先生，我大体赞同吉迪恩•拉赫曼(Gideon Rachman)在《中国不再是穷国》中阐述的观点：如果中国允许人民币对美元升值更多、更快地改善公民自由，世界各国都会受益。但我有如下保留意见。
首先，中国比拉赫曼先生所谈到的更为贫穷。世界银行(World Bank)数字显示，中国平均每天生活费低于2美元的人口约为5亿，而非拉赫曼所说的1.5亿。在与高度现代化的上海距离遥远的西部省份，即使按照南亚的标准衡量，贫困状况都十分严重。
其次，拉赫曼和其他分析人士一样，都过于重视汇率问题，仿佛只要中国允许人民币大幅升值，中国顺差和美国赤字问题就能得到明显改观。然而，要想抵消高生产率和低工资（西部源源不断的劳动力供给压低了工资水平）带来的竞争优势，升值幅度必须要高得令人难以置信。
第三，中国无视本国汇率政策的外部效应、“全力以赴”地追求经济增长的战略，部分原因在于中国领导人担心中国“未富先老”。在一代人的时间内，中国人口年龄就会超过美国。中国担忧的是，自己尚未跻身发达经济体的行列，就丧失了年轻劳动力的优势，从而在全球经济的“半外围”(semi-peripheral)角色上裹足不前。
第四，领导人无视本国经济政策对世界其它国家的深远影响的大型经济体，决非只有中国一家。美国及其货币政策就是一个明显例证——“美元是我们的货币，却是你们的问题”。而中国起码还有“贫穷”的借口。
罗伯特•H•韦德(Robert H. Wade)
英国，伦敦政治经济学院(LSE)
译者/何黎
http://www.ftchinese.com/story/001035253
From Prof Robert H. Wade.
Sir, I broadly agree with Gideon Rachman (“China can no longer plead poverty”, October 26) that the world at large would be better off if China allowed its exchange rate to appreciate more against the US dollar and improved civil liberties at a faster pace. Then come the qualifications. First, China can plead more poverty than Mr Rachman suggests. World Bank figures indicate that the number of people who live on less than about $2 a day is more like 500m than Mr Rachman’s 150m. Out in the western provinces, far from ultra-modern Shanghai, poverty levels are bad even by south Asian standards. Second, he and most other analysts give the exchange rate too much significance, as though the problem of China’s surpluses and US deficits could be substantially eliminated if only China would allow a sizable appreciation. The appreciation would have to be implausibly large, however, to offset the competitive advantage of high productivity and low wages (held down by the almost unlimited labour supply out west). Third, China’s disregard of the external effects of its exchange rate policy and its “go for broke” growth strategy is driven partly by its leaders’ fears that it will become old before it becomes rich. Within a generation it will have an older population than the US. The fear is that it will become stuck in a “semi-peripheral” role in the world economy, unable to rise to the ranks of developed economies as it loses the advantages of a young labour force. Fourth, China is by no means the only large economy whose leaders have disregarded the far-reaching effects of their economic policies on the rest of the world. Exhibit A is the US and its monetary policy, as in “the dollar is our currency and your problem”. China does at least have the excuse of poverty. Robert H. Wade, London School of Economics, UK
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