[翻译] 保罗·克鲁格曼: 7千亿美元--Cash for trash ?

美国想搞国有化？？

看不太懂！

楼主辛苦啦，DDDDDDDDDDDD

以下是引用老鱼父在2008-9-24 0:45:00的发言：

 保罗·克鲁格曼（原载2008年9月21日《纽约时报》）

一些怀疑者指亨利·鲍尔森的7000亿美元拯救美国金融体系的方案为“黄金换大粪”, 另一些人则称这项待审法案为对动用“金融武力”的授权，堪比对布什政府声名狼藉的入侵伊拉克计划开绿灯的动用军力的授权。

      这些讽刺并非空穴来风。大家都同意，采取一些主要行动是必要的。但是,  鲍尔森先生要求特别权力: 为自己和他的继任者---把纳税人的钱投入到一个方案中,  一个据我所看没有道理的方案。

      有人说，我们应该简单地相信鲍尔森先生，因为他是个聪明的家伙, 他知道他在干什么。这说法只有一半是的正确的：他的确是个聪明人，但是，确切地说，回顾过去一年半的经历---在此期间鲍尔森先生再三宣称金融危机“可控”，然后呢，他提供的是一连串失败的诊治---难道这些有理由让人相信他知道自己在做什么？他只是头痛医头，脚痛医脚，和其他庸医没什么两样。

      所以还是让我们自己来清理头绪吧。我对此次金融危机有一个“四阶段”的观点:

      1.破灭的房地产泡沫已经导致了拖欠房贷案和丧失抵押房回赎案激增。而这反过来又导致其价值源于以房贷偿还为支拄的有关债券的价格暴跌。

      2.这些金融失败业已使得很多金融机构陷入资本金严重短缺---和负债相比，已是资不抵债。这个问题显得异常严峻,  特别是在这泡沫年代,  家家都有巨额负债。

      3.由于金融机构相对其债务而言资本太少，他们不能也不愿提供经济所需的信用。

      4.金融机构一直在努力尝试出售资产偿付债务，包括出售房贷抵押支持的债券。但这又驱动他们拥有的资产价格下降，并使他们的财务状况更趋恶化。这种恶性循环就是所谓的“去杠杆化悖论 ”。(paradox of deleveraging)

      鲍尔森计划要求联邦政府购买7,000亿美元价值的坏账，主要是住房抵押贷款证券。问题是这样做又如何解决危机呢？

      那么，它可能---可能---会打破恶性循环的反杠杆化操作，也就是我的上述的第四阶段。即便是这点也不是很明晰：那么, 许多国库不打算购买的资产仍然承受作价格压力。此外，即使恶性循环被遏制住，金融机构仍然因为资本金不足而迈不开步子。

      或者更确切地说，金融机构将受困于资本金不足，除非联邦政府以高于其价值的高价购买那些资产---花纳税人的钱,  给金融机构及其股东和管理层一笔暴利。我提到过我对此方案不爽吗?

      看来这危机的逻辑决定了要介入的不在第四阶段，而在第二阶段：金融体系需要更多的资本金。如果政府计划向金融机构提供资本金，那么它应该得到提供资本金所应得到的：一部分的所有权，惟其如此，一旦援救方案奏效，其全部成果才不至于被那些引发糟糕局面的罪魁祸首所攫取。

      这正是储贷危机 (the savings and loan crisis) 所发生的：联邦接管了坏银行 (bad banks) 的所有权，而不仅仅是接管它们的不良资产 (bad assets)。发生在房地美和房利美 (Fannie & Freddie) 的正是如此。（顺便提一下，那次营救做得恰如其分。自联邦接管后，抵押利率迅速调低。）

      但是鲍尔森先生坚持他想要一个“干净”的方案。“干净”的言外之意是要纳税人没有附加条件, 没有任何补偿地为紧急救援买单。难道说这是一件好事？加上保尔森先生要求独裁的权力，再加上他要求免除“任何法庭或任何行政机构”的复审---这一切构成了一个令人不可接受的方案。

      我知道国会面临着巨大的压力,  要求其在未来几天里批准鲍尔森方案---也许会有一点小小的修改使之稍微不那么坏。根本上说，在花了一年半时间告诉每一个人事情“可控”之后，布什当局宣称天就要塌了，为了拯救世界就必须确切地按照方案所要求的去做,  立即做,  “ 现在, 而今, 眼目下。”

      但是,  我想敦促国会暂歇一分钟，深呼吸，并尝试严肃地修订方案的架构，使之切中时弊。切不可操之过急, 急则失查---如果这个方案以当前的形态付诸实施，不久的将来我们都会遗恨可期。

Cash for Trash
   By PAUL KRUGMAN 原文---给想读原文的同学并敬请翻译高手指正---老渔父

Published: September 21, 2008

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/09/22/opinion/22krugman.html?_r=2&ref=opinion&oref=slogin&oref=slogin

Some skeptics are calling Henry Paulson’s $700 billion rescue plan for the U.S. financial system “cash for trash.” Others are calling the proposed legislation the Authorization for Use of Financial Force, after the Authorization for Use of Military Force, the infamous bill that gave the Bush administration the green light to invade Iraq.

There’s justice in the gibes. Everyone agrees that something major must be done. But Mr. Paulson is demanding extraordinary power for himself — and for his successor — to deploy taxpayers’ money on behalf of a plan that, as far as I can see, doesn’t make sense.

Some are saying that we should simply trust Mr. Paulson, because he’s a smart guy who knows what he’s doing. But that’s only half true: he is a smart guy, but what, exactly, in the experience of the past year and a half — a period during which Mr. Paulson repeatedly declared the financial crisis “contained,” and then offered a series of unsuccessful fixes — justifies the belief that he knows what he’s doing? He’s making it up as he goes along, just like the rest of us.

So let’s try to think this through for ourselves. I have a four-step view of the financial crisis:

1. The bursting of the housing bubble has led to a surge in defaults and foreclosures, which in turn has led to a plunge in the prices of mortgage-backed securities — assets whose value ultimately comes from mortgage payments.

2. These financial losses have left many financial institutions with too little capital — too few assets compared with their debt. This problem is especially severe because everyone took on so much debt during the bubble years.

3. Because financial institutions have too little capital relative to their debt, they haven’t been able or willing to provide the credit the economy needs.

4. Financial institutions have been trying to pay down their debt by selling assets, including those mortgage-backed securities, but this drives asset prices down and makes their financial position even worse. This vicious circle is what some call the “paradox of deleveraging.”

The Paulson plan calls for the federal government to buy up $700 billion worth of troubled assets, mainly mortgage-backed securities. How does this resolve the crisis?

Well, it might — might — break the vicious circle of deleveraging, step 4 in my capsule description. Even that isn’t clear: the prices of many assets, not just those the Treasury proposes to buy, are under pressure. And even if the vicious circle is limited, the financial system will still be crippled by inadequate capital.

Or rather, it will be crippled by inadequate capital unless the federal government hugely overpays for the assets it buys, giving financial firms — and their stockholders and executives — a giant windfall at taxpayer expense. Did I mention that I’m not happy with this plan?

The logic of the crisis seems to call for an intervention, not at step 4, but at step 2: the financial system needs more capital. And if the government is going to provide capital to financial firms, it should get what people who provide capital are entitled to — a share in ownership, so that all the gains if the rescue plan works don’t go to the people who made the mess in the first place.

That’s what happened in the savings and loan crisis: the feds took over ownership of the bad banks, not just their bad assets. It’s also what happened with Fannie and Freddie. (And by the way, that rescue has done what it was supposed to. Mortgage interest rates have come down sharply since the federal takeover.)

But Mr. Paulson insists that he wants a “clean” plan. “Clean,” in this context, means a taxpayer-financed bailout with no strings attached — no quid pro quo on the part of those being bailed out. Why is that a good thing? Add to this the fact that Mr. Paulson is also demanding dictatorial authority, plus immunity from review “by any court of law or any administrative agency,” and this adds up to an unacceptable proposal.

I’m aware that Congress is under enormous pressure to agree to the Paulson plan in the next few days, with at most a few modifications that make it slightly less bad. Basically, after having spent a year and a half telling everyone that things were under control, the Bush administration says that the sky is falling, and that to save the world we have to do exactly what it says now now now.

But I’d urge Congress to pause for a minute, take a deep breath, and try to seriously rework the structure of the plan, making it a plan that addresses the real problem. Don’t let yourself be railroaded — if this plan goes through in anything like its current form, we’ll all be very sorry in the not-too-distant future.

克鲁格曼认为不应该买坏账,而应向金融机构注入资本金,并取得所有权.这是一个国有化方案啊.

[此贴子已经被作者于2008-9-26 0:11:00编辑过]

如果杠杆率较高，岂不意味着可能大面积国有化？

Paul Krugman 获得2008诺贝尔经济学奖

Press Release

13 October 2008

The Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences has decided to award The Sveriges Riksbank Prize in Economic Sciences in Memory of Alfred Nobel 2008 to

Paul Krugman
Princeton University, NJ, USA

"for his analysis of trade patterns and location of economic activity"

International Trade and Economic Geography

Patterns of trade and location have always been key issues in the economic debate. What are the effects of free trade and globalization? What are the driving forces behind worldwide urbanization? Paul Krugman has formulated a new theory to answer these questions. He has thereby integrated the previously disparate research fields of international trade and economic geography.

Krugman's approach is based on the premise that many goods and services can be produced more cheaply in long series, a concept generally known as economies of scale. Meanwhile, consumers demand a varied supply of goods. As a result, small-scale production for a local market is replaced by large-scale production for the world market, where firms with similar products compete with one another.

Traditional trade theory assumes that countries are different and explains why some countries export agricultural products whereas others export industrial goods. The new theory clarifies why worldwide trade is in fact dominated by countries which not only have similar conditions, but also trade in similar products – for instance, a country such as Sweden that both exports and imports cars. This kind of trade enables specialization and large-scale production, which result in lower prices and a greater diversity of commodities.

Economies of scale combined with reduced transport costs also help to explain why an increasingly larger share of the world population lives in cities and why similar economic activities are concentrated in the same locations. Lower transport costs can trigger a self-reinforcing process whereby a growing metropolitan population gives rise to increased large-scale production, higher real wages and a more diversified supply of goods. This, in turn, stimulates further migration to cities. Krugman's theories have shown that the outcome of these processes can well be that regions become divided into a high-technology urbanized core and a less developed "periphery".

Read more about this year's prize

Information for the Public (pdf)

Scientific Background (pdf)

In order to read the text you need Acrobat Reader.

[此贴子已经被作者于2008-10-14 0:17:16编辑过]

更多关于保罗·克鲁格曼

https://bbs.pinggu.org/thread-363364-1-1.html

作为新经济地理的粉丝，希望诺奖为它赢得更多关注，而不是终结

空间经济学经典文献系列

https://bbs.pinggu.org/thread-69731-1-1.html

[此贴子已经被作者于2008-10-14 3:53:22编辑过]

转一篇郭凯评Krugman独自获奖（有同感 ）

 

克鲁格曼独自得奖

人渣 @ 2008-10-13 22:04:59 阅读(1198) 评论(1) 引用通告 分类: 未归类

我早晨起来看到今年的经济学诺奖只授予了克鲁格曼一个人这条消息的时候，只能用震惊的说不出话来形容。

不要错误的理解我。克鲁格曼绝对应该得诺贝尔奖，没有克鲁格曼就没有贸易理论过去30年的发展――有时候也叫新贸易理论，真正走出古典贸易理论的理论，他的研究绝对是诺贝尔奖级的。

我震惊的是，诺奖委员会竟然让他一个人独自得奖。新贸易理论，不是克鲁格曼一个人的作品，他也许是最重要的贡献者之一，但也只是之一，他的普林斯顿同事格罗斯曼还有哈佛大学的经济学家赫尔普曼在新贸易理论上的贡献，即便“不如”克鲁格曼重要，也绝对是诺贝尔奖级的。(注：从时序上说，克鲁格曼应该是新贸易理论的开创者，但是赫尔普曼和克鲁格曼的合作是新贸易理论的经典，格罗斯曼加入的晚一点，但是他和赫尔普曼关于贸易，分工，内生增长和贸易保护的政治经济学的研究绝对是诺奖级的贡献) 。我猜这三个人一起得奖，已经猜了四五年了。

事实上是这样的。每当我跟人说起这三个人可能一起拿奖的时候，经常都会遭到反驳――反驳的原因通常是：克鲁格曼可能拿不到奖。反驳者说这话不是因为克鲁格曼的学术贡献不够，大家都知道克鲁格曼的贡献，哪个做贸易的人能绕开克鲁格曼的论文？问题是，克鲁格曼这些年已经完全不是一个学者了，他现在更广为人知的身份是《纽约时报》的专栏作家。他的专栏我几乎每篇都看，这么说吧，如果美国成立一个左翼作家联盟，简称“左联”，克鲁格曼绝对有资格当一个副盟主。他的专栏好看是因为他总是能很漂亮的论证他的观点，他的专栏不好看是因为他的观点几乎永远是：在任何一个问题上正确的都是民主党，错误的都是共和党。他其实早就由贸易理论学家克鲁格曼，变成了一个其实相当激进的左翼政论家克鲁格曼。

当然，很多人也许会把这解释成：这就对了，自由主义经济学早该完蛋了，应该把奖授予一个左翼，支持更多的政府管制，政府调控和政府参与。从某种意义上，克鲁格曼是这样一个人，他是凯恩斯的信徒(很多相信新凯恩斯主义的人其实已经不读凯恩斯了，但克鲁格曼其实还是一个传统意义上的凯恩斯信徒，他崇拜凯恩斯，他认为新凯恩斯只是在证明凯恩斯的正确)，他的政治观点在民主党中都属于偏左。但是从学术意义上，克鲁格曼又不是这样一个人。他的贸易理论，在我看来，在更激进的意义上（因为规模报酬递增）强调开放和自由贸易的重要性。他的国际收支危机模型(又称第一代危机模型)，在很大程度上，是基于对政府愚蠢的假设。

这种看似矛盾的组合，或许就是诺奖委员会需要的吧？