Given a lower growth rate, China’s fiscal position will deteriorate – gradually at first, and then rapidly – with the public debt/GDP ratio eventually rising to an unsustainable level. Making matters worse, when China needs to use its savings – accumulated over two generations and packed into US Treasury bills – to alleviate fiscal constraints, it will find that the value of its foreign-exchange reserves has already evaporated.
确实，对于一个日益宽松的政治体制，民粹主义也许会变得不可抗拒，然而政府机构的规模可能还会继续膨胀。如果增长率再低一些，中国的财政状况将会恶化——最初比较缓慢，然后急速恶化——最终公共债务对GDP比率将上升到一个无法维持的水平。让形势更加糟糕的是，当中国需要将其储蓄——两代人的积累投到了美国国债之中——来缓解财政限制时，它会发现其外汇储备的价值已经蒸发了。