经济学人:削减预算 十便士的规划(1)

搜索关注在线英语听力室公众号：tingroom，领取免费英语资料大礼包。

　　The Budget: Ten-penny plan 削减预算：十便士的规划

　　The White House proposes eye watering budget cuts 白宫提出了眼泪汪汪的预算缩减

　　During his campaign for the White House, Donald Trump¹ touted² a “penny plan” for government spending. 唐纳德·特朗普在竞选中的美国总统时，吹捧对于政府开支实行“便士”计划。

　　This meant cutting the part of the budget that funds day-to-day operations—ie, excluding Social Security, health care, debt interest or defence—by 1% a year. 这意味着削减维持日常运营的预算，也就是社会保障，医疗保健，债务利息或国防等，每年1%。

　　Critics said such cuts were unachievable. 批评者说，这些削减是无法实现的。

　　Department budgets are already beneath their historical average as a share of the economy. 部门预算作为经济的一部分已经低于其历史平均水平。

　　They would have to shrink by nearly a third over a decade, after accounting³ for inflation, to satisfy the penny plan. 他们将不得不在经通胀因素调整后，用十多年来将预算紧缩近三分之一，以满足“便士计划”。

　　That has not deterred⁴ Mr Trump. 这并不能够阻挡特朗普先生。

　　On February 27th the White House announced its headline budget numbers, ahead of a more detailed⁵ plan due to appear soon. 2月27日，白宫公布了其整体预算数字，先于一项即将出现的更具体的规划。

　　In his first year in office, Mr Trump is proposing to cut so-called “non-defence discretionary” spending not by 1%, but by more than 10%, relative to current law. 在特朗普先生就职的第一年，他提议缩减所谓的非国防开支数额，不是现行法律规定的1%，而是超过了10%。

　　The $54bn (0.3% of GDP) this would free up would flow to the defence budget. 这项540亿美元（国内生产总值的0.3%）的缩减将流向国防预算。

　　Cue incredulity. The part of the budget Mr Trump would cut, which funds things like education, housing and national parks, has already fallen by over 10% in real terms since 2010. 令人难以接受的是，川普削减的开支部分涵盖教育，住房，国家公园，这几部分的预算自2010年起，下调幅度已经超过了10%。

　　Strict spending limits in the Budget Control Act of 2011, sometimes called the “sequester”, caused the dive. 在2011年的预算控制法案中对预算开支进行了严格的限制，有时也称为“缩减”，造成了骤降。

分享到：