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And to explain why this is so, I have a question.
為了解釋為什么會是這樣，我先問一個問題。
Suppose that there are two diseases: one of them is rare, the other one is common, but if they are not treated they are equally severe.
假設有兩個疾病，一個是罕見的疾病，另一個是常見病。但是如果不治療他們，后果會同樣嚴重。
If you had to choose, which would you rather have: the common disease or the rare disease?
如果你來選擇，你會選哪一個呢？常見病還是罕見病？
Common, the common -- I think that's absolutely right, and why?
常見病。對了。我認為這是絕對正確的。為什么呢？
Because there are more drugs to treat common diseases than there are to treat rare diseases. The reason for this is incentives.
因為治療常見疾病的藥物會比治療罕見疾病的藥物多得多。問題的根源在于動力。
It costs about the same to produce a new drug whether that drug treats 1,000 people, 100,000 people, or a million people.
發明新藥物的成本都差不多，無論那個藥物可以治療1000人，10萬人，或100萬人。
But the revenues are much greater if the drug treats a million people.
但是，如果那個藥物能治療100萬人，它的營業收入會很高。
So the incentives are much larger to produce drugs which treat more people.
顯然了，生產治療常見病藥物的動力要大得多。
To put this differently: larger markets save lives. In this case misery truly does love company.
換句話說，大市場救生命。這真是真正的“同病相憐”啊。
Now think about the following: if China and India were as rich as the United States is today,
請想一想:如果中國和印度像今天的美國一樣富有，
the market for cancer drugs would be eight times larger than it is now. Now we are not there yet, but it is happening.
抗癌藥物的市場將是現在的8倍。我們還沒有達到那個程度，但這是會實現的！
As other countries become richer the demand for these pharmaceuticals is going to increase tremendously.
隨著其他國家變得更加富有對這些藥品的需求將大幅增加。
And that means an increase incentive to do research and development, which benefits everyone in the world.
這意味著研發的動力會增加，這對全世界每個人都有好處。
Larger markets increase the incentive to produce all kinds of ideas,
市場越大，創新的動力越大。
whether it's software, whether it's a computer chip, whether it's a new design.
不論是軟件，還是計算機芯片，還是一個嶄新的設計。
For the Hollywood people in the audience, this even explains why action movies have larger budgets than comedies:
對于來自好萊塢的觀眾這甚至可以解釋為什么動作片的預算比喜劇片要大：
it's because action movies translate easier into other languages and other cultures,
這是因為動作片更容易翻譯到其他語言和其他文化，
so the market for those movies is larger, people are willing to invest more, and the budgets are larger.
這些電影的市場更大，所以人們更愿意多投資，所以預算可以更大。
