[转帖] [2013.03.30]Bottoms up 经济转型:基本面分析

http://www.ecocn.org/forum.php?mod=viewthread&tid=183449
【导读:“拉动内需,经济转型”的口号喊了那么多年,或许内需老早就被拉起来了——只不过官方老是用“估计”代替“统计”,低估了我国实际消费量。】

Rebalancing the economy
经济转型


Bottoms up
基本面分析


Consumption in China may be much higher than official statistics suggest
官方数据或许大大低估了国内需求


Mar 30th 2013 | HONG KONG |From the print edition


AT HONG KONG airport, a couple hold an animated discussion about whether to buy a $350 polo shirt from Hugo Boss. Their conversation, like many in luxury shops across the city, is in Mandarin, the language of mainland China, and not the local variant, Cantonese. The mainland provides a third of the airport’s visitors and many of its most avid shoppers.
香港机场内,一对情侣正叽叽喳喳地讨论着该不该花350美元买件雨果·博斯(Hugo Boss)的衬衫。和香港大多数奢侈品店里一样,这对顾客说的是大陆人用的普通话,而非当地的方言粤语。在这座机场接待的旅客中,有三分之一是大陆人,而机场内疯狂购物的顾客们,也大多说着普通话。


In 2012, according to estimates by Jonathan Garner and Helen Qiao of Morgan Stanley, a bank, the Chinese spent over 2.3 trillion yuan ($370 billion) on domestic tourism alone. And yet China’s GDP statistics captured only a tiny part of that spending, they argue, as well as missing spending on financial services, health care and housing. As a result, official figures show private consumption languishing at around 35% of GDP. Morgan Stanley’s “bottom-up” calculations, by contrast, imply that it has grown since 2008 to almost 46% of GDP (see chart). Mr Garner and Ms Qiao draw on company reports and industry studies to fill gaps in the official data, which, they say, undercounted consumption by $1.6 trillion in 2012, more than Australia’s entire GDP. Their calculations echo earlier studies, which also found that official statistics undercount consumption, albeit by a smaller margin.

由投行摩根士丹利(Morgan Stanley)的经济学家乔纳森·戈纳(Jonathan Garner)和乔虹(Helen Qiao)作出的一项分析称,2012年,中国人光在国内旅游上就花了2.3万亿人民币(约合3700亿美元)。他们称,中国官方的GDP数据在统计时只计入了旅游支出的一小部分,而且还忽略了在金融服务、医疗服务以及住房方面的支出。这样一来,官方数据中私人消费占总GDP的比重便被压缩到了35%。但是,摩根士丹利的“基本面分析”却指出,中国消费占GDP的比重自2008年来持续增长,现在已增至46%(见上表)。戈纳和乔虹利用公司报表和行业研究报告,填补了官方统计范围的差漏。他们称,官方统计数据将中国2012年的消费总量低估了1.6万亿——这可比澳大利亚整整一年的GDP还要多。与之对应,早先的研究也曾表明官方统计数据低估了消费总量,尽管其差额要比前者所估计的要小得多。


As well as stuff bought offshore, spending online is also undercounted, the two economists argue. On a single weekend in November, Chinese consumers spent more than $3 billion on two websites, Taobao and Tmall (both part of Alibaba, an online giant), in celebration of “singles’ day”, the bachelor’s equivalent of Valentine’s day. But official statistics have failed to keep pace with changing consumer habits, Ms Qiao argues, neglecting entire categories of e-spending. Online gaming, for example, is largely missing. Yet it amounted to 53 billion yuan ($8.5 billion) last year, according to Morgan Stanley’s tally of revenues earned by online gaming firms.

两人还称,境外消费和网络购物消费额[在官方统计数据中]都被大大低估了。去年11月,为庆祝光棍们的双十一节,(电商巨头阿里巴巴旗下的)淘宝和天猫两大网站推出了促销活动。在短短一个周末的时间里,中国消费者就在这两个网站上花去了超过30亿美元。但官方统计数字却没能跟上消费者的脚步,完全忽略了网络消费的巨额数字,乔虹如是说道。比如,网络游戏消费就往往被忽略,而在对网络游戏商的财务报表进行分析后,摩根士丹利估计,仅去年一年的网游消费总额就达到了530亿人民币(约85亿美元)。


China’s statistics have long been viewed with scepticism or worse. Some economists worry that they fail to reflect reality, others that they slavishly reflect political imperatives. In 2002 Thomas Rawski of the University of Pittsburgh complained about a “tornado of deception”. Five years later Carsten Holz, then of Princeton University, said that official statistics should be taken with a “rock of salt”. When Li Keqiang, now China’s prime minister, was party chief of Liaoning province in 2007, he called the province’s output figures “man-made” and “for reference only”.

中国官方的统计数字向来饱受质疑。不少经济学家担心其统计数字并未如实反映情况,还有人则认为这些数字都是出于政治诉求而捏造出来的。2002年匹兹堡大学的托马斯·劳斯基(Thomas Rawski)还抱怨[这些数字简直]是在瞒天过海。时处普林斯顿大学的卡尔斯登·霍尔兹(Carsten Holz)警告,中国的统计数据“不可轻信”。2007年,当现任中国总理李克强担任辽宁省委书记时,他曾亲口说过该省的产值数据是“人造的”而且“仅供参考”。


But things are not as bad as they were. China’s National Bureau of Statistics (NBS), for example, long ago stopped relying on provincial output figures to calculate national GDP. China’s economic census in 2004 gave the national statisticians a better baseline for subsequent work. In 2006 a book published by the OECD argued emphatically that China’s national accounts are inevitably “wrong”, in that they are forced to plump for one of a range of plausible figures, but that they are not politically manipulated.

但情况并非想象中那么糟糕。比如,中国的国家统计局(NBS)便早已放弃以各省产值数据来计算全国GDP的做法。2004年开展的全国经济普查更是为后续的统计工作提供了坚实的基础。2006年,经合组织出版的一本书断言中国财务数据难免“有所错漏”,因为统计人员被迫在一堆真假难辨的数据中遴选出较可信的对象进行统计,但好在他们没有被政治操纵。


But the NBS does not make it easy for independent outsiders to cross-check their work. Sceptics instead look for inconsistencies between China’s growth figures and other indicators, such as power generation or cement output. To track Liaoning’s economy, Mr Li looked at rail cargo, bank lending and electricity consumption.

然而,国家统计局的努力,并未让外界的独立观察者们在审校时轻松多少。相反,怀疑者们开始寻找中国经济增长数据与其他数据——如发电量、水泥产量等——之间的错位。李克强便曾借铁路货运量、贷款发放量和耗电量来一窥辽宁省经济的实际情况。


Inspired by his example, three economists at the Federal Reserve Bank of San Francisco have distilled an alternative national growth index from three similar items. (It is a more sophisticated version of our own “Keqiang ker-ching” index published in December 2010.) They discovered that, contrary to popular belief, China’s growth figures are in the “same ballpark” as Mr Li’s indicators.

受此启发,旧金山联邦储备银行的三名经济学家也用类似的三项指标重估了中国的经济增长指数(该指数是本杂志于2010年12所提出的“克强指数”的升级版)。出人意料的是,他们发现中国的增长指数与“克强指数”竟相差无几。


Not every statistical distortion serves to flatter China. Indeed, some of the biggest remaining flaws in China’s statistics are politically awkward. The official figures may, for example, exaggerate the politically sensitive income gap between urbanites and rural folk by as much as 40%, according to Jinjun Xue of Nagoya University and Wenshu Gao of the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences.

也有些扭曲的数据反而丑化了中国,其中不少还将中国置于尴尬的政治处境。比如,名古屋大学的薛进军和社科院的高文书便称,在政治上高度敏感的城乡收入差距数据上,官方统计数字至少夸大了40%。


The understatement of consumption also gives ammunition to China’s critics, who worry that its economy relies too heavily on unsustainable investment and lament the government’s failure to rebalance the economy. Mr Garner and Ms Qiao’s alternative calculations imply instead that rebalancing is under way. In estimating consumption’s growing role, they assume that the hidden spending is not captured elsewhere in the GDP figures. If, in fact, this extra spending is misrecorded as something else, then consumption’s share of GDP would be even bigger.

低估的消费总量亦给中国的经济评论员们以抨击之机——他们担心中国的经济增长过分依赖不可持续的投资,而且对政府在经济转型上的失败悲痛不已。戈纳和乔红的研究则表明,转型已经颇有进展。在对不断增长的消费总量进行估算后,他们认为[除了境外消费和网络消费量外],官方的GDP还忽略了其他消费量。如果真是这样,那么中国消费占GDP的比重可能还要高于46%。


Not everyone doubts the purchasing power of China’s consumers. At Hong Kong airport, adverts tempting customers to splurge compete with official notices designed to put them off one kind of purchase in particular. Since March 1st anyone taking more than two tins of milk powder out of the territory faces up to two years in prison, an embargo designed to retain Hong Kong powder for local mothers, amid concerns on the mainland about the safety of Chinese milk powder. China’s statisticians are not the only ones suppressing consumption.

当然,不是人人都怀疑中国消费者的购买力。在香港机场,尽管受到香港当局的打压,还是有广告吸引着消费者们前来抢购某种产品——自3月1日以来,任何试图携带2罐以上奶粉出境的人都要面临两年的有期徒刑。该禁令旨在让香港本地的母亲们有奶粉可买,而之前出于对大陆奶粉安全的考虑,[大陆的旅客们将香港的奶粉抢购一空]。看来,打压消费的,不仅仅是官方数据。



译者注:
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[1] 基本分析(bottom-up)又称基本面分析,是指证券投资分析人员根据经济学、金融学、财务管理学及投资学的基本原理,通过对决定证券投资价值及价格的基本要素如宏观经济指标、经济政策走势、行业发展状况、产品市场状况、公司销售和财务状况等的分析,评估证券的投资价值,判断证券的合理价位,从而提出相应的 投资建议的一种分析方法。本文中指的是摩根士丹利在分析中国家庭消费占GDP比重的时候不仅考虑官方统计所涵盖的内容,还包含了其他方面的估计。

[2]  雨果博斯 (英文:Hugo Boss AG 是一个德国的时尚品牌,主攻高档男装成衣及精品,创办人是Hugo Ferdinand Boss (1885–1948)。

[3] 乔虹早年毕业于人民大学,后师从金融发展理论奠基人罗纳德·麦金农(Ronald I. Mckinnon),获斯坦福大学经济学博士学位,于 2005 年加入高盛,一直从事中国宏观经济研究。从2012年1月1日开始,担任摩根士丹利大中华区首席经济学家。

[4]  take something with a grain of salt 是指某事象食盐里的谷粒一样; 是需要警惕和剔除的东西; “对某事有保留、持怀疑态度”的意思。这里rock of salt是其夸张用法。

[5] 2007年李克強在遼寧省委書記任內會見美駐京大使雷德時稱,中國GDP數據是「人造的」,不可靠。(该注释摘自境外反华势力的网站。)

[6] 2004年中华人民共和国的第一次全国经济普查,将之前属于专项经济普查的工业普查、第三产业普查和基本单位普查三项专项经济普查合并,并将建筑业纳入普查范围。普查的时期资料为2004年度;普查对象是在中国大陆境内从事第二产业、第三产业的全部法人单位、产业活动单位和个体经营户。普查时间近两年,各地共组织培训了300多万名普查员、普查指导员和1000多万名有关单位统计、财务人员参加普查活动。查处了普查中发生的虚报、瞒报、拒报等违法违纪案件5377起,保障了经济普查工作的顺利进行。质量抽查结果显示,数据填报的综合差错率仅为4.9‰。这次普查查实了GDP总量和三次产业的比重;所有基层原始数据,都已进入国家统计局的经济普查数据库;不仅可以进行全国数据汇总,而且可以根据需要,随时加工出按地区、行业、规模和所有制等各种分组的数据,开展各种分析研究。

[7] 经济合作与发展组织(简称经合组织;Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development,OECD)是全球34个市场经济国家组成的政府间国际组织,总部设在巴黎的Chateau de la Muette。经济合作与发展组织的前身是1947年由美国和加拿大发起,成立于1948年的欧洲经济合作组织(OEEC),该组织成立的目的是帮助执行致力于第二次世界大战以后欧洲重建的马歇尔计划。后来其成员国逐渐扩展到非欧洲国家。1961年,欧洲经济合作组织改名为经济合作与发展组织。

[8] 克强指数(Li keqiang index),是英国著名政经杂志《经济学人》在2010年推出的用于评估中国GDP增长量的指标,源于李克强总理2007年任职辽宁省委书记时,喜欢通过耗电量、铁路货运量和贷款发放量三个指标分析当时辽宁省经济状况。该指数是三种经济指标:工业用电量新增、铁路货运量新增和银行中长期贷款新增的结合。自推出后,受到包括花旗银行在内的众多国际机构认可。

[9] 旧金山联邦储备银行(Federal Reserve Bank of San Francisco)是美国第十二区的联邦储备银行。第十二区由9个西部州份组成,包括阿拉斯加州、亚利桑那州、加利福尼亚州、夏威夷州、爱达荷州、内华达州、俄勒冈州、犹他州和华盛顿州,加上北马里亚纳群岛、美属萨摩亚和关岛。旧金山联邦储备银行已在洛杉矶、波特兰、盐湖城和西雅图设有分支机构,也有一个在菲尼克斯的现金处理中心。
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