2021年经济学人 美国通货膨胀的根源（在线收听）

Finance and Economics

财经版块

Inflation in America

美国的通货膨胀

Rental resurgence

租赁死灰复燃

Yet another upward force on American inflation: the housing boom

促进美国通货膨胀的另一股力量是房地产繁荣

FROM ENERGY and used cars to wages and shipping, the list of factors pushing up American inflation is growing fast.

从能源和二手车到工资和航运，推动美国通货膨胀的因素清单正在快速增加。

Could housing be next?

住房会是下一个吗？

According to figures published on October 13th, the consumer-price index (CPI) rose by 5.4% in the year to September.

根据10月13日公布的数据，截至今年9月，消费者价格指数CPI上涨了5.4%。

Its shelter component increased by 3.2%, up from 2.8% in the year to August.

其住房部分从今年8月的2.8%上升到3.2%。

And it has further to run.

而且它还有更长的路要走。

Shelter has the biggest weight in the CPI, making up 32% of the basket of goods and services used to construct the index.

住房在CPI中的权重最大，占构建该指数的“一篮子商品和服务”的32%。

The component is broken into two main buckets: regular rents paid by tenants, and the imputed cost of living in owned homes.

这一组成部分分为两个主要部分：租户支付的定期租金，以及估计的自有住房生活成本。

Although house prices rose by 20% in the year to July, they do not feed directly into the CPI.

尽管截至7月份，房价一年上涨了20%，但它们并没有直接影响CPI指数。

That is because statisticians treat home purchases as investment rather than consumption.

这是因为统计学家将购房视为投资而不是消费。

Instead they capture homeownership by estimating “owners’ equivalent rent”, the amount an owned property could collect based on leased ones nearby.

取而代之的是，他们通过估计“业主等值租金”来获取住房所有权，即一处自有房产根据附近的租赁房产可以收取的金额。

The rental market, therefore, is what drives shelter inflation.

因此，租赁市场是推动住房通胀的原因。

For much of the pandemic both rents and shelter inflation were depressed.

在疫情期间的大部分时间里，租金和住房通胀都处于低迷状态。

But there are two reasons to think the latest pickup in shelter costs will continue.

但有两个原因让我们认为住房成本的最新回升将持续下去。

The first is the expiry of the government’s eviction moratorium.

首先是政府的暂缓驱逐令到期。

The policy had helped renters stay in their homes in 2020, even as lockdowns meant some were unable to work.

2020年，这项政策帮助租户留在了家里，尽管封锁意味着一些人无法工作。

Many tenants also negotiated lower rents during that time.

在此期间，许多租户通过谈判降低了租金。

Now that the moratorium has lapsed, Goldman Sachs, a bank, expects about 750,000 evictions by the end of year.

现在禁令已经失效，高盛银行预计到今年年底将有大约75万人被驱逐。

That could lead to a jump in rents.

这可能会导致租金飙升。

The largest rises occur when a new tenant moves in, says Randal Verbrugge of the Federal Reserve Bank of Cleveland.

克利夫兰联邦储备银行的兰德尔·弗布鲁格说，新租户入住时，房价涨幅最大。

Rents for new leases are up by 17% compared with what the previous tenant paid, suggests RealPage, a rental site.

租赁网站RealPage表示，与之前的租户相比，新租约的租金上涨了17%。

The second reason why shelter inflation might rise further is that market prices feed through to the inflation figures only slowly.

住房通胀可能进一步上升的第二个原因是，市场价格对通胀数据的影响非常缓慢。

Landlords tend to charge more rent when the value of their property goes up, but with a lag.

房产价格上涨时，房东往往会收取更高的租金，但具有一定的滞后性。

Rises in new rents also take time to appear in consumer prices, because leases tend to last a year, and the CPI samples rents only every six months or so.

新租金的上涨也需要一段时间才能体现在消费价格中，因为租赁往往持续一年，而CPI数据每六个月左右才会出现租金上涨。

President Joe Biden’s Council of Economic Advisers estimates that a one-percentage-point increase in house-price inflation leads to a rise of 0.11 percentage points in the shelter component in 16 months’ time.

美国总统乔·拜登的经济顾问委员会估计，房价通胀每上升1个百分点，住房部分数据在16个月内就会上升0.11个百分点。

A timely measure of rents, published by Zillow, a property site, is up by around 10% on the year.

房地产网站Zillow公布的租金数据显示，今天房租比去年上涨了约10%。

Further rises could follow as more new leases are signed.

随着更多新租约的签署，房价可能会进一步上涨。

Laura Rosner-Warburton of Macro Policy Perspectives, a research firm, expects shelter inflation to climb to 4-6% by the end of 2022.

宏观政策展望研究公司的劳拉·罗斯纳·沃伯顿预计，到2022年底，住房通胀将攀升至4-6%。

That would contribute 1.3-1.9 percentage points to headline inflation, twice its average contribution in the decade before the pandemic.

这将为总体通胀率贡献1.3-1.9个百分点，是疫情前10年平均水平的两倍。

The next inflationary force could be home-grown.

下一股通胀力量可能是国内的。