【英语中国】中国增加消费谈何容易

In January, a remarkable thing happened: more cars were bought in China, the land of bicycles, than in the US, the land of – well – cars. US annual light vehicle sales skidded below 10m, fewer than in China where January sales ran at 10.7m a year. For those counting on the Chinese consumer to ride to the world's rescue, here, surely, was the news they had been waiting for.

Unfortunately, those vehicle numbers were not quite what they seemed. Nor – not yet, at least – is the Chinese consumer.

It turns out that China and the US count cars differently and that China's numbers were temporarily flattered by the lunar new year. Still, China remains a bright spot in the thickening gloom. Other industries too are counting on the Middle Kingdom, the largest market for television sets and mobile phones, steel and cement. Shiseido, a Japanese cosmetics company, has been racking up 30 per cent Chinese sales growth. Alex Salmond, Scotland's first minister, on a clean-energy-to-whisky sales tour of China this week, revealed there were more cashed-up Chinese than American students in Scottish universities.

The 19th-century Englishman who mused that, if every Chinese lengthened his shirttail by a foot, textile mills would spin year-round, has been replaced by 21st-century westerners hoping that Chinese will step in to buy their sedans and insurance products. But can they?

The picture is not easy to decipher. By some measures, Chinese consumers have in fact become relatively less important. In the 1980s, household consumption averaged slightly more than half China's gross domestic product. That proportion fell in the 1990s to 46 per cent, reached 38 per cent by 2005 and is about 35 per cent today. By comparison, in 2007 US household consumption was running at what we now know was an unsustainable 72 per cent of GDP.

Andy Rothman, China strategist at CLSA, says people should not get hung up on that comparison. Just as in 1950s Japan, he says, a much bigger share of China's GDP is today going to investment, something that changed in Japan only in the 1960s when consumers began to buy fridges and washing machines. Consumption rates tend to be higher in poorer countries than China where people spend a large part of their income to survive, and richer ones where discretionary spending takes hold.

Jonathan Garner, emerging markets strategist at Morgan Stanley, is another believer. In his 2005 The Rise of the Chinese Consumer, he predicted that by 2014 Chinese consumption would have risen from 9 per cent of US and 3 per cent of world consumption in 2004 to 37 per cent and 10.5 per cent respectively. By then, he forecast, the Chinese shopper would have displaced the US consumer “as the engine of world growth”. He says his prediction is still on track.

Nicholas Lardy at the Peterson Institute in Washington is more circumspect. He applauds Beijing's attempt to rebalance a lopsided economy that is too dependent on capital investment and external demand. But so far, it has not worked. Investment probably reached a high of 43.5 per cent of GDP in 2008.

There are several factors holding back the Chinese consumer. First, people have for years witnessed the destruction of the “iron rice bowl”, as once-free health and education systems have been dismantled. Now the government is committed rhetorically – and, increasingly, in practice – to rebuilding the social safety net. But it will be years before people trust the state to look after them, and run down their precautionary savings.

Second, most Chinese are what Dragonomics, a research firm, calls “survivors”, whose purchases of basic food and clothing are meaningless for multinationals or global demand. Only about 150m are part of “consuming China”, although this may double to 300m by 2015. Consuming China's median household income is about $6,000, against $45,000 in the US. The owner of a Beijing car does not spend like the owner of a Boston car.

Finally, China's recent consumption boom has been predicated on rising income, itself a function of strong external demand. Growth should continue at 7-8 per cent, but the days of double-digit expansion may be over. So, rather than accelerate, Chinese household purchases may in fact slow. It turns out that Americans have been paying for everything with credit – even Chinese consumption.

1月份发生了一件怪事：自行车王国中国的汽车销量，超过了汽车王国美国。换算成年销量，当月美国轻型汽车销量跌破1000万辆，而中国为1070万辆。对于那些指望中国消费者拯救世界的人来说，这无疑是他们一直在等待的消息。

遗憾的是，不能单从表面上来看这些数字。对中国消费者也是如此——至少就眼下来说。

事实上，中美计算汽车销量的方式不一样。而且，中国的数字受到了春节的暂时推动。尽管如此，在日渐黯淡的景象中，中国仍然是一个亮点。其它行业也在指望着这个“中央王国”：中国是全球最大的电视机、手机、钢铁及水泥市场。日本化妆品公司资生堂(Shiseido)在中国销售额的增幅一直在30%以上。苏格兰首席大臣亚历克斯•萨尔蒙德(Alex Salmond)本周正在中国进行从清洁能源到威士忌的销售之旅，他透露说，在苏格兰的大学中，用现金消费的中国学生比美国学生多。

19世纪的英国人会想，如果每个中国人都把衬衣下摆加长一英尺，那么英国的纺织厂就会整年运转不停；到了21世纪，西方人希望的是，中国人将加入购买西方轿车和保险产品的行列。但他们有这个能力吗？

这件事的前景不容易看分明。按照某些标准来衡量，中国消费者实际上已经变得相对不那么重要了。在上世纪80年代，中国家庭消费占国内生产总值(GDP)的比重平均略高于50%。该比例在上世纪90年代降到了46%，2005年达到38%，现在大约为35%。相比之下，2007年美国家庭消费占GDP的比例为72%（现在我们知道，这一水平不可维系）。

里昂证券(CLSA)中国策略师安迪•罗斯曼(Andy Rothman)表示，大家不用对这种对比感到忧心。他说，正如上世纪50年代的日本一样，如今中国GDP当中的很大一部分来自投资。在日本，这种情况到60年代消费者开始购买冰箱和洗衣机时才有所改变。较贫穷国家的消费率往往高于中国和较富裕国家，中国人会将大部分收入用在生存上，而在富裕国家，可自由支配的开支已经比较固定。

摩根士丹利(Morgan Stanley)新兴市场策略师乔纳森•加纳(Jonathan Garner)也持这种观点。在2005出版的《中国消费者崛起》(The Rise of the Chinese Consumer)一书中，他预测，到2014年，中国消费将从2004年为美国消费的9%和占世界消费的3%，分别上升到美国的37%和世界的10.5%。他预测，到那时，中国消费者将取代美国消费者，成为“全球经济增长的引擎”。他如今表示，他的预测仍会应验。

华盛顿彼得森研究所(Peterson Institute)的尼古拉斯•拉迪(Nicholas Lardy)的看法更为谨慎。他称赞中国政府试图纠正经济过度依赖于资本投资和外部需求的失衡状态。但迄今为止，这种努力没有什么效果。2008年投资占GDP的比例可能高达43.5%。

几个因素阻碍着中国消费者的脚步。首先，多年来，人们眼看着“铁饭碗”破裂，昔日免费的医疗教育体系也告瓦解。如今，政府承诺要重建社会保障体系，并在逐步地予以落实。但要到多年之后，人们才会相信政府会照顾他们，并减少自己的预防性储蓄。

其次，大多数中国人都是研究机构龙洲经讯(Dragonomics)所称的“谋生者”，他们购买衣食的基本消费，对于跨国公司或全球需求来说没什么意义。只有大约1.5亿人属于“消费的中国”，尽管这个数字到2015年将翻倍至3亿人。这部分人的家庭收入中值大约为6000美元，而美国为4.5万美元。一辆北京汽车车主的消费，与一辆波士顿汽车车主是不能相提并论的。

最后，中国近年的消费繁荣建立在收入不断增长的基础之上，而后者有赖于强劲的外部需求。中国经济增长率应会维持在7%到8%，但两位数增长的岁月可能已经结束。因此，中国家庭消费非但不会加速增长，实际上可能会放缓。结果表明，美国人一直在用借来的钱为所有东西付费——甚至包括中国的消费。

译者/何黎