In the first part of this mini-series, I surveyed howrobots, automation and other productivity-enhancing technology is affecting industries at theheart of the economy as well as some more exoticscience fiction examples. In the second part, Iconsidered the “Solow paradox” — the strangecombination of breathless innovation withstagnant labour productivity (though not sostrange when you realise there is not that muchinvestment in capital embodying the newtechnologies).
在這幾篇迷你系列文章的第一部分，我調(diào)查了現(xiàn)今機器人、自動化以及其他提高生產(chǎn)率的技術(shù)是如何影響經(jīng)濟核心產(chǎn)業(yè)以及一些更奇特的科幻小說例子。在第二部分，我考察了“索洛悖論”(Solow paradox)——令人喘不過氣的創(chuàng)新與停滯不前的勞動生產(chǎn)率的奇怪組合（不過當(dāng)你意識到并沒有那么多體現(xiàn)新技術(shù)的投資時，這就沒那么奇怪了）。
Today, we focus on the question of greatest political consequence. Who stole the jobs — wasit robots or foreigners? Or less tendentiously, was the falling number of manufacturing jobs inrich countries caused by trade liberalisation or by automation and other productivity-enhancingtechnological change?
現(xiàn)在，我們把重點放在這帶來的最大的政治影響上。誰偷走了工作——是機器人還是外國人？或者不那么帶有傾向性地來看，富裕國家制造業(yè)就業(yè)數(shù)量不斷下滑，是由貿(mào)易自由化或自動化和其他提高生產(chǎn)率的技術(shù)變革造成的嗎？
For it is largely manufacturing jobs we are talking about. The US is special in that overallemployment rates (for all jobs taken together) have fallen since the turn of the century, and forlonger than that among men. As Jason Furman and his colleagues have documentedextensively, the US faces an especially aggravating version of a more common problem inwhich manufacturing jobs have not only disappeared but failed to be replaced by anything at all.
我們主要討論制造業(yè)就業(yè)。美國的特殊之處在于，自從進入21世紀(jì)以來，總體就業(yè)率（所有工作都算在一起）一直下滑，并且下滑時間長于男性就業(yè)率下滑的時間。正如杰森?福爾曼(Jason Furman)及其同事記錄的大量文檔所表明的那樣，美國正面臨著一個比較普遍的問題的嚴(yán)重版——制造業(yè)崗位不僅消失了，而且沒有得到任何替代。
So are robots or trade to blame? The simple and largely true answer is: both. But there is stilla question of their relative importance, and of what exactly the blame entails.
那么到底該怪機器人還是貿(mào)易？一個簡單而大致上正確的回答是：兩者都怪。但現(xiàn)在還存在另一個問題——兩者相對的重要性、以及它們到底罪在哪里。
All industrialised countries have been shedding labour in manufacturing for decades, a processthat started before the wave of globalisation in the 1990s. It is clear that the balance of tradehas little to do with it: the similarities between structural change in employment in perennial-surplus Germany and permanent-deficit US are much greater than the differences.
數(shù)十年來，所有工業(yè)化國家的制造業(yè)都在減員，該過程始于上世紀(jì)90年代全球化浪潮開始前。貿(mào)易差額明顯與該問題無關(guān)：常年處于貿(mào)易順差的德國與始終處于貿(mào)易逆差的美國，在就業(yè)結(jié)構(gòu)變化方面的相似點遠(yuǎn)遠(yuǎn)超過差異。
But the growth in overall trade that accompanied the regional and global trade liberalisationduring the three decades before the global financial crisis will have the effect of changing theemployment and production structure of the opening economies — indeed that is part of thepoint of lowering trade barriers. Standard theory predicts that with more open trade, countrieswill specialise more intensively in production that makes most use of their relative endowmentof labour, skill, capital and natural resources.
但全球金融危機發(fā)生前的30年里的區(qū)域和全球貿(mào)易自由化帶來的總體貿(mào)易增長，將會改變開放型經(jīng)濟體的就業(yè)和生產(chǎn)結(jié)構(gòu)——實際上這正是減少貿(mào)易壁壘的部分意義。標(biāo)準(zhǔn)理論預(yù)測，隨著進一步開放貿(mào)易，各國將更集中地專攻最大化地利用它們在勞動力、技能、資本和自然資源上的相對稟賦的生產(chǎn)。
Recent research by Adrian Wood measures to what extent this has indeed happened. As thetable below shows (for more detail, look up the background paper) the share of manufacturingin global production and employment fell noticeably in the three decades from 1985. Butdifferent regions went through dramatically different changes. In particular, in most land-scarce regions (particularly prone to specialise in manufacturing, according to theory) theshare of manufacturing in the economy expanded, while it shrank in all land-abundant ones.
艾德里安?伍德(Adrian Wood)最近的研究衡量了這種情況發(fā)生的程度。如下表所示（若需要更多細(xì)節(jié)，請查閱相關(guān)論文），在1985年之后的30年里，制造業(yè)在全球生產(chǎn)和就業(yè)中所占比例明顯下滑。但不同地區(qū)經(jīng)歷了截然不同的變化。尤其是，在大多數(shù)土地稀缺的地區(qū)（根據(jù)理論，這些是尤其傾向于專攻制造業(yè)的地區(qū)），制造業(yè)在經(jīng)濟中的占比有所擴大，而在所有土地充裕的地區(qū)，制造業(yè)在經(jīng)濟中的占比縮小了。
Wood suggests this shows that the dramatic changes in manufacturing employment can belaid at the door of economic globalisation. But the story is not as simple as that. Look wherethe biggest changes in employment shares happened. Among rich countries (OECD members),the manufacturing employment share fell just as much in land-rich and land-scarce economies.The output share increased in land-scarce ones — but in conjunction with the loss ofmanufacturing jobs, this is surely an effect of automation and technology. Meanwhile the twoother regions with particularly large structural changes were the Soviet sphere, which in 1985had an overgrown and inefficient manufacturing sector that collapsed under its own weightonce the economy was liberalised, and China, whose liberalisation and trade integration surelycontributed to its industrial revolution.
伍德認(rèn)為，這表明制造業(yè)就業(yè)的急劇變化可以歸咎于經(jīng)濟全球化。但事實沒那么簡單�？纯茨男┑貐^(qū)的制造業(yè)就業(yè)占比變化最大。在富裕國家中（經(jīng)合組織(OECD)成員國），土地充裕經(jīng)濟體與土地稀缺經(jīng)濟體的制造業(yè)就業(yè)占比降幅相當(dāng)。制造業(yè)在土地稀缺經(jīng)濟體的產(chǎn)出中的占比增加——但同時制造業(yè)就業(yè)流失，這肯定是自動化和技術(shù)的影響。與此同時，另外兩個結(jié)構(gòu)變化特別大的地區(qū)是前蘇聯(lián)地區(qū)和中國。前者在1985年制造業(yè)發(fā)展過快、效率低下，在經(jīng)濟進行自由化時被自身重量壓垮，而后者的自由化和貿(mào)易一體化顯然促進了工業(yè)變革。
What all this points to, then, is a process in which many poor countries went from a pre-industrial employment structure to an industrial one (but some stagnated, in particular inAfrica), and in which all rich countries largely went from an industrial to a service-basedemployment structure. The poor country transition or lack of it no doubt owes a lot to theability to enter the world trading system. In the rich country transition this looks more likewhat you would expect from the continued growth in manufacturing productivity, echoingwhat had earlier happened in agriculture.
那么，這一切都指向了很多貧窮國家從工業(yè)化前就業(yè)結(jié)構(gòu)到工業(yè)化就業(yè)結(jié)構(gòu)的過程（但有些國家的這一過程陷入了停滯，特別是在非洲），以及所有富裕國家基本上從工業(yè)化就業(yè)結(jié)構(gòu)到以服務(wù)業(yè)為基礎(chǔ)的就業(yè)結(jié)構(gòu)的過程。貧窮國家實現(xiàn)轉(zhuǎn)型或未能轉(zhuǎn)型，無疑與它們進入世界貿(mào)易體系的能力有很大關(guān)系。而富裕國家的轉(zhuǎn)型，看起來更像是制造業(yè)生產(chǎn)率持續(xù)增長所必然帶來的，與之前農(nóng)業(yè)出現(xiàn)的情況相似。
And conversely, there is direct evidence for the automation thesis. A new study by DaronAcemoglu and Pascual Restrepo tries to measure the effect on US jobs (and wages) of theincreased use of industrial robots. An interview with Acemoglu about the findings puts thenumber of manufacturing jobs lost because of robots at 670,000 between 1990 and 2007.
相反，有直接證據(jù)支撐了自動化造成制造業(yè)失業(yè)的論點。達龍?阿西莫格魯(Daron Acemoglu)和帕斯夸爾?雷斯特雷波(Pascual Restrepo)的新研究試圖衡量，加大使用工業(yè)機器人對美國就業(yè)（和工資水平）的影響。在一篇就研究發(fā)現(xiàn)對阿西莫格魯?shù)牟稍L中，1990年至2007年因機器人而造成的制造業(yè)失業(yè)數(shù)字為67萬。
What lessons can we draw? First, that both trade and automation play a role. But second andmore importantly, that the two cannot be neatly separated — automation-driven productivitygrowth and attendant job loss may be both an ultimately unavoidable part of economicchange and be accelerated by trade liberalisation. Rich economies with highly-skilled labourforces are well placed to respond to greater trade by specialising in higher-value addedproducts — just those where automation can do the most to increase productivity. Hence, forexample, the success so far of the US car industry, which produces more vehicles than ever andexports finished cars to China.
我們能得出什么結(jié)論呢？首先，貿(mào)易和自動化都發(fā)揮了作用。但第二點也是更為重要的一點是，二者無法徹底分開，由自動化驅(qū)動的生產(chǎn)率增長以及隨之而來的就業(yè)流失可能都是經(jīng)濟變革最終不可避免的一部分，并且被貿(mào)易自由化加速。擁有高技能勞動力的富裕經(jīng)濟體有能力通過專門生產(chǎn)更高附加值的產(chǎn)品，應(yīng)對貿(mào)易擴大——在更高附加值產(chǎn)品領(lǐng)域，自動化最能提高生產(chǎn)率。例如迄今美國汽車業(yè)的成功，其生產(chǎn)的汽車數(shù)量超過任何時候，并將整車出口到中國。
But third, that a protectionist trade policy may not do much good even if trade was part ofwhat eroded certain jobs in the past. For if trade helped automation along the way, it is not asif restricting it will wind automation back. At most it may delay further automation, but that willcome at a cost. In particular, it will make it harder to export manufacturing goods into aglobal market that uses the most cost-effective techniques. Trade sceptics who aim toprotect manufacturing jobs should be alert to the distinction of protectionism andmercantilism. While the latter aims to boost exports, the former, by restricting imports, maywell hold back exports, too.
但第三，盡管貿(mào)易曾經(jīng)造成過去某些就業(yè)的消失，但保護主義貿(mào)易政策可能也不會有大好處。因為，即使貿(mào)易曾經(jīng)在這個過程中幫助過自動化，限制貿(mào)易也不會讓自動化倒退。它充其量可能會推遲進一步自動化，但這是要付出代價的。特別的，它將加大把制造業(yè)產(chǎn)品出口到利用最節(jié)約成本技術(shù)的全球市場的難度。試圖保護制造業(yè)就業(yè)的貿(mào)易懷疑論者應(yīng)注意保護主義和重商主義的區(qū)別。后者旨在擴大出口，而前者由于限制進口很有可能同樣阻礙出口。
