美国国家公共电台 NPR--People in Britain may have to cut down on their afternoon tea

People in Britain may have to cut down on their afternoon tea

Transcript¹

Food prices in the United Kingdom are going through the roof, and wages are stagnating². Can the next prime minister who will take over for the departing Boris Johnson handle the heat?

LEILA FADEL, HOST:

The U.K. will have a new prime minister in a few weeks, and that person will face a laundry list of economic issues, including high inflation and sluggish³ growth. The pandemic and the war in Ukraine are partly to blame, but there are other reasons the U.K. is having a particularly hard time of it. Paddy Hirsch and Darian Woods from our daily economics podcast The Indicator⁴ explain.

DARIAN WOODS, BYLINE⁵: Diane Coyle is an economist⁶ and professor of public policy at Cambridge University. Diane points to a number of issues affecting the economy that are specific to the U.S. So first, the labor⁷ market. On the surface, things look pretty healthy, like in the U.S. Unemployment is low, and the labor market is hot, which should give workers the upper hand when it comes to negotiating pay. But wages in the U.K. have stagnated⁸ over the last decade.

DIANE COYLE: We've had a labor market that has created plentiful⁹ jobs, but a lot of them have been quite low-quality jobs, gig economy, warehouse-type jobs. And workers in those don't have a lot of bargaining power, so they can't bid up their wages.

PADDY HIRSCH, BYLINE: Part of the U.K.'s labor problem derives¹⁰ from the country's very expensive housing market. A desperate shortage of housing drives rent costs up, and it makes it hard for workers to move around the country.

COYLE: It means that the economy becomes much less flexible. So as new demands emerge or new areas of growth become possible, it's very hard to get the labor supply response that you would need to those.

HIRSCH: And breaking that impasse¹¹ requires investment in different regions of the U.K. But Diane says that really hasn't happened enough. The result is that one part of the country's doing really well. That's London and the southeast. It attracts the lion's share of the money that's spent developing new businesses and building new houses. The rest of the country sees only a small fraction of that investment, which means that those areas are stagnating, and that's affecting the country's productivity.

WOODS: So if you take the G-7, the group of seven wealthy nations, the U.K.'s productivity growth rate is second to last.

COYLE: And it's a system problem. And I can give you a list of things that have gone wrong - low investment, very centralized government decision-making, really inadequate¹² skills training, constant chopping and changing of policies, an economy that's much too weighted towards financial services and professional services at the expense of manufacturing.

WOODS: And this is key. The U.K. is overwhelmingly a service economy. More than 80% of the country's wealth is generated by services like finance and business and tourism. Less than 20% comes from industry and less than 1% from agriculture.

HIRSCH: Before Britain's departure from the European Union in 2020, also known as Brexit, there was a lot of talk about rebalancing the economy and developing industry. But as it turns out, Brexit has so far only hampered¹³ Britain's ability to grow.

COYLE: If you look at what's happened to trade for most of our comparative countries since the pandemic started easing, they've all seen that trade recover. And that hasn't happened here in the U.K.

WOODS: Diane says that the U.K. has had such a seesaw¹⁴ of economic policies over the last 20 years that businesses have been unable to plan effectively. Their inability to predict what the commercial landscape will look like has had a chilling effect on their operations and on the wider economy.

COYLE: I can't see how we get sensible policies in the economic and political environment in which we find ourselves.

WOODS: Boris Johnson's successor will be announced on September 5.

HIRSCH: Paddy Hirsch.

WOODS: Darian Woods, NPR News.

1 transcript   

n.抄本，誊本，副本，肄业证书

参考例句：

• A transcript of the tapes was presented as evidence in court.一份录音带的文字本作为证据被呈交法庭。
• They wouldn't let me have a transcript of the interview.他们拒绝给我一份采访的文字整理稿。

2 stagnating   

v.停滞，不流动，不发展( stagnate的现在分词 )

参考例句：

• I feel I'm stagnating in this job. 我觉得，干这份工作我没有长进。
• ITT was stagnating when Geneen became the chief executive officer in 1959. 1959年吉宁出任行政总负责人时，国际电话电报公司正处于不景气时期。 来自辞典例句

3 sluggish   

adj.懒惰的，迟钝的，无精打采的

参考例句：

• This humid heat makes you feel rather sluggish.这种湿热的天气使人感到懒洋洋的。
• Circulation is much more sluggish in the feet than in the hands.脚部的循环比手部的循环缓慢得多。

4 indicator   

n.指标；指示物，指示者；指示器

参考例句：

• Gold prices are often seen as an indicator of inflation.黃金价格常常被看作是通货膨胀的指标。
• His left-hand indicator is flashing.他左手边的转向灯正在闪亮。

5 byline   

n.署名；v.署名

参考例句：

• His byline was absent as well.他的署名也不见了。
• We wish to thank the author of this article which carries no byline.我们要感谢这篇文章的那位没有署名的作者。

6 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。

7 labor   

n.劳动，努力，工作，劳工；分娩；vi.劳动，努力，苦干；vt.详细分析；麻烦

参考例句：

• We are never late in satisfying him for his labor.我们从不延误付给他劳动报酬。
• He was completely spent after two weeks of hard labor.艰苦劳动两周后，他已经疲惫不堪了。

8 stagnated   

v.停滞，不流动，不发展( stagnate的过去式和过去分词 )

参考例句：

• The balloting had stagnated, he couldn't win. 投票工作陷于停顿，他不能得胜。 来自辞典例句
• His mind has stagnated since his retirement. 他退休后头脑迟钝了。 来自辞典例句

9 plentiful   

adj.富裕的，丰富的

参考例句：

• Their family has a plentiful harvest this year.他们家今年又丰收了。
• Rainfall is plentiful in the area.这个地区雨量充足。

10 derives   

v.得到( derive的第三人称单数 )；（从…中）得到获得；源于；（从…中）提取

参考例句：

• English derives in the main from the common Germanic stock. 英语主要源于日耳曼语系。 来自《简明英汉词典》
• He derives his income from freelance work. 他以自由职业获取收入。 来自《简明英汉词典》

11 impasse   

n.僵局；死路

参考例句：

• The government had reached an impasse.政府陷入绝境。
• Negotiations seemed to have reached an impasse.谈判似乎已经陷入僵局。

12 inadequate   

adj.(for,to)不充足的，不适当的

参考例句：

• The supply is inadequate to meet the demand.供不应求。
• She was inadequate to the demands that were made on her.她还无力满足对她提出的各项要求。

13 hampered   

妨碍，束缚，限制( hamper的过去式和过去分词 )

参考例句：

• The search was hampered by appalling weather conditions. 恶劣的天气妨碍了搜寻工作。
• So thought every harassed, hampered, respectable boy in St. Petersburg. 圣彼德堡镇的那些受折磨、受拘束的体面孩子们个个都是这么想的。

14 seesaw   

n.跷跷板

参考例句：

• Prices have gone up and down like a seesaw this year.今年的价格像跷跷板一样时涨时跌。
• The children are playing at seesaw.孩子们在玩跷跷板。