Lawrence Summers has poured gallons of icy water on any remaining optimists. Speaking on a panel at the International Monetary Fund’s annual research conference, the former US Treasury secretary suggested that there could be no easy return to pre-crisis normality in high-income economies. Instead, he sketched out a disturbing future of chronically weak demand and slow economic growth. Mr Summers is not the first to identify the possibility of so-called “secular stagnation”: the fear of emulating Japan’s lost decade has been in the minds of thoughtful analysts since the crisis. But his was a bravura performance.
劳伦斯•萨默斯(Lawrence Summers)给所有依然乐观的人泼了一盆冷水。在国际货币基金组织(IMF)年度研究会议一个专门小组会上的讲话中，这位美国前财长认为，高收入manbetx20客户端下载 体可能很难恢复到危机之前的常态。他还勾勒出一幅令人焦虑的未来场景：需求长期疲弱，manbetx20客户端下载 增长缓慢。萨默斯并不是第一个看出所谓“长期停滞”可能性的人：危机爆发以来，思虑周全的分析师们就担忧日本“失去的十年”在其他地方上演。但他提出这一看法颇具勇气。