通胀有时定义为整个经济体内部价格全面上涨。但通胀所带来的影响很少是普遍感受到的。
在新兴市场国家，通胀正越来越令人担忧。在中国这个最大的新兴市场经济体，4.4%的消费价格通胀已促使党的官员们忙于制订政策，以求遏制物价上涨。其它发展中国家也对通胀感到不安，这种通胀是由“热钱”涌入、推高它们本币汇率或使它们的经济体充斥流动性所致。资本管制，加上政策收紧、甚至价格控制的前景，正令投资者不安。
不过，世界作为一个整体几乎没有什么通胀风险。在欧元区、日本和美国（加起来占世界经济的一半以上），总体价格水平连微幅上升都难以做到。许多个别行业的价格正在下降。剔除食品和能源后的美国核心消费价格指数在过去一年仅上升区区0.6%，这是编制该项指数53年来的最低值。日本的物价正在继续下滑。只有在欧元区，通胀才略有抬头，但仍不到2%，在经济增长相对较快的几个核心经济体甚至更低。
新兴市场国家和富国的遭遇反差明显，但两者有一个共同的起因：即银行体系瘫痪的“掉队”富裕经济体实施的货币刺激措施。各国央行的流动性龙头依然大开，使得那些能够获得信贷的人享受较低利率，对那些被急于“去杠杆化”的银行拒绝放贷的人则没有帮助。当一些人手上的资金超出需要、而另一些人手头缺钱却根本得不到资金时，部分流动性寻找出路涌向世界其它地方就不是什么怪事了。
但是，那些抱怨美国如今只出口通胀的人，应当好好审视一下自己的行动。北京方面尤其没有理由把矛头指向他人。与多数新兴国家不同，中国尚未开放其资本账户，因而能够将外国资本流动拒之门外。但中国由信贷驱动的刺激措施与美联储(Fed)的政策可谓“半斤八两”。
富国的通胀需要再高一点，穷国的通胀需要再低一点。两者的通胀率目前尚未低到（或高到）破坏稳定的程度。但其组分可能足以破坏稳定：食品价格正危险地快速上涨。当食品价格上涨快于整体通胀时，穷人的实际收入将被转移到别处。在经济低迷的富裕经济体，这对那些遭受失业和支出削减最沉重打击的人又是一个负担。在穷国，这对民众和社会秩序都可能产生生死攸关的影响。
译者/和风
http://www.ftchinese.com/story/001035635
Inflation is sometimes defined as a universal rise in prices across an entire economy. Yet inflation’s effects are hardly ever universal.
Across the emerging world, inflation is a growing cause of concern. In China, the biggest emerging market of all, consumer inflation at 4.4 per cent has sent party officials scrambling for policies to rein in price rises. Other developing countries are also feeling uncomfortably inflated by the hot money pushing up their currencies or flooding their economies. Capital controls, and the prospect of policy tightening or even price controls, are making investors nervous.
The world as a whole, however, is hardly at risk from inflation. In the eurozone, Japan and the US – which make up more than half of the world economy – overall price levels struggle to rise at all. Many individual sector prices are falling. US consumer prices excluding food and energy rose at a puny 0.6 per cent over the last year – the lowest rate in the 53 years the measure has been collected. Prices continue to slip in Japan. Only in the euro area is inflation edging up a little, but it remains below 2 per cent, and less in the core economies that have relatively fast growth.
The contrasting experiences of emerging and rich nations have a common cause: monetary stimulus of straggling rich economies whose banking systems are broken. Central banks’ liquidity taps, still wide open, lower rates for those with access to credit, but not for those cut off by banks keen to deleverage. When those with money have more than they need and those without it cannot access it, it is no surprise that liquidity is finding its way to other parts of the world.
But some who complain that inflation is the only thing the US exports nowadays must take a hard look at their own actions. Beijing in particular cannot point fingers at others. Unlike most emerging countries, China has not liberalised its capital account and can insulate itself from foreign capital flows. But its credit-driven stimulus gives the Federal Reserve a run for its money.
Rich countries could do with a bit more inflation, poor countries with slightly less. In neither case is the rate yet so low or so high as to be destabilising. But its composition may be: food is becoming more expensive dangerously fast. When food prices outpace inflation they shift real income away from the poor. In depressed rich economies, this is one more burden on those hardest hit by job losses and spending cuts. In poor countries, it can have life-and-death effects – for people and for social order.
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