China's economy will probably grow by less than 8 per cent this year due to weak international demand and a sluggish domestic real estate market. Now the talk among China-watchers is that it is approaching a breaking point on its path of growth: the episode of high growth is over and the country is heading towards a path in the range of 6-7 per cent.
今年中国的经济增速很可能低于8%，主要是受海外需求疲软以及国内房地产市场降温影响。当前，关注中国经济形势的观察家普遍认为，中国已逼近自身增长路径的转折点——高速增长阶段告一段落，未来中国经济增长率或在6%至7%的区间内徘徊。This mood is strong inside China. When Justin Yifu Lin, who just returned to China from his position as chief economist of the World Bank, announced China would keep growing by 8 per cent before 2030, the Chinese media dubbed his claim as "shooting a satellite" – a phrase referring to the widespread phenomenon of output exaggeration in the Great Leap-forward of 1958.
这种论调在国内很有市场。当不久前刚卸任世界银行首席经济学家回国的林毅夫预言中国经济有望在2030年以前保持8%的年均增速时，国内媒体纷纷调侃他在"放卫星"——在1958年开始的大跃进期间，"放卫星"常被用于形容普遍存在的夸大产出现象。China's slowdown is bad news for countries that are linked to its production chain. This includes East and Southeast Asian countries, regions that export to China, as well as China's raw material and energy providers such as Australia, Brazil and the traditional oil producers. However, China's slowdown can be good news for the developed world, especially the US. My colleague Yiping Huang and David Li, professor at Tsinghua University, both believe that the share of household consumption in GDP has increased in the past several years. China's current account surplus also declined substantially to a mere 2.8 per cent of gross domestic product last year.
中国经济增长放缓对于产业链相关国家来说是坏消息，这包括东亚和东南亚地区的对华出口国，澳大利亚、巴西、传统产油国等中国的原材料和能源供给国。但中国经济增速放缓可能利好发达国家，尤其是美国。我的同事黄益平教授以及清华大学的李稻葵教授都认为，过去几年间家庭消费在GDP中所占比重有所上升。去年中国经常项目顺差占GDP比重也大幅下降至仅为2.8%的水平。
There are good reasons to believe China's slowdown is permanent. The growth of China's labour force has been falling since 2010 and by 2020 its stock will start to decline. In accordance, wages are increasing fast; China's episode of cheap growth is approaching its end. On the international stage, the eurozone has fallen into recession again and the light of recovery is still deep in the tunnel. In the US, federal government debts will grow to more than 100 per cent of GDP even by the most conservative estimates.
固然有不少理由可以使人相信中国经济增速放缓将是长期性的。中国劳动人口增速自2010年起持续下滑，并且到2020年劳动人口总数将开始收缩。与此同时，工资水平快速上升；中国经济的低成本增长阶段接近尾声。国际方面，欧元区再度陷入经济衰退，并且复苏希望渺茫；而在美国，即使按最保守的估计，联邦政府债务规模占GDP比重也将突破100%。However, an international comparison gives hope that China may be able to maintain an 8 per cent growth rate for at least another decade. China's per-capita GDP is about the level of Japan's in 1962 and the level of Korea's in 1982. Both countries grew by 9.7 per cent in the following 10 years after they reached China's per-capita income of today. A contrast is Brazil. It reached China's current per-capita GDP in 1978 but then stagnated for more than 20 years. But the Brazilian case – and for that matter, those of other Latin American countries – is peculiar because its stagnation was triggered by a sovereign debt crisis. China has a sound – even too good by many opinions – international balance of payment and a Latin American-type of crisis is a remote possibility for the country.
但通过与其他国家横向比较，我认为中国经济至少在本十年内有望保持8%的年均增速。中国现阶段人均GDP水平与日本1962年和韩国1982年的水平相当。日韩两国在达到中国当前人均GDP水平后的十年间双双实现了9.7%的年均经济增长。一个反例是巴西，该国1978年即已达到中国现有人均GDP水平，但在其后的二十几年间一直处于停滞状态。不过巴西以及其他拉丁美洲国家的例子具有特殊性，因其经济萧条是由主权债务危机引发的。而中国的国际收支情况良好——很多人甚至认为是过好了——发生拉美式经济危机的可能性很小。Inside the country, several factors will help China maintain fast growth in the next several decades. The most significant is continuous improvement of young people's educational achievement. The bulk of China's workforce is rural migrants. Compared with a decade ago, men in rural areas aged between 21 and 29 have two more years of schooling today and women in the same age group have 2.6 years more. In the city, the average years of schooling have reached 11 for both men and women in the same age group. The government has announced a national plan of education for 2020. One of its aims is to allow rural young people to finish high school (including professional high school) education. Another aim is to raise the college enrolment rate to 40 per cent.
在中国国内，几个方面的因素将有助于中国在未来几十年保持较快增长。其中最重要的一点是青年受教育水平的不断提高。中国劳动力的主体是来自农村地区的流动人口。相对于十年前，农村地区21至29岁男女青年的受教育年限分别增长了2年和2.6年。而在城市地区，21至29岁男女青年的平均受教育年限都达到11年。中国政府颁布了国家中长期教育改革和发展规划纲要(2010-2020年)，其中战略目标之一是在农村地区普及高中教育（包括职业高中），另一战略目标是将高等教育毛入学率提升至40%。The return to education is high, averaging 10 per cent for one additional year of schooling. The schooling gap between people aged from 21 to 29 and those between 50 and 59 is 4.3 years. This means the new generation is 43 per cent more productive than the old and retiring generation. This will more than offset the loss of labour in the coming decade. Nobel Prize laureate Robert Fogel predicts China's economy would be 40 per cent of the world total in real terms by 2040. I asked him if this prediction was too optimistic when I met him in Chicago last November. His answer was no. Instead, he believed that improvement of education alone would allow China to do that.
教育回报很高，教育年限增加1年带来的平均回报率高达10%。目前21至29岁人群的受教育年限较50至59岁人群高出了4.3年。这意味着新一代劳动者的生产率相对于即将退休的年龄组高出了43%。这将足以弥补未来十年可能出现的劳动力人数下降问题所造成的影响。诺贝尔经济学奖获得者罗伯特•福格尔(Robert Fogel)预计，按实际值计量，到2040年中国经济规模占全球经济总量之比将达到40%。去年11月我在芝加哥见到福格尔时，曾问他该预测是否过于乐观。他给出了否定回答。正相反，他认为单凭教育水平提升就足以让中国达到上述水平。Improvement of education is supplemented by the Chinese government's investment in research and development. By the 12th Five-Year Programme, R&D expenditure will be increased from the current 1.7 per cent of GDP to 2.2 per cent of GDP in 2015. This will place China close to the rank of developed countries.
除发展教育以外，中国政府还计划加大在研发领域的投入。根据十二五规划纲要，2015年研发经费占GDP比重应达到2.2%，高于目前1.7%的水平。这将使中国的研发投入接近发达国家水平。The world economy of this decade resembles that of the 1980s in many ways. On one count, it will probably be as sluggish as the 1980s. However, that decade witnessed the rise of the East Asian tigers. China has a much bigger economy than the tiger economies and export cannot be a long-term driver of its growth. But China can also benefit from having a large population. The recent growth of household consumption is an encouraging sign. It is likely that the country's economy will continue to turn to domestic consumption to look for growth. As the level of income increases, the advantage of a large country will only become stronger. In the end, China will be likely to maintain an average rate of growth of 8 per cent before 2020. This will probably allow the country to take over the US to become the largest economy in nominal term by 2020.
本十年世界经济形势在很多方面或与二十世纪八十年代相似。一方面，全球经济增长可能和二十世纪八十年代一样疲软，但"东亚四小龙"却是在二十世纪八十年代崛起的。中国的经济规模远大于四小龙，而且经济增长也不可能长期依赖出口。但中国还是能从庞大人口中获益。近期居民家庭消费呈现增长态势是一个令人振奋的信号。中国经济很可能继续从国内消费环节中寻找增长源泉。随着居民收入水平的提高，大国优势只会变得更加明显。综上，中国有较大可能在2020年前保持8%的年均增速。这可能使中国在2020年以前超越美国，成为按名义值计算全球第一大的经济体。