問題詳情

請依下文回答第 46 題至第 50 題For decades inflation was the bogeyman in rich countries. But now some economists reckon that deflation, orfalling prices, may be a more serious threat—in America and Europe as well as Japan. That would be decidedlyawkward, given the surge in borrowing by firms and households in recent years. Particularly worrying is the rise inborrowing by American households to finance purchases of houses, cars or luxury goods. Deflation would swell thereal burden of these debts, forcing consumers to cut their spending.Deflation is not necessarily bad. If falling prices are caused by faster productivity growth, as happened in the late19th century, then it can go hand in hand with robust growth. On the other hand, if deflation reflects a slump in demandand excess capacity, it can be dangerous, as it was in the 1930s, triggering a downward spiral of demand and prices.Today, both the good and bad sorts of deflation are at work. Some prices are falling because of productivity gains,thanks to information technology. But the weakness of profits suggests that most deflation is now bad, not good.Deflation is particularly harmful when an economy is awash with debt. Total private-sector debt is now much higherthan when deflation was last experienced in the 1930s. Falling prices not only increase the real burden of debt, theyalso make it impossible for a central bank to deliver negative real interest rates, because nominal rates cannot go belowzero.If deflation causes real debts to swell, debtors may have to cut spending and sell assets to meet their payments.This can unleash a vicious spiral of falling incomes, asset prices and rising real debt. Irving Fisher, an Americaneconomist, described this process in a famous article in 1993 entitled “The Debt-Deflation Theory of GreatDepressions”. He described how attempts by individuals to reduce their debt burden by cutting costs couldparadoxically cause their debt burden to swell. Unable to increase prices to boost profits, firms have to cut costs, eitherby reducing labour costs and hence household income or by buying less from other firms. This is sensible for anindividual firm, but it reduces demand in the economy, thwarting the desired improvement in profit, leading to anotherround of cuts and putting further downward pressure on prices.
46 The word “bogeyman” is used to express that inflation was
(A)frightening
(B) well studied
(C) not a problem
(D) surprising

參考答案

答案：A
難度：適中0.57935
統計：A(606),B(145),C(206),D(89),E(0)

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