图一、消费者在上海超市购物
在提到西安市今年前九个月零售额增长率时，漏掉了西安市长陈宝根的话。他说，这座有八百万人口的城市已经落后于出口导向型的沿海城市,但是现在收入正在增长到消费起飞的水平。“西安已经到达了一个非常重要的发展阶段”，他解释道。“收入刚到人们买得起房子和汽车的第一阶段。
在讲到个人消费跟经济增长时，漏掉了康乃尔大学经济学家Eswar Prasad的评论以及一些重要数据。他认为，中国城镇居民家庭平均储蓄率在２００８年达到了可支配收入的２８％，比１９９５年高出１１个百分点。这个导致消费者支出在中国经济中扮演的角色继续朝向错误的方向。私人消费在国内生产总值中所占比例从２０００年的４６％下降到了２００８年的大约３５％。中国的比例大约是美国的一半，甚至落后于可比的新兴市场如印度。在印度，比例是５７％。这些数字告诉我们，中国消费者可能正在增加消费，但远远不够，以确保中国经济的可持续增长。
下面两段全部漏译：
［要让消费者支出在经济增长中扮演更大的角色，政府需要做出更多努力］这种努力将需要多年才能见效，但全球经济可能等不及了。经济学家一致认为，如果世界经济要寻找新的、健康的增长模式，中国和美国必须减轻导致目前危机的失衡。中国储存太多，开支太少，导致巨大的盈余和硬通货储备，而美国节省太少，花钱太多，造成巨大的赤字和债务。整个世界经济体制的改革将受到影响，除非中国可以改变其公民，变储蓄者为消费者。“我没有看到任何正在平衡中国经济的迹象”，麻省理工学院的黄教授说。“在有限的一段时间里要得到消费增长总是很难的”。增大的中国消费开支同样可能对世界经济产生巨大的影响。康奈尔大学的Prasad教授认为，如果中国私人消费成长每年能够增长到20％（远远高于约15％的国内生产总值增长），全球国内生产总值将因此增长0.25％。
在许多问题中，“重新平衡”可能会是美国总统奥巴马在１１月访问中国期间的首要问题。国家主席胡锦涛和其他中国高层领导人明确同意华盛 顿，中国的消费者需要花费更多。奥巴马要求加速这一进程，并沿着这一进程，继续改善中国的社会保障网。奥巴马的强力要求可能会遇到点头批准。但是奥巴马只能给北京强大压力。中国的决策者仍然拘泥于支持国家的宝贵出口产业。奥巴马的任何建议——导致经济从出口转向更重依赖于国内消费的急剧转变——将不受欢迎。这些问题中最敏感的可能是中国的汇率机制。奥巴马可能会试图诱使北京让人民币升值，从而使中国出口的竞争力下降。不过，经济学家怀疑中国的领导人将采取断然措施，在不久的某个时候改革其汇率制度。
网上中文译文
美国《时代》周刊：中国消费者能拯救世界经济吗？
美国《时代》周刊１１月１５日文章，原题：中国消费者能拯救世界经济吗？ 位于中国西部西安市郊区的一家五菱汽车特许经销商为全球经济的未来增添了希 望。在一个普通的星期三的早晨，顾客们不断地涌入展厅，只是简单地开关几下展出的汽车的车门，就走到前台去把钱重重地放在那里。当美国的汽车销售商们在吃 力地卖车时，西安特许经销商副总经理许展荣（音）却卖得火爆。许说，今年以来，汽车销量已经增长了大约４０％，每天约有５０名顾客过来把车开走。许说： “就我看来，人们的变化非常大。以前人们想的是只买需要的；现在，人们开始为了更好的或者更舒适的生活进行消费。”
许的话在全世界听来应该像音乐。随着债务沉重的美国消费者节衣缩食，越来越富有的中国消费者可能会成为全球经济增长最重要的源泉之一。中国店家的腰包更鼓了。１０月份客车销量比去年同比增长了７６％，总体零售额增长了１６．２％。这些消费帮助中国从全球经济危机中强劲复苏。中国第三季度国内生产总值 （ＧＤＰ）同比增长了８．９％。
有理由相信，这样令人瞠目的消费会持续下去。随着中国更多的广阔内地加入到令人惊讶 的经济增长中来，中国１３亿人口中有越来越多的人能够买得起汽车、冰箱和平板电视等在不久之前还被视为奢侈品的产品。在２００９年的前９个月，西安市零售额增长了１９％，高于全国城市１４．８％的水平。
但是，人们会不会消费仍然是一个公开而重要的问题。虽然中国人正在 变富，事实上他们把新财富中的更大一部分都储蓄了起来。中国消费者可能花得更多了，但是还不足以确保中国经济的可持续增长。万事达卡国际经济顾问王月魂博 士说：“消费者革命已经发生了，但是它的规模还可以大很多。”
王月魂及其他经济学家认为，这个问题的原因是普通中国 人仍然面临未来太多的不确定性，因此不敢随便花钱。中国的社会保障体系仍然脆弱，这令中国家庭花大把的钱去照顾年老的父母，支付上升的医疗账单，并为自己 的退休作准备。面对这一问题，中国政府已经采取措施，启动福利项目，以缓解中国家庭所面临的财政压力，松动他们的钱包。例如，北京启动了一项为期三年、价 值１２５０亿美元的医院和诊所建设项目，让医疗覆盖到城市９０％的人口。另外，除了这些鼓励消费者信心的长期举措外，政府还实施了刺激消费的短期措施。
但是，经济学家称，北京的措施还不够。美国麻省理工学院政治经济学教授黄亚生表示，要让消费者支出在经济增长中扮演更大的角色，政府需要做出更多努力， 加速贫困中国人收入的增长。他说，普通中国人并不像人们想象的那么有钱。事实上，中国的人均家庭收入仅仅是人均ＧＤＰ的一半，而其他经济体中这一比例是 ８０％或者更高。黄说，问题在于，农村居民和农民工收入增长远远落后于主要城市中心居民收入增长，这使得９亿人仍然倾向于把钱大量地存起来。黄亚生建议中 国极力增加农村收入。例如，将银行网点深入农村，让农民们更便捷地贷款做生意。万事达卡国际的王月魂认为，中国应该放开目前仍由大型国企主导的服务业，允 许新企业发展起来，创造更多薪水更高的职业岗位。
但是，由于有像卢波（音）这样的西安市民，我们或许有理由乐观。卢 最近一天晚上购买了一台新冰箱。３２岁的卢在中国东方航空公司空运部门做销售，他说，去年由于公司遭受金融危机的打击，他的收入减少了三分之一，但是这并 没有阻止他去消费。中国前景光明，他对自己的未来并不很担心。“从我的工作和生活上判断，我想一切都会越来越好的。”卢说。可能对于全世界经济来说也是如 此。（作者迈克尔－舒曼，高友斌译）
英文原文
By Michael Schuman / Xi'an Sunday, Nov. 15, 2009
http://www.time.com/time/world/article/0,8599,1938591-1,00.html
Customers shop at a supermarket in Shanghai.
Philippe Lopez / AFP / Getty
A Wuling minivan dealership on the outskirts of the western Chinese city of Xi'an provides hope for the future of the global economy. On an ordinary Wednesday morning, customers steadily stream into the showroom, briefly open and close the doors to the displayed minivans, manufactured by a joint venture between General Motors and two Chinese carmakers, and then march over to the front desk to plop down their money. While salesmen in the U.S. struggle to move cars off their lots, Xu Zhanrong, the deputy general manager of the Xi'an dealership, can barely keep the Wulings in stock. Sales are up some 40% this year, Xu says, with about 50 customers a day driving off with new minivans. "From what I see, people are changing very dramatically," Xu says. "Before people thought: I only buy what I need. Now people are starting to spend for a better or more comfortable life."
Xu's words should be music to the world's ears. As debt-laden consumers in the U.S. retrench, increasingly wealthy Chinese consumers could become one of the most important sources of growth for the global economy. Shoppers in China are opening their newly stuffed wallets wider than ever. Passenger car sales surged 76% in October from a year earlier, while overall retail sales jumped 16.2%. Such spending has contributed to China's robust recovery from the global economic crisis. Gross domestic product grew a hefty 8.9% in the third quarter from a year earlier.
There is reason to believe such eye-popping spending can continue. As more regions of China's vast hinterland join in its amazing economic boom, more and more of the country's 1.3 billion people can afford cars, refrigerators and flat-panel TVs items not too long ago considered luxuries for a fortunate few. Chen Baogen, Xi'an's mayor, says his city of eight million had lagged behind towns on the export-oriented coast, but now incomes are growing to the point where consumption is taking off. In the first nine months of 2009, retail sales in the city increased by 19%, well above the 14.8% growth posted in China's cities nationally. "Xi'an has reached a very important development stage," Chen explains. "Incomes are just at the first point when people can buy homes and cars."
Yet whether or not they will buy remains an open, and crucial, question. Even though Chinese are becoming wealthier, they are actually saving a greater percentage of that new wealth. Cornell University economist Eswar Prasad figures that China's average urban household saving rate reached 28% of disposable income in 2008 — 11 percentage points higher than in 1995. As a result, the role consumer spending plays in China's economy continues to head in the wrong direction. Private consumption accounted for a mere 35% of GDP in 2008, down from 46% in 2000. China's ratio stands at about half that in the United States, and even trails the level in comparable emerging markets, such as India, where the share is 57%. What those figures tell us is that Chinese consumers may be spending more, but not nearly enough to ensure sustainable growth for the Chinese economy down the road. "The consumer revolution already has been happening, but it could be much, much better," says Yuwa Hedrick-Wong, an economic advisor to MasterCard Worldwide.
The problem, says Hedrick-Wong and other economists, is that the average Chinese still faces too much uncertainty about the future to spend more freely. China's social safety net systems remain weak, forcing Chinese families to squirrel away large sums to care for elderly parents, pay rising medical bills and prepare for retirement. Aware of the problem, the Chinese government has been taking steps to beef up welfare programs to alleviate the financial burden faced by Chinese families and loosen their purse strings. Beijing, for example, is undertaking a three-year, $125 billion program to build hospitals and clinics to extend healthcare to 90% of the population. Along with these very long-term efforts to boost consumer confidence, the government has also implemented short-term measures to spur on spending. Car sales this year have been boosted by tax breaks and China's own "cash-for-clunkers" program. Xu Zhanrong's Wuling minivan sales have been helped along by a special 10% rebate offered on certain vehicles to residents of rural areas, who make up a majority of Xu's customers.
Yet economists say Beijing's measures aren't going far enough. Huang Yasheng, professor of political economy at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, says that the government needs to do much more to accelerate the income growth of poor Chinese if consumer spending is to play a bigger role in the economy. The average Chinese, he says, doesn't have as much cash to spend as many people think. Actual household income per capita is only about half of GDP per capita, compared to 80% or more in other major economies, placing "a cap," Huang says, on consumer spending. The problem is that income growth among rural dwellers and migrant workers badly trails that of residents of the major urban centers creating a mass of 900 million people who still tend to be very heavy savers. Huang suggests that China needs to act aggressively to boost rural incomes, by, for example, extending banking systems deeper into the countryside to give farmers better access to credit to start small businesses. MasterCard's Hedrick-Wong argues that China should also open up service industries now dominated by large, state-owned companies, such as finance, to allow new entrepreneurs to flourish, creating more jobs with higher wages.
Such efforts will take years to bear fruit, however time the global
economy may not be able to afford. Economists agree that China and
the United States must alleviate the imbalances that contributed to
the current crisis if the world economy is to find renewed, and
healthier, growth. China saves too much and spends too little,
leading to giant surpluses and hard currency reserves, while the
U.S. saves too little and spends too much, creating giant deficits
and debt. Unless China can transform its citizens from savers to
spenders, the reform of the entire world economic system could
suffer. "I don't see any evidence" that China's economy is
rebalancing, MIT's Huang says. "Its always difficult to get
consumption to grow in a limited period of time." Greater consumer
spending in China could have a big impact as well on the world
economy. Cornell's Prasad figures that if China can increase growth
of private consumption to 20% a year (much higher than the trend of
nominal GDP growth of about 15%), global GDP growth would get a
meaningful 0.25% boost.
With so much on the line, the subject of "rebalancing" will likely get top billing during U.S. President Barack Obama's November visit to China. President Hu Jintao and the rest of China's top leaders clearly agree with Washington that the country's consumers need to spend more. Pressure from Obama to speed that process along by, for example, continued improvements in China's social safety net, might be met with nods of approval. But Obama will only be able to press Beijing so hard. China's policymakers are still wedded to supporting the country's valuable export industries. Any suggestions from Obama that would result in a drastic shift of the economy away from exports and towards heavier reliance on domestic spending will be less welcome. The most sensitive of these issues may be China's currency regime. Obama will probably try to cajole Beijing into allowing the yuan to appreciate, thus making Chinese exports less competitive. But economists doubt China's leaders will take drastic steps to reform its currency system anytime soon.
But perhaps there is reason for optimism, thanks to Xi'an residents like Lu Bo, shopping one recent evening for a new fridge at a Suning appliance store. The 32-year-old, who works as an salesman in the air-freight department at China Eastern Airlines, says his salary was reduced by a third last year when his company was hit hard by the financial crisis, but that hasn't stopped him from spending. With China's future so bright, he doesn't worry too much about saving for the future. "Judging from my job, my life, I think everything will become better and better," Lu says. And maybe for the entire world economy as well.
With reporting by Chengcheng Jiang / Xi'an
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