Japan’s pension pot
日本养老金

Capital thinking
资本思考

Jul 24th 2008 | TOKYO
From The Economist print edition

A call to set up a sovereign-wealth fund
呼吁！建立”主权财富基金”

PENSIONERS in Japan cannot help getting older, but could they be richer? The country’s vast public-pension fund, to which every citizen must contribute, is poorly managed. Last year it lost money (Ұ5.65 trillion, around $47 billion). Reform may now be on the way, perhaps with big implications for the Tokyo market.

在日本，那些依靠退休金生活的人们无可避免的渐渐老去，他们有可能变得更加富有吗？在这个国家里，每位公民都必须缴纳的公共养老基金并没有得到妥善管理。仅去年一年，其损失的金额就达470亿美元。改革也许即将发生，而这一切，对于东京市场将意味着更多。

The fund is the world’s largest publicly invested pension pot, with ¥150 trillion of assets. But the capital is mostly stagnant. Around two-thirds is parked in Japanese government bonds (JGBs), whose ten-year yield hovers at a modest 1.6%. Bureaucrats with little investment nous are in charge. Returns are low, at some 3.5% annually, compared with around 7% for public pension funds in Norway and Sweden, and 10% in Canada and France. Pension money was squandered in the past on things like building holiday resorts in preposterous but politically important places.

该基金以150万亿日元的数额而成为世界最大的公共养老基金。然而这些资本却几乎丧失了流动性。大约有三分之二的资金被搁置在日本政府发行的公债，其十年的收益大概只有1.6%。在其位的，是那些缺乏投资常识的官僚。这导致了每年3.5%的低收益率，而同比于挪威和瑞典，加拿大和法国则分别达到了 7%，10%。过去，养老金被挥霍在一些诸如在不合理却有政治意义的地点建设度假村的事情上。

Without better returns, the government will have to reduce its support for the old or raise taxes; neither will be popular. To improve the fund’s performance, a group of politicians from the ruling Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) has called for a sliver of the pension purse, ¥10 trillion, to be set aside to create a sovereign-wealth fund. It would be run by professional managers, not necessarily from Japan, rewarded with performance-based salaries. The fund would be independent of bureaucratic and political meddling. Its working language would be English.

由于缺乏更好的收益，日本政府不得不削减其对于老年人群的赡养并提高税率；这两项同样地不得人心。为扭转以上基金利用不良的现状。一群来自执政党即自由民主党的政客们号召呼吁从养老金中抽出10万亿日元，用以建立”最高财富基金”由专业经理人运作。专业经理人不需要一定来自日本，薪酬由其表现决定。这项基金将免受来自官僚政府的行政干预。其工作语言规定为英语。

Previous efforts to reform the pension fund have been quashed by Japan’s Jurassic bureaucracy, as was an earlier attempt to create a sovereign-wealth fund using foreign-exchange reserves. Risky investments put the public’s money in peril, say detractors. To overcome this resistance, the proposed fund would maintain the same allocation to JGBs as the current one. If it can produce better returns from the portion of its capital that is actively invested, it may sway public opinion in favour of increasing its size and changing its allocation away from safe-but-sorrowful JGBs, explains Kotaro Tamura, an LDP legislator. The plan is a Petri dish for a potentially much bigger investment pool.

此前，曾尝试过利用外汇储备去建立这样一个”主权财富基金”，但这些改革努力由于日本侏罗纪式的官僚统治而成为徒劳。一些恶意的批评者称，风险投资会将公众的财富置于危险境地。为克服这一阻挠，这项基金将对政府公债保持与现行基金相同的配额。一位自由民主党的立法官员称，如果这项基金中被利用于投资的部分可以得到较好的收益，公众将倾向于扩大其规模，并减少其在安全保险却收益寥寥的政府公债中的配额。无疑，这一计划为孕育潜在中巨大的联合投资组织提供了绝佳的温床。

Any long-term shift away from JGBs may have broader fiscal consequences. The government’s debt is around 180% of GDP, the largest among industrialised countries. But it borrows cheaply, partly because the pension fund is a captive buyer. If the fund were to seek more enticing assets elsewhere, the government would have　to offer better terms on its bonds, raising its cost of borrowing.

任何有关政府公债的长期转变都可能在财政方面产生更加深远的后果。日本政府的负债大约相当于GDP的180%，位于工业化国家之最。但其借贷利率却较低，一部分就是由于养老金不得不对这一情况买单。如果这一部分基金转向其它利润更加诱人的地方，政府将不得不在其公债上加上其它优惠条件，并提高借贷利率。

Some officials fear this would harm the national economy. But the true consequences would probably be more subtle. Pensioners would be better off, possibly at the expense of future taxpayers, who would bear the burden of repaying the government’s more costly debt.

一些官员担忧，以上措施将对国有经济产生不良影响。然而，真正的后果却可能更加微妙。靠退休金生活的老人们的生活会得到改善，却可能是以未来的纳税人为代价，后者将背负上更加沉重的政府债务。

There may be wider gains. The plan’s backers hope that fresh funds and cannier investment will give the Tokyo stockmarket a lift, by putting pressure on companies to improve shareholder value. Better performance may also inspire individuals to invest more creatively. Japanese households sit on ¥1,500 trillion of assets, half of which is buried in bank deposits earning scant interest. Unleashing that capital would really help to cushion old age.

同样，更多的好处也可能浮现。这项计划的支持者希望，新生的资金和精明的投资可以通过向公司施加压力提高股东们的收益而振作东京的股票市场。更好的表现同样也会激发个人更有创造力的投资。日本家庭坐拥1500万亿资产，其中一半陷于银行储蓄，只能赚取极为有限的利息。放手这部分资金将真正帮助改善老年人群的生活

译者：topsun    http://www.ecocn.org/forum/viewthread.php?tid=12890&extra=page%3D1