美国国家公共电台 NPR 美两党达成巨额支出法案 20年后重启枪支暴力研究

We've talked about the huge debt relief bills Congress has approved. To finance them, the Treasury¹ says it will borrow $3 trillion in the April-May-June quarter. That is six times the amount borrowed in the previous quarter. So where's all the money coming from? Let's ask David Wessel, director of the Hutchins Center at the Brookings Institution. Hi, David.

DAVID WESSEL: Good morning.

MARTIN: Where's all the money coming from? The government doesn't just have it already.

WESSEL: (Laughter) No. It doesn't. When the Treasury wants to borrow, it holds auctions³. It held one yesterday, another one today and still another tomorrow. What it says is we want to borrow $100 billion. That's this week's auction². It solicits⁴ bids. And it borrows from those who offer to lend at the lowest interest rates by giving them IOUs — Treasury notes or Treasury bonds. Who's doing all this lending? Well, there are banks, mutual⁵ funds, pension funds and the like.

There are a lot of global investors⁶ who had money outside the United States who are kind of frightened and looking for a safe place to put it. And for all the concern we have about what's going on in the United States, nothing is considered safer than U.S. Treasury debt. And then there's the Federal Reserve, which, through the magic of central banking⁷, prints money, uses it to buy Treasury bonds — not directly from the Treasury, but from dealers⁸ who buy it from the Treasury and then sell it to the Fed.

MARTIN: So all that borrowing — I mean, the federal government must be accruing⁹ a ton of interest. How — is that how it works?

WESSEL: Well, it is, of course. But interest rates are extraordinarily¹⁰ low. The Treasury today will borrow $32 billion for 10 years. And it'll pay well under 1% because interest rates are so low. In fact, for the first seven months of the government's fiscal¹¹ year — October through April — the U.S. government spent no more on interest than it did in the same months of the previous fiscal year even though the debt was trillions of dollars higher.

MARTIN: So trillions of dollars of borrowing on top of the trillions of dollars the government already owed, this cannot possibly go on indefinitely.

WESSEL: It certainly can't go on forever. For now, though, the Treasury is having no trouble borrowing all this money at low interest rates. And that's a good thing because they need the money now to invest in the public health, to help people through the pandemic and to keep businesses on life support so we can — until we can safely reopen the economy. No one knows when global investors will stop lending or demand higher interest rates.

Although scary predictions that we're headed for a crisis, a financial crisis, because of the debt — well, we've been hearing them for years and it hasn't come true yet. But given the costs of an ageing population and rising health care spending, the federal debt was on an unsustainable trajectory¹² before the pandemic. It's still on an unsustainable trajectory. And someday, we're going to have to cut spending and raise taxes. But this is not someday.

MARTIN: (Laughter) Right. So now that you've told us how we can't afford to spend this money, can you just remind us what we are spending it on? What's it going to be used for?

WESSEL: Well, the government is taking in a lot less money because so many fewer people are working and because it told people they didn't have to pay their income taxes on April 15. They could wait until July 15. And Congress, as you said, has expand — has approved a lot of spending, the $1,200 a month — $1,200 adult stimulus¹³, the expanse of...

MARTIN: Yeah.

WESSEL: ...Unemployment benefits and all that. The Congressional Budget Office says, in the first seven months of the fiscal year, revenues were down 10% from last year. Spending was up 30% above last year. So that's where the money is going.

MARTIN: David Wessel of Brookings. Thank you.

WESSEL: You're welcome.

1 treasury   

n.宝库；国库，金库；文库

参考例句：

• The Treasury was opposed in principle to the proposals.财政部原则上反对这些提案。
• This book is a treasury of useful information.这本书是有价值的信息宝库。

2 auction   

n.拍卖；拍卖会；vt.拍卖

参考例句：

• They've put the contents of their house up for auction.他们把房子里的东西全都拿去拍卖了。
• They bought a new minibus with the proceeds from the auction.他们用拍卖得来的钱买了一辆新面包车。

3 auctions   

n.拍卖，拍卖方式( auction的名词复数 )

参考例句：

• They picked up most of the furniture at auctions in country towns. 他们大部分的家具都是在乡村镇上的拍卖处买的。 来自辞典例句
• Our dealers didn't want these cars, so we had to dump them at auctions. 我们的承销商都不要这些车子，因此我们只好贱价拍卖。 来自辞典例句

4 solicits   

恳请

参考例句：

• They were planning to solicit funds from a number of organizations. 他们正计划向一些机构募集资金。
• May I solicit your advice on a matter of some importance? 我有一件要事可以请教你吗？ 来自《简明英汉词典》

5 mutual   

adj.相互的，彼此的；共同的，共有的

参考例句：

• We must pull together for mutual interest.我们必须为相互的利益而通力合作。
• Mutual interests tied us together.相互的利害关系把我们联系在一起。

6 investors   

n.投资者，出资者( investor的名词复数 )

参考例句：

• a con man who bilked investors out of millions of dollars 诈取投资者几百万元的骗子
• a cash bonanza for investors 投资者的赚钱机会

7 banking   

n.银行业，银行学，金融业

参考例句：

• John is launching his son on a career in banking.约翰打算让儿子在银行界谋一个新职位。
• He possesses an extensive knowledge of banking.他具有广博的银行业务知识。

8 dealers   

n.商人( dealer的名词复数 )；贩毒者；毒品贩子；发牌者

参考例句：

• There was fast bidding between private collectors and dealers. 私人收藏家和交易商急速竞相喊价。
• The police were corrupt and were operating in collusion with the drug dealers. 警察腐败，与那伙毒品贩子内外勾结。

9 accruing   

v.增加( accrue的现在分词 )；（通过自然增长）产生；获得；（使钱款、债务）积累

参考例句：

• economic benefits accruing to the country from tourism 旅游业为该国带来的经济效益
• The accruing on a security since the previous coupon date. 指证券自上次付息日以来所累积的利息。 来自互联网

10 extraordinarily   

adv.格外地；极端地

参考例句：

• She is an extraordinarily beautiful girl.她是个美丽非凡的姑娘。
• The sea was extraordinarily calm that morning.那天清晨，大海出奇地宁静。

11 fiscal   

adj.财政的，会计的，国库的，国库岁入的

参考例句：

• The increase of taxation is an important fiscal policy.增税是一项重要的财政政策。
• The government has two basic strategies of fiscal policy available.政府有两个可行的财政政策基本战略。

12 trajectory   

n.弹道，轨道

参考例句：

• It is not difficult to sketch the subsequent trajectory.很容易描绘出它们最终的轨迹。
• The path followed by a projectile is called its trajectory.抛物体所循的路径称为它的轨道。

13 stimulus   

n.刺激，刺激物，促进因素，引起兴奋的事物

参考例句：

• Regard each failure as a stimulus to further efforts.把每次失利看成对进一步努力的激励。
• Light is a stimulus to growth in plants.光是促进植物生长的一个因素。