葡萄牙难以告别苦日子

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葡萄牙难以告别苦日子

天之聪教育 2013-04-17 天之聪教育 294次

葡萄牙难以告别苦日子

Austerity fails to pay off for Portugal PM

Since Portugal asked for an international bailout exactly two years ago, Pedro Passos Coelho, the prime minister, has been one of Europe’s staunchest upholders of the faith that austerity will deliver growth – and relatively quickly.

自两年前葡萄牙请求国际纾困以来，对于紧缩能够在相对较短的时间内带来增长这一信念，葡萄牙总理佩德罗•帕索斯•科埃略(Pedro Passos Coelho)堪称欧洲最忠实的支持者之一。

After winning office in June 2011, he said a “rigorous programme of austerity and structural reform” would result in two “terrible years” of deep recession and record unemployment, but would also return the country to growth and win back the confidence of international investors.

2011年6月当选后，他曾表示“严格的财政紧缩和结构性改革”会导致深度衰退和创纪录失业的两年“苦日子”，但也会令葡萄牙重返增长，重新赢得国际投资者的信心。

His forecast of two years of suffering has proved wholly accurate. But instead of the promised recovery, Portugal faces a much deeper and longer recession than the government or international lenders had foreseen.

事后证明，他有关两年苦日子的预言十分精准。不过承诺的复苏并未到来，相反，葡萄牙面临的衰退程度之深和延续时间之长，都远远超出了该国政府及国际放贷者的预期。

Portugal’s adjustment programme has also failed to deliver the fiscal consolidation that Mr Passos Coelho has described as a precondition for “sustainable growth, competitiveness and employment creation”. The budget deficit widened from 4.4 per cent of national output in 2011 to 6.4 per cent last year.

葡萄牙的调整方案也未能实现财政整顿，而帕索斯•科埃略曾将财政整顿称为“可持续增长、竞争力以及就业创造”的前提条件。葡萄牙预算赤字与国民产出之比从2011年的4.4%扩大到了去年的6.4%。

This year’s deficit target – originally 3 per cent of output – has twice been relaxed and is now 5.5 per cent. But the constitutional court’s decision to reject austerity cuts means Lisbon may have to ask for even more leeway. Public debt is forecast to peak at 124 per cent in 2014, higher and later than initially projected. For the prime minister’s many critics – who include employers’ organisations and prominent figures within the two governing parties – this lack of results is evidence that the bailout is not working.

今年的赤字目标原本定为国民产出的3%，经过两次放宽后，现在是5.5%。而葡萄牙宪法法院判决紧缩减支措施违宪意味着，葡萄牙政府可能被迫请求进一步放宽赤字目标。葡萄牙公共债务预计将在2014年达到顶峰，与国内生产总值(GDP)之比将达124%。比最初的预期更高，也到来得更晚。对于总理的众多批评者（这其中包括雇主团体以及两个执政党内的大人物）来说，如此缺乏成果证明纾困未能生效。

Uncompromising austerity, they say, is not only choking off potential for growth, but also hitting tax revenue, meaning government’s self-confessed “enormous” tax increases are failing to dent the deficit.

他们表示，过于生硬的紧缩政策不仅扼杀了经济增长的潜力，还打击了国家的税收，也就是说，政府自认“巨大”的增税措施未能降低赤字。

Público, the newspaper, wrote in a February editorial: “Portugal has entered a recessionary cycle. People have no reason to believe the future will be any better. The [adjustment] programme has failed and has to be changed.”

葡萄牙《大众日报》(Público) 2月在社评中写道：“葡萄牙已进入一个衰退性的循环。人民没有理由相信未来会更美好。（调整）方案已经失败，必须加以改变。”

If it is failing, as so many in Portugal believe, Mr Passos Coelho cannot blame the troika of international lenders – the European Commission, the International Monetary Fund and the European Central Bank – for foisting an unworkable solution on a reluctant government forced to accept reforms in return for a €78bn rescue.

如果调整方案真的像许多葡萄牙人相信的那样已经失败，那么帕索斯•科埃略不能指责三大国际贷款方——欧盟委员会(European Commission)、国际货币基金组织(IMF)以及欧洲央行(ECB)，称其将行不通的解决方案强加于不情愿的葡萄牙政府，迫使后者接受改革以换取780亿欧元纾困。

On the contrary, the prime minister has affirmed he is a true believer in the fiscal orthodoxy advocated by the troika, Germany and others, promising to go beyond what was required, privatising more companies than stipulated and seeking to hit deficit-reduction targets ahead of schedule.

相反，葡萄牙总理曾郑重宣称，他是三大贷款方、德国及其他国家所倡导的正统财政思想的真正信徒。他承诺将在纾困计划要求的基础上更进一步，将更多企业私有化，并寻求提前达到减赤目标。

“We do not view these reforms as an imposed obligation,” he wrote in the Financial Times a year ago. “If we were not operating under a bailout programme, Portugal would still be in dire need of reform for the sake of its own future. By implementing these reforms, trade and investment will follow, growth will come and debt and interest rates will fall.”

一年前，他在为英国《金融时报》撰稿时写道：“我们不认为这些改革措施是强加于我们的义务。就算我们不按照纾困计划来管理葡萄牙，为了葡萄牙自身的未来我们依然亟需改革。推行这些改革后，贸易与投资将随之而来，经济将会增长，债务和利率将会降低。”

Mr Passos Coelho has been true to his word in implementing the adjustment programme to the letter, consistently winning praise in the troika’s quarterly progress reports. In March, Víctor Gaspar, finance minister, produced graphs showing Lisbon had executed 92 per cent of the bailout measures required to date.

在不折不扣地执行调整方案这点上，帕索斯•科埃略确实遵守了自己的诺言，在三大贷款方的季度进展报告中，他总是因此而受到赞扬。葡萄牙财政部长维托尔•加斯帕(Vítor Gaspar)在3月份用图表说明，葡萄牙政府已经执行了92%迄今所要求的纾困措施。

“The [rescue] programme is ambitious and we don’t believe the government can do more,” Peter Weiss, a European Commission economist, said a year into the bailout. “Whether Portugal is able to convince the markets is, of course, another matter.”

纾困开始一年后，欧盟委员会经济学家彼得•魏斯(Peter Weiss)曾表示：“（救援）计划雄心勃勃，我们觉得葡萄牙政府已经做了一切能做的事。当然，葡萄牙能否让市场信服则是另一回事。”

In fact, after a shaky start when many investors were convinced Portugal would have to follow Greece in seeking a second bailout, Mr Passos Coelho’s commitment to reform – and the assurance given by the ECB last July that it would do “whatever it takes” to preserve the eurozone’s integrity – have seen yields on Portugal’s benchmark 10-year bonds fall below 6 per cent from a peak of more than 17 per cent early last year.

实际上，虽然十分不利的开局曾令许多投资者相信，葡萄牙可能将不得不步希腊后尘，寻求第二轮纾困，但是帕索斯•科埃略对改革的承诺（再加上欧洲央行去年7月担保将“不惜代价”保持欧元区的完整），已使葡萄牙基准10年期国债的收益率得以从去年早些时候逾17%的峰值下跌至低于6%。

The prime minister can also claim a success in reducing the current account deficit from an unsustainable 10.4 per cent of national output in 2010 to just 0.3 per cent this year, with a surplus forecast for 2014. The IMF has also praised Lisbon for achieving an estimated 6 per cent adjustment in the primary structural budget deficit, which excludes interest payments and extraordinary items.

降低经常项目赤字的成就也可以归功于这位葡萄牙总理。2010年葡萄牙经常项目赤字与国民产出之比达到不可持续的10.4%，而今年这一比率降到了区区0.3%，预计2014年将会出现盈余。而葡萄牙政府在基本结构性预算赤字（不包括利率支付及非经常项目——译者注）上实现估计6%的调整，这一点也得到IMF的赞赏。

Exports have also surged during Mr Passos Coelho administration, by 5.8 per cent last year, with 20 per cent growth outside Europe. But the deeper European downturn than expected will see export growth slow to 0.8 per cent this year.

在帕索斯•科埃略执政期间，葡萄牙出口也出现了激增，去年出口增长5.8%，其中对欧洲以外地区的出口增长了20%。然而欧洲经济低迷程度超出预期，这导致今年的出口增长率可能减缓至0.8%。

For the prime minister, it is the poorly performing European economy that has blown his reform plans off course, aggravated by troublesome factors such as Friday’s constitutional court ruling. But for his Portuguese critics, he has been on the wrong route from the start.

对于葡萄牙总理来说，正是欧洲经济的低迷打乱了他的改革布局，而类似于上周五宪法法院裁决的添乱更令局面雪上加霜。但在批评他的葡萄牙人眼里，他从一开始就选择了错误的路线。