关注社会:新一轮QE离我们有多远?

The Federal Open Market Committee of the Federal Reserve is no longer expected to announce a further round of monetary easing when it concludes its two-day meeting in Washington next week. The fact that the hawks have lost enthusiasm for more quantitative easing is scarcely surprising, given the fall in unemployment, and the stickiness of inflation.

美联储公开市场委员会(FOMC)本周将在华盛顿召开为期两天的会议，人们不再预计FOMC将在会议结束时公布新一轮的货币宽松举措。鉴于失业率的下滑以及通胀粘性，鹰派人物对出台更多定量宽松政策(QE)失去热情的事实已在人们的意料之中。

But until very recently the hawks have not been in control of the committee. What is more surprising is that the powerful group of doves, which includes Ben Bernanke, Bill Dudley and Janet Yellen, and which normally has disproportionate weight on the FOMC, has also taken QE off the agenda .

但直到最近，鹰派才在FOMC中占据了上风。令人更感意外的是，强大的鸽派阵营同样也将QE从议程上撤了下来。包括本•伯南克(Ben Bernanke)、比尔•达德利(Bill Dudley)和珍妮特•耶伦(Janet Yellen)在内的鸽派往往能够对FOMC产生非同一般的影响。

So is that the end of QE? Not necessarily. The doves seem to have changed their policy conclusion without changing their basic view of the economy. In recent speeches, they have all repeated that the current unemployment rate of 8.2 per cent will remain two to three percentage points above the level consistent with the Fed’s mandate for some time. This judgment depends on their interpretation of the work of three distinguished economists: Arthur Okun (1928-80), William Beveridge (1879-1963) and John Taylor (who is still alive and kicking at Stanford University).

QE这样就算寿终正寝了吗？未必如此。鸽派虽然改变了他们的政策意见，但他们对于经济的基本看法却似乎仍和往常一样。他们在近日的讲话中无一例外地重申，目前8.2%的失业率仍比美联储达到使命所应具有的水平高出二至三个百分点。这一论断是依据他们对三位杰出经济学家的成果所进行的解读。这三人分别是：阿瑟•奥肯（Arthur Okun，1928-80年）、威廉•贝弗里奇（William Beveridge，1879-1963年）和约翰•泰勒（John Taylor，目前在斯坦福大学任教）。

First, Okun’s Law. This describes the relationship between real gross domestic product growth and unemployment, which is reasonably stable over long periods. This stability broke down last year, with unemployment falling much more than it “should” have done, given the reported growth of real GDP. One possible, hawkish, interpretation could be that real GDP growth has been underestimated. But the doves argue that the unexpected drop in unemployment was just a reversal of the abnormally large shake-out of labour by employers in 2009. If this is correct, then unemployment will stop falling soon, unless GDP growth picks up significantly.

先来看看奥肯定律。它描述了实际国内生产总值(GDP)增速与失业率之间的关系，这种关系从长期来看具有相当的稳定性。而这种稳定在去年被打破，相对于官方公布的实际GDP增速而言，失业率的下滑程度大大超过了它“应该”下滑的程度。鹰派可能给出的一种解释是，实际GDP增速被低估了。而鸽派则认为，失业率的意外下滑只不过是对用工者2009年疯狂裁员的一次逆转。如果的确如此，那么除非GDP增速大幅提高，否则，失业率很快便会停止下滑。

Second, the Beveridge Curve. This describes the normally inverse relationship between unemployment and unfilled vacancies in the labour market. Higher vacancies should imply lower unemployment but in the past three years there has been a much larger rise in vacancies than would have been implied by the level of unemployment. The hawkish interpretation of this rise in unfilled jobs is that there is a mismatch between the skills and location of the unemployed, compared with the nature of the new jobs being created in the economy. If so, structural unemployment has risen, leaving less scope for monetary accommodation.

再来看贝弗里奇曲线。它描述了失业率与劳动力市场上的空缺职位通常成反比的关系。空缺职位增加意味着失业率应该会下滑，但过去三年中，空缺职位增加的数量远远超过了根据失业率水平所应推导出的数量。对于空缺职位的增加，鹰派给出的解释是，经济活动会创造出新的就业机会，而与这类岗位的性质相比，失业人群的技能与所在地区之间存在着某种错位。若果真如此，结构性失业已经增加，如此一来，运用货币宽松政策的空间将受到挤压。

But the doves argue that this is not the case, saying instead that the Beveridge Curve has broken down for temporary reasons. These include the extension in the maximum duration of unemployment benefits and delays between the rise in vacancies and the subsequent decline in unemployment. For these reasons, the doves conclude that the level of structural unemployment has not risen.

但鸽派人士指出，事实并非如此，贝弗里奇曲线只是因为某些暂时性的原因才失效。这些因素包括政府延长了领取失业救济金的最长期限，以及空缺职位增加与随之出现的失业率下降之间存在着滞后现象。出于这些原因，鸽派得出结论：结构性失业率并未上升。

Third, the Taylor Rule. This describes the “appropriate” path for short-term interest rates, given the behaviour of inflation and unemployment, which are the subjects of the Fed’s twin mandates. According to Janet Yellen’s speech on April 11 in New York, John Taylor proposed two versions of his famous “rule”, one in 1993 and the second in 1999. The latter includes a larger role for unemployment in determining the appropriate short rate, while the former gives a bigger role to inflation.

最后我们再来看看泰勒规则。它描述了在不同的通胀和失业率（美联储双重使命的对象）环境下，短期利率所应遵循的“适当”走势。根据珍妮特•耶伦4月11日在纽约发表的讲话，约翰•泰勒提出的众所周知的“泰勒规则” 其实有两个版本，分别于1993年和1999年时提出。在后一个版本中，泰勒认为制定适宜的短期利率时，应更多地考虑失业率，而前一个版本则认为通胀应该受到更多的重视。

Ms Yellen prefers the 1999 rule, which has more dovish implications when unemployment is high, as it is today. She calculates that, on this version of the rule, short rates should stay at zero until the end of 2014, as implied in the Fed’s latest policy announcements. She also reckons that monetary policy has been too tight since 2008, because quantitative easing has not been powerful enough to allow for the fact that short rates could not be reduced below zero. In compensation for this, she argues that monetary policy should be kept easier for longer than the 1999 Taylor Rule implies.

耶伦更认同1999年的版本，当失业率高企时（就像今天这样），它更具有鸽派的意味。耶伦推断，按照1999年版的泰勒规则，到2014年底之前，短期利率应该一直维持在零区间，这正是美联储在最新的政策声明中所阐述的观点。她还认为，自2008年之后采取的货币政策过于紧缩，因为定量宽松的力度不够，未能考虑到短期利率不可能为负的情况。作为补救措施，她认为宽松货币政策保持的时间应该比1999年版泰勒规则所要求的更长。

John Taylor has denied Ms Yellen’s claim that he ever proposed the 1999 version of his rule, saying that it was an idea that emerged from the Fed itself. And anyway he strongly prefers the 1993 version, which has the hawkish implication that short rates should already be positive and should certainly be rising by 2013. But the doves see things differently.

约翰•泰勒否认了耶伦的说法，称他从未提出过所谓1999年版的泰勒规则，这只是美联储自身的想法。他极力支持1993年的版本。该版本的观点带有鹰派色彩，认为短期利率应该为正，且在2013年以前必须保持升势。而鸽派人士却有着不同的看法。

Given the doves’ determination to interpret these key issues in the direction of highly accommodative policy, it is hard to explain why they have shelved their desire to introduce another bout of QE. To judge from their underlying economic rationale, they are probably just biding their time while inflation is somewhat above target, and will seek to bring easing back on the agenda as soon as they can.

鉴于鸽派一心想沿着极度宽松的方向去解读这些关键性问题，因此，很难理解他们为何会搁置推出新一轮QE的想法。从他们的根本经济主张来看，在通胀水平略高于目标的情况下，他们或许只是在等待时机，一旦时机成熟，他们会尽快将宽松政策重新提上议事日程。

Gavyn Davies is co-founder of Fulcrum Asset Management and Prisma Capital Partners, and writes a regular blog on macroeconomics at

本文作者是Fulcrum资产管理公司和Prisma Capital Partners的创始人之一，定期在上撰写有关宏观经济的博客。译者:薛磊