中英对照：中国为何“压低”人民币？

中国为何“压低”人民币？WHY CHINA WANTS TO KEEP THE RENMINBI PINNED DOWN

China will do what it considers to be in its own interest. That should surely be self-evident. What is not self-evident is how it does – and should – identify that self-interest. That is almost always more difficult than naive realists tend to suppose. This is true of its policy towards North Korea. It is just as true of its policy towards the exchange rate.

中国会做它认为符合自己利益的事。这应该是显而易见的。不那么明显的，是它如何、以及应该如何界定自己的利益。这几乎总是比天真的“现实主义者”通常想象的更难。中国的朝鲜政策如此，汇率政策也是如此。

The Chinese government seems to believe its interest lies in maintaining a highly competitive real exchange rate for as long as possible. The evidence also suggests it can do so for a long time. But should it do so?

中国政府似乎认为，它的利益在于尽可能长久地将实际汇率保持在具有高度竞争力的水平。目前的证据也表明，它能够在长时间内做到这一点。但是，它应该这样做吗？

Economic theory indicates that a fast-growing developing country should have an appreciating real exchange rate. This is known as the Balassa-Samuelson effect, after the late Bela Balassa of Johns Hopkins University and the Nobel laureate Paul Samuelson, who discovered it independently of each other.

经济理论指出，一个快速增长的发展中国家，其实际汇率应该不断上升。这就是“巴拉萨-萨缪尔森效应”(Balassa-Samuelson effect)，是以约翰?霍普金斯大学(Johns Hopkins University)已故的贝拉?巴拉萨(Bela Balassa)和诺贝尔奖(Nobel)得主保罗?萨缪尔森(Paul Samuelson)的名字命名的，他们二人分别发现了这一理论。

The argument is straightforward. Economies contain two sorts of activity: tradeable – manufacturing and services that can be supplied readily at a distance; and non- tradeable – haircuts, childcare and so forth. With economic development, productivity in the former tends to rise faster than in the latter.

这个理论直截了当。经济活动包括两类：可贸易的——随时可以远距离供应的制造业和服务业；和不可贸易的——理发、照看孩子等等。随着经济的发展，前者生产率的提高往往快于后者。

Assume, for simplicity’s sake, that we are talking about a small country with a fixed exchange rate. Then the price of tradeables will be set in the world market and the domestic price will be the world price multiplied by the exchange rate. Prices of non- tradeables will rise relative to those of tradeables, because their relative unit labour costs will be increasing. This is why haircuts are cheap in poor countries and expensive in rich ones.

为简单起见，我们假设谈论的是一个实行固定汇率机制的小国。那么，可贸易经济活动的价格将由全球市场决定，其在国内的价格为全球价格乘以汇率。不可贸易经济活动的价格，相对于可贸易活动的价格将上涨，因为其相对单位劳动成本将会上升。这就是理发在穷国便宜、在富国贵的原因。

What does all this have to do with China? The answer, as Andrew Smithers of London-based Smithers & Co, has pointed out, is that real exchange rate appreciation is the dog that has not barked.

这一切跟中国有什么关系呢？正如伦敦咨询机构Smithers & Co的安德鲁?史密瑟斯(Andrew Smithers)所指出的那样，答案在于，实际汇率上升是“一条不叫的狗”。

Despite the modest change in exchange rate policy in July 2005, the nominal exchange rate of the renminbi has moved little since January 1994. Because China’s inflation rate has been below that of the US for most of the past nine years, the tendency of the real exchange rate has been towards depreciation. According to JPMorgan, it has depreciated by about 7 per cent since January 1998 (see chart).

尽管中国在2005年7月对汇率政策做了微幅调整，但自1994年1月以来，人民币的名义汇率几乎一直没有变动。过去9年，中国的通胀率大多数时候都低于美国，因此实际汇率一直呈现下降趋势。据JP摩根(JPMorgan)估计，自1998年1月以来，人民币实际汇率已下降约7%。（见图表）

Yet China seems to meet all the conditions for real exchange rate appreciation. As the International Monetary Fund notes in its September World Economic Outlook, productivity growth in industry has, on average, been about three percentage points a year faster than in services since 1979.

然而，中国似乎满足实际汇率上涨所需的一切条件。国际货币基金组织(International Monetary Fund)在9月份的《世界经济展望》(World Economic Outlook)指出，自1979年以来，中国工业领域生产率的增幅平均每年比服务业高出3个百分点。

If a real exchange rate one would expect to appreciate depreciates, one would also expect China to become more competitive in world markets. The evidence suggests that this is the case: look at both the astonishing growth of China’s exports and the soaring current account surplus.

如果人们预期会上升的实际汇率不升反降，那么人们也就会认为，中国在国际市场上将变得更有竞争力。证据表明，情况确实如此：看看中国出口的惊人增长和经常账户盈余的不断飙升吧。

I would argue that there are now three fundamental indicators of a significant undervaluation. First, the scale of the required foreign currency intervention; second, the fact that the source of surplus receipts of foreign exchange is now a current account surplus rather than inflows of relatively unstable short-term capital; and, above all, that the surplus in the basic balance – the sum of the current account and long-term capital inflows – is at least 10 per cent of gross domestic product (see charts). Jonathan Anderson of UBS suggests that the undervaluation is about 20 per cent.

我认为，目前有三个基本指标表明，人民币汇率被严重低估了。首先，外汇市场干预所需的规模；其次，外汇收入过剩的根源如今是经常账户盈余，而不是相对不稳定的短期资金流入；最重要的是，基本差额盈余至少占国内生产总值(GDP)的10%（见图表）。基本差额即经常账户与长期资金流入之和。瑞银集团(UBS)的乔纳森?安德森(Jonathan Anderson)认为，人民币低估幅度约为20%。

As Mr Smithers argues, the progressive real depreciation of the renminbi is why China’s emergence has also been disinflationary for the world. The prices of the manufactures it exports have indeed tended to fall in dollars. But this did not have to be the case. It was the combination of a virtually fixed nominal exchange rate with a depreciating real exchange rate that made it so.