被忽视的群体 中国失业大军构成隐忧

China may have recorded its worst annual growth rate in nearly a quarter of a century but the country’s leadership does not appear too worried.

中国也许出现了近四分之一个世纪以来最低的年度增长率，但这个国家的领导层似乎不太担心。

“The national economy has been running steadily under the ‘new normal’, showing good momentum of stable growth, optimised structure, enhanced quality and improved livelihoods,” Ma Jiantang, head of China’s National Bureau of Statistics, said on Tuesday as he revealed the economy had grown 7.4 per cent last year, the slowest pace since 1990.

“国民经济在新常态下保持平稳运行，呈现出增长平稳、结构优化、质量提升、民生改善的良好态势，”中国国家统计局(NBS)局长马建堂周二表示。他公布中国经济去年增长7.4%，这是自1990年以来最慢的增长步伐。

The main reason for the nonchalance is the fact that job creation and wage growth in China are both chugging along steadily, even as the economy slowed from 7.7 per cent growth in both 2012 and 2013.

这种不担心的主要原因是中国的就业创造和工资上涨都在稳步推进，即便经济增速从2012年和2013年7.7%的水平有所放缓。

China created 13.22m jobs last year and this, combined with the fact the slowdown has so far been gradual, has convinced the Communist party it can allow growth to slow further.

去年中国创造了1322万就业岗位，而且经济增长放缓迄今是逐渐的。这些情况使共产党确信，它可以允许增长进一步放缓。

Overall employment pressure is also fading because China’s working-age population peaked in 2011 and is expected to fall at an accelerating rate in the coming years, thanks largely to the decades-old one-child policy.

总体就业压力也在减轻，因为中国的劳动年龄人口已经在2011年见顶，预计将在未来几年加快下降——这归因于实行几十年的一胎化政策。

China’s working-age population fell 3.71m last year, after falling 2.44m in 2013.

中国的劳动年龄人口去年下降了371万，此前在2013年下降了244万。

But China’s official unemployment statistics are the worst of a notoriously unreliable set, raising a worrying question over whether Beijing’s sang-froid is misguided.

不过，中国官方的失业统计数字以不可靠出名，这就带来一个令人担忧的问题：中国高层的镇定是不是受到误导的？

The country’s official jobless rate has remained unchanged, at 4.1 per cent, for the past five years.

过去五年来，中国的官方失业率一直保持在4.1%不变。

It has fluctuated in a tiny band between 4.0 per cent and 4.3 per cent for the past 13 years, a period in which the quarterly year-on-year GDP growth rate was as high as 14 per cent and as low as 6 per cent.

过去13年里，这个数字在4.0%至4.3%的狭窄区间里波动，即便在此期间季度同比GDP增长率最高为14%，最低为6%。

The government itself acknowledges this number is not credible and has for many years gathered its own internal data, which it periodically announces but does not regularly publish.

政府自己也承认这个数字是不可信的，并已多年采集自己的内部数据，后者不定期宣布，但没有定期发布。

On Tuesday, in response to a question from the Financial Times, Mr Ma said these internal “non-published” data put the real jobless rate in China at 5.1 per cent last year.

周二，在回答英国《金融时报》提出的问题时，马建堂表示，根据这些“没有正式发布”的内部数据，中国去年的实际失业率为5.1%。

The debate over China’s real unemployment rate is not just academic.

围绕中国实际失业率的辩论不仅仅是学术性的。

Since at least 1989, Beijing’s top priority has been to create enough jobs to maintain social stability and head off popular uprisings that could overthrow the authoritarian state.

至少自1989年以来，中国高层的首要任务一直是创造足够的就业机会，以维护社会稳定，阻止可能推翻威权政府的群体性事件。

As recently as 2011, the government regarded 8 per cent annual growth as a quasi-mystical threshold, below which Chinese society would descend into chaos and the Communist dynasty would implode.

就在2011年，政府还把每年增长8%当作某种近乎神奇的门槛，仿佛达不到这个门槛中国社会就会陷入混乱，共产党王朝就会发生内爆。

Thanks to a much larger base, less pressure from demographics and a gradual shift in the economy away from heavy industry towards labour-intensive services, the government’s new growth threshold is somewhere between 6.5 per cent and 7 per cent.

由于基数扩大了许多、人口压力减轻，以及中国经济从重工业向劳动力密集的服务业逐渐转型，政府设定的新增长门槛介于6.5%和7%之间。

“The [official, published] unemployment rate is based on the number of people who register as unemployed but most people who lose their jobs in China have no incentive to register,” says Ding Dajian, associate professor at People’s University School of Labor and Human Resources. “In the worst years, the government was not willing to publish the [more accurate internal] unemployment rate, which scholars estimated as high as 20 per cent. Now pressure in the labour market has really moderated so it is a very good time to announce the real unemployment rate.”

“（官方发布的）失业率是基于登记失业的人数，但中国大多数失业者没有登记的动力，”中国人民大学劳动人事学院副教授丁大建表示。“在最糟糕的年份，政府不愿意发布（更精确的内部）失业率，学者们估计该数字可能高达20%。现在，劳动力市场的压力确实减轻了，所以这是一个宣布实际失业率的很好时机。”

Some analysts believe the internal figure revealed by Mr Ma on Tuesday is still too low.

一些分析师认为，马建堂周二透露的内部数字仍然偏低。

The Economist Intelligence Unit released a report last week, based on research conducted with the IMF and the International Labour Organization, in which it estimated China’s real unemployment rate in 2014 was actually 6.3 per cent.

经济学人信息部(EIU)根据其与国际货币基金组织(IMF)和国际劳工组织(ILO)联合进行的研究，上周发表了一份报告。报告估计，中国2014年的实际失业率达到6.3%。

That was higher than both the UK, which the EIU estimated had an unemployment rate last year of 6 per cent, and the US, at 6.2 per cent.

这比英国和美国都更高。EIU估计，去年英国失业率为6%，美国为6.2%。

The picture is complicated further by the 274m rural migrant workers who power China’s economy but are almost entirely ignored by unemployment statistics.

若考虑到为中国经济发展立下汗马功劳、但几乎完全被失业统计忽略的2.74亿农民工，情况就更加复杂了。

When most migrant workers lose their jobs they return to their homes in the countryside.

多数农民工在失去工作后，都会回到自己在农村的家。

Since these people can generally grow enough food to survive, this serves as a safety net in the case of mass unemployment of the kind China saw in late 2008 and early 2009.

这些人一般都能生产足够的食物维生，对于中国在2008年末2009年初出现的那种大规模失业，这形成了某种安全网。

On the other hand, these people are severely underemployed and returning to the farms often pushes them back into abject poverty.

在另一方面，这些人严重就业不足，而且回到农村往往使他们再度陷入赤贫。

China’s slowdown is expected to continue this year, with problems particularly concentrated in the real estate construction, manufacturing and heavy industrial sectors, all of which are suffering from chronic overcapacity.

中国经济放缓预计将在今年持续下去，问题特别集中在房地产建筑业、制造业和重工业，这些产业都存在长期产能过剩。

“As the property downturn persists and further weighs on growth in 2015, employment will likely come under pressure,” says Wang Tao, chief China economist at UBS. “We expect job losses to be less severe in scale, though more protracted in length, relative to 2008-2009.”

“由于房地产持续低迷，进一步拖累2015年增长，就业将很可能承受压力，”瑞银(UBS)中国首席经济学家汪涛表示。“相对于2008-2009年，我们预计这一次的裁员在规模上不那么严重，但会持续更久。”

For now, China’s leaders appear relatively sanguine about the potential for massive lay-offs and accompanying social unrest.

就目前而言，中国领导人似乎对大规模裁员和与之相伴的社会动荡的可能性比较乐观。

But if the government’s own internal unemployment figures are not accurate then the risks of miscalculation amid the slowdown only increase.

但是，如果政府自身的内部失业数字是不准确的，那么在经济增长放缓期间，误判的风险只会增加。