本期原文选自The Economist 2017-01-28的文章In retreat，释义来自牛津高阶七版、灵格斯词典、有道词典、元照英美法词典、维科英汉词典等资源。词汇大串烧见文末小结。如果您也在学习The Economist，欢迎订阅我的文集The Economist，一起学习交流。
In retreat
Global companies are heading home. And it's not only because of the threat of protectionism
AMONG the many things that Donald Trump dislikes are big global firms. Faceless and rootless, they stand accused of unleashing “carnage” on ordinary Americans by shipping jobs and factories abroad. His answer is to domesticate【1】 these marauding【2】 multinationals. Lower taxes will draw their cash home, border charges will hobble【3】 their cross-border supply chains and the trade deals that help them do business will be rewritten. To avoid punitive treatment, “all you have to do is stay,” he told American bosses this week.
【1】domesticate 使喜家具，使精于家务，驯养，驯化；domesticated( adj.); domestication
【2】marauding劫掠，打劫，猎食；marauder (n.)
【3】hobble阻止，妨碍，跛行
Mr Trump is unusual in his aggressively protectionist tone. But in many ways he is behind the times. Multinational companies, the agents behind global integration, were already in retreat well before the populist revolts of 2016. Their financial performance has slipped so that they are no longer outstripping【4】 local firms. Many seem to have exhausted their ability to cut costs and taxes and to out-think【5】 their local competitors. Mr Trump’s broadsides【6】 are aimed at companies that are surprisingly vulnerable and, in many cases, are already heading home. The impact on global commerce will be profound.
【4】outstrip超过，胜过
【5】out-think以智取胜，比…更善于思考，思考得比…正确（或深刻、迅速等）
【6】broadside猛烈抨击
The end of the arbitrage【7】
Multinational firms (those that do a large chunk of their business outside their home region) employ only one in 50 of the world’s workers. But they matter. A few thousand firms influence what billions of people watch, wear and eat. The likes of IBM, McDonald’s, Ford, H&M, Infosys, Lenovo and Honda have been the benchmark【8】 for managers. They co-ordinate the supply chains that account for over 50% of all trade. They account for a third of the value of the world’s stockmarkets and they own the lion’s share【9】 of its intellectual property—from lingerie【10】 designs to virtual-reality software and diabetes drugs.
【7】arbitrage套利，套汇，套购
【8】benchmark基准
【9】the lion’s share (of sth) 最大或最好的一份
【10】lingerie女士内衣
They boomed in the early 1990s, as China and the former Soviet bloc opened and Europe integrated. Investors liked global firms’ economies of scale and efficiency. Rather than running themselves as national fiefs【11】, firms unbundled【12】 their functions. A Chinese factory might use tools from Germany, have owners in the United States, pay taxes in Luxembourg and sell to Japan. Governments in the rich world dreamed of their national champions becoming world-beaters. Governments in the emerging world welcomed the jobs, exports and technology that global firms brought. It was a golden age.
【11】fief封地，势力范围
【12】unbundle 分门别类，分类
Central to the rise of the global firm was its claim to be a superior moneymaking machine. That claim lies in tatters【13】 (see Briefing). In the past five years the profits of multinationals have dropped by 25%. Returns on capital have slipped to their lowest in two decades. A strong dollar and a low oil price explain part of the decline. Technology superstars and consumer firms with strong brands are still thriving. But the pain is too widespread and prolonged to be dismissed as a blip【14】. About 40% of all multinationals make a return on equity【15】 of less than 10%, a yardstick【16】 for underperformance. In a majority of industries they are growing more slowly and are less profitable than local firms that stayed in their backyard. The share of global profits accounted for by multinationals has fallen from 35% a decade ago to 30% now. For many industrial, manufacturing, financial, natural-resources, media and telecoms companies, global reach has become a burden, not an advantage.
【13】in tatters破烂不堪，破败的，坍塌的
【14】blip暂时性的问题，变故，（仪表屏幕上的）光点
【15】return on equity股权收益率，股本盈利
【16】yardstick码尺，准绳，衡量标准
That is because a 30-year window of arbitrage is closing. Firms’ tax bills have been massaged down as low as they can go; in China factory workers’ wages are rising. Local firms have become more sophisticated. They can steal, copy or displace global firms’ innovations without building costly offices and factories abroad. From America’s shale industry to Brazilian banking, from Chinese e-commerce to Indian telecoms, the companies at the cutting edge【17】 are local, not global.
【17】cutting edge尖端，最前沿，优势
The changing political landscape is making things even harder for the giants. Mr Trump is the latest and most strident【18】 manifestation of a worldwide shift to grab more of the value that multinationals capture. China wants global firms to place not just their supply chains there, but also their brainiest activities such as research and development. Last year Europe and America battled over who gets the $13bn of tax that Apple and Pfizer pay annually. From Germany to Indonesia rules on takeovers, antitrust and data are tightening.
【18】strident强硬的，咄咄逼人的，刺耳的
Mr Trump’s arrival will only accelerate a gory【19】 process of restructuring. Many firms are simply too big: they will have to shrink their empires. Others are putting down deeper roots in the markets where they operate. General Electric and Siemens are “localising” supply chains, production, jobs and tax into regional or national units. Another strategy is to become “intangible”. Silicon Valley’s stars, from Uber to Google, are still expanding abroad. Fast-food firms and hotel chains are shifting from flipping burgers and making beds to selling branding rights. But such virtual multinationals are also vulnerable to populism because they create few direct jobs, pay little tax and are not protected by trade rules designed for physical goods.
【19】gory血腥的，残暴的
Taking back control
The retreat of global firms will give politicians a feeling of greater control as companies promise to do their bidding【20】. But not every country can get a bigger share of the same firms’ production, jobs and tax. And a rapid unwinding of the dominant form of business of the past 20 years could be chaotic. Many countries with trade deficits (including “global Britain”) rely on the flow of capital that multinationals bring. If firms’ profits drop further, the value of stockmarkets will probably fall.
【20】to do sb's bidding服从某人；bidding命令，吩咐，请求
What of consumers and voters? They touch screens, wear clothes and are kept healthy by the products of firms that they dislike as immoral, exploitative and
aloof【21】
. The golden age of global firms has also been a golden age for consumer choice and efficiency. Its
demise【22】
may make the world seem fairer. But the retreat of the multinational cannot bring back all the jobs that the likes of Mr Trump promise. And it will mean rising prices, diminishing competition and slowing innovation. In time, millions of small firms trading across borders could replace big firms as transmitters of ideas and capital. But their weight is tiny. People may yet look back on the era when global firms ruled the business world, and regret its passing.
【21】aloof冷漠，冷淡；keep/hold oneself aloof, remain/stand aloof不参与，漠不关心，无动于衷
【22】demise终止，倒闭，死亡
【小结】
跨国公司正在撤回本国（heading home）,原因不只是保护主义的威胁。特朗普讨厌很多事情，大型跨国公司就是其中之一。人们谴责跨国公司将就业机会输出到国外、将工厂建在他国而对美国民众进行了一场“大屠杀（carnage）”。对此，特朗普的回答是驯服（domesticate）这些四处劫掠（marauding）的跨国公司。较低的税率会把现金引入国内，边境收费会对跨境供应链构成阻碍（hobble）。特朗普的保护主义论调非常强硬，但从很多角度来看他的思想已经落伍（behind the times）。跨国公司在2016年民粹主义反抗之前就已经节节败退（in retreat），其财务状况下滑而无法胜过（outstripping）本土公司，为了消减成本和智胜（out-think）本土竞争者也已精疲力尽。特朗普猛烈抨击（broadsides）的对象正是那些非常脆弱（vulnerable）、已经在撤回本国的公司。跨国公司所雇员工仅占全球的1/50，但这些公司非常重要。几千个公司影响着几十亿人的生活。像IBM、麦当劳、福特汽车、H&M、Infosys、联想、本田这样的公司，对于经营管理者来说都是行业的标杆（benchmark）。这些公司拥有绝大部分（the lion’s share）知识产权，从女士内衣（lingerie）设计到虚拟现实软件和糖尿病药物，不一而足。跨国公司在90年代早期蓬勃发展（boomed）。它们没有固守本国“封地（fiefs）”，而是对职能部门进行分类细化（unbundled their functions）。富裕国家的政府希望自己国家的一流企业成为举世无比的强者（becoming world-beaters）。新兴市场国家的政府欢迎跨国公司带来就业机会、出口和技术。那是个黄金时代。跨国公司的崛起，关键在于自诩为赚钱机器，然而这种说法已被击碎（lies in tatters）。在过去五年里，跨国公司的利润下降了25%，资本回报率跌至20年来的最低水平（slipped to their lowest in two decades）。这种痛苦，范围广泛，影响深远，绝不能视为暂时性问题（blip）而轻视。约40%的跨国公司的股权收益率（return on equity）不足10%，这个数字正是股票弱势（underperformance）的衡量标准（yardstick）。这是因为30年的套利窗口期（window of arbitrage）走向终结。公司税单已经不能再低。中国工厂的工人工资正在上涨。本土公司变得更加精明老练（sophisticated）。各行各业最前沿的（at the cutting edge）企业已经不是跨国公司，而是本土企业。风云突变的政治前景让巨型公司更难生存。世界各国开始充分利用跨国公司的价值，特朗普的强硬（strident）手段体现了这种转变。中国不仅希望跨国公司将供应链设在中国，还希望其在中国开展研发等智力活动。特朗普执政只会加快血腥的（gory）重组进程。很多公司规模太大了，需要将其宏伟帝国缩小。还有些公司在各自市场扎根越来越深。另一个策略是“无形化”。但这种虚拟跨国公司在民粹主义面前还是很脆弱。跨国公司对政客的命令言听计从（promise to do their bidding），其撤退会让政客有一种更强烈的控制感。但并不是每个国家都能在同一公司的生产、就业和纳税环节占有更多的份额。过去20年来主导的商业形式快速撤退，会带来混乱的局面。那么消费者和选民又会受到哪些影响呢？他们认为跨国公司道德缺失、唯利是图、冷漠无情（aloof），而他们使用的电子产品、衣物和保健用品正是来自其憎恨的这些企业。跨国公司的消亡（demise）可能让世界更公平。但其撤退并不能将特朗普之辈许诺的就业机会全部带回本国。其结果是，物价上涨，竞争减弱，创新减慢。人们回想起跨国公司统治世界的年代，只能扼腕叹息。
*注：本文仅供学习交流之用，不代表作者观点。
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