一个很短的圣诞支出季节 圣诞经济重要吗

In 1939, Lew Hahn, the head of the Retail Dry Goods Association in the US, noticed something that gave him cause for concern: Thanksgiving would fall on November 30 that year, the latest possible date. Since it was thought poor form to start hawking Yuletide goodies before Thanksgiving was over, this would mean a brief Christmas spending season.

1939年，美国零售干货协会会长卢•韩(Lew Hahn)注意到了一件让他不得不担心的事情：那一年的感恩节将落在11月30日，即最晚可能的日期。既然在感恩节结束前开始叫卖圣诞商品被视为不好的行为，这将意味着一个很短的圣诞支出季节。

Hahn was concerned that consumers would spend less, damaging an already weak economy, to say nothing of the prosperity of the members of the Retail Dry Goods Association. And so he had a word with the secretary of commerce, Harry Hopkins, who had a word with President Franklin D Roosevelt, who had a word with the nation. He explained that as Thanksgiving was a federal holiday it was the president’s job to select the date — and he was choosing November 23 instead.

韩担心，消费者将会减少支出，破坏本已疲弱的经济，更不必说影响零售干货协会成员的繁荣了。因此他和美国商务部部长哈利•霍普金斯(Harry Hopkins)谈了这件事，霍普金斯和总统富兰克林•罗斯福(Franklin Roosevelt)谈了这件事，罗斯福和国家谈了这件事。罗斯福解释称，既然感恩节是一个联邦假日，那么选择哪一天是总统的职责——而他选择了11月23日。

The move was controversial. Alfred Landon, the Republican who had been defeated by Roosevelt in the presidential election of 1936, compared FDR’s high-handedness to that of Adolf Hitler, thus beginning a hallowed tradition in US political commentary. For a couple of years, half the country celebrated on the old Thanksgiving date while the other half marked the new “Franksgiving” instead; a couple of states sat on the fence and made both days a holiday.

此举引发了争议。在1936年总统选举中败给罗斯福的共和党人艾尔弗雷德•兰登(Alfred Landon)将罗斯福的专横与阿道夫•希特勒(Adolf Hitler)相提并论，从而开启了美国政治评论的神圣传统。在两年时间里，一半的美国人在旧的感恩节日期庆祝，另一半人则庆祝新的“富兰克林感恩节”(Franksgiving)，还有两个州采取骑墙立场，把两个日期都列为假日。

All this raises a deeper question: what are the macroeconomic consequences of Christmas? The answer depends on your politics. Economic conservatives, from Rick Santorum to Alf Landon toGeorge Osborne, believe Christmas has little effect on the health of the economy; liberals, from Ed Balls to Franklin Roosevelt to Paul Krugman, believe Christmas is macroeconomically invaluable.

所有这些引发了一个更深层次的问题：圣诞节的宏观经济后果是什么？该问题的答案取决于你们的政治。从里克•桑托勒姆(Rick Santorum)和艾尔弗雷德•兰登到英国财相乔治•奥斯本(George Osborne)，经济保守派人士相信，圣诞节对经济健康几乎毫无影响；而从埃德•鲍尔斯(Ed Balls)到富兰克林•罗斯福，再到保罗•克鲁格曼(Paul Krugman)等自由派人士认为，圣诞节对宏观经济具有不可估量的价值。

I should emphasise that I am making assumptions here. I have not approached any of these people to ask their opinions about Christmas. But the views I am speculating that they hold seem a logical extension of their views on government stimulus spending.

我应该强调的是，我在这里只是假设。我没有向这些人中的任何人询问过关于圣诞节的看法。但从他们对政府刺激支出的观点来看，我的假设似乎符合逻辑。

Allow me to explain. Imagine that this Christmas day, the Queen, the Pope and even Oprah Winfrey announced that Christmas would be a purely religious occasion from 2015 onwards. There would be no presents and no feasting. If people respected this declaration, about $75bn-$100bn of extra consumer spending in the US alone would simply not materialise next December. What then?

让我解释一下。想象一下，在今年圣诞节，女王、教皇，甚至奥普拉•温芙瑞(Oprah Winfrey)宣布，从2015年开始圣诞节将成为一个纯粹的宗教节日。届时将不会有礼物，也不会有大吃大喝。如果人们尊重这种声明，那么在明年12月，仅仅在美国就有大约750亿美元至1000亿美元的额外消费支出不会发生。结果会如何？

One possibility is that the economy would be just fine. This is the classical view of macroeconomics: nothing significant would change after the abolition of Christmas. We would retain the same labour force and the same skills, the same factories and the same power stations, the same financial sector and the same logistics networks. The capacity of the economy to produce goods and services would be undiminished, and after a period of adjustment, during which tinsel factories would be retooled and Christmas tree plantations replanted, all would be well.

一个可能是，经济将还不错。这是宏观经济学的经典观点：废除圣诞节之后不会有重大变化。我们将保留同样的劳动力和同样的技能、同样的工厂和同样的发电厂，以及同样的金融部门和同样的物流网络。经济生产商品和服务的能力将不会减弱，在经过一段时期的调整以后——届时金属箔片工厂将会更换设备，圣诞树种植园将种植其他树木——一切都会恢复正常。

What would replace nearly $100bn of seasonal consumer spending? Nothing noticeable, but the replacement would happen just the same. The productive capacity freed up by the disappearance of Christmas could be turned to other uses; prices would fall just enough to tempt us to spend our money at other times of the year. Indeed, cancelling Christmas might even provide a modest boost to our prosperity in the longer term, as bunching up all that spending into a few short weeks strains factories and supply chains. Smoothing out our spending would be more efficient.

近1000亿美元的季节性消费支出将会被什么替代？没有什么引人注目的支出，但替代还是会有的。圣诞节消失所释放的生产力可被转向其他用途；价格将下跌，吸引我们在一年里的其他时间花钱。的确，取消圣诞节甚至可能小幅提振更长期的繁荣，因为把所有那些支出集中在短短几个星期给工厂和供应链带来紧张。让我们的支出在一年里变得均匀一些将更有效率。

This classical view of how the economy works is also the view taken by Mr Osborne, the UK chancellor, and by Republicans in the US. Their view is that government stimulus spending does not work; cut it back, they argue, and the economy would adjust as the private sector took up the slack.

这种关于经济运行方式的经典观点也是英国财政大臣奥斯本和美国共和党人的观点。他们认为，政府刺激支出不会奏效；他们主张，削减刺激支出后，随着私营部门弥补不足，经济将会调整。

On the other side of the debate stands Mr Balls, the UK’s shadow chancellor, as well as American stimulus proponents such as Mr Krugman and Lawrence Summers. Mr Krugman once commented that panic about an attack from aliens would help the economy because it would get the government spending money again. Since aliens are not available, Santa Claus will have to do.

辩论的另一头是英国影子财政大臣鲍尔斯以及克鲁格曼和劳伦斯•萨默斯(Lawrence Summers)等美国的刺激政策支持者。克鲁格曼曾经表示，对外星人袭击的恐慌将有利于经济发展，因为它将让政府再次支出。既然外星人不见踪影，那么圣诞老人将不得不发挥作用。

This Keynesian view of how the economy works differs from the classical view in one crucial way: it argues that supply does not always and automatically create demand. When Christmas is abolished (or a financial crisis devastates people’s confidence and their spending power), consumers will plan to spend less. And if consumers plan to spend less, price adjustments may not induce them to change their minds; the price adjustments may not even happen. If Christmas spending disappears, it may take many years for the economy to replace it. Those factories will still be there and the workers will remain available — but they will stand idle.

这种关于经济运行方式的凯恩斯主义观点在一个关键方面不同于经典观念：它认为，供应并不总是自动创造需求。当圣诞节被废除（或者金融危机破坏人们的信心和购买力）的时候，消费者将会计划减少支出。而如果消费者计划减少支出，价格调整可能不会让他们改变想法；价格调整甚至可能不会发生。如果圣诞节支出消失，经济可能需要许多年才能取代它。那些工厂仍将在那里，工人们将依然准备劳动，但他们将无所事事。

Who is right? I should confess a bias. I am sceptical about the efficiency of many government spending programmes and of many Christmas purchase decisions. In both cases, too much attention is lavished on appearances and too little on what the recipient might truly want. In the long run, then, I should hope both for a smaller state and for a smaller Christmas.

谁是正确的？我得坦白自己存在偏见。我对许多政府支出项目和圣诞购买决定的效率感到怀疑。在这两种情况下，人们过多地注意表面，不怎么关注接收方真正想要什么。因此长期而言，我倒希望政府和圣诞节的规模都更小一些。

But that is a matter for the ghost of Christmas yet to come. Despite my own biases, I have to acknowledge that this Christmas interest rates are still close to zero. Until that changes, the liberals will have the better of the argument. Stimulus spending remains effective, regardless of whether the stimulus comes from the Treasury — or from the North Pole.

但这是未来圣诞节的问题。尽管我自己存在偏见，但我不得不承认，在这个圣诞节，利率仍接近于零。在这种情况发生改变之前，自由派人士的观点将会占上风。刺激支出依然有效，无论刺激是来自财政部还是来自北极。