今日读的一篇小短文，关于中国出口比重的变迁。从1978年改革开发以来，中国出口的比重占全球出口不断上升，尤其是2001年加入WTO之后。但2016年开始，拐点发生。同时，出口比重在亚洲的占比也在下降，低价值市场上份额不断被越南蚕食；在高价值市场上，日本，韩国和台湾地区总计比重也在增加（这三个经济体在高端电子元器件的能力，正好符合日益增长的AI和机器人行业需求。）如下图：
原因呢？虽然有人民币升值，劳动力成本上升等因素，文章认为不足以完全解释此变化。以下两方面更为重要：
1）经济结构从工业化向服务业进化，服务产业为虚拟产业，因此不计入出口统计数据；
2）消费升级，本来出口的很多商品，现在已经为国人自己购买；
文章最后得出的结论是：虽然中国出口占比无论在世界范围还是在亚洲范围，都是在下降，但中国商品的附加值在增加，因此出口占比下降无伤大雅；
读完后，忽然想到2016年正好是时髦词“消费升级”流行的一年。现在回头看，这波“消费升级”固然有经济发展的因素，但也应该有2015股灾后大量资金涌入社会，杠杆盛行的原因，所以部分也是泡沫繁荣。最近又出来一个“消费降级”的概念，我觉得也是因为中央在强调去杠杆，从而导致资金收紧等因素。总之，强烈地感受到，国内的社会经济现象更多来自政府的宏观调控，而不是市场的自由发展。
文里有个有趣的细节，讲到Japan, South Korea and Taiwan时，用的词是rivals，the trio's，economies, 没有出现countries. 😃
附原文：
China’s share of global and Asian exports is falling (Mar 8th 2018 Print edition | China)
CHINA’s exporters once had little to offer the world and everything to learn from it.In the 1960s intrepid entrepreneurs ventured across the border from Hong Kong to the Canton Fair to buy wooden toys from China’s rudimentary factories. One visitor threw away a sock in his hotel, according to the book “Toy Town” by Sarah Monks. It was later mailed back to him,darned and washed.
In 1978 when the country began to reform and open up, it accounted for less than 1% of global exports of goods. For the next 37 years, its share grew remorselessly, accelerating around the time of its entry into the World Trade Organisation in 2001. In socks, for example, China accounts for about 40% of world exports.
But in 2016 something unusual happened. China’s share of global merchandise exports slipped: from 13.9% to 13.5%, according to IMF data. That might have been a blip in atumultuousyear. But in the first 11 months of 2017 (the latest data available) its share fell again, to less than 13%.
The story is similar within Asia, points out Louis Kuijs of Oxford Economics, a forecasting firm. China’s share of the region’s exports has dropped by 2.6 percentage points from 2015 to 2017 (see chart). Currency fluctuations are one potential culprit. But although the value of the yuan, weighted by trade and adjusted for inflation, rose until 2015, it weakened for the next year and a half.
It is also tempting to place the blame wholly on deteriorating demographics and rising labour costs. But although China’s working-age population is shrinking, its labour force, and urban employment, is still growing.
Besides, China is losing market share not only to cheaper, younger countries like Vietnam. It is also ceding ground to greyer, costlier rivals like Japan, South Korea and Taiwan. The trio’s combined share of Asia’s exports rose by almost 1.2 percentage points from 2015 to 2017.
Exporters in these three developed economies have benefited from a powerful upswing in demand for sophisticated electronic components, such as flash memory chips—an industrial niche that China has yet tocommandeerfor itself. But the price of some of these technological delicacies has recently begun to fall. Are these countries’ gains therefore merelycyclical? The present tech cycle may indeed be losing momentum, argues Mr Kuijs, but the three countries are still well placed to gain from the long-term growth of artificial intelligence and robotics.
China’s economy meanwhile has evolved from industry towards services, which are harder to sell across borders and which are anyway excluded from merchandise-trade statistics (which cover only goods). China’s domestic spending has also risen faster than production, resulting in a narrower trade surplus. Some of the goods China would once have sold to foreigners it now consumes itself.
China’s exports have also become more Chinese. Fifteen years ago they had a big hole in them: only 55% of their value was added in China, according to a broad measure of the “processing trade” compiled by Mr Kuijs. Most of the remainder was embedded in parts and components that China had imported and assembled. That hole has since diminished. The percentage of value added in China is now 67% or so.
This evolution is visible even in socks. In Datang, or “Sock City”, in Zhejiang province, where 70% of China’s socks are made, firms increasingly offer their own branded varieties, rather than making pairs that will be sold under a foreign company’s label. China may be producing a declining share of the world’s exports. But it now claims a higher share of their value.
单词：
intrepid [ɪn’trɛpɪd] /adj. 无畏的；勇敢的；勇猛的/
rudimentary [,rudɪ’mɛntri] /adj. 基本的；初步的/
darn/v. 织补，缝补/
tumultuous [tu’mʌltʃuəs] /adj. 吵闹的；骚乱的；狂暴的/
cede/vt. 放弃；割让（领土）/
culprit/n. 犯人，罪犯；被控犯罪的人/
deteriorating [dɪ'tɪrɪə,retɪŋ]
cyclical[ˈsɪklɪkəl] /adj. 周期的，循环的/
commandeer [,kɑmən'dɪr] /vt. 征用；霸占，没收；强取/
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