前聯邦儲備委員會主席伯南克認為，為了降低通脹，經濟必須進一步放緩。| CNN商業

Former Fed Chair Bernanke argues economy must slow further to bring down inflation | CNN Business 前聯邦儲備委員會主席伯南克認為，為了降低通脹，經濟必須進一步放緩。| CNN商業

Washington, DCCNN  —  華盛頓特區CNN —

Former Federal Reserve Chair Ben Bernanke, who steered the central bank during the Great Recession, argued in a newly released paper that the Fed still has more work to do to bring inflation down. 曾經領導聯邦儲備委員會度過大衰退的本·伯南克前主席在一份新發布的論文中表示，聯邦儲備委員會仍有更多工作要做，以降低通脹。

“Looking forward, with labor market slack still below sustainable levels and inflation expectations modestly higher, we conclude that the Fed is unlikely to be able to avoid slowing the economy to return inflation to target,” Bernanke and Olivier Blanchard, a former International Monetary Fund chief economist, wrote in the paper released Tuesday. 「展望未來，勞動力市場仍未達到可持續水平，通脹預期略高，我們得出結論，聯邦儲備委員會難以避免減緩經濟以達到通脹目標。」伯南克和前國際貨幣基金組織首席經濟學家奧利維爾·布朗查德在周二發布的論文中寫道。

Inflation has cooled in the past several months, according to the Fed’s preferred inflation gauge and the Consumer Price Index, though some Fed officials have said that it’s not cooling fast enough. The new study co-authored by the former Fed chair argued that the labor market has become a larger contributor of inflation, and might prove to be a stubborn source of price pressures that might only be remedied by an economic downturn. 通貨膨脹在過去幾個月已經降溫，根據聯邦儲備委員會偏好的通貨膨脹指標和消費者物價指數，儘管一些聯邦儲備委員會官員表示，降溫速度不夠快。這份由前聯邦儲備委員會主席共同撰寫的新研究指出，勞動力市場已成為通貨膨脹的更大貢獻者，可能會成為價格壓力的頑固來源，只有經濟下行才能解決。

Indeed, the labor market remains on strong footing. Employers added 253,000 jobs in April and average hourly earnings rose by 0.5% that month. Jobless claims remain relatively low — though they have trended up in recent weeks — and job openings still exceed the number of unemployed people seeking work. 事實上，勞動市場仍然保持強勁。雇主在四月份新增了253,000個工作崗位，平均每小時工資在當月上漲了0.5%。失業救濟申請仍然相對較低 - 雖然最近幾周有上升趨勢 - 而工作機會仍然超過尋求工作的失業人數。

“Overheating in the labor market has played a minor role but an increasing one over time. As price shocks fade, it is likely to be the dominant factor, requiring a slowdown of the economy to return inflation to target,” Bernanke and Blanchard wrote in a slide show of their paper presented at a forum hosted by the Brookings Institution in Washington, DC. 「勞動市場過熱在過去扮演了較小的角色，但隨著時間的推移，其作用逐漸增加。隨著價格震盪的消退，它很可能成為主要因素，需要減緩經濟增長以將通脹率恢復到目標水平，」伯南克和布蘭查德在他們的論文幻燈片中寫道，該論文在華盛頓特區布魯金斯學會主辦的一個論壇上發表。

The paper analyzed the causes of inflation’s ascension in 2021 and how it has evolved since. 該論文分析了2021年通貨膨脹上升的原因以及其演變情況。

Inflationary pressures began in the goods market that year as commodity prices spiked and American consumers, flush with stimulus payments at the time, dealt with the goods shortages, according to the study. Overall inflation crept up throughout that year, then the Fed began to raise interest rates in March 2022 from near zero. 根據該研究，當年商品價格飆升，美國消費者因當時的刺激付款而面臨商品短缺，貨物市場開始出現通貨膨脹壓力。整體通貨膨脹在那一年逐漸上升，然後聯邦儲備委員會從2022年3月開始將利率從接近零的水平提高。

The central bank has seen some progress since raising interest rates 10 times in a row, though bank stresses emerged earlier this year as inflation slowed, raising some concerns over the effects of the Fed’s aggressive rate hiking campaign. Despite the failures of three regional banks since March, the Fed still raised interest rates two more times during that period. 自從連續10次加息以來，中央銀行已經看到了一些進展，儘管在通脹放緩時出現了銀行壓力，引發了一些對聯邦政府積極加息行動影響的擔憂。儘管自3月以來已經有三家地區銀行失敗，但聯邦儲備委員會在此期間仍然加息了兩次。

After officials voted unanimously to raise the central bank’s benchmark lending rate by a quarter point earlier this month, they indicated in their post-meeting statement that a future pause in rate hikes is now a possibility. 本月早些時候，官員們一致投票通過將中央銀行基準貸款利率上調四分之一個百分點，他們在會後聲明中表示，未來暫停加息現在是可能的。

But some Fed officials have indicated in recent speeches and interviews that they’re not yet convinced that inflation is on a certain path toward the central’s banks 2% target, intensifying the debate over raising rates again or pausing. 但一些聯邦儲備委員會官員在最近的演講和採訪中表示，他們尚未確信通脹是否會朝著中央銀行2%的目標發展，加劇了再次加息或暫停的辯論。

Data gauging the state of the labor market in coming weeks and a CPI report during the Fed’s two-day meeting in mid-June will further inform officials on whether to opt for an additional rate hike or a pause. Officials will also be taking into consideration credit conditions and the lagged effects of tighter monetary policy, which could further dampen demand. 在六月中旬聯邦公開市場委員會（Fed）的兩天會議期間，關於勞動力市場未來幾週的數據和消費者物價指數報告將進一步告知官員們是否選擇進行額外的加息或暫停。官員們還將考慮信貸條件和貨幣政策收緊的滯後效應，這可能會進一步抑制需求。

Mary Daly, president of the Federal Reserve Bank of San Francisco, said during a conference on Monday that the time when rising interest rates begin to notably impact the broader economy “is getting nearer and we have to be extremely mindful that that built up slowing is already in the chain could start to show through at any point in time.” 舊金山聯邦儲備銀行總裁瑪麗·戴利在週一的一次會議上表示，當升息開始明顯影響整個經濟時，“這個時刻越來越近，我們必須非常謹慎，因為已經在鏈條中建立的減速可能隨時開始顯示出來。”

“And when you add the credit tightening that we’ve been seeing to that, it means that there’s a lot of factors pulling back the reins on the economy and that’s why we have to be so critically data-dependent, because if we think it’s not here yet and then we tighten too much, we can easily create an unforced error where we’ve over tightened,” Daly, who isn’t currently voting on interest-rate decisions, said. 當你加上我們一直看到的信貸緊縮時，這意味著有很多因素在制約經濟，這就是為什麼我們必須如此關鍵地依賴數據，因為如果我們認為它還沒有到來，然後我們緊縮得太多，我們很容易創造一個非強制性錯誤，我們已經過度緊縮了，”戴利說。戴利目前不參與利率決策的投票。

新聞來源: CNN (#國際新聞)

原文網址:

https://edition.cnn.com/2023/05/23/economy/bernanke-inflation-paper-brookings/index.html