alevel 经济学概念（AlevelAP经济A学习笔记）

A-level economics revision guides and question banks covering labour markets, supply and demand, market structure and all core economics a-level topics.

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今天带给大家Alevel经济笔记是：

第4章：Exchange Rates—The Exchange Rate Mechanism (ERM)

The ERM was a fixed, but adjustable, exchange rate system for the countries of the European Union (EU) that started in 1979.

Although there were the standard economic reasons for the new system (stability, discipline, etc.), it was also a precursor to European Monetary Union (EMU), the final stage of which was the creation of the euro, the single currency for the EU.

It was felt that the single market of the EU would not be complete without a single currency as well.

The single market came into force on the 1st January 1993, with the single currency starting exactly six years later.

ERM 是 1979 年开始的针对欧盟 (EU) 国家的固定但可调整的汇率制度。虽然新制度有标准的经济原因（稳定性、纪律等），但它也是欧洲货币联盟 (EMU)的前身，其最后阶段是创建欧元，即欧盟的单一货币。人们认为，如果没有单一货币，欧盟的单一市场也不完整。单一市场于 1993 年 1 月 1日生效，而单一货币正好在六年后开始。

The ERM was similar to the Bretton Woods system, except that it was not based on any currency or gold.

The currencies were pegged to a central unit known as the ECU that was based on a weighted average of the participating countries in 1979.

As with the Bretton Woods' system, where all currencies were measured against the dollar, even though gold was the actual basis of the system, the German mark soon became the currency against which other currencies were quoted (although the mark was not the basis of the system).

ERM 类似于布雷顿森林体系，只是它不是基于任何货币或黄金。这些货币与一个称为 ECU 的中央单位挂钩，该单位基于 1979 年参与国的加权平均值。与布雷顿森林体系一样，所有货币都以美元衡量，尽管黄金是实际基础在该系统中，德国马克很快成为其他货币的报价货币（尽管该马克不是该系统的基础）。

Like the Bretton Woods system, currencies were allowed to make small adjustments around their entry rate (±2¼%) and realignments were allowed if the entry rate was obviously not right.

This happened quite often to start with, but after the first few years the currencies had found their correct levels and realignments were more rare.

与布雷顿森林体系一样，货币被允许围绕其进入率（±2¼%）进行小幅调整，如果进入率明显不正确，则允许重新调整。这种情况一开始就经常发生，但在最初的几年之后，货币找到了正确的水平，重新调整的情况更加罕见。

The pound joined in October 1990.

There was a lot of political pressure to join, with the completion of the single market over the horizon.

In hindsight it was the wrong time (as the UK entered a recession) and at the wrong rate (£1 = 2.95DM was too high).

The pound was allowed larger band's (±6%), but by the summer of 1992 the pound was already hovering around the bottom band (£1 = 2.78DM).

英镑于 1990 年 10 月加入。随着单一市场的完成，加入的政治压力很大。事后看来，这是错误的时间（因为英国进入了衰退），而且汇率也错误（1 英镑 = 2.95 马克太高了）。英镑被允许有更大的波动范围（±6%），但到 1992 年夏天，英镑已经徘徊在底部波动范围内（1 英镑 = 2.78 马克）。

The rules of the ERM stated that all members had to help struggling currencies stay within the permitted bands.

This meant buying pounds or (in the case of non-UK countries) cutting interest rates to make the pound more attractive to investors and speculators.

In practice, help was minimal. There was no point buying pounds when the effect would be small compared with the might of global money flows.

Also, Germany was in the process of reunification, and the resulting increase in the money supply needed higher interest rates.

In fact, it was because Germany's interest rates were relatively high over the period 1990-92 that the UK had to keep their interest rate higher than they would have liked given that the UK was in the depths of a recession.

ERM 的规则规定，所有成员都必须帮助陷入困境的货币保持在允许的范围内。这意味着购买英镑或（在非英国国家的情况下）降低利率以使英镑对投资者和投机者更具吸引力。在实践中，帮助是微乎其微的。与全球资金流动的影响相比，如果影响很小，那么购买英镑是没有意义的。此外，德国正处于统一进程中，因此货币供应量的增加需要更高的利率。事实上，由于德国的利率在 1990-92 年期间相对较高，英国不得不将利率保持在高于他们所希望的水平，因为英国正处于衰退的最深处。

The pressure was too much.

Speculators continually sold the pound in September and the only buyer was the UK government! On the 16th September 1992, the government lost £7 billion buying pounds.

They even raised interest rates by 5% in one day (from 10% to 15%).

This was taken as a sign of desperation and the speculators kept selling pounds. They knew the pound was only going one way.

The Chancellor announced the UK's suspension of their membership of the ERM that evening. The pound fell by 15% instantly and has been floating ever since.

压力太大了。投机者在 9 月不断抛售英镑，唯一的买家是英国政府！1992 年 9 月16日，政府在购买英镑时损失了 70 亿英镑。他们甚至在一天内将利率提高了 5%（从 10% 到 15%）。这被视为绝望的迹象，投机者继续抛售英镑。他们知道英镑只会走一条路。财政大臣当晚宣布英国暂停其在 ERM 的成员资格。英镑立即下跌了 15%，此后一直在浮动。

Other countries suffered as well. The bands were widened to ±15%. These bands were so wide that the ERM was barely an exchange rate system any more.

The experience of the ERM was similar in some respects to that of the Bretton Woods system.

Whilst frequent realignments would disrupt the stability on which the system was based, too little realignment puts pressure on countries not to realign however bad the problems are.

There were no realignments between 1987 and 1992.

The pound should probably have been realigned earlier in 1992, but membership of the ERM was the foundation stone around which the rest of government macroeconomic policy was built. Realignment was seen as failure just as rising inflation would be today.

其他国家也遭受了损失。条带加宽至±15%。这些范围是如此之宽，以至于 ERM 几乎不再是一个汇率系统。ERM 的经验在某些方面与布雷顿森林体系的经验相似。虽然频繁的调整会破坏系统所基于的稳定性，但调整过少会给各国带来压力，无论问题有多严重，都不要调整。1987 年至 1992 年期间没有调整。英镑可能应该在 1992 年初进行调整，但 ERM 的成员资格是制定政府其他宏观经济政策的基石。重新调整被视为失败，就像今天通胀上升一样。

As John Major found out when he lost the 1997 General Election, even though devaluation out of the ERM helped the economy recover, his reputation for economic management was in tatters.

Many voters in opinion polls cited the ERM fiasco as the reason for voting the government out.

What made it worse was the fact that the recovery of the economy after the pound fell out of the ERM suggested that government policy of being in the ERM was simply wrong.

正如约翰·梅杰在 1997 年大选中失利时发现的那样，尽管 ERM 的贬值帮助经济复苏，但他在经济管理方面的声誉已经破败。民意调查中的许多选民将 ERM 惨败作为投票支持政府的原因。更糟糕的是，英镑脱离 ERM 后经济的复苏表明政府加入 ERM 的政策是完全错误的。

Advantages and disadvantages of fixed and floating systems

固定和浮动系统的优缺点

As you have seen, each system has its good and bad points. We shall summarise them below, starting with fixed exchange rate systems.

如您所见，每个系统都有其优点和缺点。我们将在下面总结它们，从固定汇率制度开始。

The advantages of a fixed exchange rate system

固定汇率制度的优势

Stability稳定

Some economists would argue that this is the most significant advantage.

If exchange rates are stable over a given period of time, exporting firms will be able to plan ahead without worrying about huge swings in the value of the pound eliminating their profit margin.

This will encourage more investment and trade between countries, both of which are important if economies are to grow in the long term.

一些经济学家会争辩说，这是最显着的优势。如果汇率在给定时期内保持稳定，出口公司将能够提前计划，而不必担心英镑价值的巨大波动会消除他们的利润率。这将鼓励国家之间更多的投资和贸易，如果经济要长期增长，这两者都很重要。

Discipline纪律

If a country is part of an exchange rate system, they cannot devalue their currency at the first sign of trouble (i.e. a large current account deficit).

They have to try and cure the fundamental problem by, for example, improving the competitiveness of their exporters through increased productivity and improved quality.

如果一个国家是汇率体系的一部分，他们不能在出现问题的第一个迹象（即巨额经常账户赤字）时贬值其货币。他们必须尝试解决根本问题，例如通过提高生产力和质量来提高出口商的竞争力。

One can also argue that fixed exchange rate systems discipline countries into keeping inflation down.

Again, there is no option to devalue if increasing inflation leads to reduced competitiveness. This was the case with the UK in the ERM.

Their actions were effectively dictated by the actions of the strongest member of the system, Germany.

They were notoriously strict on inflation, perhaps keeping interest rates higher than they needed to be.

The UK was forced to follow suit and keep interest rates relatively high to keep the pound within the ERM. The system almost forced the UK to keep inflation down.

Others would argue that the ERM simply forced the UK to stay in a recession. Anyone can keep inflation low by having a recession!

人们也可以争辩说，固定汇率制度可以约束各国降低通货膨胀。同样，如果通胀上升导致竞争力下降，就没有贬值的选择。英国在 ERM 中就是这种情况。他们的行动实际上是由系统中最强大的成员德国的行动决定的。众所周知，他们对通货膨胀的严格要求，也许将利率保持在高于他们需要的水平。英国被迫效仿并保持相对较高的利率以将英镑保持在 ERM 范围内。该系统几乎迫使英国降低通胀。其他人会争辩说，企业风险管理只是迫使英国陷入衰退。任何人都可以通过经济衰退来保持低通胀！

Avoid speculation?

避免投机？

Theoretically, fixed exchange rates should eliminate speculation because there is no point buying and selling currencies that will not change in value.

In the real world, this is not always the case. The story of the pound falling out of the ERM is a classic example where this theory went a bit wrong!

从理论上讲，固定汇率应该消除投机，因为买卖不会改变价值的货币是没有意义的。在现实世界中，情况并非总是如此。英镑从 ERM 中掉出来的故事就是这个理论有点错误的经典例子！

Having said that, in the run up to the introduction of the euro (a totally fixed exchange rate system!) the rates were fixed six months before the start date of the 1st January 1999 and lots of speculation against these rates was predicted.

In this case, it simply did not happen. Speculators believed the politicians when they said that these rates were forever, and so did not see the point in buying or selling the currencies involved.

Of course, the euro was sold after its introduction, but that is a different story (see the next Learn-It).

话虽如此，在引入欧元（一个完全固定的汇率系统！）之前，汇率是在 1999 年 1 月 1日开始日期前六个月固定的，并且预计会有很多针对这些汇率的投机。在这种情况下，它根本没有发生。投机者相信政客们说这些汇率是永久的，因此没有看到买卖相关货币的意义。当然，欧元在推出后就被卖出了，但那是另一回事（见下一个 Learn-It）。

The lesson, therefore, is that systems that are credible will experience less speculation.

Systems, or members within systems, that do not inspire confidence may well have to put up with lots of speculative buying and selling.

因此，教训是可信的系统将经历较少的猜测。不能激发信心的系统或系统内的成员可能不得不忍受大量的投机买卖。

The disadvantages of a fixed exchange rate system

固定汇率制度的弊端

The loss of monetary policy货币政策的损失

As the UK government found when they were part of the ERM, a commitment to a fixed exchange rate means that you lose control over all other instruments of monetary policy.

Although the government pretended that UK interest rate decisions we still their own (and technically they were) any movement of the German interest rate was usually quickly followed by a similar change in the UK.

Today the Monetary Policy Committee (MPC) can set interest rates at whatever level they want, but they cannot control the value of the pound at the same time.

Controlling one of these two instruments means a loss of control of the other.

正如英国政府在加入 ERM 时发现的那样，对固定汇率的承诺意味着您将失去对所有其他货币政策工具的控制。尽管政府假装英国的利率决定我们仍然是他们自己的（从技术上讲，他们是）德国利率的任何变动通常很快就会在英国发生类似的变化。今天，货币政策委员会（MPC）可以将利率设定在他们想要的任何水平，但他们无法同时控制英镑的价值。控制这两种工具中的一种意味着失去对另一种的控制。

The need for a large pool of reserves

需要大量储备

To maintain the pound's value within the ERM, the government had to have a large pool of foreign reserves with which to buy the pound when it fell to the floor of the bottom band.

Apart from being expensive in itself, some countries may find it hard to get their hands on sufficient stocks of reserves to support their currency.

One of the main jobs of the IMF in the Bretton Woods system was to help poor countries in times of trouble and lend them reserves when they were short.

为了将英镑的价值维持在 ERM 范围内，政府必须拥有大量外汇储备，以便在英镑跌至底部区间时购买英镑。除了本身价格昂贵之外，一些国家可能会发现很难获得足够的储备来支撑其货币。国际货币基金组织在布雷顿森林体系中的主要工作之一是在困难时期帮助贫穷国家，并在它们短缺时借给它们储备金。

Problems of uncompetitiveness

缺乏竞争力的问题

With a freely floating currency, a deteriorating trade situation should automatically cause the pound to fall (speculators permitting!), which, in turn, would improve the competitiveness of British exporters and improve the trade balance.

在货币自由浮动的情况下，不断恶化的贸易形势应该会自动导致英镑下跌（投机者允许！），这反过来又会提高英国出口商的竞争力并改善贸易平衡。

Economies stuck in a fixed exchange rate system with a deteriorating trade balance may feel that they joined the system at too high an exchange rate.

Although they may be allowed to devalue eventually, the exchange rate may be at the wrong rate for significant periods of time. This can cause permanent job losses and recession.

Some economists feel that the recession of 1990-92 in the UK was prolonged due to membership of the ERM.

陷入贸易平衡恶化的固定汇率体系的经济体可能会觉得他们以过高的汇率加入该体系。尽管它们最终可能被允许贬值，但汇率可能在很长一段时间内处于错误的汇率。这可能导致永久性失业和经济衰退。一些经济学家认为，由于加入了 ERM，英国 1990-92 年的经济衰退被延长了。

Advantages of a floating exchange rate system

浮动汇率制度的优势

Theoretical elimination of trade imbalances理论上消除贸易失衡

As we have stated before, floating exchange rates should adjust automatically to trade imbalances, which, in turn, will eliminate the trade imbalance.

Of course, it has also been noted that this does not always work in the real world because so few currency transactions that take place are for trade.

正如我们之前所说，浮动汇率应根据贸易不平衡自动调整，从而消除贸易不平衡。当然，也有人指出，这在现实世界中并不总是有效，因为发生的货币交易很少用于贸易。

No need for reserves?

不需要储备吗？

On the whole, foreign reserves are used to help maintain a currency's position within a fixed exchange rate.

If a currency is freely floating, then there is no need to use reserves to affect its value.

In the real world, governments will always have some reserves, in case of a crisis in the balance of payments, or if they feel that their currency is getting a bit too high or too low.

总体而言，外汇储备用于帮助维持货币在固定汇率内的地位。如果一种货币是自由浮动的，那么就没有必要使用储备来影响其价值。在现实世界中，政府总会有一些储备，以防国际收支出现危机，或者如果他们觉得他们的货币有点太高或太低了。

More freedom over domestic policy

国内政策的更多自由

As was stated above, if the government is not controlling their exchange rate, then they can control their rate of interest.

The evidence of the past five years suggests that, although exporters suffer with a strong pound, the economy as a whole is best served when the authorities can control domestic monetary policy.

如上所述，如果政府不控制他们的汇率，那么他们可以控制他们的利率。过去五年的证据表明，尽管出口商受到英镑走强的影响，但当当局能够控制国内货币政策时，整体经济将得到最好的服务。

The disadvantages of a floating exchange rate system

浮动汇率制度的弊端

Speculation猜测

Again, there are two ways of looking at this.

You could argue that with floating exchange rates, speculation is less likely because an exchange rate can move freely up or down, so it is more likely to be at its true level.

But the very fact that it does move up and down easily means it can move a long way if speculators think that it is at the wrong level.

The quick rise in the value of the pound in the second half of 1996 showed that big swings in currencies do not just happen when speculators force them out of fixed exchange rate systems.

同样，有两种看待这个问题的方法。您可能会争辩说，在浮动汇率下，投机的可能性较小，因为汇率可以自由上下波动，因此更有可能处于其真实水平。但它确实很容易上下波动的事实意味着，如果投机者认为它处于错误的水平，它可能会走很长一段路。1996 年下半年英镑的快速升值表明，货币的大幅波动不仅仅发生在投机者迫使它们退出固定汇率体系时。

Uncertainty不确定

The biggest advantage of fixed exchange rate systems was their stability and certainty.

This tended to increase investment and trade, both good things.

The biggest disadvantage of floating exchange rate systems is their uncertainty, reducing the rate at which investment and trade increase.

Firms often use the currency markets to hedge against large fluctuations in the exchange rate, which helps to a certain extent, but there is still felt to be too much uncertainty.

固定汇率制度的最大优势在于其稳定性和确定性。这往往会增加投资和贸易，这都是好事。浮动汇率制度的最大缺点是其不确定性，降低了投资和贸易增长的速度。企业经常利用货币市场对冲汇率的大幅波动，这在一定程度上有所帮助，但仍感觉不确定性太大。

今天的Alevel经济笔记就更新到这里，如果大家对Alevel经济学感兴趣可以关注我们，

关于Alevel经济笔记第四章：Exchange Rates后续的更新计划如下：

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