外刊精读：市场正让我们失望

本文来自《时代周刊国际版》2020.4.20刊

MARKETS ARE FAILING US

By Joseph E. Stiglitz

Many Americans, and those around the world, are mystified by the apparent shortages of N95 masks, protective gear, ventilators and other materials essential for battling COVID-19 effectively. After all, aren’t markets supposed to respond quickly and efficiently to changes in demand? They seem to be failing us, just when we need them most.

许多美国人，以及世界各地的人们，对N95口罩、防护装备、呼吸机和其他有效对抗COVID-19的必需物品的明显短缺感到迷惑不解。毕竟，市场不应该对需求的变化做出快速而有效的反应吗？就在我们最需要的时候，它们似乎辜负了我们。

mystified：感到困惑。

ventilator：呼吸机。

fail: fail常用的意思是是失败、未做成，在这里的意思是“辜负；使…失望”。

New York, the epicenter of the U.S. coronavirus crisis, is clamoring for medical supplies. Trump has said, Don’t look to us, the federal government. He even argued that states should compete in getting the supplies they need. His answer: trust in markets. But markets are disappointing. They work well when everything is going smoothly, when things are normal. But markets don’t work well in crises. Indeed, economic crises are symptomatic of markets not working well. The 2008 financial crisis was a quintessential example. No country in times of serious war turns to markets. We don’t use markets to allocate how our troops should be deployed, and we didn’t rely only on markets for producing tanks, airplanes and other essential materiel in World War II. We needed immediate action, with complex coordination and changing demands; markets just don’t work well in these circumstances.

美国新冠病毒疫情危机的震中的纽约正大声疾呼，需要医疗物资。特朗普说，不要看我们联邦政府。他甚至认为各州应当在获得所需物资中进行竞争。他的答案是：相信市场。但是市场令人失望。当一切都运转的很顺利时，所有事物都很正常时，市场会运转良好。但在危机中，市场不能很好的发挥它的作用。事实上，经济危机就是市场失灵的征兆。2008年金融危机是典型的例子。没有国家会在严峻的战争时期转向市场。我们不会让市场分配我们的军队应如何部署。二战中我们也没有仅仅依赖市场生产坦克、飞机和其他必须的物资。我们需要立刻采取行动，进行复杂合作、不断变更需求。在这种情形下，市场不会发挥它的作用。

epicenter：震中。英国英语用“epicenter”。

clamor：demand sth. loudly. 搭配用法有：clamor for sth. / clamor to do sth.

crises：紧要关头，是crisis的复数形式。Economic crises，经济危机。

symptomatic：adj. 是…的征兆

quintessential：最典型的；最本质的。

deploy: 部署，调集（部队或军事力量）。Deploy troops, 部署士兵。

Deploy还有“发挥…的作用”的意思，在之前的外刊里出现过。Deploy skills/talents: 发挥技能／才能。

Markets are shortsighted and risk-averse—and the market mechanisms for looking into the future and managing risks are very deficient. And that private risk aversion and that extreme shortsightednessgive rise to a large disparity between social and private returns. Society would like to have an excess supply of masks or ventilators in case we have an emergency like the current one. A well functioning government would have stockpiled them, recognizing the risk of not having them. The cost of storage is infinitesimal compared with the costs of not having these supplies on hand.

市场是缺乏远见并且规避风险的——并且用来展望未来和处理风险的市场机制是十分不完善的。私人风险规避和极度缺乏远见会导致社会和私人回报之间的巨大差异。社会希望有多余的口罩或呼吸机以防我们遭遇像现在这样的紧急情况。一个运转良好的政府应当储存这些，意识到没有它们的风险。相较于没有这些物资在手里的成本，储存的成本是极其微小的。

shortsighted：目光短浅的。

Short-sightedness: 缺乏远见。

recognize the short-sightedness of this approach: 认识到这个方法缺乏远见。

反义词：long-sighted, 目光长远的，目光长远还能用long-thought, farsighted, look more at the long term表达。

risk-averse：规避风险的。

例句：But I think that the regulatory environments have become somewhat risk averse, if you will, in trying to find out everything.

但我认为，监管环境在试图找出所有问题时也变得有些不愿意接受风险。

looking into the future：展望未来。

managing risks：处理风险。

deficient：有缺点的，不完善的。

例句：His theory is deficient in several respects.

他的理论有几方面的不足。

give rise to: 引起、导致。

例句：Her disappearance gave rise to the wildest rumours.

她的失踪引起了各种流言蜚语。

disparity：差异、悬殊。

the growing disparity between rich and poor: 不断增长的贫富差距。

functioning：运行。此处是它的现在分词形式。

stockpile：（大量）储备，贮存。

infinitesimal：微小的，微不足道的。

A private firm producing these just in case they might be needed could well go bankrupt. It would have to pay out production costs now, and hope it would get a return in the future. There’s no insurance the firm can buy against the risk that the goods wouldn’t be needed. Its cost of capital is far higher than the cost to the government and its ability to bear risk is far lower, so at most the company will keep a limited inventory—far less than is socially desirable. Not only doesn’t it pay for a private company to inventory these essential products, it also doesn’t pay for it to expand its production capacity.

如果一家私人公司来制造这些口罩以备不时之需，那它很可能会破产。它现在将必须付出生产成本，而祈祷未来能收回来。也没有一种保险，来为公司承担社会不需要这批物资的风险。私人企业这样做付出的资金成本远高于政府，其承担风险的能力也远低于政府，所以私人企业最多也只会保留有限的库存，而这远远不能满足社会不时之需。政府不仅不会支付私人企业储存这些物资的费用，也不会为企业扩大产能提供资金支持。

in case：万一、假使。

pay out：支付，花费（通常指一大笔钱）。football clubs who pay out millions of pounds for players，付数百万英镑购买球员的足球俱乐部

bear risks: 承担风险。

inventory：n. 存货。

vt. 开列清单，在本文中引申为“储存”的意思.

We also have a broader problem in our society: we live at the edge, on the margin, in our never-ending quest for greater efficiency. But in doing this, we’re shortsighted. And this is especially so for our financial markets, which play a central role in allocating resources. We saw that in 2008, in the form of excessive risk-taking. We’re seeing it again. They value the short-term gains, paying no attention to the long-term risks. Stock prices soared as firms engaged in share buybacks—with never a thought about how that undermined resilience, never a thought about the economy facing another crisis. In our shortsightedness, we took out spare tires from cars, lowering the costs of purchase by a small amount, paying no attention to the costs we pay down the line when we have a flat tire. We’ve been running our entire society without spare tires—and proud of the seeming efficiency we’ve gained. And never prouder than in the health care sector. After all, this is part of how we can give huge profits to the health insurance and pharmaceutical companies.

我们的社会也面临着一个更广泛的问题：我们生活在不断追求更高效率中的边缘地带。然而，我们这样做是目光短浅的，对于我们在分配资源方面发挥着核心作用的资本市场而言尤其如此。我们在2008年以极为冒险的方式认识到了这一点。现在历史再次重演。公司看重短期收益，但不重视长期风险。股票价格因公司参与股票回购而飙升，但公司从未考虑过这样做，抵御风险能力会被削弱；从未考虑过将面临另一场经济危机。由于目光短浅，我们从汽车中取出了备用轮胎，从而小幅降低了购买成本。但我们却没有注意轮胎漏气时需要花费的费用。我们一直在不遗余力地经营着整个社会，并为我们所获得的看似高效而感到自豪。从来没有比医疗行业更引以为傲的行业。毕竟，这是我们可以为健康保险和制药公司带来巨额利润的一部分。

edge &margin辨析

edge和margin都有“边缘”的意思。edge普通用词，指较窄的边沿。margin指物体的空白边，一般较宽。

此外，rim指圆形或有曲线的物体的边缘。verge指明显地标志一个表在或一广阔空间的边界，或终端线，也指极狭窄的空间。常用作比喻。brim指深容器的内边或河、湖等水域的最高线。fringe指地毯的须边、围巾的花边、烫发的卷边或人群的边缘。

risk-taking：冒险 adj.&n.

例句：Many of them are spoiled by other family members, which makes them self-centered and risk-taking.

both fail to mention how his frequent bouts（发作） of depression（抑郁症） may have contributed to his impulsiveness and risk-taking.

soar：猛增；高耸, 屹立；高飞, 翱翔 v.

例句：The prices seemed soaring up without limit.

share buybacks：股份回购

resilience：恢复力，适应力；弹回，弹性。v.

例句：She has shown great resilience to stress.

Resilience is a property of rubber.

pay down：偿还，付清。

flat tire：漏气轮胎。Flat：平坦的，扁平的；单调的。此处理解为轮胎漏气。

pharmaceutical：制药的，配药的。adj.

Even now that the demand is so clear, companies may be slow to step forward. They know that if they charge much more than the normal prices, they’ll be accused of price gouging. But they assume (and hope) this will be a one time event. Can they recover the large costs of quickly expanding capacity for a rush of production now at normal prices? Many will decide that the answer is no.

即使现在需求如此明确，公司经营的步伐仍可能缓慢。公司清楚知道，如果他们收取的费用高于正常价格，他们就会被指控价格欺诈。但是他们认为（并希望）这将是一次例外。他们是否能够以正常价格收回迅速扩大产量所带来的巨额成本？许多人会认为，答案是否定的。

price gouging：价格欺诈，哄抬物价。

gouge：欺骗；挖。v.  圆凿；以圆凿刨；沟。n.

例句：Similarly, the authors used surveys to show that people find practices like price gouging in the wake of disasters unfair.

To make a Halloween lantern, you first have to gouge out the inside of the pumpkin.

This is instead a social cost that needs to be shared across society, and borne disproportionately by the well-off. Hopefully, enough firms will step forward to meet our urgent needs. But if not, we shouldn’t hesitate to make full use of the wartime powers of the government to commandeer the necessary resources. The Trump Administration squandered valuable weeks. There is no time to spare.

这是一种需要在全社会范围内分担的社会成本，并不是由企业不适当地承担。希望有足够的公司可以站出来满足我们的紧急需求。但如果不是这样，我们应该毫不犹豫地充分利用政府的战时权力来夺取必要的物资。特朗普政府浪费了宝贵的时间。没有时间可以去浪费了……

well-off：本意指富裕的人，此处应指“企业”。

wartime：战时。n.

commandeer：强征，征用。v.

相关阅读：

1.什么让N95口罩如此难求？

The United States is now confronted with a shortage of N95 masks for a number of reasons. The masks themselves are difficult to make, in part because they require specialized equipment to meet stringent regulatory standards. Many of the companies that can make the masks are also in China. That supply chain wasn’t prepared for a pandemic, especially one that originated in the same country where many of these masks are produced. And as the novel coronavirus spread throughout China, the country’s government bought its domestically produced masks, ensuring they weren’t exported. That’s made the gap between supply and demand in the US much larger.

由于种种原因，美国现在面临N95口罩短缺的问题。口罩本身很难制作，部分原因是它们需要专业的设备以符合严格的监管标准。许多能制造口罩的公司也在中国。该供应链没有为流行病做好准备，尤其是许多口罩都在同一国家被生产。随着新型冠状病毒在中国各地传播，中国政府购买了国产口罩，确保这些口罩不被出口。这使得美国供需之间的差距更大。

In the absence of a pandemic, the US has typically not produced enough of these N95 masks to meet the needs of its own workers. 3M and Prestige Ameritech are the two primary companies that do end-to-end production of medical-grade N95 masks in the US, and both are both ramping up production. Another American company, Honeywell, recently started producing N95 masks at its Rhode Island and Phoenix facilities. Still, these three companies won’t solve our mask shortage.

在没有流行病的情况下，美国通常没有生产足够的N95口罩来满足本国工人的需求。3M和Prestige Ameritech是两家主在美国生产医疗级N95口罩的主要公司，这两家公司都在加紧生产。另一家美国公司霍尼韦尔最近开始在罗得岛和菲尼克斯工厂生产N95口罩。尽管如此，这三家公司还是不能解决美国的口罩短缺问题。

Now that China appears to have slowed its own Covid-19 outbreak, overseas shipments of protective equipment are starting up again. Even if China exported the same number of masks that it did before the novel coronavirus outbreak, the US would still need a lot more since it’s now combating the highest number of confirmed cases of any country in the world. The US is also competing with many other countries eager to get hold of more N95 masks.

现在，中国似乎已经减缓了国内的Covid-19疫情，海外的防护装备正在重新开始生产。即使中国出口的口罩数量与新型冠状病毒爆发前相同，美国仍需要更多的口罩，因为美国目前是世界上确诊病例数量最多的国家。美国也在与许多希望获得更多N95口罩的国家竞争。·

2.面对口罩短缺问题，美国联邦政府做了什么？

The government’s Strategic National Stockpile, which has emergency supplies stored in secret locations around the country, contains millions of masks. Nevertheless, the Trump administration seems to be distributing medical supplies unevenly during this public health crisis. Not all states are getting what they’ve asked for.

政府的战略国家储备有紧急物资储存在全国各地的秘密地点，有数百万个口罩。然而，在这次公共卫生危机中，特朗普政府似乎正不均匀地分配医疗用品。并非所有州都得到他们所要的东西。

To address the shortage, the president has turned to the DPA, which enables him to force private companies to produce needed medical supplies during an emergency. He’d previously used the law to manufacture much-needed ventilators. Denying health care workers access to essential equipment inevitably raises questions about the Trump administration’s ability to manage a supply chain that’s been consumed by disruption, misinformation, and profiteering.

为了解决短缺问题，总统求助于DPA，这让他能在紧急情况下要求私营公司生产所需的医疗用品。他以前曾利用这项法律制造急需的呼吸机。拒绝卫生保健工作者获得基本设备不可避免地引发了对特朗普政府管理供应链能力的质疑，供应链被混乱情况、错误信息和牟取暴利所消耗。

3.疫情之下企业如何生存？

The crisis is set to amplify three trends. First, a quicker adoption of new technologies. The planet is having a crash course in e-commerce, digital payments and remote working. More medical innovations beckon, including gene-editing technologies. Second, global supply chains will be recast, speeding the shift since the trade war began. Apple has just ten days’ worth of inventory, and its main supplier in Asia, Foxconn, 41 days. Firms will seek bigger safety buffers and a critical mass of production close to home using highly automated factories. Cross-border business investment could drop by 30-40% this year. Global firms will become less profitable but more resilient.

这场危机将放大三种趋势。首先，更快地采用新技术。全球正在经历电子商务、数字支付和远程工作的快速反应过程。更多的医学创新在召唤，包括基因编辑技术。其次，全球供应链将被重新转换，加速自贸易战开始以来的变化。苹果只有10天的库存，而它在亚洲的主要供应商富士康只有41天的库存。企业将利用高度自动化的工厂，在离自家近的地方寻求更大的安全缓冲和临界生产量。今年跨境商业投资可能下降30-40%。全球公司的利润将降低，但更具弹性。

推荐阅读

投稿邮箱：[e-mail]

主题；篇幅；体例

本文责编 ✎ 金钟罩

本期编辑 ✎ Ben