It is possible that more inflation is coming.
更多的通貨膨脹可能正在到來。
An economy that is stimulated will eventually overheat.
受刺激的經濟最終將會過熱。
The central bank may believe that low unemployment is about to cause inflation.
央行可能認為低失業率導致了通貨膨脹。
But the truth is that nobody is sure how far unemployment can fall before prices and wages soar.
但事實上沒有人可以確定在物價和工資飆升之前,失業率能下降多少。
Not many years ago some rate-setters put this “natural” rate of unemployment at over 6%; the median rate-setter's estimate is now 4.7%.
就在幾年前,一些利率制定者將自然失業率定在6%以上,但是現在他們估測自然失業率中位數僅為4.7%。
The only way to find the labour market's limits is to feel them out.
找出勞動力市場的限制因素的唯一方法就是去親自體會它們。
Falling inflation and middling wage growth both suggest that these limits are some way off, for two possible reasons.
不斷下降的通脹率和中等的工資增長都表明,這些限制因素多少有些不合實際,其原因有二。
First, higher wage growth could yet tempt more of the jobless to seek work (those who are not actively job-hunting do not count as unemployed).
第一,更高的薪水增長會吸引更多的失業者去尋找工作(不積極找工作的人不算失業者)。
The proportion of 25- to 54-year-olds in employment is lower than before the recession, by an amount representing almost 2.4m people.
如今25至54歲就業者的比率比經濟衰退時期前更低,大約為240萬人。
By this measure, which fell in May, joblessness is worse in America than in France, where the overall unemployment rate stands at 9.5%.
以這個方式來衡量,五月的就業率是下降的,美國的失業率比法國更高,整體失業率達到9.5%。
Second, even the moderate pickup in wage growth to date might encourage firms to invest more, lifting productivity out of the doldrums and dampening inflationary pressure.
第二,目前工資增長的明顯好轉可能會鼓勵企業增加投資,來提升生產力以脫離不景氣,減少通脹壓力。
Jobs growth in America has already slowed from a monthly average of 187,000 in 2016 to 121,000 in the past three months.
美國的就業增長從2016年的月平均187000人已經減少到了最近三個月的平均121000人。
That is enough to reduce slack in the economy, but only just.
這足夠減少經濟的不景氣所帶來的影響了,但也僅僅是剛剛好。
Slowing it still further is needless so long as inflation remains quiescent.
只要通脹率保持不變,進一步放緩就顯得不重要了。
It makes still less sense when you consider the asymmetry of risks before the Fed.
當你在美聯儲之前考慮到風險的不對稱性時,它就沒有什么意義了。
If tighter money tips the economy into recession, the central bank has only a little bit of room to cut rates before it hits zero.
如果貨幣緊縮政策導致了經濟衰退,那么央行在其到利率零點之前就僅有一點點空間來削減它了。
But if inflation rises, it can raise them as much as it likes.
但是如果通脹率繼續上升,央行就可以任意加息了。
This asymmetry of risks extends to the Fed's credibility.
這種風險不對稱性延伸倒了美聯儲的信譽。
Inflation has been below 2% for 59 of the 63 months since the target was announced in January 2012.
從2012年一月美聯儲宣布這個目標以來,通脹率已經在63個月中有59個月保持在2%以下。
Continuing to undershoot the goal would cast more doubt on the central bank's commitment to it than modest overshoots would.
比起適度的超過,繼續脫離這個目標會使央行遭到更多對其曾經承諾的目標的質疑。
For too long, hawks have made excuses for the persistence of low inflation.
長久以來,鷹派以很多理由來保持低通脹率。
The latest is to blame new contracts offering unlimited amounts of mobile data, as if cheaper telecommunications somehow should not count.
最新的一個理由是指責那些新合同提供了不限量的移動數據,似乎廉價的電信數據不應計算在內。
The Fed should keep its promise to base its decisions on the data, and leave interest rates exactly where they are.
美聯儲應繼續堅守自己的承諾,它基于數據做出決定,并且保持利率精確的走向。
譯文來源考研英語時事閱讀