美國經濟將更像微軟還是亞馬遜？

The most important biographical fact about Theresa May is not her Anglicanism, her middle-classness or her sex. More tellingly, she had never served as Britain’s opposition leader or chancellor of the exchequer before she became its prime minister.

特里薩•梅(Theresa May)生平中最重要的部分，不是她信仰英國國教、屬于中產階層或她的性別。更能說明問題的是，她在成為首相之前，從未擔任過英國的反對黨領袖或財政大臣。

Those two jobs, which most of her predecessors had done at least one of as a tour of duty for the premiership, acquaint a politician with the full spectrum of work undertaken by the state: the loftiest geopolitics, the technical morass of welfare, the producer interests in healthcare and education. Mrs May’s pedigree is a six-year immersion in the Home Office — a narrow department even before criminal justice fell out of its remit in 2007 — and some journeyman portfolios in opposition. She had never done a business-facing job.

梅的大多數(shù)前任，在成為首相之前都擔任過這兩個職位中的至少一個。這種經歷讓一位政客熟悉政府承擔的一整套任務：高遠的地緣政治、福利制度的技術難題、以及醫(yī)療和教育領域的生產者利益。她的“血統(tǒng)”是在內政部(Home Office)任職6年——即便在2007年刑事司法職責被剝離之前，該部都是一個職責較窄的部門——并在保守黨是反對黨期間當過一段學徒。她此前從未擔負過跟企業(yè)打交道的職責。

On the life-and-death matters of crime, terror and espionage, no recent prime minister has sounded more authoritative. On other subjects, none has shown more nervousness. A lot of government is alien to her. She knows it. Increasingly, we know it too.

在事關生死的犯罪、恐怖主義和間諜問題上，近幾十年沒有哪位首相聽起來比梅更權威。在其他主題上，沒有哪位首相表現(xiàn)得比梅更緊張。她對政府中的很多事務都很陌生。她了解這一點。我們也越來越了解這一點。

On Monday, Mrs May retreated from her second big idea in as many months. Both had to do with money, not the existential work of an interior minister. The increase in national insurance charges that she announced and then withdrew under criticism in April constituted a forgivable rookie error.

周一，梅不再堅持她兩個月來的第二項大主張。這兩項主張都跟錢有關，而非內政大臣負責的那種關系生死的事務。她先是宣布提高國民保險(NI)稅，隨后因遭到批評而在4月撤銷該決定，這可以算是一個新手常犯的錯誤，可以原諒。

The latest capitulation is worse. Last week, she came up with a flawed but constructive answer to the crisis of funding in social care. The elderly would finance their care out of their own estate upon death. The upper limit on their contribution would go but they could keep £100,000 for their children. In the mixed metaphors that proliferate in politics, a floor would replace a cap.

最新的讓步更糟糕。上周，她對社會護理的資金來源危機拿出了一個有缺陷、但頗具建設性的答案。老人們將用自己過世后的遺產為自己的護理買單。他們的貢獻上限將被取消，但他們可以給子女留下10萬英鎊。用政壇流行的混合隱喻來說，下限將取代上限。

The idea turned old age into a high-stakes game of chance — die suddenly and your estate would go untouched, contract dementia and it would shrivel over time — but it confronted voters with the principle that things must be paid for and challenged the Conservative cult of inheritance. Mrs May made it central to her election manifesto. Her self-image as a firm leader hinged on her fidelity to this brave, contentious idea.

這個主張把垂垂暮年變成一場高賭注的豪賭：突然去世，你的遺產將不受影響;患上癡呆，你給子女留下的遺產將隨著時間推移而減少——但這讓選民面對一個原則：什么事都是要有人買單的;這個方案還挑戰(zhàn)了保守黨對于財產繼承的癡迷。梅將其列為她的競選宣言的中心內容。她作為一個堅強領導人的自我形象有賴于她對這一大膽、富有爭議的主張的忠誠度。

A few days of popular disquiet and the cap is back. If Mrs May did not know that old people feel attached to their asset base, she was derelict. If she did and (admirably) resolved to face them down, then her resolve does not amount to much. Colleagues who defended her proposal in public, lobby interests who fought it and any EU negotiators tuning in from the continent will infer the same lesson: this prime minister is strong and stable, until you test her.

在幾天的公眾不安之后，上限又回來了。如果梅當初不了解老年人對于自己資產基礎的依附感，那她就太不接地氣了。如果她本來就了解這一點，然后(令人敬佩地)決定對他們堅持原則，那么她的決心實在經不起考驗。在公開場合為她的提議辯護的同事、反對該提議的游說利益集團，以及從歐洲大陸關注英國事態(tài)的歐盟談判人員，將得出同一個結論：這位首相是強大穩(wěn)固的——直到你對她進行考驗。

In politics, a change of mind is always a “U-turn”, but that image assumes a certain grace of movement. Cars reverse direction smoothly. This government does it with denial and recrimination. “Nothing has changed,” said Mrs May on Monday, like an Iraqi information minister playing down the fall of Baghdad even as American tanks trundle into town. For a moment, there was panic. For a moment, strength and stability looked like elephantine ponderousness.

在政界，改變想法永遠是“180度大轉彎”，但這種形象假設了某種優(yōu)雅的轉身姿勢。就像汽車平穩(wěn)掉頭。本屆政府則是用否認和怪罪別人來轉身。梅周一表示：“什么都沒改變。”就像在美國坦克轟隆隆開進巴格達時，伊拉克信息部長仍在信心滿滿地聲稱巴格達沒有失守那樣。一會兒是恐慌。一會兒是力量和穩(wěn)定貌似大象般的沉重。

None of this matters now as the election is safe. Her poll lead has “collapsed” to the low double-digits and, if social care is a mess, the ultimate problem is an unrealistic public, not her. The real worry concerns the future under this government. How many more times will it miscalculate and under-prepare, and on what stage? The complex work of EU exit starts in June. The pressure will make the election campaign feel like the non-event it is. The breadth of the work will take Mrs May beyond her comfort zone to the widest possible horizon of subjects.

這些現(xiàn)在都不重要，因為這場大選的結果是沒有懸念的。她在民調中的領先優(yōu)勢已“滑坡”至10多個百分點;再說，如果社會護理搞得一團糟，那么最終的問題是不現(xiàn)實的公眾，而不是她。真正的擔心在于在這屆政府領導下的未來。它還會再錯判和準備不足幾次，還會在哪些問題上出錯?退歐的復雜任務將從6月開始。這種壓力將讓此次競選像是一件無關緊要的事情(事實上也確實如此)。工作的廣度將讓梅脫離她的舒適區(qū)，面對種種主題。

For all the thought-pieces devoted to a new-ish prime minister — “Who is the real Theresa May?” — the question is no longer what this government stands for but whether it is any good. Or at least whether it is good enough, given the work ahead. The philosophic contents of “Mayism”, and its supposed break with Thatcherism, seems a less pressing conversation than it did last week.

盡管有大量深刻的文章點評這位上任不太久的首相——“哪一個是真正的特里薩•梅”，但問題不再是本屆政府主張什么，而是它是否合格?；蛘哒f鑒于下一階段的工作量，它是否足夠合格。與上周相比，“梅主義”(Mayism)的哲學內容及其理應發(fā)生的與撒切爾主義(Thatcherism)劃清界限，似乎已經是不那么緊迫的討論。

Most prime ministers live to see their greatest strength reinterpreted as their greatest flaw. Margaret Thatcher’s conviction became her brusqueness. Tony Blair’s charisma became his skill at deception. David Cameron’s lack of dogma became his tactical, game-playing shallowness. And Mrs May’s reticence will become her self-doubt. Right now, we attribute her terse, rehearsed statements to a clever strategic ruse or an endearing, low-key Englishness that hints at several fathoms of hidden depth. In time, we might put it down to a simple lack of confidence, as though she knew the reality of her premiership before we did.

多數(shù)首相會在有生之年看到他們的最大優(yōu)勢被重新解讀為最大缺點?，敻覃愄?bull;撒切爾(Margaret Thatcher)的堅定信念變成了唐突。托尼•布萊爾(Tony Blair)的領袖魅力變成了擅長說謊。戴維•卡梅倫(David Cameron)的不教條變成了玩游戲般的、戰(zhàn)術性的膚淺。梅的沉默寡言將變成自我懷疑。眼下，我們把她簡要、預先準備好的聲明歸因于明智的戰(zhàn)略性計策，或者是惹人喜愛的低調英倫氣質(暗示著一些深藏不露的潛質)。到時候，我們可能會把這歸因于簡單的缺乏信心，就好像她比我們更早知道她作為首相的真實水平。

One of my first economics lessons contrasted perfect competition, which was judged to be a good thing, with monopoly, which was not. There are worse places to begin than by being shown the difference between championing the miracle of the free market and favouring the depredations of dominant businesses.

我最早上過的經濟學課程之一將完全競爭(被評判為好事)與壟斷(不被認為是好事)進行對照。一個不那么糟糕的起點是看到兩個方面的差異：一方面是倡導自由市場的奇跡，另一方面是贊成霸王企業(yè)的劫掠。

But monopoly power has often seemed like yesterday’s issue. Standard Oil was broken up in 1911; AT&T in 1984. To the extent that we economists worried about companies being too big, we were thinking about the systemic risks from banks that were too big to fail. But we are starting to notice again the risks not of corporate failure but of corporate success.

但壟斷權力經常似乎是昨天的問題。標準石油(Standard Oil)在1911年被分拆;AT&T在1984年被分拆。以至于當我們這些經濟學家擔心公司太大時，我們想到的是大到不能倒的銀行構成系統(tǒng)性風險。但是，我們正開始再次注意到企業(yè)成功(而非企業(yè)失敗)的風險。

The most obvious examples are the big digital players: Google dominates search; Facebook is the Goliath of social media; Amazon rules online retail. But, as documented in a new working paper by five economists, American business is in general becoming more concentrated.

最明顯的例子是數(shù)字領域的大企業(yè)：谷歌(Google)主導搜索;Facebook是社交媒體的巨人;亞馬遜(Amazon)統(tǒng)治線上零售。但是，正如五位經濟學家在一份新的工作論文中所記載的那樣，總體而言，美國商界正在變得更加集中。

David Autor and his colleagues looked at 676 industries in the US — from cigarettes to greeting cards, musical instruments to payday lenders. They found that for the typical industry in each of six sectors — manufacturing, retail, finance, services, wholesale and utilities/transportation — the biggest companies are producing a larger share of output.

戴維•奧托爾(David Autor)和他的同事們考察了美國的676個行業(yè)——從卷煙到賀卡、從樂器到高利貸機構。他們發(fā)現(xiàn)，在制造業(yè)、零售業(yè)、金融業(yè)、服務業(yè)、批發(fā)業(yè)和公用事業(yè)/運輸業(yè)這六個部門的典型行業(yè)里，大型公司的產出占比更大了。

For example, in the early 1980s the largest four players in any given US manufacturing industry averaged 38 per cent of sales; three decades later the figure was 43 per cent. In utilities and transportation the typical market share of the biggest four companies rose from 29 per cent to 37 per cent. In retail, overshadowed by Walmart and Amazon, the rise was dramatic: 14 per cent to 30 per cent.

以1980年代初為例，在任何給定的美國制造行業(yè)，最大4家公司在行業(yè)銷售中平均占到38%;30年之后，這個比例變成了43%。在公用事業(yè)與運輸業(yè)中，最大4家公司的占比由29%升高至37%。在沃爾瑪(Walmart)和亞馬遜主導的零售行業(yè)，占比升幅是戲劇性的：從14%升至30%。

This is surprising. As the world economy grows, one might expect markets to become more like the perfectly competitive textbook model, not less. Deregulation should allow more competition; globalisation should expose established players to pressure from overseas; transparent prices should make it harder for fat cats to maintain their position. Why hasn’t competition chipped away at the market position of the leading companies? The simplest explanation: they are very good at what they do. Competition isn’t a threat to them. It’s an opportunity.

這一現(xiàn)象令人驚訝。隨著世界經濟的增長，人們也許預期市場會變得更像完全競爭的教科書模式，而不是更不像。去監(jiān)管應該會提高競爭程度;全球化應該會讓成熟企業(yè)面對來自海外的壓力;透明的價格應該會讓“肥貓們”更難保住自己的地位。為何競爭沒有削弱領先公司的市場地位?最簡單的答案是：這些公司非常擅長自己所做的事情。競爭對它們而言并非威脅，而是機會。

What Professor Autor and his colleagues call “superstar firms” tend to be more efficient. They sell more at a lower cost, so they enjoy a larger profit margin. Google is the purest example: its search algorithm won market share on merit. Alternatives are easily available, but most people do not use them. But the pattern holds more broadly: superstar firms have grown not by avoiding competitors but by defeating them.

奧托爾教授及其同事所稱的“超級明星公司”通常效率更高。這類公司以較低的成本實現(xiàn)較高的銷售，所以利潤率更高。谷歌就是最純粹的例子：它的搜索算法憑借本事贏得了市場份額。其他搜索引擎唾手可得，但大多數(shù)人并不使用它們。但是，這一模式適用于更廣范圍：超級明星公司成長壯大，靠的不是避開競爭對手，而是擊敗它們。

This is not entirely bad news. But it’s not entirely good news, either. The superstar firm phenomenon is the best explanation we have of a little-noticed but worrisome trend: since 1980, in the US and many other advanced economies, workers have been getting a steadily smaller slice of the economic pie (the distribution of this labour income also became much more unequal during the 1980s and 1990s).

這并非完全是壞消息。但也并非完全是好消息。超級明星公司現(xiàn)象是對人們很少注意到、但令人擔憂的一個趨勢的最好解釋：自1980年代以來，在美國和其他許多發(fā)達經濟體里，勞動者在經濟蛋糕所獲得份額一直在穩(wěn)步減少(在1980年代至1990年代，勞動力收入分配的不平等程度也大大加深了)。

Workers, from shelf-stackers to chief executives, have seen their total share of economic value-added fall from about 66 per cent to about 60 per cent in the US since 1980. This decline in “labour share” is often blamed on international trade making life harder for workers and easier for footloose capital. Prof Autor and his colleagues find little evidence for this idea.

自1980年以來，美國勞動者——從理貨員到首席執(zhí)行官——在經濟增加值中獲得的總回報的份額從約66%下降到約60%。這種“勞動收入份額”的降低，經常被歸咎于國際貿易讓勞動者的日子更難過，讓自由流動的資本的日子更加好過。奧托爾教授和他的同事基本沒有找到支持這一觀點的證據(jù)。

Superstar firms, instead, seem to be the cause. The story is simple. These businesses are highly productive and achieve more with less. Because of this profitability, more of the value added by the company flows to shareholders and less to workers. And what happens in these groups will tend to be reflected in the economy as a whole, because superstar firms have an increasingly important role.

相反，超級明星公司似乎是其中原因。整件事十分簡單。這些公司的生產率非常高，能以更少投入實現(xiàn)更大產出。由于具備這種盈利能力，公司增加值中流向股東的部分更多，流向勞動者的部分更少。發(fā)生在這些公司里的情況，傾向于在整體經濟中得到反映，因為超級明星公司的角色越來越重要。

All this poses a headache for policymakers — assuming policymakers can pay attention to the issue for long enough. The policy response required is subtle: after all, the growth of innovative, productive companies is welcome. It’s the unintended consequences of that growth that pose problems.

這一切都讓政策制定者感到頭疼——假定他們關注這個問題的時間足夠長的話。所需的政策回應是微妙的：畢竟，創(chuàng)新型、生產型公司的增長是可喜的。這種增長的意外后果才構成問題。

Those consequences are not easy to predict, but here are two possibilities. Either the US economy ends up like Amazon, or it ends up like Microsoft. The Amazon future is one of relentless competition, a paradise for consumers but a nightmare for workers, and with the ever-present risk that dominant businesses will snuff out competition as the mood takes them.

這些后果不容易預料到，但存在兩種可能性。美國經濟最終要么像亞馬遜，要么像微軟(Microsoft)。如果像亞馬遜，未來美國經濟的特征是毫不留情的競爭，是消費者的天堂，但卻是勞動者的噩夢，并時刻存在著一種風險：霸王企業(yè)可能隨心所欲地扼殺競爭。

The Microsoft future epitomises the economist John Hicks’s quip: “the best of all monopoly profits is a quiet life”. Microsoft in the 1990s became famous as a once-brilliant company that decided to pull up the drawbridge, locking in consumers and locking out competitors.

如果像微軟，那么未來美國經濟就成為約翰•?？怂?John Hicks)的妙語“壟斷利潤的最高境界是安逸日子”的體現(xiàn)。1990年代，曾經杰出的微軟決定放下吊橋，把消費者關在里面，把競爭對手擋在外面，由此出名。

In either scenario ordinary people lose out, unless they can enjoy returns from capital as well as returns from working. In the very long run a superstar economy could become a technological utopia, where nobody needs to work for a living. That would require quite a realignment in our economic system; I wouldn’t bet on such an outcome happening by chance.

無論是哪種情形，普通人都會淪為輸家——除非他們在得到勞動報酬的同時享受到資本回報。從長遠看，超級明星型經濟可能成為一個技術烏托邦，誰也不需要靠勞動來謀生。那將要求對我們的經濟制度進行一場相當規(guī)模的重構;我不會押注碰巧會得到這種結果。