来源：《卫报》
原文刊登日期：2022年1月19日
The economic news this week is stark. Inflation has hit a 30-year high and the average British worker is entering their third drop in real wages in a decade. But what’s really sobering is that the worst is still to come. Next month, the regulator Ofgem announces the maximum price for heating bills, and energy company bosses are already warning that they will almost certainly be double last winter’s levels. The new price cap kicks in from April, at just the point that national insurance goes up alongside council tax increases, and there’s a stealth rise in income tax.
本周的经济新闻是严峻的。通货膨胀达到30年高点，英国普通工人的实际工资在10年内第三次下降。但真正令人警醒的是，最糟糕的情况还在后头。下个月，监管机构英国能源监管局(Ofgem)将宣布取暖费的最高价格，能源公司的老板们已经警告称，几乎可以肯定，取暖费将是去年冬天的两倍。新的价格上限将于4月开始实施，此时正值国民保险和市政税同时上涨，个人所得税也在悄然上涨。
Without immediate state action, the human fallout of all of this will be severe. Two big points need to be borne in mind: first, when basics are shooting up in price, households cannot put off their purchases or buy something cheaper. You either switch the heating on or not; you either have enough food or you go hungry. Second, although prices are going up for everyone, not all families have the same financial buffer against this storm. As it is, debt charities are already warning of many more people trying to borrow to keep on top of their bills. Fuel poverty looks almost certain to shoot up.
如果政府不立即采取行动，所有这一切造成的人道主义后果将是严重的。有两点需要牢记：第一，当基本生活必需品价格飙升时，家庭不能推迟购买或购买更便宜的东西。你要么打开暖气，要么关闭；你要么有足够的食物，要么忍饥挨饿。第二，虽然物价对于每个人来说都在上涨，但并不是所有的家庭都有相同的财务储备来抵御这场风暴。事实上，债务慈善机构已经警告说，更多的人试图借钱来维持他们的开支。燃料贫困似乎几乎肯定会加剧。
What should be done immediately has been sketched out by Labour’s Rachel Reeves: a windfall tax on oil and gas companies, with the proceeds going towards the least well-off to help with bills. Labour is also proposing scrapping VAT on fuel bills for a few months.
工党的瑞秋·里夫斯已经简述了应该立即采取的行动：对石油和天然气公司征收暴利税，所得收入将用于帮助最不富裕的人支付账单。工党还提议临时取消燃油费增值税几个月。
In any case, it would not be a surprise to see the business secretary, Kwasi Kwarteng, steal one or both of these ideas. What he should also do, but won’t, is restore the £20 cut from universal credit and increase benefits, which are not going up in line with prices. Still, Labour should continue to press the government on this policy.
无论如何，如果商务大臣Kwarteng窃取了其中一个或两个想法，都不会令人惊讶。他还应该做，但不会做的是，恢复从统一福利中削减的20英镑，并增加福利，这些福利不会随着物价上涨而上涨。不过，工党应该继续在这一政策上施压。
Much more of a mistake would be for Whitehall to hand money to utility firms, as has been suggested: that hands money to shareholders rather than to households. Over the longer term, the state needs to build up a much bigger renewables base so that the UK is less dependent on international oil and gas markets.
更大的错误是政府将资金交给公用事业公司，正如有人说的那样：这是将资金交给股东而不是家庭。从长期来看，政府需要建立一个更大的可再生能源基础，以降低英国对国际石油和天然气市场的依赖。
What doesn’t help is for the Bank of England to raise interest rates again, as looks likely. There is no evidence of workers pushing for higher wages, but there are already signs of companies raising their prices in line with their material costs.
没有用的是，英格兰银行再次提高利率，这看起来有可能。没有证据表明工人们要求更高的工资，但已经有迹象表明，企业已经根据原材料成本提高了价格。
A quarter-point increase in the base rate will do nothing to prevent that, nor will it curb fluctuations on international oil markets. All it does is signal a certain complacency on Threadneedle Street about the prospects for the UK economy, which are not that rosy. The high growth, high productivity miracle promised by Boris Johnson just last autumn is being revealed instead as a high-cost, high-inequality flop.
将基准利率提高25个基点无助于阻止这种情况的发生，也无法遏制国际石油市场的波动。它所做的只是表明，英国央行对英国经济前景存在某种自满情绪——英国经济前景并不那么乐观。鲍里斯•约翰逊去年秋天承诺的高增长、高生产率奇迹，如今却变成了高成本、高不平等的失败。