2022年高级口译时事新闻素材 (55)

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　　Man-made climate change may prove a disaster. No, I do not mean climate change itself. My concern here is rather over the policy responses.

　　人为造成的气候变化也许确实是一场灾难。不，我指的并非气候变化本身。在这个问题上，我更担心的是政府做出的政策回应。

　　For, as was predictable and predicted, recognition of the risks is generating a host of interventionist gimmickry, not least in the UK.

　　因为，正如可以预计和已经预计到的那样，对风险的认知正在滋生大量干涉主义花招，尤其是在英国。

　　People I think of as my friends - pro-market liberals - are suspicious of what many of them consider the "man-made climate change hysteria". They are surely right to note that it is a remarkably convenient banner for opponents of the market economy, be they egalitarians or deep-green environmentalists. This time, they fear, Malthusians and socialists may have a politically successful (albeit, in their view, scientifically false) argument in favor of a long-standing desire to throttle the life out of the free-enterprise economy.

　　我视为朋友的那些人——支持市场经济的自由主义者，对他们中许多人将“人为造成的气候变化看作歇斯底里症”的观点表示怀疑。他们指出(这点无疑是正确的)，对于反对市场经济的人——无论是平等主义者还是环保主义者，这都是一个相当方便的旗号。他们担心，马尔萨斯主义者和社会主义者这次可能拥有了一个在政治上颇为成功的论点(尽管在他们看来，这种论点在科学上是错误的)，来支持扼杀自由企业经济的长期愿望。

　　Lord Lawson, Chancellor of the Exchequer in the government of Margaret Thatcher, partly took this line in a lecture he delivered to the Centre for Policy Studies last November. I do not know what he thinks of David Cameron’s adventures in the politics and policy of climate change. But I can guess.

　　去年 11 月，曾任玛格丽特 撒切尔(Margaret Thatcher)政府财政大臣的劳森爵士(Lord Lawson)在政策研究中心(Centrfor Policy Studies)发表演说时，在一定程度上采取了这种姿态。我不知道他对英国保守党领袖大卫 卡梅隆(David Cameron)在政治和气候变化政策方面的冒险作何感想。但我可以猜到。

　　Yet even if one accepts the validity of concerns about man-made climate change, one should agree that market liberals also have a legitimate concern. Instead of policies that are minimally intrusive, well-targeted and efficient, we are depressingly likely to get the exact opposite.

　　然而，即使承认对人为造成的气候变化的担忧有其合理性，人们也应当同意，市场自由主义者的担心也不无道理。令人沮丧的是，我们看到的可能不是侵犯性最小、目标明确和行之有效的政策，而是恰恰相反。

　　This is partly because many on the climate-change bandwagon do not want to leave the market economy intact. "Are you enjoying yourselves?" seems to be their question. "Let's find some way of stopping you." It is also because politicians have a strong desire to tinker piecemeal.

　　这其中的部分原因在于，许多攀上气候变化大潮的人并不想让市场经济毫发无伤。他们的问题似乎是：“你很快乐?那我们要设法阻止你。”另一个原因在于，政界人士强烈希望修补残局。

　　Since climate change is likely to be a concern over decades, it is essential to get policy right. The big rule, as always, is: keep it simple, stupid.

　　气候变化可能会成为一个持续数十年的问题，因此制定正确的政策至关重要。一如往常，首要的原则是：要简单，笨蛋。

　　A good example of what many (though not all) economists would consider a mistake has been the decision to go for tradable emissions permits whose prices have proved disturbingly unstable. Predictably, the adoption of such permits is already leading to proposals to create a carbon emissions budget for every individual. Predictably, too, this return to rationing is, in the UK, supported by rhetorical appeal to the egalitarian spirit of the Blitz (Mark Roodhouse, this page, March 13, 2007).

　　许多(尽管并非所有)经济学家都认为是一个错误的恰当例子是：决定推行可交易的排放权。令人不安的是，事实证明，排放权价格非常不稳定。正如人们能够预见的到的那样，采用这种排放权制度已经导致有人提议，为每个人建立一份碳排放预算。同样如人们可以预见到的那样，这种向配给制度的回归在英国得到布利茨平等主义精神呼声的支持(马克 鲁德豪斯(Mark Roodhouse)，本版，2007年3月 13日)。

　　Yet the spirit of the Blitz, applied in the UK alone, will achieve just about nothing, since the UK is responsible for a mere 2 per cent of the global total. So what Mr. Roodhouse and his ilk should call for is a global system of individual tradable permits, to operate not just for a decade, but for the indefinite future. It is clear why an egalitarian with control-freak tendencies might welcome such a system of bureaucratic controls on most of humanity that this would require. But why should anybody else do so? And why should anybody believe it could be made workable?

　　但仅仅应用于英国的布利茨精神几乎不会取得任何成效，因为英国的温室气体排放量仅占全球总量的区区2%。因此，鲁德豪斯等人应当呼吁的是，在全球范围内建立一个可交易的个人排放权制度，期限不是只有10 年，而是无限的未来。很显然，有“控制狂”倾向的平等主义者可能会欢迎这样一个对多数人进行官方控制的系统。但为何其他人也要欢迎这样做呢?为何每个人都应该认为它可以行得通呢?

　　Yet Mr. Roodhouse is at least logical. He does also accept that his ration coupons should be tradable. Meanwhile, Mr. Cameron suggests that each individual might have some sort of "green air miles allowance", with a sliding scale of taxation on those who travel most. The difficulty of monitoring such travel would prove immense: one can already foresee the host of business people taking their flights from Paris. Mr. Cameron is right that air travel should be included in the scope of taxation.

　　不过，鲁德豪斯的观点至少还合乎逻辑。他的确也承认，他的“配给券”应该是可交易的。与此同时，卡梅隆提出，每个人或许都可以有某种“温室气体里程津贴”，对旅行最多的人计征浮动税率。监测这类旅行的难度会极其巨大：我们可以预见，从巴黎搭乘航班的商业人士数量是多大的一个数字。卡梅隆关于乘飞机旅行应该被纳入征税范围的观点是对的。

　　He is right, too, that the taxation of emissions should, other things being equal; replace other taxes, rather than raise the overall level of taxation.

　　他的另外一个观点也是对的：在其它条件不变的情况下，碳排放税应当取代其它税种，而不是提高整体税负。

　　But this is surely no more than a populist gimmick.

　　但这无疑只是一个民粹主义者的小花招罢了。

　　Then there is the government. In its new climate change bill, it proposes "a series of clear targets for reducing carbon dioxide emissions - including making the UK's targets for a 60 per cent reduction by 2050 and a 26 to 32 per cent reduction by 2020 legally binding". In this case, as I understand it, the government would be held legally liable for failing to compel the people of this country to behave as it desires over the next half century.

　　接下来是政府。在最新的气候变化方案中，英国政府提议“为降低二氧化碳排放设定一系列明确的目标，包括让英国在 2050年之前减排60%、 2020年之前减少26%至 32%的目标具有法律约束力”。我的理解是，在这种情况下，如果英国政府在未来半个世纪不能迫使其民众按照要求的方式行事，那政府将承担法律责任。

　　I find that frightening.

　　我发现这种情景很恐怖。

　　Meanwhile, in a typically wide-ranging speech this week, the chancellor proposed a raft of initiatives and incentives on light bulbs, efficiency standards, and home insulation and micro-generation. It is impossible for the outsider to judge whether these would be cost-effective. Is the plan to make new homes "zero carbon" an efficient way to achieve emissions reductions? I have no idea. I suspect the government does not have any idea either.

　　与此同时，在本周一次典型的、内容广泛的演讲中，劳森爵士针对灯泡、效率标准、家居绝缘和微型发电等，提出了大量创造性建议和激励计划。让外人来判断这些东西是否具有成本效益，这是不可能的。让新建房屋实现“零排放”的计划是实现减排目标的有效途径吗?我不知道。我猜想政府也不知道。

　　Let us concentrate on the big issues: any workable policy system must be global; it must create stable incentives; it must be administratively simple; it must include investment in creation and dissemination of new technologies; and, not least, it must allow people to get on with their lives with as much freedom as possible. Uniform prices on emissions -ideally, through taxation - will do most of this job.

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