Standard Money Theory and the Coronavirus
The theme and illustrations of this essay are from the new book “Paying Ourselves to Save the Planet.”
本文的主题和插图来自新书《为拯救地球付出代价》。
It might seem, as we observe the U.S. government “instantly” generating $2 trillion new dollars for direct payments and grants to people and businesses, that the coronavirus pandemic has shed a new light on the authenticity (and necessity) of modern money theory (MMT).
当我们观察到美国政府“立即”产生 2 万亿美元新美元用于向民众和企业直接付款和补助时，冠状病毒大流行似乎为现代货币理论 (MMT) 的真实性（和必要性）提供了新的视角。
But that light, if it is being shed at all, is illuminating instead the dramatic limitations of the “standard money theory” we insist on applying to the exigencies of an unfolding modern society (including, but not limited to, how to deal with pandemics).
但这种启示，如果它真的被阐明的话，反而说明了我们坚持应用于解决现代社会的紧迫问题（包括但不限于如何应对流行病）的“标准货币理论”的巨大局限性。
What do I mean by “standard money theory”?
“标准货币理论”是什么意思？
I mean a very simple assumption implicitly built into our mental models of how money works: namely, that the only money available to sovereign governments for their spending purposes are dollars (or euros, or yen etc.) that have been earned in private enterprise.
我的意思是一个非常简单的假设，它隐含在我们关于货币如何运作的心智模型中：即，主权政府可用于支出目的的唯一货币是私营企业赚取的美元（或欧元、日元等）。
According to the standard theory, the government (in order to spend) must claim a share of that privately earned money through taxation—and if that is not adequate to meet its spending needs, it must borrow a further share by issuing treasury bonds (government debt) which, themselves, can only be redeemed by the collection of future taxes on private earnings.
根据标准理论，政府（为了支出）必须通过税收索取私人赚来的钱的一部分——如果这不足以满足其支出需求，它必须通过发行国债（政府债务）借入更多份额，而国债本身只能通过未来对私人收入征收税收来赎回。
Thus, government spending to buy the goods and services of public enterprise— those things which profit-seeking private enterprise is unwilling or unable to provide but which collective society requires for its vital functioning—that government spending is literally “feeding” on the fruits of personal labor and entrepreneurship.
因此，政府支出购买公共企业的商品和服务——那些追求利润的私营企业不愿意或无法提供，但集体社会需要其重要运作的东西——政府支出实际上是在“喂养”个人劳动和企业家精神的成果。
This view of the sovereign government as the Ouroboros—the mythical snake eating its own tail—permeates our mental models and government policies about money, taxes, and “private” versus “public” enterprise.
这种将主权政府视为衔尾蛇（Ouroboros）（一条吃自己尾巴的神话蛇）的观点渗透到了我们关于金钱、税收以及“私人”与“公共”企业的思维模式和政府政策中。
The snake can eat only so much of its tail before the unimaginable happens!
在难以想象的事情发生之前，蛇只能吃掉这么多尾巴！
This perspective leads inexorably and inescapably to two overarching positions in the national economic and fiscal policy debate: First, the snake must be given free rein and nourishment to grow (to stay ahead of the consuming mouth of public enterprise);second, public enterprise’s voracious mouth must be forcefully held in check, lest it get ahead of the snake’s growth, and gobble itself toward the unimaginable oblivion.
这种观点不可避免地导致了国家经济和财政政策争论中的两个首要立场：第一，必须给予蛇自由的控制和营养来成长（以领先于公共企业的吞噬之口）；第二，必须有力地控制公共企业贪婪的嘴巴，以免它超越了蛇的增长，吞噬自己走向难以想象的遗忘。
The tension between these positions has become paralyzing in today’s modern society—as is now evident in our confrontation with the coronavirus.
在当今的现代社会中，这些立场之间的紧张关系已经变得瘫痪——正如我们现在与冠状病毒的对抗中所体现的那样。
(It will become more evident—and more tense—as the global climate crises unfolds.)
（随着全球气候危机的展开，这种情况将变得更加明显，也更加紧张。）
A case in point is a recent news article in the Washington Post about the efforts, within the last decade, by the federal government (spurred by the SARS epidemic) to establish a national preparedness for the next pandemic.
一个典型的例子是《华盛顿邮报》最近发表的一篇新闻文章，介绍了联邦政府在过去十年中（在非典疫情的推动下）为下一次大流行建立全国准备的努力。
A study group identified one of the weakest links to be the availability of protective respirator masks for medical personnel.
一个研究小组发现，最薄弱的环节之一是医务人员能否获得防护口罩。
These masks, unlike other medical components, cannot be produced ahead of time and stock-piled because they have a relatively short shelf-life, with no way of predicting how many years they’d have to sit on their shelves before a pandemic arrived.
与其他医疗部件不同，这些口罩无法提前生产和储存，因为它们的保质期相对较短，无法预测在大流行到来之前它们需要在货架上放置多少年。
The federal government awarded a $5M contract to a private medical company to design a high-speed machine that could manufacture the protective masks—as needed— after a pandemic occurred.
联邦政府向一家私营医疗公司授予了一份价值 500 万美元的合同，设计一台高速机器，可以在大流行发生后根据需要生产防护口罩。
The design was completed and submitted to the government in 2018—along with a request for the next stage of funding for the more expensive task of building and testing a prototype.
该设计已于 2018 年完成并提交给政府，同时还请求为下一阶段的资金支持，以用于建造和测试原型这一更昂贵的任务。
This, apparently, was one “bite” too far to allow the Ouroboros: The project was abandoned by the Trump administration— (the same year, it should be noted, that the Ouroboros was fed a gargantuan, growth-seeking meal of tax-cuts).
显然，这对衔尾蛇来说太过分了：该项目被特朗普政府放弃了——（值得注意的是，同一年，衔尾蛇得到了一顿巨大的、寻求增长的减税大餐）。
In hindsight it was obviously a bad decision—but a decision that even political progressives, strapped with the perspective of the Ouroboros, are virtually helpless to counteract.
事后看来，这显然是一个糟糕的决定，但即使是政治进步人士，从衔尾蛇的角度来看，也几乎无法抵制这个决定。
Even president Obama admitted the government was “broke,” and spent a lot of golfing hours with John Boehner negotiating a “grand bargain” to restrain the snake’s out-of-control appetite.
就连奥巴马总统也承认政府“破产了”，并花了很多时间与约翰·博纳（John Boehner）打高尔夫球，谈判达成一项“大协议”，以抑制蛇失控的食欲。
But it was only one of many relevant bad decisions driven and informed by the standard money theory.
但这只是标准货币理论驱动和指导的众多相关错误决策之一。
We read about the 1980’s when, during the SARS epidemic, big-pharma saw great potential for profit-making in the development of a vaccine—and made significant strides in developing one, only to abandon the effort (just closing in on the brink of achievement!) when the SARS virus suddenly subsided: The “market” disappeared!—so what purpose (from the perspective of a profit-oriented and profit financed business) was there in continuing with the effort?
我们读过1980年代的故事，当时SARS流行期间，大型制药公司看到了疫苗开发的巨大盈利潜力，并在疫苗开发方面取得了重大进展，但当SARS病毒突然消退时，他们却放弃了这一努力（刚刚接近成果！）：“市场”消失了！那么，继续努力的目的是什么（从以利润为导向和利润融资的企业的角度来看）？
It’s now clear that vaccine, had the final efforts been made to develop and test it, could well have proved fateful against the coronavirus we now confront.
现在很清楚，如果为开发和测试做出最后的努力，疫苗很可能对我们现在面临的冠状病毒具有决定性作用。
So, great “profit” could have resulted, but not in the kind of “profit timeline” that profit-demanding private enterprise requires.
因此，可能会产生巨大的“利润”，但不会达到追求利润的私营企业所要求的那种“利润时间表”。
So now private enterprise starts again from scratch.
所以现在民营企业又从头开始了。
Are its fingers crossed that, this time, the pandemic will last long enough to provide a profit-making “market”?
是否祈祷这一次疫情能够持续足够长的时间以提供一个盈利的“市场”？
Or has another reality taken hold?
还是另一个现实已成为现实？
The realization that without the health and prosperity of collective society private enterprise itself is threatened?
意识到没有集体社会的健康和繁荣，私营企业本身就会受到威胁吗？
Does the Ouroboros now need to be given bigger, trillion dollar tax bites?
现在是否需要给予衔尾蛇更大的、数万亿美元的税收优惠？
What needs to be made clear—shouted from the media rooftops—is that another perspective of the Ouroboros is possible—a perspective in which the tensions of self-consumption disappear, and public enterprise is freed to pursue what is necessary for collective society to meet its challenges and prosper.
媒体屋顶上需要明确的是，衔尾蛇的另一种观点是可能的——在这种观点中，自我消费的紧张感消失了，公共企业可以自由地追求集体社会应对挑战和繁荣所必需的东西。
This other perspective, of course, is modern money theory, or MMT.
当然，这种另一种观点就是现代货币理论（MMT）。
MMT views the same phenomena—the collection of taxes by the sovereign government, the issuance of treasury bonds—but sees a completely different structure than what the standard theory insists upon.
现代货币理论认为同样的现象——主权政府征税、发行国债——但却看到了与标准理论所坚持的完全不同的结构。
MMT sees that taxes are spent for public enterprise—but the purpose of taxes is not to fund public enterprise.
现代货币理论认为，税收是用于公共企业的，但税收的目的不是为公共企业提供资金。
The purpose of taxes is to infuse the sovereign fiat money with authoritative value.
税收的目的是为主权法定货币注入权威价值。
MMT sees that treasury bonds are issued when taxes fall short of the spending needs of public enterprise—but the act of issuing treasury bonds is not the act of “borrowing” money from the private earnings of people and businesses.
现代货币理论认为，当税收不足以满足公共企业的支出需求时，就会发行国债，但发行国债的行为并不是从个人和企业的私人收入中“借”钱的行为。
It is, instead, the act of issuing new sovereign fiat money which subsequently lands in the spending account of public enterprise.
相反，它是发行新的主权法定货币的行为，这些货币随后进入公共企业的支出账户。
“Deficit spending” is merely an accounting calculation of the difference between taxes collected and treasury bonds issued.
“赤字支出”只是对税收与发行国债之间差额的会计计算。
What the standard theory so ominously refers to as the “national debt” is not something that ever has to be repaid to anybody for the simple reason that they’ve already been paid (with the treasury bonds themselves which can be exchanged/traded at any moment of the day for sovereign fiat money).
标准理论如此不祥地提到的“国债”并不是任何人都必须偿还的东西，原因很简单，因为它们已经被偿还了（国债本身可以在一天中的任何时候与主权法定货币进行交换/交易）。
From the perspective of MMT, then, the Ouroboros appears as a completely different animal!
那么，从现代货币理论的角度来看，衔尾蛇似乎是一种完全不同的动物！
The snake is not eating its tail at all!
蛇根本不吃它的尾巴！
One might ask what, then, is the snake feeding on if it’s not taxes and private earnings?
有人可能会问，如果不是税收和私人收入，那条蛇又以什么为食呢？
The answer is it is feeding on the real resources—labor, inventiveness, and materiel—which are available to be put to work in the pursuit of public enterprise.
答案是，它依赖于真正的资源——劳动力、创造力和物资——这些资源可以用来追求公共企业。
Its feeding has nothing to do with the availability of money but rather the opposite: the availability of money matches the availability of the real resources which public enterprise can marshal to accomplish its goals.
它的供给与货币的可用性无关，而是相反：货币的可用性与公共企业可以调动以实现其目标的实际资源的可用性相匹配。
Which brings us, of course, full circle back to what we should be seeing and understanding in the federal government’s response to the pandemic: We are not talking about (and shouldn’t be fretting about) collecting $2.2 trillion in new taxes —now, or ever.
当然，这又让我们回到了联邦政府在应对疫情时应该看到和理解的问题：我们不是在谈论（也不应该担心）征收 2.2 万亿美元的新税——无论是现在还是将来。
Just as we won’t be talking about collecting $100 trillion in new taxes when we get serious about confronting the climate crisis.
正如当我们认真应对气候危机时，我们不会谈论征收 100 万亿美元的新税。
What we’re talking about, instead, is employing trillions of dollars’ worth of real resources—labor, inventiveness, and materiel—to accomplish the things that private enterprise and finance cannot find a profit in doing, but which need to be done, nevertheless.
相反，我们谈论的是利用价值数万亿美元的实际资源（劳动力、创造力和材料）来完成私营企业和金融机构无法从中获利但仍然需要完成的事情。