【經濟學人】天津為何沉淪

來自專欄經濟學人精讀

TIANJIN, a northern mega-city, has produced some of China』s wittiest comedi-ans. It is a good thing that its 15m residents have a sense of humour. Their hometown was, at points over the past decade, the fastest-growing of China』s 31 provincial-level regions. Since the beginning of last year it has been the slowest (see chart). Businesses joke that the sole part of the local economy that is expanding these days is the value of assets seized from corrupt officials. The city』s sharp deceleration serves as a stress test of China』s economic problems, and as a warning of the difficulty in fixing them.

天津是北方一個特大城市，這裡誕生了一批中國最幽默的喜劇演員。1500萬天津居民都有幽默感是一件好事。過去十年里，天津是中國31個省級地區中發展最快的。從去年年初開始，卻變成了最慢的（見圖表）。一些企業家開玩笑說，近期當地經濟的增長都源自從腐敗官員手中繳獲的資產。天津經濟增長急劇減速是對中國經濟問題的壓力測試，也是對其解決困難的警示。

Other areas of China are also grappling with subdued growth. Commodity-producing regions have struggled to adapt to a modernising economy, as has the rust-belt north-east. But Tianjin stands out as a place that should be doing better. It boasts a busy port and good universities. A skilled manufacturing hub, it has attracted firms from Airbus to Motorola. Just half an hour from Beijing by train, it is well situated.

中國其他一些地區也在努力應對經濟增長放緩的問題。商品生產地區一直在努力適應現代化經濟，東北部的銹帶也是如此。但在這些地區當中，天津略好一些。天津有繁忙的港口和優秀的大學。作為一個技術成熟的製造中心，它吸引了空客、摩托羅拉等公司。天津距離北京只有半小時的火車車程，地理位置優越。

rust-belt 銹帶 以製造業為經濟支柱的美國東北部，底特律，匹茲堡，克利夫蘭和芝加哥等大工業城市所在的地區在上世紀70—80年代由於工業急劇衰落、工廠大量倒閉、失業率增加而使閑置的設備銹跡斑斑，被人們形象地稱為「銹帶」。

The problem is that the city』s planners got far ahead of themselves. They built a big new financial district, which they billed as China』s Manhattan, in the Binhai district, on the city』s far-east side. Nearly 70% of offices there are vacant, ac-cording to Jones Lang LaSalle, a property-services firm. That flatters the reality. One whole floor of the New Finance Building, a glistening complex, has been converted into 「escape rooms」 for adventure games. 「The buildings are great,」 Zhang Junkai, a port worker who lives nearby, says with a wry smile. 「It』s just that we don』t have enough people in them.」

問題是天津的規劃者太過好高騖遠。他們在濱海區建立了一個新的大型金融區，稱之為中國的曼哈頓，位於該市的遠東地區。據房地產服務公司仲量聯行稱，近70％的辦公室空置。雖然這有些誇大其辭。新金融大廈的整個樓層，一個閃閃發光的建築群，已被改造成玩冒險遊戲的「逃生室」。住在附近的港口工人張俊凱苦笑著說：「建築很棒，只是裡面沒有人。」

Some 60km away, on the city』s western fringes, the waste is even more striking. A private developer wanted to create a high-tech zone, anchored by the world』s fifth-tallest skyscraper. Construction all but stopped a few years ago. The sky-scraper』s skeleton is nearly 600 metres tall, and surrounded by a dozen other abandoned building sites, which are a short drive from a fledgling polo club, itself ringed by empty luxury residences.

約60公里以外，天津西部邊緣，空間浪費更加嚴重。一位私人開發商希望創建一個高科技區，以世界第五高的摩天大樓為標誌。幾年前工程停滯了。這座摩天大樓的骨架高近600米，周圍還有十幾座廢棄的建築遺址，距離一個新建的馬球俱樂部車程很短，這個俱樂部還帶有豪華住宅，但幾乎都空置。

Corruption fuelled the excesses. In the city centre, Zhao Jin, a property mag-nate, paid off bureaucrats to flout zoning rules. He had permission to build three towers of no more than 35 storeys, but instead went for 66 storeys. He and the bureaucrats (some of them, anyway) are now in jail; his development, an unfinished eyesore, was listed for demolition. In another case, at the port, managers of a chemical warehouse exploited connections to pass inspections on matters from fire safety to chemicals handling. In August 2015 a massive explo-sion obliterated the warehouse and the surrounding area, killing 173.

腐敗助長了過度行為。在市中心，房地產業巨頭趙瑾（音譯）向官員行賄，藐視區域規劃原則。按規定他可以建造三座不超過35層的塔樓，但他建了66層。現在，他和一些涉事官員都進了監獄。他在建的塔樓也被列入拆遷序列。另一個案例中，天津港口化學品倉庫的管理人員利用關係，通過消防安全和化學品的檢查。 2015年8月，一場大爆炸摧毀了倉庫和周邊地區，造成173人死亡。

eyesore /』a?s?? ;ˋa??s?r / n. something that is very ugly, especially a building sur-rounded by other things that are not ugly 礙眼的事物，難看的東西

The deadly blast seems to have marked a turning point. Huang Xingguo, mayor since 2007, was jailed last year for corruption. Li Hongzhong, Tianjin』s new Communist Party boss, has presided over a clean-up. Corruption investigations in the first half of this year have already exceeded the total for 2015. The gov-ernment has also changed its economic course. It has tightened its belt, budget-ing nearly 15% less spending this year. Once-busy building sites have attracted scavengers. Ads for metal-recycling services are plastered on construction walls in the high-tech zone.

這場大規模爆炸已經成為一個轉折點。2007年起擔任市長的黃興國因腐敗被判入獄。天津新任市委書記李洪忠主持了清洗工作。今年上半年的腐敗調查已超過2015年的總數。政府也改變了經濟政策方向。政府已經收緊了腰帶，今年預算支出減少了近15％。曾經繁忙的建築工地引來了拾荒者。高科技區貼滿了金屬回收服務的廣告。

Tianjin, along with a handful of other Chinese regions, has admitted that its economic record was grossly inflated. Binhai, which accounts for half the city』s output, declared in January that its GDP was a third smaller than previously re-ported. Partly as a result of correcting for past fabrication, Tianjin』s annual GDP growth has averaged just 3.5% since 2017, compared with 13.5% under Mr Huang, a precipitous drop.

天津以及其他一些中國地區，已經承認其經濟數據摻雜了很大的水分。濱海佔全市產量的一半，1月份宣布其國內生產總值比先前報告的數字小三分之一。部分是由於對過去捏造數據的糾正，天津年度GDP增長率平均數自2017年以來僅為3.5％，相比黃時代的13.5％下滑嚴重。

precipitous /pr?ˋs?p?t?s / adj.突然的，驟然的，急劇的

Tianjin』s woes are an extreme version of China』s. Over the past decade cities have rushed to expand. Yang Weimin, a senior official, revealed this year that, based on electricity usage, China』s housing vacancy rate is higher than Japan』s, which stands at 13%. In downtown Tianjin that is almost palpable. Colonial buildings, dating to the 19th century, have been beautifully restored. Yet they are eerily quiet. 「All the units have been sold, but few people have moved in,」 says a guard at the Tai』an Avenue luxury complex.

天津也許是中國的極端案例。在過去十年中，中國城市爭先恐後地擴張。高級官員楊為民今年透露，根據用電情況來判斷，中國的住房空置率高於日本的13％。在天津市中心，這一情況更明顯。19世紀殖民時期的建築，都被精心修復。但現在這裡卻出奇地安靜。 「所有單元都已售出，但很少有人搬進去，」泰安大道豪宅的一名警衛說。

palpable /』p?lp?b ? l/ adj. a feeling that is palpable is so strong that other people notice it and can feel it around them 明顯的，顯而易見的

The question of whether Tianjin can recover, then, is of national salience. Coming clean about its problems is a good first step. But in two other ways, the Tianjin example is worrying. First, local officials appear willing to tolerate only a limited reckoning. Tianjin, like other parts of China, has relied on government-owned companies to pay for investments. Zhang Zhiwei, an economist with Deutsche Bank, has estimated that in Tianjin these companies only have enough revenue to cover about 40% of what they owe in interest, the third-worst ratio among China』s provinces. Tianjin is, he says, a 「pilot experiment」 for how the government will resolve its debts.

天津能否順利走出發展困境對整個國家意義重大。首先，天津應認清問題。然而，「天津案例」卻因兩點令人擔憂。首先，當地官員似乎只願意批准部分賬單。與其他區一樣，天津靠國有企業支援來支持投資。張志偉（音譯）是一位任職於德意志銀行的經濟學家，他估計這些天津的國有企業的收入只夠支付利息的40%，這一數據在全國所有省、直轄市中位列倒數第三。他認為，天津是政府解決債務問題的試點實驗市。

The experiment is not going all that well. In May two city-owned developers flirted with defaults on loans that together were worth 700m yuan ($103m). In both cases they conveniently came up with cash in the end. But some analysts saw that as a missed opportunity. In the absence of genuine defaults banks will go on lending to rotten state firms, knowing the government will always prop them up. 「China hasn』t killed off this implicit guarantee,」 Mr Zhang says.

但是試驗並不總是順風順水。今年五月，分別有兩家市政府實控的房產開發商草率對待總額高達7億元人民幣（1.03億美元）的債務違約。最後，這兩家都提出現金兌付的方案。一些分析人士認為，天津錯過了一次改變的機會。在銀行眼中，這些風光不再的國有企業並非實際拖欠，他們樂意向他們借貸，因為政府總會支撐國有企業。張志偉說道，「政府還在暗自給他們輸血。」

Second, Tianjin shows that China』s preferred solution to debt problems—growing out of them—is getting harder. As the economy slows, it takes longer to digest bad investments. Binhai is not a ghost city, but it is far from attaining critical mass. The train to Tianjin』s centre is a tenth full during rush hour. The big excitement these days is that the Juilliard School, an American performing-arts conservatory, will open a campus in Binhai next year, its first such venture abroad. But it is also a marker of reduced ambitions. The Juilliard will occupy just one new building. Planners hoped that many more would house big firms by now.

其二，「天津案例」也體現了，中國政府所青睞的債務解決辦法（通過大量投資而自動解決問題）已難為繼。當經濟放緩，要「消化」糟糕的投資項目耗時更長。雖不是鬼城，濱海新區遠未達成經濟發展所需的最低人口數。在通往市中心的地鐵上，百分之九十的座位都空著。美國茱莉亞音樂學院將於明年在濱海新區建立第一所海外分校，這一消息令人興奮，不過，該校只打算佔用一棟建築。城市規劃者當初所期望的是，到現在為止，應該有更多的大公司搬來濱海新區的建築里。

The appeal of Tianjin for foreign investors has waned amid soaring labour costs. Its GDP per person has passed $17,000, ten times higher than in the late 1990s, when manufacturing firms flocked to the city. Samsung, a South Korean electronics giant, once operated several factories in Tianjin. It has shifted its focus to Vietnam, where labour is much cheaper.

勞動力成本急劇增長，天津的外資吸引力降低。自上世紀九十年代末以來，大量工廠湧入天津，該市的人均GDP上漲了十倍，達17000美元。韓國的電子製造商巨頭三星，一度曾在天津運轉多家工廠，但現在該公司已將重心轉至越南，當地的勞動力更為廉價。

It does not help that Tianjin is also one of China』s most rapidly ageing cities. Nearly a quarter of those with local hukou, or residency permits, are more than 60 years old, up from a tenth in the 1980s. As pension and health-care costs rise, social-security provisions will consume nearly half of Tianjin』s pared-down budget this year. Younger migrants have also started to drift away to faster-growing regions in China』s interior. Tianjin lost 52,000 residents last year, its first such decline in five decades.

另一個難題在於，天津是中國老齡化趨勢最迅猛的城市之一。近四分之一的有當地戶口的居民年齡在六十歲以上，在上世紀八十年代，這一數據為十分之一。養老金和醫療保險支出上漲，社會保障投入將會佔已削減了的政府預算的一半。年輕的外來人員已開始向內陸更迅速的城市轉移，去年，天津遭遇了該市50年來首次人口流失，達52000人。

In May the city made a bold move to attract young professionals. It offered hukous, usually hard to obtain in big cities, to anyone under 40 with a university degree willing to live in Tianjin. In one day 300,000 people applied. With a Tianjin hukou, they could send children to local schools, a big enticement. But many applicants simply wanted to base their families in the city. So officials added a condition, requiring applicants to work there, too. Just 5,800 applicants made the first cut.

今年五月，天津為了吸引年輕的技術人才，做出了大膽的嘗試。一般來講，在大城市落戶遠非易事，今年，天津開放條件，凡是想要在天津居住的人，只要年齡四十歲以下的持大學學歷皆可落戶。因為持天津戶口者可以將孩子送入當地學校，這一政策帶來巨大的誘惑。但是許多申請者僅僅想把家庭戶籍遷移於此，因此，天津政府提出附加條件，還要求申請者必須在此地工作。最終，僅有5800人順利落戶。

There is one big wild card in Tianjin』s future. The central government talks of unifying it with Beijing, to create a huge city cluster. If it truly did that, and moved some government functions from Beijing, Tianjin』s office gluts could vanish, says Tin Sun of CBRE, an international property agency. So far it has taken only baby steps.

天津的未來還受制於一個未知因素。中央政府曾提及合併京津兩市，打造一個巨大的城市群。田隼（音譯）任職於跨國物業管理公司世邦魏理仕，他談到「如果計劃落成，北京的一些政府職能機構將會遷出，天津的供過於求的辦公室將不復存在。但現在該計劃尚處胎腹。

In the meantime Tianjin is trying to pick itself up. It is pitching itself to companies in Beijing as a location for back-offices. Tech firms, including Byte dance, a developer of popular apps, have based censorship teams in Tianjin. This is not the glitzy future of the city』s dreams, but it pays the rent. On July 17th, when Tianjin officials reported a grim batch of economic data, they added a rallying cry: 「we must summon the courage that it takes to roll a rock up a mountain.」 A worthy ambition, so long as they can avoid the fate of Sisyphus.

與此同時，天津正走在自我振興的道路上。該市正在歡迎北京的公司將中後台部門遷於此地。包括位元組跳動有限公司（流行app的開發商）在內的科技公司已經在津建立審查團隊。這並非這座城市夢中的美妙藍圖，但是至少這些公司可以帶來租金收入。7月17日，天津市政府官員公布了一組經濟數據，情況不容樂觀，緊接著這些官員慷慨激昂道：我們要眾志成城，滾石上山。只要他們可以避免西西弗斯式的命運，這一追求便值得一試。

譯者註：西西弗斯因為在天庭犯了法，被大神懲罰，降到人世間來受苦。對他的懲罰是：推一塊石頭上山。每天，西西弗斯都費了很大的勁把那塊石頭推到山頂，然後，石頭又會自動地滾下來，於是，西西弗斯又要把那塊石頭往山上推。這樣，西西弗斯所面臨的是永無止境的失敗。

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