TED演讲:下一次工业革命就在眼前(1)

 Guys, we have an issue. Growth is fading away, and it's a big deal. 各位，我们遇到问题了。经济增长逐渐放缓，这可是个大问题。

Our global economy stops growing. And it's not new. 全球经济停止增长。这已经不是什么新闻了。

Growth has actually declined for the last 50 years. 事实上，过去50年来增速一直在逐渐放缓。

If we continue like this, we need to learn how to live in a world with no growth in the next decade. 如果这一态势延续下去，我们就必须学习如何在无经济增长的情况下生存。

This is scary because when the economy doesn't grow, our children don't get better lives. 这听起来很恐怖，因为一旦经济发展停滞，我们的孩子就无法拥有更好的生活。

What's even scarier is that when the pie does not grow, each of us get a smaller piece. 更加可怕的是一旦馅饼不再变大，每个人分到的份额就会更小，

We're then ready to fight for a bigger one. This creates tensions and serious conflicts. Growth matters a lot. 要随时备战以争取更大的馅饼。形势就会紧张，出现严重的冲突。经济增长事关重大。

If we look at the history of growth, times of big growth have always been fueled by big manufacturing revolutions. 如果我们回顾经济增长史，就会发现高速增长往往都由大型工业革命带动。

It happened three times, every 50-60 years. 这在历史上一共发生了三次，每50到60年一次。

The steam engine in the middle of the 19th century, the mass-production model in the beginning of the 20th century, thanks, Mr. Ford¹. 它们分别是：19世纪中叶的蒸汽机，20世纪早期的大规模生产模型——这要感谢福特先生。

And the first automation wave in the 1970s. 和20世纪70年代的第一次自动化浪潮。

Why did these manufacturing revolutions create huge growth in our economies? 为什么这些工业革命会引发经济高速增长呢？

Because they have injected huge productivity improvement. 因为他们显著提高了生产效率。

It's rather simple: in order to grow, you need to be producing more, putting more into our economy. 这其实很简单：为了实现增长，人们需要生产更多的产品，为我们的经济投入更多的资源。

This means either more labor² or more capital or more productivity. 这就意味着需要更多劳动力，更多资本或更高的生产力。

Each time, productivity has been the growth lever. 每次，生产力都是经济增长的杠杆因素。

1 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。

2 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。