今年一季度，中国经济实现了11.9%的强劲增长，引发了经济学界对于中国经济过热的担忧。最近，随着经济出现放缓迹象，学界情绪发生了改变。7月份，中国制造业产出增幅跌至17个月来最低水平，不少预测认为，中国第三季度经济增长率将跌破10%。外国经济学家开始担心中国经济增长乏力将危及全球复苏。
对于中国经济的短期前景不必过于担忧。不要忘记，中国2009年经济增长9.1%。虽然按中国的标准衡量，这一成绩只能说还不错。但在全球深陷金融灾难之际，这无论如何是一项令人赞叹的成就。增长的动力主要来自基建投资，其对GDP增长的8个百分点以上的贡献，充分抵消了出口的大幅下滑。不过，中国庞大的刺激计划在获得了巨大成功的同时，也给未来埋下了严重隐患。
在匆忙中投资于道路和楼宇肯定会导致浪费。而这会给中国虽有所改善、但依然脆弱的银行业体系带来严重长期后果。投资于基础设施，可以避免产能过剩，但只有在伴随制造业其它领域收入增长的基础设施投资才能带来回报。如果八车道的高速公路上没有车流量，通行费从何而来？如此又何以偿还银行贷款呢？
对于这类问题还未及充分研究，中国政策制定者又开始忙于应付房地产过热。2009年大规模信贷扩张所带来的低利率和流动性过剩，已将房价推升至令人眩晕的高度。从2009年1月至2010年5月，中国36个大中城市住宅价格上涨了40%。北京、上海和深圳的涨幅甚至更大。
无论有理与否，高房价已经让老百姓怨声载道。因此，中国领导人后来又尝试调整在当初的经济刺激政策。2009年下半年中国政府就开始撤出过度扩张的货币政策。信贷扩张得到了遏制，随后还出台了抑制房地产开发热的政策。此外，物业税和资本利得税也头一次双双成为讨论议题。
值得庆幸的是，这些措施似乎正在生效，房地产销售逐渐降温。实际上，今年的经济增长之所以会放缓，主要原因是中国政府有意为之的政策调整。欧洲主权债务危机和全球经济放缓对中国的影响，可能会在今年晚些时候显现，但目前尚未出现。
目前，中国内部经济辩论的焦点是：政府是否应该再次调整政策？这次是指是否应该扭转由于政府前一时期政策所造成的增长放缓。有些人，尤其是一些西方经济学家，担心中国的房地产市场正开始崩盘，这会对中国银行业体系造成冲击。在我看来，因当前的增长放缓而摇摆不定，将是错误的。
的确，目前购房者与房地产开发商之间正在进行一场"拔河"比赛。房价是否会下降，取决于谁先松劲。而这又取决于政府政策的信誉度。如果政府立场坚定，房价就会下跌。当然，如果抑制房价过热措施的实施没有章法，不能排除政府面临上述崩盘的可能性。但就目前来看，房价下跌30%已是最糟糕的结果。中国家庭负债水平较低，而且，即使房价大跌，资本雄厚的银行也承受得住。
总体而言，中国短期财政状况仍远远强于其它几乎所有大型经济体。但从长期来看，并非一切尽如人意。一个可持续发展的经济体，不能单纯依赖钢筋水泥。中国的问题更大程度上在于资源配置不当，而非房地产泡沫破灭。目前，房地产投资（约占投资总额的四分之一）占据了太多的经济空间。
中国经济面临着很多结构性问题，其中包括过分依赖投资和外部需求，无法令人接受的收入差距，公共产品匮乏，以及服务业发展不足等等。此外，反腐行动和机构改革进展缓慢，也令人忧虑。
然而，从长远来看，最值得关注的依然是增长模式的转变问题。投资和出口一直是中国经济增长的两大引擎。但投资增长将很快达到社会、环境及自然资源所允许的极限。这有可能造成通缩局面和增长中断。增加出口可以推迟――但无法阻止――这种逆转。
随着中国经济规模的扩大和全球经济的普遍放缓，中国的出口努力将同贸易摩擦和保护主义发生正面冲突。要想保持增长，中国必须降低投资增长速度，并对经常账户进行重新调整。首要任务应该是改进增长的质量、而非数量。
很长时期以来，中国一直过分关注GDP的增长。但增长并非推迟急需进行的结构性调整的借口。一旦启动这种再调整，必然会导致经济减速。但这是为长期可持续增长奠定坚实基础的唯一途径。耽搁的时间越久，调整的过程也就越痛苦。
本文作者为中国社科院学部委员，前中国人民银行货币政策委员会委员
译者/陈云飞
http://www.ftchinese.com/story/001033985
Earlier this year China posted robust growth of 11.9 per cent, prompting worries that the country was overheating. Recently the mood has changed, with signs of a slowdown. Manufacturing output grew at its slowest rate for 17 months in July, while predictions suggest third-quarter growth will dip below 10 per cent. Concerns are now being voiced that a faltering of the Chinese economy will imperil the global recovery.
Such short-term concerns are premature. Remember that China posted growth in 2009 of 9.1 per cent, a merely respectable achievement by Chinese standards, but impressive nonetheless in the midst of a global financial catastrophe. Most of this came from new infrastructure investment, which probably added 8 percentage points, offsetting a sharp fall in exports. Yet although China's huge stimulus package was a great success, it also stored up serious problems for the future.
Rushed investment in roads and buildings leads to waste, which will have dire long-term consequences for China's improved, but still fragile, banking system. Investment in infrastructure avoids overcapacity, but bring returns only if it goes hand-in-hand with stronger manufacturing and other growth. Where will tolls come from if there is no traffic on an eight-lane highway? How then will the bank loans be repaid?
Such issues have been under-examined as Chinese policymakers grapple with how to halt a housing boom. Low interest rates and excess liquidity created by 2009's huge credit expansion have driven house prices to dizzying heights. From January 2009 to May 2010, in 36 big cities, residential house prices increased by 40 per cent. In Beijing, Shanghai, and Shenzhen rises were even greater.
Justifiable or not, high house prices have caused immense public resentment, and as a result China's leaders have of late been attempting to undo some of their own work. Over-expansionary monetary policy began to be withdrawn in the second half of 2009. Credit expansion was reined in. Policies to contain the fever of property development also followed. For the first time, both a property tax and a capital gains tax are under discussion.
Thankfully, these measures seem to be working, with property sales cooling. Indeed, weaker growth this year is mostly explained by deliberate policy changes in Beijing. Europe's sovereign debt crisis and the slowdown of the global economy may have an impact later this year, but they have not done so yet.
Now the real economic debate in China focuses on whether the government should move again, this time to reverse the new slowdown it itself initiated. Some western economists, in particular, worry that China's property market is beginning a collapse that will hit the nation's banking system. But, in my view, wobbling because of the current dip in growth would be a mistake.
Yes, at the moment there is a tug of war between house buyers and property developers. Whether prices fall will depend on who blinks first. But this, in turn, depends on whether both believe in the credibility of government policy. If the government stands firm, house prices will fall. Of course, if controls are implemented haphazardly the government risks such a collapse. But currently a 30 per cent drop is the worst-case scenario. Chinese households have low debt levels and even a dramatic fall could be borne by well-capitalised banks.
Overall, therefore, China's short-term fiscal position remains much better than almost all other big economies. It is in the long-run that all is not well. A viable economy cannot be built on steel and concrete alone, and China's problem is more its poor allocation of resources than the bursting of a property bubble. At present real estate, at around a quarter of total investment, simply takes up too much economic room.
The economy's list of structural problems is also long, including over-dependence on investment and external demand, an unacceptably wide gap in incomes, too few social goods and an underdevelopment of the service sector. Slow progress in anti-corruption campaigns and institutional reforms are also worrying.
In the long-run, however, it is the pattern of growth that needs most urgent attention. Investment and exports have been the twin engines of China's growth. But investment growth will soon hit a ceiling imposed by social, environmental and natural resources. The danger is that deflation will set in and the growth process will break down. Increasing exports can postpone, but not prevent, this reverse.
Following the increase in the size of the Chinese economy and the general slowdown of the global economy, China's export drive is also crashing into a stone wall of trade friction and protectionism. To sustain growth it must lower investment and rebalance its current account. Improving the quality, rather than the quantity, of growth should be the priority.
China has concentrated obsessively on GDP growth for far too long. But growth is not a good excuse for postponing much-needed structural adjustment. This readjustment, when it comes, will inevitably lead to a slowdown. But it is the only way to lay a solid foundation for sustainable growth in the long-run. And the longer the delay, the more painful the adjustment will be.
The writer is an academician with the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences and a former member of the monetary policy committee of the Chinese central bank
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