How the Economic Machine Works A Template for Understanding What is Happening Now
Ray Dalio Created October 31, 2008 | Updated March, 2012
The economy is like a machine. At the most fundamental level it is a relatively simple machine, yet it is not well understood. I wrote this paper to describe how I believe it works. My description is not the same as conventional economists’ descriptions so you should decide for yourself whether or not what I’m saying makes sense. I will start with the simple things and build up, so please bear with me. You will be able to understand and assess my description if we patiently go through it.
经济机器是如何运作的一个模板，用来理解现在正在发生的事情
Ray Dalio创建于2008年10月31日|更新于2012年3月
经济就像一台机器。在最基本的层面上，它是一个相对简单的机器，但还没有得到很好的理解。我写这篇文章是为了描述我认为它是如何工作的。我的描述和传统经济学家的描述不一样，所以你应该自己决定我所说的是否有意义。我会从简单的事情开始，并建立起来，所以请容忍我。如果我们耐心地阅读，你将能够理解和评估我的描述。
How the Economic Machine Works: “A Transactions-Based Approach”
经济机器如何运作：“基于交易的方法”
An economy is simply the sum of the transactions that make it up. A transaction is a simple thing. Because there are a lot of them, the economy looks more complex than it really is. If instead of looking at it from the top down, we look at it from the transaction up, it is much easier to understand.
一个经济体只是组成它的交易的总和。交易很简单。因为他们有很多例子，经济看起来比实际情况更复杂。如果我们不是从上往下看，而是从交易往上看，那就更容易理解了。
A transaction consists of the buyer giving money (or credit) to a seller and the seller giving a good, a service or a financial asset to the buyer in exchange. A market consists of all the buyers and sellers making exchanges for the same things – e.g., the wheat market consists of different people making different transactions for different reasons over time. An economy consists of all of the transactions in all of its markets. So, while seemingly complex, an economy is really just a zillion simple things working together, which makes it look more complex than it really is.
交易包括买方向卖方提供金钱（或信贷）和卖方向买方提供商品、服务或金融资产作为交换。一个市场由所有买卖双方为同一事物进行交易组成，例如，小麦市场由不同的人因不同的原因在一段时间内进行不同的交易组成。一个经济体包括其所有市场的所有交易。所以，一个经济体看似复杂，但实际上只是无数个简单的东西在一起工作，这使得它看起来比实际情况更复杂。
For any market, or for any economy, if you know the total amount of money (or credit) spent and the total quantity sold, you know everything you need to know to understand it. For example, since the price of any good, service or financial asset equals the total amount spent by buyers (total $) divided by the total quantity sold by sellers (total Q), in order to understand or forecast the price of anything you just need to forecast total $ and total Q. While in any market there are lots of buyers and sellers, and these buyers and sellers have different motivations, the motivations of the most important buyers are usually pretty understandable and adding them up to understand the economy isn’t all that tough if one builds from the transactions up. What I am saying is conveyed in the simple diagram below. This perspective of supply and demand is different from the traditional perspective in which both supply and demand are measured in quantity and the price relationship between them is described in terms of elasticity. This difference has important implications for understanding markets.
对于任何一个市场，或者任何一个经济体，如果你知道花费的钱（或信贷）的总量和销售的总量，你就知道了解它所需要知道的一切。例如，由于任何商品、服务或金融资产的价格等于买方花费的总金额（总计$）除以卖方出售的总数量（总计Q），为了理解或预测任何东西的价格，您只需预测总计$和总计Q。而在任何市场上都有许多买方和卖方，这些买家和卖家有不同的动机，最重要买家的动机通常是可以理解的，如果从交易中积累起来，把它们加起来理解经济并不那么困难。我所说的在下面的简单图表中表达出来。这种供求观不同于传统的以数量衡量供求、以弹性描述价格关系的观点。这种差异对于理解市场具有重要意义。
The only other important thing to know about this part of the Template is that spending ($) can come in either of two forms – money and credit. For example, when you go to a store to buy something you can pay with either a credit card or cash. If you pay with a credit card you have created credit, which is a promise to deliver money at a later date,1 whereas, if you pay with money, you have no such liability.
关于模板的这一部分，唯一要知道的另一件重要事情是，支出（$）可以有两种形式——货币和信贷。例如，当你去商店买东西时，你可以用信用卡或现金支付。如果你用信用卡支付，你已经创造了信用，这是一个承诺，交付钱在以后的日期，1而如果你用钱支付，你没有这样的责任。
因为货币和信贷，以及通过它们的需求，比商品、服务和投资资产的生产更容易创造（或停止创造），所以我们有经济和价格周期。
In brief, there are different types of markets, different types of buyers and sellers and different ways of paying that make up the economy. For simplicity, we will put them in groups and summarize how the machine works. Most basically:
简言之，构成经济的市场类型不同，买卖双方类型不同，支付方式也不同。为了简单起见，我们将把它们分组并总结机器的工作原理。最基本的是：
x All changes in economic activity and all changes in financial markets’ prices are due to changes in the amounts of 1) money or 2) credit that are spent on them (total $), and the amounts of these items sold (total Q). Changes in the amount of buying (total $) typically have a much bigger impact on changes in economic activity and prices than do changes in the total amount of selling (total Q). That is because there is nothing that’s easier to change than the supply of money and credit (total $).
x经济活动的所有变化和金融市场价格的所有变化都是由于1）货币或2）信贷金额（总美元）和这些物品的销售金额（总Q）的变化引起的。购买量（总美元）的变化通常对经济活动和价格的变化的影响要比销售总量（总Q）的变化大得多。这是因为没有什么比货币和信贷供应更容易改变的了。
x For simplicity, let’s cluster the buyers in a few big categories. Buying can come from either 1) the private sector or 2) the government sector. The private sector consists of “households” and businesses that can be either domestic or foreign. The government sector most importantly consists of a) the Federal Government2 which spends its money on goods and services and b) the central bank, which is the only entity that can create money and, by and large, mostly spends its money on financial assets.
为了简单起见，让我们把买家分成几个大类。购买可以来自1）私营部门或2）政府部门。私营部门包括“家庭”和企业，可以是国内的，也可以是国外的。政府部门最重要的组成部分是a）将资金用于商品和服务的联邦政府2）和b）中央银行，中央银行是唯一能够创造资金的实体，大体上，其资金主要用于金融资产。
Because money and credit, and through them demand, are easier to create (or stop creating) than the production of goods and services and investment assets, we have economic and price cycles.
因为货币和信贷，以及通过它们的需求，比商品、服务和投资资产的生产更容易创造（或停止创造），所以我们有经济和价格周期。
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