美国企业是全球化的主宰者

 　　At a in dinner in Silicon¹ Valley in 2011, President Barack Obama is reported to have asked Steve Jobs what it would take for Apple to employ Americans in America to make iPhones. With characteristic candour, Mr Jobs replied: “Those jobs aren’t coming back.”

　　据报道，2011年在硅谷的一场晚宴上，时任美国总统巴拉克?奥巴马(Barack Obama)问史蒂夫?乔布斯(Steve Jobs)，苹果(Apple)怎样才会在美国雇用美国人生产iPhone。乔布斯以自己特有的直率回答道：“那些工作不会回来了。”

　　In that one comment he was making three points that President Donald Trump² might consider as he wends his curious way between deregulation and protectionism, between slashing³ taxes to liberate⁴ business and a heavy-handed industrial policy.

　　这句话中所表达出的三层意思，现任美国总统唐纳德?特朗普(President Donald)或许应当考虑。目前，特朗普正在“去监管”与保护主义之间、在减税以解除企业包袱与高压的产业政策之间走一条不同寻常的道路。

　　The first point was that politicians had to stop kidding themselves about bringing manufacturing jobs back to America. Some may return, but never on the scale of the post-second world war years. Brains and busywork have replaced brawn⁵. The vision of the American worker has gone from the great, sinewy⁶ He-Men of Thomas Hart Benton’s murals, heaving rocks and pounding metal, to Google programmers and the office-park slackers of Workaholics.

　　第一点是，政治家们别再欺骗自己，说什么可以让制造业就业岗位回到美国。部分就业岗位可能回到美国，但绝不会有二战后那样的规模。脑力和琐碎工作取代了体力劳动。美国工人的形象已经从托马斯?哈特?本顿(Thomas Hart Benton)壁画中身形伟岸、肌肉发达、举石锤铁的硬汉，变为谷歌(Google)的程序员和情景喜剧《工作狂》(Workaholics)中那些上班像逛公园一样闲散的员工。

　　Mr Jobs’ second point was that outsourcing was no longer just a hunt for the lowest possible cost. The best plants in Shenzhen had shot up the learning curve, to become the best of their kind at any price. Even if Apple were to build a plant in America and pay American workers American wages, it would take a long time to manufacture with the speed, precision and flexibility⁷ the company could achieve with its partners in China. And that is to assume the Chinese stopped getting better.

　　乔布斯话中的第二点意思是，外包不再只是尽可能寻找最低成本。深圳最好的工厂快速拉升了学习曲线，不惜一切代价要成为同行中的翘楚。即便苹果在美国建厂、向美国工人发美国水平的工资，也需要很长时间才能达到其在中国与合作伙伴所能达到的制造速度、精度和灵活性。这还是在假定中国合作伙伴不再提升水平的情况下。

　　And the third was that the best US companies had become brilliant at managing across borders and directing resources to where they generate the highest returns. They weren’t victims of globalisation. They were its masters and had become less and less American.

　　第三点是，最优秀的美国企业已非常擅长跨国界管理以及将资源配置至可产生最高收益的地区。他们不是全球化的受害者。他们是全球化的主宰者，而且变得越来越“去美国化”。

　　In 1990, the economist⁸ Robert Reich published an article titled “Who Is Us?” He argued that the success of US-owned corporations and American competitiveness were the same thing. Business was off plundering⁹ new markets and employing tens of thousands of foreign workers. Meanwhile, foreign companies, notably¹⁰ the Japanese, were investing in American plants and factories, hiring American workers, and teaching their American rivals how to be more productive. Foreigners were driving American competitiveness, while Americans were off seeking higher returns on capital overseas. So to his question “who is us?” Mr Reich answered: “The American workforce¹¹, the American people, but not particularly the American corporation.” And this was several years before the North American Free Trade Agreement.

　　1990年，罗伯特?赖克(Robert Reich)发表了一篇题为《我们是谁？》(Who Is Us?)的文章。他认为，美国企业的成功与美国的竞争力是一回事。美国企业不再抢夺新市场，不再雇用数以万计的外籍工人。与此同时，外国公司（尤其是日本公司）在美国投资建厂、雇用美国工人，教美国竞争对手如何提高生产效率。外国人推动了美国竞争力的提升，而美国人不再在海外寻求更高的资本收益。因此，对于他的“我们是谁？”这个问题，赖克回答道：“我们是美国劳动力、美国人，但不见得是美国企业。”那时距《北美自由贸易协定》(North American Free Trade Agreement)签订还有好几年。

　　These decades of multinational¹² shape-shifting have made America’s largest corporations easy prey¹³ for an economic nationalist. Ford¹⁴, for example, has 199,000 employees worldwide, of whom only 48 per cent are in America. Apple has about 66,000 employees in the US yet is reported to have had almost five times that number working on making a single version of the iPhone at its Chinese supplier, Hon Hai.

　　这几十年来，美国大企业朝着跨国公司的形式转变，使它们很容易成为经济民族主义者的攻击目标。例如，福特(Ford)在全球拥有19.9万名员工，其中只有48%是在美国。苹果在美国拥有约6.6万名员工，但据称在苹果的中国供应商鸿海(Hon Hai)，生产一款iPhone的工人就几乎是这一数字的五倍。

　　If one accepts Milton Friedman’s argument that a corporation’s sole responsibility is to its owners, then one cannot find fault with these multinationals¹⁵. They plant their flag where the money is. Their shareholders¹⁶ don’t want them playing the “Star Spangled Banner” in the boardroom. And while they may not directly be investing in American workers, they are generating returns for US investors¹⁷ who can reallocate their capital as they see fit. Mr Trump has done precisely¹⁸ this with his own business, investing in property deals far beyond US shores.

　　如果你接受米尔顿?弗里德曼(Milton Friedman)的观点，即一家公司唯独需要向其所有者负责，那你就挑不出这些跨国公司有什么错。哪儿能赚钱他们就上哪儿。股东们不希望他们在董事会会议室奏响美国国歌。虽然他们或许没有直接在美国工人身上投资，但他们在为美国投资者带来回报，而后者可以将资本再配置到自己认为合适的地方。特朗普在自己名下的企业中就是这样做的，在远离美国的地方从事房地产交易。

　　But this is a fragile argument and Mr Trump is gleefully smashing it to pieces. He knows you cannot respond to stagnant¹⁹ wages and economic insecurity among the working and middle classes with the crystalline logic²⁰ of a Nobel-winning economist. And he is threatening to perp walk before the press any companies that disappoint him.

　　但这一论点不太有力，特朗普正得意地将它撕成碎片。他知道，你无法用一名诺贝尔经济学奖得主的清晰逻辑来应对中产工薪阶层工资增长停滞及经济上缺乏保障的问题。他威胁要让任何令他失望的企业在媒体上曝光。

　　The other problem for US multinationals is the 2004 Homeland Investment Act, which gave companies a tax break if they repatriated²¹ foreign income. The government told them they were being given this on the condition they invested in R&D and worker training. They were not to hand it all out to shareholders through dividends²² and buybacks. Guess what happened next?

　　美国跨国公司面临的另一个问题是2004年的《本土投资法案》(Homeland Investment Act)，该法案规定企业将海外收入汇回国内可享受税收减免。美国政府告诉他们，只要他们投资研发和员工培训，就可以享受减免。他们没有通过派息和股票回购将海外利润全部分给股东。猜猜接下来发生了什么？

　　全球化.jpg

　　The problem was the “fungibility of money”. Once companies brought their foreign money home and ran it through the accounts, it became a shell game. The government couldn’t keep track of which money was what, and where overseas funds were going. Shareholders got somewhere between 62 and 90 cents of every dollar repatriated.

　　问题在于“金钱的可替代性”。企业将海外资金汇回国内并通过国内账目来管理之后，这就和变戏法一样了。政府无法跟踪哪些资金属于什么性质，海外资金去了哪里。股东可以从汇回的每一美元中得到约62至90美分。

　　Today, US companies are holding an estimated $1tn or so in cash overseas. If they were given another opportunity to bring it home, chances are the same thing would happen again.

　　如今，美国企业在海外拥有约1万亿美元现金。如果他们再有机会将这些现金汇回国内，很可能还会发生同样的事情。

　　For global companies, patriotism²³ can be stimulated²⁴ with incentives²⁵ like tax breaks, or threats like tariffs²⁶, but it is not a natural state of mind. Capital hasn’t been scarce these past few years. If businesses saw more value in investing in American workers, they could easily have done so. But they would rather wait for robots.

　　对跨国公司而言，爱国主义可以通过像减免税这样的激励政策或者征收关税之类的威胁激发出来，但这并非一种自然心态。近几年资本并不稀缺。如果企业认为在美国工人身上投资更有价值，它们很可能已经这样做了。但它们宁可等待机器人。

　　The writer is author of ‘What They Teach You at Harvard Business School’

　　本文作者著有《在哈佛商学院他们教你什么》(What They Teach You at Harvard Business School)一书

1 silicon   

n.硅(旧名矽)

参考例句：

• This company pioneered the use of silicon chip.这家公司开创了使用硅片的方法。
• A chip is a piece of silicon about the size of a postage stamp.芯片就是一枚邮票大小的硅片。

2 trump   

n.王牌，法宝；v.打出王牌，吹喇叭

参考例句：

• He was never able to trump up the courage to have a showdown.他始终鼓不起勇气摊牌。
• The coach saved his star player for a trump card.教练保留他的明星选手，作为他的王牌。

3 slashing   

adj.尖锐的；苛刻的；鲜明的；乱砍的v.挥砍( slash的现在分词 )；鞭打；割破；削减

参考例句：

• Slashing is the first process in which liquid treatment is involved. 浆纱是液处理的第一过程。 来自辞典例句
• He stopped slashing his horse. 他住了手，不去鞭打他的马了。 来自辞典例句

4 liberate   

v.解放，使获得自由，释出，放出；vt.解放，使获自由

参考例句：

• They did their best to liberate slaves.他们尽最大能力去解放奴隶。
• This will liberate him from economic worry.这将消除他经济上的忧虑。

5 brawn   

n.体力

参考例句：

• In this job you need both brains and brawn.做这份工作既劳神又费力。
• They relied on brains rather than brawn.他们靠的是脑力，而不是体力。

6 sinewy   

adj.多腱的，强壮有力的

参考例句：

• When muscles are exercised often and properly,they keep the arms firm and sinewy.如果能经常正确地锻炼肌肉的话，双臂就会一直结实而强健。
• His hard hands and sinewy sunburned limbs told of labor and endurance.他粗糙的双手，被太阳哂得发黑的健壮四肢,均表明他十分辛勤，非常耐劳。

7 flexibility   

n.柔韧性，弹性，（光的）折射性，灵活性

参考例句：

• Her great strength lies in her flexibility.她的优势在于她灵活变通。
• The flexibility of a man's muscles will lessen as he becomes old.人老了肌肉的柔韧性将降低。

8 economist   

n.经济学家，经济专家，节俭的人

参考例句：

• He cast a professional economist's eyes on the problem.他以经济学行家的眼光审视这个问题。
• He's an economist who thinks he knows all the answers.他是个经济学家，自以为什么都懂。

9 plundering   

掠夺，抢劫( plunder的现在分词 )

参考例句：

• The troops crossed the country, plundering and looting as they went. 部队经过乡村，一路抢劫掳掠。
• They amassed huge wealth by plundering the colonies. 他们通过掠夺殖民地聚敛了大笔的财富。

10 notably   

adv.值得注意地，显著地，尤其地，特别地

参考例句：

• Many students were absent,notably the monitor.许多学生缺席，特别是连班长也没来。
• A notably short,silver-haired man,he plays basketball with his staff several times a week.他个子明显较为矮小，一头银发，每周都会和他的员工一起打几次篮球。

11 workforce   

n.劳动大军，劳动力

参考例句：

• A large part of the workforce is employed in agriculture.劳动人口中一大部分受雇于农业。
• A quarter of the local workforce is unemployed.本地劳动力中有四分之一失业。

12 multinational   

adj.多国的，多种国籍的；n.多国籍公司，跨国公司

参考例句：

• The firm was taken over by a multinational consulting firm.这家公司被一个跨国咨询公司收购。
• He analyzed the relationship between multinational corporations and under-developed countries.他分析了跨国公司和不发达国家之间的关系。

13 prey   

n.被掠食者，牺牲者，掠食；v.捕食，掠夺，折磨

参考例句：

• Stronger animals prey on weaker ones.弱肉强食。
• The lion was hunting for its prey.狮子在寻找猎物。

14 Ford   

n.浅滩，水浅可涉处；v.涉水，涉过

参考例句：

• They were guarding the bridge,so we forded the river.他们驻守在那座桥上，所以我们只能涉水过河。
• If you decide to ford a stream,be extremely careful.如果已决定要涉过小溪，必须极度小心。

15 multinationals   

跨国公司( multinational的名词复数 )

参考例句：

• These local companies are only small fry compared with the huge multinationals. 同那些跨国公司比，这些当地的公司不过是小鱼小虾。
• Some people believe that the multinationals have too much power. 有人认为跨国公司的权力太大了。

16 shareholders   

n.股东( shareholder的名词复数 )

参考例句：

• The meeting was attended by 90% of shareholders. 90%的股东出席了会议。
• the company's fiduciary duty to its shareholders 公司对股东负有的受托责任

17 investors   

n.投资者，出资者( investor的名词复数 )

参考例句：

• a con man who bilked investors out of millions of dollars 诈取投资者几百万元的骗子
• a cash bonanza for investors 投资者的赚钱机会

18 precisely   

adv.恰好，正好，精确地，细致地

参考例句：

• It's precisely that sort of slick sales-talk that I mistrust.我不相信的正是那种油腔滑调的推销宣传。
• The man adjusted very precisely.那个人调得很准。

19 stagnant   

adj.不流动的，停滞的，不景气的

参考例句：

• Due to low investment,industrial output has remained stagnant.由于投资少，工业生产一直停滞不前。
• Their national economy is stagnant.他们的国家经济停滞不前。

20 logic   

n.逻辑(学)；逻辑性

参考例句：

• What sort of logic is that?这是什么逻辑？
• I don't follow the logic of your argument.我不明白你的论点逻辑性何在。

21 repatriated   

v.把（某人）遣送回国，遣返( repatriate的过去式和过去分词 )

参考例句：

• The refugees were forcibly repatriated. 难民被强制遣送回国。
• Ancient artworks were repatriated from the US to Greece. 古代艺术品从美国遣送回希腊。 来自《简明英汉词典》

22 dividends   

红利( dividend的名词复数 )； 股息； 被除数； （足球彩票的）彩金

参考例句：

• Nothing pays richer dividends than magnanimity. 没有什么比宽宏大量更能得到厚报。
• Their decision five years ago to computerise the company is now paying dividends. 五年前他们作出的使公司电脑化的决定现在正产生出效益。

23 patriotism   

n.爱国精神，爱国心，爱国主义

参考例句：

• His new book is a demonstration of his patriotism.他写的新书是他的爱国精神的证明。
• They obtained money under the false pretenses of patriotism.他们以虚伪的爱国主义为借口获得金钱。

24 stimulated   

a.刺激的

参考例句：

• The exhibition has stimulated interest in her work. 展览增进了人们对她作品的兴趣。
• The award has stimulated her into working still harder. 奖金促使她更加努力地工作。

25 incentives   

激励某人做某事的事物( incentive的名词复数 )； 刺激； 诱因； 动机

参考例句：

• tax incentives to encourage savings 鼓励储蓄的税收措施
• Furthermore, subsidies provide incentives only for investments in equipment. 更有甚者，提供津贴仅是为鼓励增添设备的投资。 来自英汉非文学 - 环境法 - 环境法

26 tariffs   

关税制度； 关税( tariff的名词复数 )； 关税表； （旅馆或饭店等的）收费表； 量刑标准

参考例句：

• British industry was sheltered from foreign competition by protective tariffs. 保护性关税使英国工业免受国际竞争影响。
• The new tariffs have put a stranglehold on trade. 新的关税制对开展贸易极为不利。