中國央行官員新書挑戰(zhàn)西方經(jīng)濟學

Do Asian social values like filial piety and institutions like state-owned enterprises hold the key to diagnosing flaws in mainstream economic theory that rendered most economists unable to predict the 2008 financial crisis?

孝道等亞洲社會價值觀和國企等機構(gòu)，是否掌握著診斷出主流經(jīng)濟學理論缺陷的鑰匙?正是這些缺陷導致大多數(shù)經(jīng)濟學家無法預測到2008年的金融危機。

This is the provocative claim advanced by Chinese central bank official Wang Zhenying in his ambitious new book, Principles of Transactional Economics, published last year by China Financial Publishing House.

這就是中國央行官員王振營(見上圖)在他那本雄心勃勃的新書《交易經(jīng)濟學原理》中提出的爭議性看法。該書去年由中國金融出版社出版。

The financial crisis has spawned a wide array of critiques of mainstream economics, but Mr Wang’s comes from a distinctly Chinese perspective.

金融危機使主流經(jīng)濟學遭到了廣泛批評，但王振營的批評出自一種獨特的中國視角。

At a book talk at the People’s Bank of China’s Shanghai headquarters, Mr Wang brought Chinese translations of western economics’ cornerstone texts — Adam Smith’s The Wealth of Nations, Alfred Marshall’s Principles of Economics, John Maynard Keynes’ The General Theory of Employment, Interest and Money, and Paul Samuelson’s seminal 1948 textbook — to illustrate his points.

在中國央行上?？偛康囊粓鰣D書介紹會上，王振營引用西方經(jīng)濟學經(jīng)典文本——亞當•斯密(Adam Smith)的《國富論》(The Wealth of Nations)、艾爾弗雷德•馬歇爾(Alfred Marshall)的《經(jīng)濟學原理》(Principles of Economics)、約翰•梅納德•凱恩斯(John Maynard Keynes)的《就業(yè)、利息和貨幣通論》(The General Theory of Employment, Interest and Money)和保羅•薩繆爾森(Paul Samuelson)于1948年出版的影響巨大的教科書——的中文譯本來證明他的觀點。

“Mainstream economists didn’t believe the world was in crisis (in 2007 and early 2008). The core issue was our theoretical framework, whose foundation was established at the beginning of the industrial revolution. It’s an extremely simple framework,” said the soft-spoken Mr Wang, who joined the PBoC in 1994 and currently serves as head of director of the survey and statistics department at the PBoC’s Shanghai headquarters.

“(在2007年和2008年初，)主流經(jīng)濟學家不相信世界處于危機之中。核心問題在于我們的理論框架，這一框架的基礎是在工業(yè)革命之初建立的。這是一個極端簡單的框架，”語氣柔和的王振營說。他于1994年加入中國央行(PBoC)，目前擔任上海總部調(diào)查統(tǒng)計研究部主任。

Mr Wang entered university in 1979 at age 16, a member of the third student cohort following the end of the Cultural Revolution, when merit-based university admissions were halted. He is among the first students of mainstream western economics following an era in which Chinese scholars only studied Marxism.

1979年，16歲的王振營考入大學，成為文革后第三批大學生。文革期間，中國的大學不再基于分數(shù)錄取學生。在他入學之前，中國經(jīng)歷了一個學者只研究馬克思主義的時期，而他是這一時期過后第一批攻讀主流西方經(jīng)濟學的學生之一。

His critique is informed by his experience growing up in a rural family in Henan province in the 1960s and 1970s. He recalled a spanking from his mother when, as a boy of six, he took his dinner from the stove before his older brother and uncle had come in from working in the fields. It was the first inkling of an economic theory that aims to take account of variables like self-sacrifice for family, which undermines mainstream economics’ conception of individuals as selfish utility maximisers.

他的批評基于他上世紀六七十年代在河南一個農(nóng)村家庭長大的經(jīng)歷。他回憶起6歲時被母親打屁股的情形——在田間干活的哥哥和大人還沒回來，他就把飯從爐子上拿起來吃。一套旨在將類似“對家庭的自我犧牲”等變量考慮在內(nèi)的經(jīng)濟學理論，就在那時第一次顯露痕跡。這一經(jīng)濟學理論顛覆了主流經(jīng)濟學的這一觀念：人是自私的，追求效用最大化。

“There have been many criticisms of mainstream economics and many proposed solutions. But they’re all basically fixes to the existing theoretical framework. They aren’t fundamentally new theoretical system, so they can’t really solve the problem.”

“人們對主流經(jīng)濟學一直有很多批評，很多人提出了解決方案。但這些方案基本上都是對現(xiàn)有理論框架的修修補補，并非全新的理論體系，所以不可能真正解決問題。”

Mr Wang’s first critique of mainstream economics is that it posits the existence of undifferentiated economic actors — households and companies — that respond almost exclusively to price signals. This framework theory does not account for differences in how various actors make economic decisions.

王振營對主流經(jīng)濟學的第一項批評是，它假定存在無差別的經(jīng)濟行為主體——家庭和企業(yè)——這些主體幾乎僅對價格信號作出反應。這個框架理論沒能解釋不同行為主體做出經(jīng)濟決策的方式的不同。

Mr Wang criticises mainstream economics for neglecting the importance of balance sheets. Because each household and company has a unique balance sheet, they will not respond to price signals in the same way.

王振營批評主流經(jīng)濟學忽視了資產(chǎn)負債表的重要性。因為每個家庭和企業(yè)都有獨特的資產(chǎn)負債表，它們不會以相同方式回應價格信號。

“Classical economics talked about the accumulation of wealth and how value was created. But neoclassical theory took this huge and complex theory and simplified down it into a narrow focus on prices. Prices have a core status. Everyone knows prices are important, but they’re not everything.”

“古典經(jīng)濟學討論了財富的積累，以及價值的創(chuàng)造方式。但是新古典理論接收了這個龐雜的理論，并將其簡化為對價格的狹隘關注。價格占據(jù)了核心地位。每個人都知道價格很重要，但價格不是一切。”

His focus on balance sheets echoes Nomura economist Richard Koo’s theory of the balance-sheet recession.” Mr Koo used the theory to explain why highly indebted Japanese companies declined to borrow and invest in the 1990s, despite ultra-low interest rates.

他對資產(chǎn)負債表的關注與野村(Nomura)經(jīng)濟學家辜朝明(Richard Koo)的資產(chǎn)負債表衰退理論相吻合。辜朝明用這個理論解釋了，為何高負債的日本企業(yè)在上世紀90年代拒絕借款和投資，盡管那時利率極低。

Substituting the concept of “economic actors” for that of “transactional bodies” can form the basis for a theory that can account for variables not captured in mainstream economics. That includes not only balance sheets, but also differences in market power between different entities, including government and large corporations.

將“經(jīng)濟行為主體”的概念替換為“交易主體”的概念，可以為一種能夠解釋主流經(jīng)濟學未包含變量的理論奠定基礎。這些變量不僅包括資產(chǎn)負債表，而且包括不同實體(包括政府和大企業(yè))在市場力量方面的差異。

Another blind spot in mainstream economics appeared to Mr Wang in the 1990s, as he observed the way Chinese state-owned enterprises continued to produce and sell, despite racking up huge losses.

上世紀90年代，王振營發(fā)現(xiàn)了主流經(jīng)濟學的另一個盲點，當時他觀察到了盡管虧損巨大且不斷加重，但中國國企繼續(xù)生產(chǎn)和銷售的情況。

The answer, of course, was that banks continued to lend to lossmaking SOEs, who had a political responsibility to maintain employment and social stability. This problem has re-emerged in recent years, after the government again called on SOEs to stimulate the economy in 2008.

個中原因當然是銀行繼續(xù)對虧損的國企放貸，這些國企肩負著維持就業(yè)和社會穩(wěn)定的政治責任。繼中國政府2008年又一次呼吁國企刺激經(jīng)濟發(fā)展之后，這個問題近年來再次出現(xiàn)。

While mainstream economics cannot account for this behaviour in terms of profit or market share maximisation, his theory’s focus on the special characteristics of various transactional bodies allows it to explain economic behaviour in centrally planned economies.

主流經(jīng)濟學無法從利潤或市場份額最大化的角度解釋這種行為，而王振營的理論對不同交易主體特殊屬性的關注，使它可以解釋中央計劃經(jīng)濟中的經(jīng)濟行為。