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Signalling explains all kinds of behaviour.
信號行為能夠解釋各種各樣的行為。
Firms pay dividends to their shareholders, who must pay income tax on the payouts.
企業給股東支付紅利，股東必須為這筆支出繳納收入稅。
Surely it would be better if they retained their earnings, boosting their share prices, and thus delivering their shareholders lightly taxed capital gains.
如果留下盈利，刺激股價上漲，從而分發給股東課稅較輕的資本利得會更好。
Signalling solves the mystery: paying a dividend is a sign of strength, showing that a firm feels no need to hoard cash.
信號行為能夠解開這個迷團：支付紅利是一種力量的信號，表明企業認為無需囤積現金。
By the same token, why might a restaurant deliberately locate in an area with high rents?
同理，為什么餐館要有意選址于高房租地區呢？
It signals to potential customers that it believes its good food will bring it success.
這是在向潛在的客戶發出相信自己的美食會帶給它成功的信號。
Signalling is not the only way to overcome the lemons problem.
信號行為不是克服檸檬問題的唯一辦法。
In a 1976 paper Mr Stiglitz and Michael Rothschild, another economist, showed how insurers might “screen” their customers.
在1976年的一篇論文中，斯蒂格利茨與另一名經濟學家邁克爾·羅斯柴爾德展示了保險商可能如何 “篩選” 客戶的問題。
The essence of screening is to offer deals which would only ever attract one type of punter.
篩選行為的關鍵是提供永遠只吸引某類客戶的協議。
Suppose a car insurer faces two different types of customer, high-risk and low-risk.
假設，汽車保險商面對兩種不同類型的客戶，一類是高風險的，一類是低風險的。
They cannot tell these groups apart; only the customer knows whether he is a safe driver.
他們無法將其區分開來；只有客戶才知道自己是否是安全的駕駛員。
Messrs Rothschild and Stiglitz showed that, in a competitive market, insurers cannot profitably offer the same deal to both groups.
羅斯柴爾德先生和斯蒂格利茨先生指出，在競爭市場中，保險商無法有盈利地把同樣的保單同時提供給這兩類人。
If they did, the premiums of safe drivers would subsidise payouts to reckless ones.
倘若如此，安全的駕駛員的保費就會補貼對魯莽的駕駛員的賠付。
A rival could offer a deal with slightly lower premiums, and slightly less coverage, which would peel away only safe drivers because risky ones prefer to stay fully insured.
對手可能會提供一份保費稍微低一點、承保范圍稍微小一點的保單，由于風險大的駕駛員傾向于保持全保，這份保單只會剔出安全的駕駛員。
The firm, left only with bad risks, would make a loss.
鑒于剩下來都是高風險的業務，保險企業會出現損失。
(Some worried a related problem would afflict Obamacare, which forbids American health insurers from discriminating against customers who are already unwell: if the resulting high premiums were to deter healthy, young customers from signing up, firms might have to raise premiums further, driving more healthy customers away in a so-called “death spiral”. )
(有人擔心，一個相關的問題會困擾禁止美國醫療保險商歧視性對待已經患病的客戶的奧巴馬醫改：如果由此產生的高額保費把健康的、年輕的客戶嚇得不簽約的話，保險企業可能不得不進一步提高保費，迫使更多的健康客戶脫離所謂的 “死亡漩渦”。)
The car insurer must offer two deals, making sure that each attracts only the customers it is designed for.
汽車保險商必須提供兩份保單，確保每份保單只吸引為之所設計的客戶。
The trick is to offer one pricey full-insurance deal, and an alternative cheap option with a sizeable deductible.
竅門是提供一分昂貴的全保保單和一份便宜的自費比例大的替代保單。
Risky drivers will balk at the deductible, knowing that there is a good chance they will end up paying it when they claim.
由于知道自己在理賠時終將為自費條款掏腰包的概率很大，風險大的駕駛員會避開自費條款多的保單。
They will fork out for expensive coverage instead.
相反，他們會為昂貴的承包范圍出錢。
Safe drivers will tolerate the high deductible and pay a lower price for what coverage they do get.
安全駕駛員會容忍高額自費條款，并為他們得到的承包范圍支付較低的價格。
This is not a particularly happy resolution of the problem.
這不是這一問題的特別愉快的解決之道。
Good drivers are stuck with high deductibles—just as in Spence's model of education, highly productive workers must fork out for an education in order to prove their worth.
好駕駛員受高額自費條款所困擾——如同在斯彭斯的教育模型中，高生產率的工人必須要為了證明他們的價值而為學歷花很多錢一樣。
Yet screening is in play almost every time a firm offers its customers a menu of options.
然而，在幾乎每一次企業為客戶提供一份選項菜單時，篩選行為都在發揮作用。
Airlines, for instance, want to milk rich customers with higher prices, without driving away poorer ones.
例如，航空公司想用較高的價格培養富有的客戶，同時又不趕走較窮的客戶。
If they knew the depth of each customer's pockets in advance, they could offer only first-class tickets to the wealthy, and better-value tickets to everyone else.
如果事先知道每一位客戶的錢包的深淺，他們可能只給富人提供頭等艙機票，給其他人提供性價比更高的機票。
But because they must offer everyone the same options, they must nudge those who can afford it towards the pricier ticket.
但是，由于他們必須給每一個人都提供同樣的選項，因而必須把能夠出得起錢的人推向價格更高的機票。
That means deliberately making the standard cabin uncomfortable, to ensure that the only people who slum it are those with slimmer wallets.
這意味著有意讓標準倉不舒適，確保唯一屈尊標準倉的是錢包較癟之人。
Adverse selection has a cousin.
逆向選擇有一位近親。
Insurers have long known that people who buy insurance are more likely to take risks.
保險商早就知道，投保的人更有可能去冒險。
Someone with home insurance will check their smoke alarms less often; health insurance encourages unhealthy eating and drinking.
買了房屋保險的人會降低檢查煙霧警報裝置的頻率；健康險會促進不健康的飲食行為。
Economists first cottoned on to this phenomenon of “moral hazard” when Kenneth Arrow wrote about it in 1963.
經濟學家最初開始理解這種 “道德風險” 現象是肯尼斯·阿羅在1963年論述它的時候。
Moral hazard occurs when incentives go haywire.
道德風險發生在激勵失控之時。
The old economics, noted Mr Stiglitz in his Nobel-prize lecture, paid considerable lip-service to incentives, but had remarkably little to say about them.
斯蒂格利茨在他的諾獎演說中指出，老的經濟學曾給激勵開出了大量的空頭許諾，但極少說起它們。
In a completely transparent world, you need not worry about incentivising someone, because you can use a contract to specify their behaviour precisely.
在一個完全透明的世界中，由于可以用合約精確地規范他人行為，人們根本無需為激勵他人而操心。
It is when information is asymmetric and you cannot observe what they are doing (is your tradesman using cheap parts? Is your employee slacking? ) that you must worry about ensuring that interests are aligned.
只有在信息不對稱或者看不到別人正在做什么 (店員是否正是使用廉價部件？雇員是否正在偷懶？)的情況下，才必須為確保利益均衡而操心。
Such scenarios pose what are known as “principal-agent” problems.
這類情況所引發的就是眾所周知的 “委托—代理” 問題。
How can a principal (like a manager) get an agent (like an employee) to behave how he wants, when he cannot monitor them all the time?
(類似于管理者的) 委托人怎么才能讓 (類似于雇員的) 代理人在自己無法時刻監控他們的時候，按照他的意愿去做事呢？
The simplest way to make sure that an employee works hard is to give him some or all of the profit.
最簡單的辦法是確保努力工作的雇員把盈利部分或者全部地交給他。
Hairdressers, for instance, will often rent a spot in a salon and keep their takings for themselves.
例如，理發師經常會在沙龍內租用一處地點，把收入放進自己的腰包。
But hard work does not always guarantee success: a star analyst at a consulting firm, for example, might do stellar work pitching for a project that nonetheless goes to a rival.
但是，努力工作并非總能保證成功：例如，咨詢公司的明星分析師可能會為了拿到一個落入對手手中的項目拼命工作。
So, another option is to pay “efficiency wages”.
因而，另一個選項是支付 “效率工資”。
Mr Stiglitz and Carl Shapiro, another economist, showed that firms might pay premium wages to make employees value their jobs more highly.
斯蒂格利茨和另一位經濟學家卡爾·夏皮羅指出，企業或許會為了讓雇員更重視他們的工作而支付獎勵工資。
This, in turn, would make them less likely to shirk their responsibilities, because they would lose more if they were caught and got fired.
反過來，這會讓雇員不太可能去推卸責任，因為如果被抓或是遭到解雇，他們會失去更多。
That insight helps to explain a fundamental puzzle in economics: when workers are unemployed but want jobs, why don't wages fall until someone is willing to hire them?
這個真知灼見有助于解釋經濟學的一個根本之謎：當工人失業但是想要工作時，為什么工資直到有人原意雇傭才下降呢？
An answer is that above-market wages act as a carrot, the resulting unemployment, a stick.
答案是：高于市場的工資扮演的是胡蘿卜的角色，由此而造成的失業則是大棒。
And this reveals an even deeper point.
而且這還揭示出更深的一點。
Before Mr Akerlof and the other pioneers of information economics came along, the discipline assumed that in competitive markets, prices reflect marginal costs: charge above cost, and a competitor will undercut you.
在阿克洛夫和信息經濟學的其他先驅出現之前，這門學科假設，在競爭市場中，價格反映邊際成本：只要收費高于成本，競爭對手就會以低于你的價格出售。
But in a world of information asymmetry, “good behaviour is driven by earning a surplus over what one could get elsewhere,” according to Mr Stiglitz.
但是，據斯蒂格利茨，在信息不對稱的世界中，“良好的行為是由賺取高于他處所得的盈余所推動的”。
The wage must be higher than what a worker can get in another job, for them to want to avoid the sack; and firms must find it painful to lose customers when their product is shoddy, if they are to invest in quality.
工資必須要高于工人在另一個工作中的所得；企業必須在產品粗制濫造時發現失去客戶是痛苦的。
In markets with imperfect information, price cannot equal marginal cost.
在信息是不完全的市場中，價格不可能等于邊際成本。
The concept of information asymmetry, then, truly changed the discipline.
如此說來，信息不對稱的概念真正改變了這門學科。
Nearly 50 years after the lemons paper was rejected three times, its insights remain of crucial relevance to economists, and to economic policy.
在檸檬論文遭到三次拒絕將近50年后，它的真知灼見仍與經濟學家和經濟政策密切相關。
Just ask any young, black Washingtonian with a good credit score who wants to find a job.
只要問問華盛頓州的任何一位信用得分良好的年輕人或者黑人即可。
