飓风卡特里娜对美国经济的影响

Contessa Brewer¹: Joining me to discuss how the damage from Katrina could affect the economy, from Washington is David Wessel, deputy bureau chief of the Wall Street Journal. David, nice to see you today.

David Wessel: Nice to see you.

Contessa Brewer: So how much has hurricane Katrina affected² oil and gas production here?

David Wessel: Well, the, the Gulf³ of Mexico, as you point out, is a very important center of oil exploration and production. And even more important it's a port for importing oil and other energy materials into the United States. So the reason oil prices has spiked⁴ is because their concerns that the supply will be disrupted. We won't really know how bad it is for a few days till we assess the damage. But we're very vulnerable there as you point out.

Contessa Brewer: Yeah. we heard,urh, initial reports that you know, Chevron⁵ for instance was flying over a huge refining plant out there along the Gulf Coast that some of these big platforms with the big ocean-going liners coming in to offload their oil. They may have been damaged there; they could prevent those supplies coming in. The president is considering releasing some oil stock from the Strategic Petroleum⁶ Reserve, but if the refineries⁷ can't handle that work, how would that help?

David Wessel: Well, it , it wouldn't help what the Strategic Petroleum Reserve has is raw material that would have to be refined. The problem is this comes at a moment when we don't have a lot of access refining capacity and when oil markets were already on edge because demand for oils from around the world has been so strong. So it is a very delicate moment. I think it actually goes beyond that, because one fifth of all the nation's imports and exports come out of the ports down there in the areas affected by the hurricane. And if it turns out that those ports are damaged, it'll take a while to reopen. The economy effects could go beyond the energy ones.

Contessa Brewer: Ok! That's good to know. I didn't even realize it was such a big import situation.

David Wessel: A lot of , a lot of the nations' grain is exported through those ports, you know, goes down the Mississippi River so...

Contessa Brewer: So you are talking about that perhaps prices could go up for all kinds of goods?

David Wessel: Right or we could sell less of it, absolutely. I mean that's a thing it's so interesting. You know it's obviously devastating⁸ for the people who live there and those pictures are so upsetting and you can't imagine what it's like to be there. As a center of production in the US, of the overall US economy, it's not very big. About three percent of the GDP is in this area. That's not very big. But our imports and exports of energy are very important part of that region's economy. And that could have national implications .

Contessa Brewer: Well let's talk a little bit too about the insurance industry because certainly (right) it's already been a long hurricane season. How is Katrina going to affect them when you're talking about early estimates being more than nine billion dollars in insured losses?

David Wessel: Well. Clearly the insurance industry is gonna pay off a lot of money to home owners, and to businesses that have lost property or have had their businesses interrupted. The total losses are being talked about in the range of 25 billion dollars although those estimates are always very squishy so early on. What this means is that the insurance companies and particularly the reinsurance companies those are insurance companies that insure insurance companies are gonna spend a lot of money. There isn't any reason to worry about the financial stability of the system. They have a lot of resources. They've reserved for this. So it's gonna be a big cost, it's gonna hurt their earnings⁹, it's already hurt their stock prices. But I don't think it's gonna have big ripples¹⁰ outside the industry, except for one thing, it always happens like this. They have a big disaster and even though they prepare for disasters and even though they have insurance business,it almost always leads to rating increases across the board for people who buy properties, casualties and liability insurance.

Contessa Brewer: Ok, David thank you so much for joining us with your perspective on that and today you've offered several new angles for us to ponder there. David Wessel with Wall Street Journal.

1 brewer   

n. 啤酒制造者

参考例句：

• Brewer is a very interesting man. 布鲁尔是一个很有趣的人。
• I decided to quit my job to become a brewer. 我决定辞职，做一名酿酒人。

2 affected   

adj.不自然的，假装的

参考例句：

• She showed an affected interest in our subject.她假装对我们的课题感到兴趣。
• His manners are affected.他的态度不自然。

3 gulf   

n.海湾；深渊，鸿沟；分歧，隔阂

参考例句：

• The gulf between the two leaders cannot be bridged.两位领导人之间的鸿沟难以跨越。
• There is a gulf between the two cities.这两座城市间有个海湾。

4 spiked   

adj.有穗的；成锥形的；有尖顶的

参考例句：

• The editor spiked the story. 编辑删去了这篇报道。 来自《简明英汉词典》
• They wondered whether their drinks had been spiked. 他们有些疑惑自己的饮料里是否被偷偷搀了烈性酒。 来自辞典例句

5 chevron   

n.V形臂章；V形图案

参考例句：

• He wore shoulderstrap rank slides with sergeant's chevrons.他佩戴标示级别的肩章，上面有中士的V形标志。
• The chevron or arrow road sign indicates a sharp bend to the left or right.V形或箭头路标表示有向左或向右的急转弯。

6 petroleum   

n.原油，石油

参考例句：

• The Government of Iran advanced the price of petroleum last week.上星期伊朗政府提高了石油价格。
• The purpose of oil refinery is to refine crude petroleum.炼油厂的主要工作是提炼原油。

7 refineries   

精炼厂( refinery的名词复数 )

参考例句：

• The efforts on closedown and suspension of small sugar refineries, small saccharin refineries and small paper mills are also being carried out in steps. 关停小糖厂、小糖精厂、小造纸厂的工作也已逐步展开。
• Hence the sitting of refineries is at a distance from population centres. 所以，炼油厂的厂址总在远离人口集中的地方。

8 devastating   

adj.毁灭性的，令人震惊的，强有力的

参考例句：

• It is the most devastating storm in 20 years.这是20年来破坏性最大的风暴。
• Affairs do have a devastating effect on marriages.婚外情确实会对婚姻造成毁灭性的影响。

9 earnings   

n.工资收人；利润，利益，所得

参考例句：

• That old man lives on the earnings of his daughter.那个老人靠他女儿的收入维持生活。
• Last year there was a 20% decrease in his earnings.去年他的收入减少了20%。

10 ripples   

逐渐扩散的感觉( ripple的名词复数 )

参考例句：

• The moon danced on the ripples. 月亮在涟漪上舞动。
• The sea leaves ripples on the sand. 海水在沙滩上留下了波痕。