本期原文选自The Economist 2016-9-17的Leaders板块A giant problem，释义来自牛津高阶七版、元照英美法词典、Lexisnexis英汉法律词典等资源。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。

A giant problem

Disruption may be the buzzword【1】 in boardrooms, but the most striking feature of business today is not the overturning of the established order. It is the entrenchment【2】 of a group of superstar companies at the heart of the global economy. Some of these are old firms, like GE, that have reinvented themselves. Some are emerging-market champions, like Samsung, which have seized the opportunities provided by globalisation. The elite of the elite are high-tech wizards—Google, Apple, Facebook and the rest—that have conjured up【3】 corporate empires from bits and bytes【4】.

【1】buzzword 流行词语

【2】entrenchment 确立；trench 战壕

【3】conjure sth from sth 令人惊讶地创造出；conjure变魔术，变戏法

【4】bits and bytes本意是位与字节，这里指代计算机技术，采用了头韵alliteration修辞手法

As our special report this week makes clear, the superstars are admirable in many ways. They churn out【5】 products that improve consumers’ lives, from smarter smartphones to sharper televisions. They provide Americans and Europeans with an estimated $280 billion-worth of “free” services—such as search or directions—a year. But they have two big faults. They are squashing competition, and they are using the darker arts of management to stay ahead. Neither is easy to solve. But failing to do so risks a backlash【6】 which will be bad for everyone.

【5】churn out 大量生产

【6】backlash 强烈反对，反冲

More concentration, less focus

Bulking up【7】 is a global trend. The annual number of mergers and acquisitions is more than twice what it was in the 1990s. But concentration is at its most worrying in America. The share of GDP generated by America’s 100 biggest companies rose from about 33% in 1994 to 46% in 2013. The five largest banks account for 45% of banking assets, up from 25% in 2000. In the home of the entrepreneur, the number of startups is lower than it has been at any time since the 1970s. More firms are dying than being born. Founders dream of selling their firms to one of the giants rather than of building their own titans.

【7】Bulk up 增大

For many laissez-faire【8】 types this is only a temporary problem. Modern technology is lowering barriers to entry; flaccid incumbents will be destroyed by smaller, leaner ones. But the idea that market concentration is self-correcting is more questionable than it once was. Slower growth encourages companies to buy their rivals and squeeze out costs. High-tech companies grow more useful to customers when they attract more users and when they gather ever more data about those users.

【8】laissez-faire自由放任，放任主义；该词源于法语，17世纪后期，法国财政部长科尔贝〔Colbert〕询问一位企业家：政府可以为企业做什么，企业家回答：Laissez nous faire(不要干涉我们；让我们自己处理)。这个词即转化成为政府在经济事务上不干预，在相关法律中不加以限制的代名词。这一理论的过分运用，导致了大规模无限制的竞争。作为法律用语，该词强调与法律限制相对的契约自由，使用和处分财产的自由（参照元照英美法词典）。

The heft of the superstars also reflects their excellence at less productive activities. About 30% of global foreign direct investment (FDI) flows through tax havens【9】; big companies routinely use “transfer pricing【10】” to pretend that profits generated in one part of the world are in fact made in another. The giants also deploy huge armies of lobbyists, bringing the same techniques to Brussels, where 30,000 lobbyists now walk the corridors, that they perfected in Washington, DC. Laws such as Sarbanes-Oxley and Dodd-Frank, to say nothing of【11】 America’s tax code, penalise small firms more than large ones.

【9】tax havens 避税地

【10】transfer pricing 转让定价，是指关联企业之间在销售货物、提供劳务、转让无形资产等时制定的价格。在跨国经济活动中，利用关联企业之间的转让定价进行避税已成为一种常见的税收逃避方法，其一般做法是：高税国企业向其低税国关联企业销售货物、提供劳务、转让无形资产时制定低价；低税国企业向其高税国关联企业销售货物、提供劳务、转让无形资产时制定高价。这样，利润就从高税国转移到低税国，从而达到最大限度减轻其税负的目的。（该释义来自百度百科）

【11】to say nothing of 更不用说

None of this helps the image of big business. Paying tax seems to be unavoidable for individuals but optional for firms. Rules are unbending for citizens, and up for negotiation when it comes to companies. Nor do profits translate into jobs as once they did. In 1990 the top three carmakers in Detroit had a market capitalisation【12】 of $36 billion and 1.2m employees. In 2014 the top three firms in Silicon Valley, with a market capitalisation of over $1 trillion, had only 137,000 employees.

【12】market capitalisation 市值，市场资本化

Anger at all this is understandable, but an inchoate desire to bash business leaves everyone worse off. Disenchantment【13】 with pro-business policies, particularly liberal immigration rules, helped the “outs” to win the Brexit referendum in Britain and Donald Trump to seize the Republican nomination. Protectionism and nativism【14】 will only lower living standards. Reining in【15】 the giants requires the scalpel, not the soapbox【16】.

【13】disenchantment；disenchanted with sb/sth 不再抱幻想，失望

【14】nativism 本土主义，排外主义

【15】Rein in 严格控制，用缰绳勒马；rein缰绳

【16】scalpe和soapbox又是头韵的修辞手法

That means a tough-but-considered approach to issues such as tax avoidance【17】. The OECD countries have already made progress in drawing up common rules to prevent companies from parking money in tax havens, for example. They have more to do, not least【18】 to address the convenient fiction that different units of multinationals are really separate companies. But better the grind of multilateral negotiation than moves such as the European Commission’s recent attempt to impose retrospective taxes on Apple in Ireland.

【17】tax avoidance 避税（合法）；tax evasion逃税，偷税漏税（非法）

【18】not least 尤其

Concentration is an even harder problem. America in particular has got into the habit of giving the benefit of the doubt to【19】 big business. This made some sense in the 1980s and 1990s when giant companies such as General Motors and IBM were being threatened by foreign rivals or domestic upstarts. It is less defensible now that superstar firms are gaining control of entire markets and finding new ways to entrench themselves.

【19】give the benefit of the doubt to sb / give sb the benefit of the doubt 当你不同意或反对对方意见的时候，如果理据并不充分，则假定对方是正确的或无辜的

Prudent policymakers must reinvent antitrust for the digital age. That means being more alert to the long-term consequences of large firms acquiring promising startups. It means making it easier for consumers to move their data from one company to another, and preventing tech firms from unfairly privileging their own services on platforms they control (an area where the commission, in its pursuit of Google, deserves credit【20】). And it means making sure that people have a choice of ways of authenticating their identity online.

【20】deserve credit 值得赞扬

1917 and all that

The rise of the giants is a reversal of recent history. In the 1980s big companies were on the retreat, as Margaret Thatcher and Ronald Reagan took a wrecking ball【21】 to state-protected behemoths【22】 such as AT&T and British Leyland. But there are some worrying similarities to a much earlier era. In 1860-1917 the global economy was reshaped by the rise of giant new industries (steel and oil) and revolutionary new technologies (electricity and the combustion engine). These disruptions led to brief bursts of competition followed by prolonged periods of oligopoly【23】. The business titans of that age reinforced their positions by driving their competitors out of business and cultivating close relations with politicians. The backlash that followed helped to destroy the liberal order in much of Europe.

【21】wrecking ball 落锤破碎机，破碎球，这里是指拆分巨型企业

【22】behemoth 超级公司或机构

【23】oligopoly 卖方寡头垄断；近义词monopoly

So, by all means celebrate the astonishing achievements of today’s superstar companies. But also watch them. The world needs a healthy dose of competition to keep today’s giants on their toes【24】 and to give those in their shadow a chance to grow.

【24】keep sb on their toes 使某人保持警觉

【小结】

Disruption是董事会会议室（boardroom）的流行词语（buzzword），但当今商业最引人注目的特征不是既定秩序（established order）的破坏，而是处于全球经济核心地位的明星公司的确立（entrenchment）。高科技公司是精英中的精英，在计算机领域（from bits and bytes）建立了企业帝国（corporate empires）。这些公司大量生产（churn out）能够改善人类生活的产品，但存在两个错误：压制竞争；采用隐秘的管理方式保持其领先地位。虽然这两个问题都难以解决，但如果不这样做又有反冲（backlash）的风险。企业壮大（bulking up）是全球趋势，但集中化（concentration）却是美国最令人担忧的问题。垂死挣扎的公司多于新生公司。企业创建者希望把企业卖给大公司，而不是创建自己的大型企业（titan）。对于很多放任自由（laissez-faire）的企业来说，这只是暂时性的问题。高科技公司吸引更多用户，收集更多用户数据，从而为客户提供更完善的服务。明星企业还通过避税天堂（tax haven）、转让定价（transfer pricing）、游说者（lobbyist）等方式谋取更多利润。一些法律（更不用说（to say nothing of）美国税法）对小型公司的惩罚比大型公司更严厉。法规对普通公民来说是冷漠无情的，但对于公司来说却可以协商。市值（market capitalisation）增加却不能带来更多工作岗位。人们对利商政策不再抱有幻想（disenchantment）。保护主义（protectionism）和本土主义（nativism）只会降低生活标准。严格管控（rein in）大型企业，需要采取强硬措施应对避税（tax avoidance）等问题。为了防止一些公司把钱留在避税地，经合组织国家还需采取行动，尤其（not least）要让跨国公司的不同分支真正成为分立公司。但征收追溯税（retrospective tax）等方式不如多方协商。集中化是更严重的问题。美国已经习惯假定大企业是无辜的（give the benefit of doubt to big business），但如今明星公司控制整个市场并寻求新方式确立自身地位，这种假定则有失偏颇。决策者需要警惕大企业收购有前景的小型初创公司而造成的长期后果，防止技术公司利用自身控制的平台对自身服务赋予特权。欧盟处理此类问题的方式值得赞扬（deserve credit）。撒切尔和里根曾对国企施行大刀阔斧的私有化改革，使巨型企业（behemoth）进行拆分（took a wrecking ball to state-protected behemoths）。当今世界也存在类似的问题。新的大型企业崛起，新的革命性技术出现，使得全球经济得以重塑。短暂的竞争之后却是长期的寡头垄断（oligopoly）。当今明星公司取得的惊人成就值得庆幸，但还有待观望。世界需要健康的竞争，以使大型企业保持警惕，同时小型企业也能获得生存机会。

* 注：本文仅供学习交流之用，不代表作者观点。