经济自由主义地基牢固

金融危机让经济自由主义受到打击，但是大厦的地基依然牢固。经济自由主义的有其好处，也有缺陷。FT经济评论员塞缪尔·布里坦(Samuel Brittan)分析了它的前景和挑战。

测试中可能遇到的词汇和知识：

neoliberalism 新自由主义，是兴起于上世纪70年代的一种意识形态，基于古典自由主义，主张小政府，强调私有制和交易自由，与"福利国家"和凯恩斯主义针锋相对。

pejorative [pɪ'dʒɒrətɪv] n./adj.轻蔑的，轻蔑的话

Ludwig Erhard 路德维希·艾哈德，经济学家，联邦德国经济部长、总理，“社会市场经济之父”。 malign [mə'laɪn] v./adj.诽谤，污蔑

coercion [kəʊ'ɜːʃ(ə)n] n.强迫

externalities 外部性，指一个人的行为直接影响他人的福祉，却没有承担相应的义务或获得回报。

political failure 政治失灵，政府失灵，也称Government failure，是一种由政府干预而引发的一系列无效率资源分配，其作用往往会恶化其市场失灵的结果。一般认为人性自私和行政体制的缺陷是其原因。

A case remains for economic liberalism (814 words)

This is a good time to ask what is left of an outlook known to its enemies as neoliberalism and by at least some of its friends as just economic liberalism. One cannot be too careful in choice of wording. For neoliberalism was originally the self-chosen name for a group formed just before the second world war around the US commentator Walter Lippmann and which advocated, among other things, making greater use of market forces in economic policy. It has only more recently acquired pejorative associations.

Roughly speaking, the quarter century after 1945 was not a promising time for economic liberalism – except perhaps in West Germany where Ludwig Erhard was the guiding spirit of the so-called economic miracle. The tide turned towards economic liberalism in the last quarter of the century, symbolised by the leadership of Ronald Reagan and Margaret Thatcher in the 1980s. The approach lingered on even after the departure of these charismatic leaders. While Tony Blair and Bill Clinton may have come from a different end of the political spectrum, they made no attempt to reverse course. The traumatic event was of course the financial crisis that broke out in 2007-08 and administered a fatal blow to economic liberalism.

Or did it? As far as normal goods and services are concerned, there is still a great deal to be said for giving a leading role to prices and profits. But for financial markets economic liberalism, at least in the form we have known it, has proved fatally flawed. The tendency of capitalist economies to boom and bust is intimately connected with that failure. As almost every government and central bank is committed to its reform, I would for the present concentrate on other aspects.

The basic case for competitive markets is, first, that they provide consumers with what they wish to have rather than with what some authority thinks would be good for them. Second, they provide some guidance on how goods and services should be produced. It would not have been sensible to build the Great Wall of China with 21st-century electronic equipment when there were millions of underemployed labourers ready to hand. Thirdly, allowing innovators to keep some of the fruits of their activities may provide some incentive to progress. In a priori theory, competitive markets do not have to be capitalist ones. There have been numerous blueprints, from market economies based on state ownership to workers’ co-operatives. But they have not really got off the ground.

An example of misunderstanding is a book that appeared this year with the strange title Masters of the Universe by Daniel Stedman Jones. It was about free-market economists, such as Friedrich Hayek and Milton Friedman and their supposedly malign influence over governments. It is very thorough, honest according to its lights, but thoroughly misleading. For the thinkers in question are not just politicians in disguise. So far as they had an overriding policy or agenda, it was to reduce the influence of coercion in human affairs. What they certainly did not wish to do was to rule the universe either directly or through their political disciples.

There are, of course, numerous examples of market failures. There are the famous “externalities”. Factories do not have to pay for the damage caused by smoking chimneys. Owners of smart front gardens receive no benefit from the enjoyment conferred on passers-by.

There is also always the temptation of successful capitalists to try to become monopolists. There are correctives using markets and prices. Examples range from the auctioning of planning permits to anti-cartel legislation. Free trade is often the most effective corrective. Above all, however, critics of market failures are offset by political failures. Governments often have neither the incentive nor the knowledge to impose effective correctives.

The biggest flaw in market liberalism is in the distribution of income and wealth. For a long time the degree of concentration fluctuated around a fairly stable rate. But in the past two or three decades it has increased markedly, making it much more difficult for supporters of capitalism to argue that a rising tide floats all boats. We could live with this situation in which the top 1 per cent of US families owned 7-8 per cent of US incomes, as in the early 1980s, but hardly when they are getting 18 per cent as they are said to do now. The respectable academic response is to try to correct the situation through the tax and social security systems. But this may be more difficult in a world struggling to achieve genuine mobility of labour where emigrants could overwhelm the redistributive apparatus.

This has not happened yet. But we need to prepare. The hard truth is that tensions can develop between free migration and other economic freedoms. But for all the looming problems, it is still untrue that the nanny state knows best.

请根据你所读到的文章内容，完成以下自测题目：

1.Who was the champion of economic liberalism in its bad times?

A. German Chancellor Ludwig Erhard.

B. US President Ronald Reagan.

C. British PM Margaret Thatcher.

D. British PM Tony Blair.

答案(1)

2.Why competitive markets are necessary?

A. Consumers need nanny state to decide what they really need.

B. Markets provide signals guiding resource allocation to produce goods and services.

C. Innovators can do well outside a market economy at least in the form we know it.

D. All of above.

答案(2)

3.What can we learn about free-market economists?

A. They deny the existence of externalities.

B. They are politicians in disguise who exert a bad influence over governments.

C. They oppose the idea that a rising tide floats all boats.

D. They do not like state ownership or planned economy.

答案(3)

4.According to the passage, what's "the biggest flaw" of economic liberalism?

A. Critics of market failures are offset by political failures.

B. The distribution of income and wealth is becoming unbearable.

C. There is always the temptation of successful capitalists to try to become monopolists.

D. Tensions can develop between free migration and other economic freedoms.

答案(4)

* * *

(1) 答案：A.German Chancellor Ludwig Erhard.

解释：这四人都践行经济自由主义的政策。

作者说，1945年以后四分之一个世纪，也就是到80年代之前，经济自由主义式微，似乎只有艾哈德一个例外。 而80年代的“里根-撒切尔革命”一直影响至今。西方学界一般认为中国的改革开放也是这一去管制化、私有化、自由化浪潮的一部分。 90年代的克林顿和布莱尔，虽然来自左翼党，但是made no attempt to reverse course.

(2) 答案：B.Markets provide signals guiding resource allocation to produce goods and services.

解释：AC与作者的总结刚好相反。 消费者最有权判断产品和服务如何、资源该用来生产什么，而创新者和企业家只有在能将自己才能变现的市场经济中，才有动力进行创新。

(3) 答案：D.They do not like state ownership or planned economy.

解释：ABC都与事实相反。A:自由市场经济学家并不否认外部性，也不否认市场的失灵，但是指出政府失灵可能更严重。

B:他们想要making greater use of market forces，也就是说希望减少人为的、权力的干预，因此作者说《宇宙的主宰》这本书错的离谱。

C:他们赞同这一观点，认为“一部分人先富起来”可以带动“共同富裕”。

(4) 答案：B.The distribution of income and wealth is becoming unbearable.

解释：1%最富的美国人拥有的收入在30年间从7%上涨到18%。不管收入更加集中是否合理，在公众看来这多少有点难以接受。A提到了市场失灵，但是对市场失灵的矫正，常常带来更糟的政府失灵。CD算是经济自由主义面临的问题和挑战，但不是“最大的缺陷”。