译言网 | 中国权贵阶层令十二五经济改革目标难以实现

明年三月，中国将开始实施新的五年计划，旨在将经济增长的主要动力由投资增长转变为个人消费，从而建立起更有可持续性的经济发展模式。

It's a commendable objective, but a confidential US embassy cable posted on the WikiLeaks website this month gives a telling insight into why it will be almost impossible to achieve.

这一目标固然值得赞许，但其实现的可能性几乎为零。维基解密本月公布的一条发人深省的美国使馆密电，为这一判断提供了有力论据。

Sent in July 2009, the cable describes how senior Communist Party bigshots have "carved up China's economic pie" between them.

该密电发于2009年7月，讲述了中国高层权贵们如何“大肆瓜分国家经济蛋糕”。

Quoting "embassy contacts with access to leadership circles", the US cable says it is "well known" how former premier Li Peng and his family exert control over the electricity generation sector, while former security chief Zhou Yongkang and his allies dominate the country's oil industry.

该电文引述“使馆内接近中国领导人圈子者”的话说，--及其家族掌管电力部门，--及其盟友控制了石油工业，这些已路人皆知。

Similarly the cable describes how the family of late revolutionary leader Chen Yun control substantial interests in the banking sector, while Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference chairman Jia Qinglin is said to command an extensive power base among Beijing's real estate developers. Other senior leaders boast close ties to developers elsewhere and to the heads of major corporations in other key economic sectors.

此外，电文还详述--的家族成员掌控大量银行业利益，---据称在北京房地产界享有广泛政治支持。其他高层权贵亦以与开发商、关键经济领域的企业负责人建立密切关系为荣。

The result of this carve-up is an "ossified system" in which vested interests drive decision-making and impede reform as leaders constantly manoeuvre to ensure that their personal fiefdoms are not threatened.

对经济领域的瓜分导致体制僵化。既得利益阶层制定政策，竭力确保各自势力范围不受侵犯。改革因此停滞。

The self-interested political imperatives of the senior leadership are replicated further down the power structure. The cable describes how most local leaders have "bought" their positions and so demand an immediate financial return on their investments. As a result they always favour fast-growth policies over controlling inflation or providing welfare for the poor, and oppose any reform efforts that might harm their interests.

自私自利的政治作风由权力金字塔的上层传染到了下层。密电描述了地方领导人“买官”及之后谋取金融回报的种种手段。他们偏好高增长政策，不愿控制通胀，冷对穷人福利，反对任何侵害自身利益的改革措施。

This alignment of political and business interests has caused huge distortions in China's economy over recent years.

这种政商利益的结合近年来极大扭曲了中国经济。

Although growth has been rapid, it has been wildly unbalanced as policy-makers have kept lending rates at rock-bottom levels to ensure their favoured business sectors can get easy access to cheap bank loans.

为使自己宠幸的经济部门轻易得到银行贷款，决策者长期压低银行贷款利率。结果，中国经济增长虽然迅猛，却极不平衡。

At the same time policy-makers have sought to support bank earnings by maintaining an artificially wide spread between the rates banks earn on their lending and the interest rates they have to pay China's vast legions of ordinary savers on their deposit accounts.

同时，决策者为保障银行收益，在银行贷款利率和普通大众储蓄存款利率间人为地制造差距。

That's been fantastic for politically connected businesses, which have enjoyed near-limitless supplies of cheap capital to fund extravagant investment projects. And it's been great for the country's banks, which have earned massive profits on the back of interest rate and spreads their overseas investment，which counterparts can only look at with envy.

有政治背景的企业乐开了花，他们利用几乎无限的资本供应投资花销巨大的项目。银行也大受鼓舞，他们依靠利率差额获得大量收益，并用以扩张海外投资；而他们的外国同行除了羡慕，只能眼巴巴地看着。

But it's been brutally punishing for China's ordinary consumers and savers. The government's determination to keep interest rates down means that deposit rates have typically been held below China's rate of inflation. As a result, over the last five years the average return on one-year household deposit accounts has been negative in real terms, which means China's people have effectively been losing money by keeping their savings in the country's banks.

但这项政策无情地伤害了中国广大的消费者和储蓄者。政府致意压低利率，导致储蓄存款利率低于通货膨胀率。结果，过去5年中，按实质计算中国家庭储蓄存款收益为负数。换句话说，民众的钱放进国家银行后，变少了。

In effect, Beijing's interest rate policy enforces a massive subsidy paid by the country's ordinary people to fund the expansion of the senior leadership's pet business sectors.

事实上，中国政府的利率政策用老百姓的钱为高层宠幸的经济部门扩张做巨额补贴。

Not surprisingly given such a huge transfer of wealth from individuals to the corporate sector, private consumption has suffered, falling from almost 50 per cent of gross domestic product in 1990 to just 35 per cent last year. Meanwhile, investment has soared, climbing from 25 per cent of GDP to 45 per cent (see the second chart).

将如此巨额的财富从个人转入企业部门，个人消费自然减少，占GDP的比重从1990年的50%降至2009年的35%。与此同时，投资占GDP比重大增，从25%涨至45%。

The trouble is that such profligate investment is largely wasted. According to Diana Choyleva at Lombard Street Research, over-investment pushed China's return on assets down to a feeble 1.2 per cent last year.

问题是，如此恣意的投资多被浪费掉了。Lombard Street Research的Diana Choyleva支出，过度投资令中国去年的资产回报率降至可怜的1.2%.

Many in the senior leadership recognise that such an unbalanced growth model is unsustainable, hence the new five-year plan's aim of boosting private consumption. Yet it is doubtful whether Beijing can succeed in encouraging consumption without dismantling an interest rate regime under which ordinary consumers subsidise politically favoured business interests.

中国高层已意识到这种不平衡增长模式不可持续，因此新的五年计划旨在促进个人消费。然而，如果不打破这种利用普通消费者资产补贴特权企业的利率体制，这一目标能否实现尚需画一个问号。

And given the picture painted by the US embassy cable of a leadership which spends much of its time protecting those interests, it looks very much as if the new five year plan is doomed to failure before it has even been adopted.

而按照美国使馆电文勾勒出来的图景，中国权贵阶层终日维护自身利益，这个新的五年计划很可能还没有实施就已经面临失败的命运。