中美贸易顺差：400美元的iPhone中谁的附加值更大？

要准确估计贸易赤字，是相当棘手的任务。 本月稍早，世界贸易组织(WTO)秘书长Pascal Lamy在一次谈话中表示，“如果我们用附加价值而非用计算毛利的方法来衡量贸易，那么，双边贸易平衡就会显得非常不同。”事实上，这种用附加价值来计算的方法将导致“中国与美国的顺差减少一半。” 你说什么？ 当我第一次在《中国日报》(China Daily)上读到这段演讲时，我下意识地抓了抓头。 (这份由国家掌控的报纸忽略Lamy大部份的谈话，仅着重在中国对美贸易顺差减少一半上)。 如果你也像我看完整篇演讲，就知道Lamy并未特别针对中国。相反地，他的重点在于贸易性质已大幅改变。贸易不再是双边的，它是全球性的。 “过去，高科技产品通常在美国、日本和德国制造，”Lamy指出。“而今天，这些产品在许多国家制造组件，最终装配地所在的国家对于该产品的产值贡献度可能只有一小部分。” Lamy认为，“并非每个人都已充分了解这个重大转变，但重点在于我们如何去衡量贸易发展。” Lamy以苹果(Apple)的iPhone为例指出， iPhone在中国组装的，但它所需的各类产品和 服务则来自位在不同国家的15间不同的公司。而中国为iPhone添加的价值是4%左右，远低于美国、日本、德国和韩国的附加价值。 然而，WTO的经济学家估计，若中国与美国的双边贸易以产品附加值来衡量，则中国对美国的2,950亿贸易顺差可减少近一半，这是WTO老板的结论。 Lamy 的说法有他的理论基础。在面临当前的经济环境和美国总统大选时，中国被指责为刻意压低人民币汇率，好让中国出口的产品更便宜。Lamy对此表示，并没有明 确的结论显示人民币升值会影响中国的贸易平衡。他接着指出：可以观察出是汇率被高估或者低估的地方并不是WTO，而是国际货币基金(IMF)。 底线在哪里？ 由于美中之间的关系对全球其它地区都有着极端的重要性，因此，现在必须冷静思考并从不同的角度看贸易统计──开始为新产品添加附加价值。 你怎么看？ 本文授权编译自EE Times，版权所有，谢绝转载 编译： Joy Teng 参考英文原文：Yoshida in China: $400 iPhones and skewed trade stats ，by Junko Yoshida

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{pagination} Yoshida in China: $400 iPhones and skewed trade stats Junko Yoshida Measuring a trade deficit can be a tricky business. In a speech earlier this month, World Trade Organization Director-General Pascal Lamy said, "If we were to measure trade in value-added rather than gross statistical terms, bilateral trade balances would look very different." In fact, such a value-added measure would result in “China's surplus with the United States reduced by half." Say what? When I first read the speech in China Daily, I scratched my head. (The state-controlled newspaper ignored most of Lamy's speech and glammed onto the bit about China’s surplus with the United States being reduced to half.) If, as I did, you read the entire speech, Lamy wasn’t being particularly soft on China. Rather, he was making a point about how drastically the nature of trade has changed. Trade is no longer bilateral, it's global. “High-tech products used to be made in the U.S., Japan or Germany," said Lamy, stating the obvious. "Today, they are made [around] the world, with components and parts fabricated in many countries. The country where the final assembly takes place may contribute only a small fraction of the final value of the product.” In Lamy's view, “Not everyone has fully understood this important shift, but the debate is evolving, starting with the way we measure trade.” Lamy made his case using Apple’s iPhone as Exhibit A. “True, the iPhone is assembled in China, but the goods and services leading up to the final assembly came from 15 different companies in many different countries. The value added to the iPhone in China is around 4 percent, far less than the value added in the United States, Japan, Germany and South Korea. “Yet, when a $400 iPhone is sold in the United States, standard trade accounting lists it as $400 credit to China’s side of the ledger and $400 debit for the United States." WTO economists estimate that China’s $295 billion trade surplus with the U.S. could be reduced by nearly half if two-way trade were measured in value-added terms, the WTO boss concluded. Lamy’s argument is valid. In the current economic environment and the U.S. presidential campaign, China is blamed for keeping the yuan's value artificially low to make Chinese exports cheaper. Lamy said there is “no clear-cut conclusion” that a revaluation of the yuan will affect China’s trade balance. Putting on his politician hat, he added: “The place where the exchange rate could be seen as overvalued or undervalued is not the WTO,” but the International Monetary Fund. What’s the bottom line? Given the critical importance of the U.S.-China relationship to those two countries and for the rest of the world, it’s time to cool the rhetoric and look at trade statistics from a different perspective -- starting with the value added to new products. What do you think?