作者：瑞·达利欧(Ray Dalio)
原文链接：
https://blog.csdn.net/cjtxzg/article/details/80699863
In a transaction, you have to give something in order to get something, and how much you get depends on how much you produce. Over time we learn and that accumulated knowledge, raises our living standards, we call this productivity growth. Those who were inventive and hardworking, raise their productivity and their living standards faster than those who are complacent and lazy but that isn’t necessarily true over the short run. Productivity matters most in the long run, but credit matters most in the short run. This is because productivity growth doesn’t fluctuate much, so it’s not a big driver of economic swings, debt is, because it allows us to consume more than we produce when we acquire it and it forces us to consume less than we produce when we have to pay it back.
在一项交易中，为了获得某样东西，你必须付出另一样东西，长期来看你得到多少取决于你生产多少。我们的知识随时间而逐渐增多，知识的积累会提高我们的生活水平，我们将此称为生产率的提高。一个善于创新和勤奋的人，将比那些自满和懒惰的人，更快的提高生产率和生活水平，但在短期内不一定体现出来，生产率在长期内最关键，但信贷在短期内最重要。这是因为生产率的提高不会剧烈波动，因此不是经济起伏的一个重要动力，但是债务是这种动力。因为我们能够通过借贷让消费超过产出，但是在还贷时不得不让消费低于产出。
Debt swings occur in two big cycles. One takes about five to eight years and the other takes about 75 to a hundred years, while most people feel the swings, they typically don’t see them as cycles because they see them too up close, day by day, week by week. In this chapter, we’re going to step back and look at these three big forces and how they interact to make up our experiences.
债务量的波动有两大周期，其中一个周期持续大约5-8年，另一个持续大约75-100年。大部分人虽然能够感受到波动，但由于离波动太近，每天每周都身临其境，通常比不认为这是周期，我们将在本章考察这三股主要动力，并观察它们如何相互作用，以及它们在日常经济中的表现。
As mentioned, swings around the line are not due to how much innovation or hard work there is, they’re primarily due to ho much credit there is. Let’s for a second imagine an economy without credit, in this economy, the only way I can increase my spending is to increase my income which requires me to be more productive and do more work. Increase productivity is the only way for growth. Since my spending is another person’s income, the economy grows every time I or anyone else is more productive. If we follow the transactions and play this out, we see a progression like the productivity growth line but because we borrow, we have cycles. This isn’t due to any laws or regulations, it’s due to human nature and the way that credit works.
如上所述，经济的上下起伏，不是取决于人们多么善于创新或是勤奋工作，而是主要看信贷的总量。我们先想象一下一个没有信贷的经济运行。在这样的经济运行中，增加支出的唯一办法是增加收入。因此，需要提高生产率和工作量，提高生产率是经济增长的唯一途径，由于我的支出是另一个人的收入，当我或者另一个人提高生产率的时候，经济就会增长。我们如果观察各种交易加以总结，就会发现一条类似于生产率增长轨迹的渐进线，但是由于我们借贷于是产生了周期。原因并不是任何法规，而是人的天性和信贷的运作方式。
Think of borrowing as simply a way of pulling spending forward. In order to buy something you can’t afford, you need to spend more than you make. To do this, you essentially need to borrow from your future self. In doing so, you create a time in the future that you need to spend less than you make in order to pay it back, it very quickly resembles a cycle. Basically, anytime you borrow you create a cycle. This is as true for an individual as it is for the economy. This is why understanding credit is so important because it sets into motion, a mechanical, predictable series of events that will happen in the future, this makes credit different from money.
借债不过是提前消费，为了购买现在买不起的东西，你的支出必然超过收入，因此你需要借钱，实质上是向未来的自己借钱。你给自己设定了一个未来的时间，到那个时候你的支出必须少于收入，以便偿还债务，这样马上就形成了一个周期。通常一旦你借钱就制造了一个周期，对于个人是这样，对于整个经济运行也是这样。这就是为什么必须理解信贷，因为信贷触发了一系列机械和可以预料的将在未来发生的事件。这就是信贷不同于货币的地方。
Money is what you settle transactions with. When you buy a beer from a bartender with cash, the transaction is settled immediately but when you buy a beer with credit, it’s like starting a bar tab. You’re saying you promise to pay in the future, together you and the bartender create an asset and a liability, you just created credit out of thin air. It’s not until you pay the bar tab later, that the asset and the liability disappear, the debt goes away and the transaction is settled.
完成交易需要使用货币，当在酒吧用货币买一瓶啤酒时，交易立即完成。但是如果你用信用来买一瓶啤酒，比如赊账，你相当于承诺今后为这瓶啤酒付钱，你和酒吧一起创造了一笔资产和一笔负债，你们凭空制造出了信贷。只有在你今后清偿了这笔赊账之后，上述资产和负债才会消失，债务才会还清，交易才会了结。
The reality is, that most of what people call money is actually credit. The total amount of credit in the United States is about 50 trillion dollars and the total amount of money is only about three trillion dollars. Remember, in an economy without credit the only way to increase your spending is to produce more, but with an economy with credit, you can also increase your spending by borrowing. As a result, an economy with credit has more spending and allows incomes to rise faster than productivity over the short run but not over the long run. Now don’t get me wrong, credit isn’t necessarily something bad but just causes cycles.
现实生活中大部分所谓钱实际上是信贷，美国国内的信贷总额大约50万亿美元，而货币总额只有大约3万亿美元。不要忘记，在没有信贷的经济运行中，增加支出的唯一办法是增加生产，但是在有信贷的经济运行中，还可以通过借债来增加支出。因此，有信贷的经济运行能增加支出，使得收入的增长速度在短期内超过生产率的增长，但在长期内并非如此。但是请不要误解我的意思，信贷不一定是坏事，只是会导致周期性变化。
It’s bad when it finances over a consumption that can’t be paid back, however it’s good when it efficiently allocates resources and produces income, so you can pay back the debt. For example, if you borrow money to buy a big TV, it doesn’t generate income for you to pay back the debt. But if you buy money to, say buy a tractor, and that tractor let’s you harvest more crops and earn more money, then you could pay back your debt and improve your living standards. In an economy with credit, we can follow the transactions and see how credit creates growth.
信贷如果造成超过偿还能力的过度消费就是不良信贷，但是信贷如果高效率的分配资源和产生收入，让你能偿还债务就是良性信贷。例如如果你借钱买一台大彩电，电视机不会带来任何收入让你偿还债务，但是你如果借钱买一台拖拉机，用它来收获更多的庄稼，赚更多的钱，你就能偿还债务，提高生活水平。
In an economy with credit, we can follow the transactions and see how credit creates growth. Let me give you an example, suppose you earn $100,000 a year and have no debt, you are credit worthy enough to borrow $10,000, say on a credit card. So, you can spend $110,000 even though you only earn $100,000, since your spending is another person’s income, someone is earning $110,000. The person earning $110,000 with no debt can borrow $11,000, so he can spend $121,000 even though he has only earned $110,000. His spending is another person’s income, and by following the transactions, we can begin to see how this process works in a self reinforcement pattern. But remember, borrowing creates cycles and if the cycle goes up, it eventually needs to come down, this leads us into the short term debt cycle.在有信贷的经济运行中，我们可以跟踪各种交易，观察信贷如何带来经济增长。我举一个例子，假设你每年挣10万美元，没有任何债务，你有不错的信用可以借1万美元，比如用信用卡借。因此你每年可以花11万美元，即时你的收入只有10万美元。由于你的支出是别人的收入，另一个人因此挣了11万美元，这个挣了11万美元的人如果没有任何债务，可以借1.1万美元，他可以消费12.1万美元，即使他的年收入只有11万美元。由于他的支出是另一个人的收入，而我们通过跟踪个人的交易可以看到这个过程不断自我强化。但不要忘记借债形成，周期会上升最终也会下降。