Meet Uncle Sam. He has a lot of bills to pay, almost four trillion dollars' worth every year. Uncle Sam's income is a little over two trillion dollars per year. To make up the difference, the deficit, he does what most Americans do: he borrows money.
這是山姆大叔。他有很多帳單要付，每年將近四兆美金。山姆大叔每年的收入比兩兆美金多一些。要彌補那差距，也就是赤字，他做了大部份美國人做的事：他借錢。
When Uncle Sam takes out a loan, he calls it a bond. Bonds can be held by banks, investors or even foreign governments. Uncle Sam has to promise to pay interests on these bonds, just as you do on any loan you take out.
當山姆大叔去貸款，他稱之為公債。公債可以為銀行、投資人或甚至外國政府所持有。山姆大叔必須保證支付這些公債的利息，就像是你對任何的貸款一樣。
Ever think about paying your mortgage with your credit card? That's exactly what Uncle Sam does! He takes out new loans, new bonds, so that he can make payments on the old ones. All those loans, and especially all that interest adds up.
你可曾想過用信用卡支付房貸？那正是山姆大叔所做的事情!他借新的貸款、發行新的公債，因此他可以支付舊的款項。所有那些貸款，特別是那利息堆疊起來。
Right now, Uncle Sam owes about fourteen trillion dollars. To put that in perspective, fourteen trillion is about the same as National GDP: the total value of all the goods and services produced by American economy in an entire year. It's such a huge amount of money that Uncle Sam is starting to run out of people to borrow from. And he is having trouble just paying the interest on his loans.
現在，山姆大叔積欠了大約十四兆美金。正確說來，十四兆美金大約就跟美國國內生產毛額一樣：也就是所有美國經濟體一整年所生產的貨物和服務總值。這是筆大數目，因此山姆大叔開始沒人可以借貸。而他就連支付貸款利息都有問題了。
The obvious solution would be to either cut spending or increase taxes. But if he cuts spending, the people that he's spending money on, would complain that they don't have money to spend, and that he was hurting the economy. If he tried to raise taxes, enough to close this gap, not only would people definitely have less money to spend, he'd probably have riots on his hands.
顯而易見的解決方案要不就是減少支出，要不就是增加稅賦。但如果減少支出，他花錢照顧的人民，會抱怨沒錢可以花，而且那樣他是在傷害經濟。若是他試著提高稅賦，高到足夠消弭這差距，不但人民絕對會缺錢可用，他可能還會給自己招來暴動。
So, Uncle Sam chooses the easy way to make money: just make it. He calls up the Federal Reserve, which is our Central Bank, and like magic, Dollars are created and deposited into banks all around America. The problem is that the more of something there is, the less its worth. Same goes for the US Dollar. The more Dollars there are, the less each one will buy. That's why commodities like gasoline, food and gold become more expensive when Uncle Sam does his money-making magic. The commodities aren't really worth more. Your money is just worth less. That's called Inflation.
所以，山姆大叔選擇了比較簡單的方式來生錢：就是印鈔票。他通知美國聯準會，也就是我們的中央銀行，然後就像是魔術一般，美金被生產出來存到全美國的銀行。問題是有越多的某種東西，它的價值就越低。對美金來說也是。有越多的美金，它能買到的東西就越少。那就是為何當山姆大叔玩弄他的印鈔票魔術時，像是汽油、食物和黃金等商品就變得更貴。這些商品沒有真的變得更有價值。只是你手中的錢價值降低了。那叫做通貨膨脹。
Remember the foreign governments that lent money to Uncle Sam? When they lent money to the American government, something interesting happened. It made the US look richer, and their countries look poorer. When a country looks poorer compared to America, one dollar of our money buys a lot of their money. So they can pay their workers only a few pennies a day. With such low labor costs, they can sell their products to America for lower prices than any American manufacturer can. The easiest way for American companies to compete, is to move their factories overseas, and pay their workers a few pennies a day too. This contributes to a recession.
記得借錢給山姆大叔的外國政府嗎？當他們借錢給美國政府時，有趣的事情發生了。它使美國看起來更有錢，而他們自己的國家看起來更窮了。當一個國家看起來比美國窮時，我們的一塊美金可以買很多他們的錢。所以他們能夠一天只付給工人幾分錢。用這麼低的勞工成本，他們能夠以比任何美國製造商還要低的價錢將產品賣到美國。美國公司要競爭最簡單的方法，是把他們的工廠遷到海外，一天也付給他們的員工幾分錢。這造成經濟哀退。
Americans lose their jobs, stop paying taxes and start collecting government benefits, like Medicaid, under unemployment. This means that Uncle Sam has even less income and even more expenses. At the same time, the people who still have jobs are desperate to keep them. So they tend to do more work but not to get paid any more. When your dollars are worth less, and you're not earning more of them, that's called Stagflation. And this is why Uncle Sam is in Catch-22.
美國人失去工作，停止繳稅並開始領政府福利，像是醫療補助，在失業的情況下。這意味著山姆大叔有更少的收入和更多的開銷。同時，那些還有工作的人拚著老命也要保住飯碗。所以他們趨向於做得更多而沒領到更多。當你的美金貶值，而你沒賺更多，那叫做「停滯性通膨」。而這就是為何山姆大叔處於左右為難的局面。
He can't raise taxes or cut spending without making the recession worse. And he can't have the Federal Reserve create more money without making inflation worse. For now, he can keep on borrowing money, but since he can't even pay the interest on the loans he already has, it just makes his inevitable bankruptcy even worse.
他無法提高稅賦或減少支出而不加重經濟哀退。還有他不能讓聯準會印更多鈔票而不加重通膨。現在，他能夠繼續借錢，但既然他連已有的貸款利息都付不出來，那只是讓他無可避免的破產情況更加惡化。
Whether it's in two months or two years, the day will come when Uncle Sam can no longer pay his bills. When that happens, the banks, investors and foreign governments who are counting on that money, won't be able to pay their bills.
不管兩個月或是兩年之內，總有一天山姆大叔再也無法付他的利息。當那發生時，依靠那筆錢的銀行、投資人和外國政府，將沒辦法付他們自己的帳單。
You see, just like Uncle Sam, governments, banks and corporations don't actually have much money. Mostly, all they have is debt to each other. If one link in the debt chain stops paying, defaults, the whole thing falls apart. If investors can't pay their bills, corporations won't be able to pay their employees. If banks can't pay their bills, you won't be able to take out a loan, use a credit card, or even withdraw your savings. If foreign governments can't pay their bills, their own banks and corporations will have the same problems. That's called a Global Economic Collapse.
你看，就像是山姆大叔一樣，政府、銀行和企業其實不是真的很有錢。大多時候，他們擁有的只是彼此間的債務。如果這債務鏈中有一環停止付款，違約，全面崩潰。如果投資人不能買單，企業便無法支薪。如果銀行不能買單，你將無法貸款、使用信用卡或甚至提領存款。如果外國政府不能買單，他們自己的銀行和企業也將會有相同的問題。那叫做「全球經濟崩潰」。
It's never happened before. So nobody really knows how bad it will be; how long it will last; or even how we'll eventually get out of it. The house of cards has already been built. There's no painless way to dismantle it now. All we can do is to educate each other about what's actually going on, and to prepare for what may be very extraordinary circumstances.
這從來沒發生過。所以沒人真的知道它會有多嚴重；它會持續多久；或甚至我們最後要如何脫困。這紙板糊的房子已建造了。現在沒有無痛的方式可以拆除它。所有我們能做的只是互相教育了解真正在發生的事情，並準備面對可能會非常令人驚奇的情勢。
- 「左右為難、進退維谷的局面」- Catch-22
And this is why Uncle Sam is in Catch-22.
而這就是為何山姆大叔處於左右為難的局面。註解：Catch-22這個term原本用在美國空軍。在二次大戰時，轟炸機飛行員出任務九死一生，軍法規定出50趟任務便可以退役返鄉。但軍方一再藉故延長飛行員的飛行次數，於是造成大家不滿。許多飛行員開始藉故裝病或是假裝發瘋，規避出任務。於是，軍方定下這條條例叫做「Catch 22」，也就是第22條條款，說明如果精神上有不適任者，只要「親自提出申請」，便可由軍醫評鑑退伍。但這條款中卻有一條詭計...軍醫對於那些自行提出申請的飛行員，既然能夠提出申請，都評定為有行為能力，沒有人可以通過鑑定。於是日後大家便引用「Catch-22」為左右兩難、進退維谷的局面。
