此轮全球性通货膨胀的原因:从中央银行角度讨论(上)

The Causes of This Round of Global Inflation:From the Perspective of Central Banks(Ⅰ)

近期全球物价水平持续大幅上涨,许多国家面临严重的通货膨胀压力。有学者将其简单归因于政府的大规模经济刺激计划或俄乌冲突、新冠肺炎疫情等国际政治经济因素,这样的观点并不完全令人信服。面对日益严峻的通货膨胀形势,各国中央银行未能及时调整货币政策,这与2008年全球金融危机后中央银行独立性的削弱不无关系。事实上,中央银行在进行货币政策操作时必须在物价稳定与经济增长之间权衡,而经济状况又关乎选民的投票倾向,因而其往往承受着较大的国内政治压力。同时,凯恩斯经济学的广泛应用与供应经济学的式微也使各国中央银行低估了经济刺激计划可能带来的通货膨胀风险。引进负利率政策等创新性货币政策工具可能是中央银行对抗国内政治压力、保持物价稳定的有效手段,但无论如何,低通货膨胀时代已经结束,各国中央银行将面临比新冠肺炎疫情更加严峻的挑战。

Recently,the global price level has continued to rise sharply,and many countries are facing serious inflationary pressure.Some scholars simply attribute this to the government's massive economic stimulus plan or international political and economic factors such as the Russia-Ukraine conflict and the COVID-19 pandemic.However,such views are not entirely convincing.The failure of central banks to adjust monetary policy in time in the face of rising inflation is related to the weakening of central bank independence after the 2008 global financial crisis.In fact,central banks are often under greater domestic political pressure as they must trade off price stability against economic growth when conducting monetary policy operations,and the state of the economy is a matter of voters'voting preferences.At the same time,the widespread use of Keynesian economics and the decline of supply economics have led central banks to underestimate the potential inflationary risks associated with stimulus packages.The introduction of innovative monetary policy tools such as negative interest rate policy may be an effective means for central banks to counter domestic political pressures and keep prices stable,but in any case,the era of low inflation is over and central banks will face a more serious challenge than COVID-19.