经济停滞，我不知道什么是。我并不是说我知道凯恩斯会对此说些什么，不过我确实听到他老人家正气得在坟墓里翻身。

The inflation outlook is a little less gloomy. After rising towards 3 per cent in the next few months, it is expected to fall back towards the target 2 per cent some time in 2014. But even that forecast is hedged with qualifications. Inflation can be buffeted by volatile commodity price movements; there is a big question mark over domestic productivity movements and uncertainty “about the extent to which idiosyncratic influences, such as tuition fees and domestic energy bills will continue to impart upward pressure.

通胀前景展望稍微有点亮色。预计在未来几个月，通胀率会逐渐增至3%，之后在2014年某个时候回落至2%的目标值。然而即便是这一预测也是有前提的。大宗商品价格的变动可能冲击通胀率；而国内生产率变动情况还是一个问号，“学费及国内能源法案等特殊因素会在多大程度上持续增大（通胀的）上行压力也无法确定。

I have a suggestion that could put the Bank of England governor or his successor a little out of his or her misery. Inflation targets were first introduced into the UK by Norman Lamont, the chancellor, in 1992, after the UK was forced out of the European Exchange Rate Mechanism. The idea was to reassure economic agents that the UK was not about to embark on an inflationary spree. Today the dangers are different and it would be sensible to move to a target for domestically generated inflation alone.

我有个建议，也许可以稍稍减轻英国央行行长及其继任者的痛苦。通胀目标是1992年英国被迫脱离欧洲汇率机制(European Exchange Rate Mechanism)时由财政大臣诺曼·拉蒙特(Norman Lamont)首次提出的。当时提出这个目标的目的，是为了让经济主体(economic agent)放心，使他们相信英国不会放任通胀。如今，英国面临的危险不同了，我们应该转而把源自英国国内因素的通胀作为控制目标。

The separation would be neither easy nor non-controversial, but it could be attempted by any competent national income statistician. The BoE’s own charts show that inflation would have been both less volatile and less off-target measured in this way. One great attraction is that it would hold public servants responsible only for those things they can influence. Neither the chancellor nor the BoE governor would have to resign if the Strait of Hormuz were blocked or if there were an outbreak of hostilities in the South China Sea.

将源自英国国内因素的通胀与源自国外因素的通胀分开处理做起来不容易，也具有争议性，不过任何称职的国民收入统计学家恐怕都想这么干。从英国央行自己的图表能看出来，采用这种办法，通胀率的波动性会降低，其衡量结果也更接近预期目标。最大的好处是，这样一来，公务员们只需要为他们所能施加影响的事情负责。就算霍尔木兹海峡(Strait of Hormuz)被封锁、南中国海(South China Sea)开战，财政大臣和英国央行行长也都不需要辞职。

The BoE has reacted to strictures about relying too much on fallible forecasts by moving towards what has been called “the taxonomic approach to economic policy – in other words, listing possibilities as non-committally as possible. This tends to be based on “flow of funds analysis. The basic idea here is that if you take the main sectors of the economy – households, business corporations, the public and external sector and one or two others – net flows between them sum by definition to zero. So if you have an idea of either likely or needed changes in one or two sectors, you have a handle on the others.

有人批评英国央行过于依赖常常并不准确的预报，为应对这种批评，英国央行采取了一种所谓的“经济政策的分类学办法——换句话说就是，对可能发生的事情尽可能含糊其辞。这种办法应该是来自“资金流分析。其中的基本思想是，如果考虑经济的主要部门——家庭、企业、公共部门以及外部部门，还有一两个其他部门——那么，所有部门间的净资金流总和按定义应该为零。因此如果你有个想法，这个想法可能或必须改变其中的一两个部门，那么你也会改变其他部门。

I have always been profoundly suspicious of this type of analysis, even though it appeals to many economists as a way of bypassing doctrinal disputes. The trouble is that it says nothing about the level of output at which the zero balance is achieved. Nor – sound money advocates please note – does it tell you the level of inflation. For all I know, the financial balances summed satisfactorily to zero at the height of German hyperinflation in the 1920s.

我对这种分析方法始终非常怀疑，虽然这种方法在许多经济学家看来能避免理论争端。问题在于，这种方法没有提到平衡点的产量是多少。另外，稳健货币的倡导者必须注意的是，这种办法也没提到平衡点的通胀水平。据我所知，上世纪20年代，德国在恶性通货膨胀时期，其财政结余正是完美的“零。

I mention this because flow of funds analysis is the basis of a recent BoE article that tries to give substance to all the rhetoric about “rebalancing the economy. It is, as one would expect, full of ifs, buts and maybes. Its tentative conclusion is that both the public and the external sectors need to improve their balances, while both the corporate and the household sectors could in time run their balances down. I am reminded of Cambridge arguments years ago, when Professor Austin Robinson used to dissect the British balance of payments, while Milton Friedman, then on a visiting sabbatical, thought all the authorities needed to do was to float the pound and maintain a stable monetary policy. He was not in the least bothered by budget deficits. Need I say where my sympathies lie?

我提到这一点，是因为资金流分析是英国央行最近一篇文章的基矗那篇文章试图为那些“平衡经济的说辞提供理由。可想而知，“如果、“但是和“也许这几个词在文中随处可见。那篇文章的初步结论是：公众部门和对外部门需要改善收支情况，这样企业和家庭两个部门就可以及时降低结余。这个结论让我我想起几年前在剑桥发生的一场争论，当时奥斯汀·鲁滨逊(Austin Robinson)喜欢剖析英国的收支平衡，而当时正在剑桥作学术休假的米尔顿·弗里德曼(Milton Friedman)则认为，政府应该做的是允许英镑汇率浮动，并维持货币政策的稳定。弗里德曼一点儿也不担心预算赤字。我赞同他们两人中谁的观点，这还用问么？