評論
打印
Recording Two
錄音二
Sweden was the first European country to print and use paper money, but it may soon do away with physical currencies.
瑞典是第一個印刷和使用紙幣的歐洲國家，但它可能很快就會擯棄實物貨幣。
Banks can save a lot of money and avoid regulatory headaches by moving to a cash-free system, and they can also avoid bank robberies, theft, and dirty money.
銀行使用無現金系統能節約很多資金并避免很多管理的麻煩，還能避免搶劫、盜竊和洗錢問題。
Claer Barrett, the editor of Financial Times Money, says the Western world is headed toward a world without physical currency.
“Financial Times Money”主編克萊爾·巴雷特稱，西方世界正朝著無實物貨幣的方向發展。
"Andy Holder—the chief economist at The Bank of England—suggested that the UK move towards a government-backed digital currency.
英格蘭銀行首席經濟學家安迪·霍爾德認為，英國在向著政府支撐的數字貨幣的方向發展。
But does a cashless society really make good economic sense?
但無現金社會真得能帶來良好的經濟效益嗎？
"The fact that cash is being drawn out of society, is less a feature of our everyday lives,
現金正從社會中剝離出去一事，在我們的日常生活中已經越來越不足為奇了，
and the ease of electronic payments—is this actually making us spend more money without realizing it?"
而且電子支付便捷——這種方式是不是實際上讓我們在不經意間花了更多的錢？
Barrett wanted to find out if the absence of physical currency does indeed cause a person to spend more, so she decided to conduct an experiment a few months ago.
巴雷特想要找到在沒有實物貨幣的情況下是否真的會讓某人花更多的錢的證據，為此，幾個月前她決定做一個實驗。
She decided that she was going to try to just use cash for two weeks to make all of her essential purchases and see what that would do to her spending.
她決定嘗試只使用現金來完成她兩周所有必需品的購買，以此查看這種方式對她開銷的影響。
She found she did spend a lot less money because it is incredibly hard to predict how much cash one is going to need—she was forever drawing money out of cash points.
她發現她的確花錢更少，因為非常難預測一個人會需要多少現金——所以她總是去自動取款機取錢。
Months later, she was still finding cash stuffed in her trouser pockets and the pockets of her handbags.
幾個月后，她發現她的褲袋和手提包的袋子里仍然塞滿著現金。
During the experiment, Barrett took a train ride.
實驗期間，巴雷特乘了一次火車。
On the way, there was an announcement that the restaurant car was not currently accepting credit cards.
旅途中，火車工作人員宣布餐車目前不接受信用卡支付。
The train cars were filled with groans because many of the passengers were traveling without cash.
火車上一時充滿了抱怨聲，因為很多乘客都是不帶現金旅行的。
"It underlines just how much things have changed in the last generation," Barrett says.
巴雷特說，“它表明自上一代以來發生的巨大的變化。”
"My parents, when they were younger, used to budget by putting money into envelopes—they'd get paid and they'd immediately separate the cash into piles and put them in envelopes, so they knew what they had to spend week by week.
“我父母年輕的時候，常常使用把錢放進信封的方法來進行預算——他們得到工資后，立即把錢分為若干部分，然后把它們裝進不同的信封里，因此他們很清楚每周必須支出多少。”
It was a very effective way for them to keep track of their spending.
這是當時他們記錄日常支出的非常有效的方式。
Nowadays, we're all on credit cards, we're doing online purchases, and money is kind of becoming a less physical and more imaginary type of thing that we can't get our hands around."
如今，我們全都使用信用卡支付，都會在網上購物，金錢的物理形態越來越淡化，而變為我們不會拿在手邊的、更為虛擬的物體了。
Questions 19 to 22 are based on the recording you have just heard.
問題19到22是基于你剛才所聽到那段的錄音。
Question 19: What do we learn about Sweden?
問題19：我們了解到瑞典的什么信息？
Question 20: What did Claer Barrett want to find out with her experiment?
問題20：克萊爾·巴雷特想通過她的實驗弄清楚什么？
Question 21: What did Claer Barrett find on her train ride?
問題21：克萊爾·巴雷特在乘坐火車的時候發現了什么問題？
Question 22: How did people of the last generation budget their spending?
問題22：上一代人是如何進行他們的開支預算的？
譯文屬可可原創，僅供學習和交流使用，未經允許不得轉載
