美国正处于信贷危机"余震期"

Here is the reality. We have intense uncertainty on US fiscal, energy and health policies. Nobody knows what their effective tax rate is going to be next year so they cannot plan. When you model that uncertainty in economic terms, you end up with higher liquidity ratios in business and rising savings rates in the personal sector. This damps spending growth and spending is what gross domestic product is all about.

美国目前的现实情况是：在财政、能源以及医疗政策领域存在巨大不确定性。没有人知道自己明年的实际税率将是多少，因而也无法提前进行财务规划。如果将不确定性上升的影响放在经济模型框架下考察，你会得出企业流动资产比率以及居民储蓄率都将上升的结论。这将抑制支出增长，而支出规模直接关系到GDP。

On top of that, we have an export shock from the spreading European recession that is only now starting to show through in the data, such as the plunge in US purchasing managers' orders. Now, if the baseline growth trend in the US economy was in the old paradigm range of 4-6 per cent for this stage of the cycle, we could certainly absorb these negative shocks. But the underlying trend in the pace of economic activity is somewhere between 1 and 2 per cent, so there is little margin for error: the cushion is razor-thin.

除此之外，欧洲经济衰退范围扩大还对美国出口构成冲击，目前这种影响刚刚开始体现在数据上，例如美国采购经理指数(PMI)中的新订单分类指数近期显著下跌。在当前所处的经济阶段，如果美国经济的基础趋势增长率仍在以往4%至6%的区间范围内，我们完全有能力吸收这些负面冲击。但目前经济活动的潜在趋势水平已降至1%至2%区间，因此经济政策的试错空间极小：缓冲空间非常狭小。

After almost four years of $1tn-plus fiscal deficits, near-zero policy rates, and a Fed balance sheet that is pregnant with triplets, how can we not have some growth, any growth? The government spigots have been turned on to such an extent that if this were a normal plain-vanilla cycle, the economy would have ballooned at an 8 per cent average annual rate since the "great recession" ended three years ago.

近四年来，美国政府财政赤字规模一直高于1万亿美元，政策利率在接近于零的水平徘徊，美联储(Fed)资产负债表规模激增，为何这些因素没能推动经济实现较快增长？如果当前经济处于一个正常的周期阶段，在政府如此大规模的流动性注入推动下，整体经济自2009年"大萧条"结束以来应能实现高达8%的年均增长。

The fact that it has expanded at barely more than a 2 per cent pace – the weakest recovery ever – speaks to the secular headwinds from debt-burdened households, structural unemployment and retrenchment at state and local government level.

但事实上这段时期内美国经济的年均增长率仅为2%——堪称有史以来最疲软的经济复苏——家庭环节背负沉重债务负担，结构性失业问题难以解决，州和地方政府则忙着缩减开支，这些问题阻碍着经济复苏。

Indeed, the recession may well have ended in June 2009, but the problem is that there was no recovery to speak of. Lingering excess supply in the labour market has led to a 5 per cent decline in real median incomes over the past three years.

当然，美国经济衰退确有可能已于2009年6月结束，但问题是随后并未出现复苏。劳动力市场长期供过于求已导致实际收入中位数在过去三年中下降了5%。

The necessity of crawling out of excess indebtedness has led to the mother of all deleveraging cycles: the aggregate household debt/income ratio has contracted from the bubble-high 134 per cent in 2007 to a nine-year low of 114 per cent. That is an unprecedented 20 percentage point decline in five years. And what makes this cycle a totally different animal to anything we have seen in the past is the destruction of wealth. The Fed told us recently that median household net worth collapsed an epic 39 per cent from 2007 to 2010. That is a depression statistic. And this is what, shamefully, the economics community has totally missed: the effects, the scars if you like, will linger for a long time.

摆脱过度负债的必要性已引发了去杠杆周期——家庭总负债与总收入之比已从2007年的泡沫峰值134%下降至近九年低点114%，在五年中前所未有地跌去了20个百分点。而令当前这轮周期有别于我们以往所见任何周期的是其对财富的毁灭效应。美联储近期公布，2010年美国家庭资产净值中位数较2007年显著下滑了39%。这是一个令人深感沮丧的数据。而经济研究领域却极不光彩地将其彻底忽略：经济危机的影响，或称其为伤疤，在很长一段时间里仍将存在。

This wealth collapse was the equivalent of an earthquake measuring 7 or 8 on the Richter scale, and earthquakes are followed by aftershocks, which is exactly what has provided the biggest hurdle for the post-recession healing phase we have been in for the past three years.

此次财富缩水的影响等同于一场里氏7级或8级地震。正如地震之后通常伴有余震一样，财富缩水的余震效应正是近三年来衰退过后的复苏阶段美国面临的最大障碍。

It takes time for a slump in household net worth to register fully. As such, there are lags between the event and the drawn-out but profound impact on consumer spending patterns, as frugality emerges as the new and lasting fashion.

家庭资产净值大幅缩水的影响需要一段时间才能完全显现。不过纵然存在一定时滞，消费者支出模式已经发生了深刻的改变，节俭成为了经久不衰的消费新风尚。

The baby boomers, who are now entering their mid-60s and the group that was at the epicentre of this tragic collapse in net worth, are still in the process of recalculating their ability to retire when they thought they could at the bubble highs. They have lowered their expectations of what their living standards will look like when they do stop work.

婴儿潮的一代人里，年龄在65岁以上者日渐增多。作为身处此轮财富缩水"震中"的群体，目前他们仍在忙于重新计算自己能于何时退休，而在危机前的市场泡沫期他们曾认为自己可以立即享受退休生活。他们还降低了对退休后生活水平的预期。

So the era of the aftershock is what we are in and what we will probably stay in for years to come. That means consumer behaviour and patterns will undergo profound and enduring changes that will prove to be intensely disinflationary and foster a prolonged period of ultra-low interest rates, bond yields and expected returns in the public capital markets.

因此，余震期即是美国当下所处的经济阶段，并且未来很多年美国都将陷在该阶段停滞不前。这意味着消费者行为以及消费模式将发生深刻而持久的变化。这种变化可能产生巨大的通货紧缩效应，并在很长一段时间内将公开资本市场上的利率、债券收益率以及预期回报率压制在一个超低水平。

I remain of the view that the secular bull market in Treasuries does not come to a complete end until the long bond goes all the way back to its early 1940s low of 2 per cent, so there is still a hefty 65 basis points of rally left in this monster. This will make spread product an attractive way to pick up a yield premium at the lows and mean dividend themes stay prevalent in the equity market.

我依然认为，在长期国债收益率回到二十世纪四十年代早期的低点2%以前，美国国债市场漫长的牛市不会真正完结。因此长期国债仍有高达65个基点的上升空间。在国债收益率降至低点时，非美国国债的债券品种将成为获取超额收益的有吸引力的投资标的。这还意味着在股票市场上分红概念仍将流行。

The scars from the detonation of the housing and credit bubble-bust have yet to heal. Household net worth per capita is still 15 per cent or $100,000 shy of where it was five years ago and ultra-low interest rates are punishing those who save in bank deposits or money market funds. The median age of the boomer is 55 going on 56 and retirement is the darkness at the end of the tunnel.

住房与信贷市场泡沫破灭对美国家庭造成的伤痕目前仍未愈合。家庭平均资产净值较五年前仍低15%，或10万美元。而超低利率环境则对将资金存入银行或投进货币市场基金的个人不利。婴儿潮一代的年龄中值处于55岁接近56岁的水平，未来他们退休后的生活前景一片暗淡。

The trend towards second jobs, do-it-yourself, private labels, dollar stores, maintaining your existing vehicle, downsizing property needs, cocooning and frugality will continue unabated. The boomer age of narcissism is over, but look at the bright side: I've never met a Buddhist who wasn't completely tranquil and . . . happy.

当前的潮流是第二职业、DIY、零售商的自有品牌、一美元商店、自己保养现有汽车、缩小住房面积需求以及"宅在家里"。节俭之风将继续大行其道。婴儿潮一代的自恋期现已结束，但还是让我们想想好的方面吧：我遇见过的佛教徒都是既平静又快乐的。

David Rosenberg is chief economist and strategist of Gluskin Sheff

戴维•罗森伯格是Gluskin Sheff的首席经济学家兼策略师