斯蒂格利茨：如何防范下一個華爾街危機(譯文完成)

美聯(lián)儲為了挽救房產(chǎn)泡沫投入了太多資金；金融機構(gòu)的新牟利策略隱藏了過度借貸；管理者們?yōu)榱俗穼ざ唐诶妫幌?chuàng)造和承擔(dān)高風(fēng)險；為了防范未來再次出現(xiàn)危機，必須大規(guī)模變革。

人文與社會編輯小組譯（http://humanities.cn）

CNN前言: 約瑟夫·斯蒂格利茨，現(xiàn)在是哥倫比亞大學(xué)的教授，2001年獲得諾貝爾經(jīng)濟學(xué)獎，2008年他參加的氣候變化小組獲得諾貝爾和平獎。他支持奧巴馬，在克林頓時代是經(jīng)濟顧問委員會的成員和主席，后來加入世界銀行。他和琳達·比爾姆斯合寫了《三兆美元的戰(zhàn)爭：伊拉克紛爭的真實代價》。

經(jīng)濟學(xué)家斯蒂格利茨稱，美聯(lián)邦監(jiān)督者和經(jīng)營者在華爾街危機中起了推波助瀾的作用。

紐約 (CNN) -- 很多人看來都震驚于目前的經(jīng)濟動蕩的廣泛性和嚴重性。我，還有幾個經(jīng)濟學(xué)家，早就看到這次危機的來臨，也警告過它的風(fēng)險。

要責(zé)難的方面很多，但提出責(zé)難是為了降低類似情況復(fù)發(fā)的可能性。

布什總統(tǒng)不久前說了句眾所周知的話，這次的問題很簡單："造了太多房子。"對，不過這個答案太粗糙了：為什么會出現(xiàn)那樣的情況呢？

可以說美聯(lián)儲失敗了兩次，一次是做為監(jiān)督者，一次是做為金融政策的執(zhí)行者。美聯(lián)儲的流動資產(chǎn)(可以低息貸出的金錢)和松緩的規(guī)定導(dǎo)致了房產(chǎn)泡沫。當(dāng)泡沫破滅的時候，基于超額估價的資產(chǎn)而做出的融資過度的貸款就成為壞賬。

對于所有那些新發(fā)明的經(jīng)濟手段來說，這只是基于過度融資（或者說借貸）和金字塔結(jié)構(gòu)而造成的另一起金融危機。

這些新"發(fā)明"只是隱藏了系統(tǒng)化融資的規(guī)模，把風(fēng)險變得比較不透明；正是這些發(fā)明才讓這次的經(jīng)濟危機變得比早期的經(jīng)濟危機更加戲劇化。但我們需要追問，為什么美聯(lián)儲失敗了？

首先，關(guān)鍵的監(jiān)督者們，比如阿蘭·格林斯潘，沒有真正相信監(jiān)督的作用。當(dāng)金融系統(tǒng)的不節(jié)制被指出的時候，他們提倡的是自我監(jiān)督－－這個詞本身就自相矛盾。

第二，科技泡沫的破滅使得宏觀經(jīng)濟陷入困境。2001年的稅率下調(diào)本意不是刺激經(jīng)濟發(fā)展，而是給有錢人的慷慨禮物－－而這個社會群體在過去的4分之一世紀中，已經(jīng)享受了很多好處。

伊拉克戰(zhàn)爭是致命的一擊，這是油價暴漲的原因之一。原來用于購買美國產(chǎn)品的金錢被用到海外了。美聯(lián)儲很重視保持經(jīng)濟發(fā)展的任務(wù)，但它的做法是用另一個泡沫－－房產(chǎn)泡沫－－來取代科技泡沫。家庭存款降低到了零，這是自從1929年大蕭條以來最低水平。這樣雖然維持了經(jīng)濟，但這種維持方式是短視的：美國人靠借來的時間和金錢生活。

最后，責(zé)難的中心必須放在那些金融機構(gòu)本身。它們－－更嚴重的是它們的經(jīng)營者－－的獎勵機制跟我們的經(jīng)濟與社會的需求很不一致。

這些金融機構(gòu)的經(jīng)營者得到的回報很豐厚，說起來是因為他們冒了風(fēng)險并且分配資本，這兩方面被認為能提高經(jīng)濟效率，因此也使得他們的高收入看起來合理。但是他們錯誤地分配了資本，他們錯誤地處理風(fēng)險問題－－他們實際制造了風(fēng)險。

他們的行動是基于他們的獎勵機制的：專注于短期贏利，鼓勵承擔(dān)過度風(fēng)險。

這并不是我們的金融制度的第一個危機，我們也不是第一次看到那些信奉自由、不受限制市場的人向政府尋求幫助。我們可以看到一個規(guī)律，這個規(guī)律顯示著深層的系統(tǒng)問題，－－當(dāng)然也顯示著很多不同的解決問題的方法:

第一. 我們首先需要糾正管理人員的獎勵制度，降低利益沖突的程度，提供給持股者更多關(guān)于股票期權(quán)造成的股票價格稀釋的信息。對于長期以來盛行的基于過度風(fēng)險和短期利益的獎勵機制，應(yīng)該加以抑制，抑制手法可以是把每年的分紅改成基于五年的收益支付的獎金。

第二. 我們需要創(chuàng)造一個金融產(chǎn)品安全委員會，以保證銀行、養(yǎng)老基金等等買賣的金融產(chǎn)品對"人類消費"來說是安全的。成年人只要同意就可以享受高度的行動自由，但這并不意味著他們可以用其他人的錢來賭博。某些人可能會擔(dān)心這樣的措施會壓制創(chuàng)新。但考慮到我們過去見到的創(chuàng)新(也就是試圖推翻會計制度和規(guī)定)都是什么樣的，那也許是件好事。我們需要的是針對普通美國人的需要提出的創(chuàng)新，讓他們能夠在經(jīng)濟條件發(fā)生變化的時候仍能保持他們的住房。

第三. 我們需要簡歷一個金融系統(tǒng)穩(wěn)定委員會來全盤處理整個金融系統(tǒng)，要認識到系統(tǒng)中各部分間的關(guān)系，并且防止我們剛剛經(jīng)歷的過度融資再度出現(xiàn)。

第四. 我們需要施行其他提高金融系統(tǒng)安全和健康的制度，比如限制借貸的“限速帶”。歷史上，高速擴展的借貸造成了相當(dāng)大比例的經(jīng)濟危機，這次的經(jīng)濟危機也不例外。

第五. 我們需要更好的法令來保護消費者，包括防止吞噬性借貸的發(fā)生。

第六. 我們需要更好的法令來規(guī)范競爭。金融機構(gòu)能夠通過信用卡掠奪消費者的原因之一，就是缺乏競爭。但更重要的是，我們不應(yīng)該看到一個機構(gòu)“大得不可能失敗”的情況。如果一個公司變成那么龐大，那么它就應(yīng)該被分拆。

這些改革并不能保證我們不會再次遇到危機。那些金融市場中的人們實在有著令人驚嘆的本事。最后他們還是會設(shè)法規(guī)避一切的規(guī)定。但這些改革能讓另一次類似的危機變得不那么容易再現(xiàn)，而且，假設(shè)這樣的情況重現(xiàn)的話，能讓它不那么嚴重。
人文與社會編輯小組漢譯（http://humanities.cn）

戰(zhàn)爭的真正代價：斯蒂格利茨新書《三兆美元的戰(zhàn)爭：伊拉克沖突的真實代價》訪談

(人文與社會編輯小組校訂重譯:: Http://humanities.cn)

2005年起，諾貝爾經(jīng)濟學(xué)獎獲得者 約瑟夫•斯蒂格利茨（Joseph Stiglitz）開始了計算伊拉克戰(zhàn)爭的艱難過程。在他與琳達•比爾姆斯合作的新書(《三兆美元的戰(zhàn)爭：伊拉克沖突的真實代價》The Three Trillion Dollar War: The True Cost of the Iraq Conflict. Norton, 2008. 一兆=一萬億)中，他展示了急功近利的預(yù)算決策，后果發(fā)生后的遮遮掩掩，以及一場非正義的戰(zhàn)爭將怎樣在將來的年代中繼續(xù)影響我們所有人。阿依達•愛德馬里安（Aida Edemariam）與約瑟夫•斯蒂格利茨，進行了一次會談。

春日時斷時續(xù)的陽光溫暖著新哥特風(fēng)格倫敦國會大廈的石灰?guī)r建筑，成群結(jié)隊的觀光客在四周游逛，但米爾班克的地下咖啡館幽暗僻靜，約瑟夫•斯蒂格利茨看來有些睡眼惺忪。兩天來，他一直在發(fā)表言論：在倫敦經(jīng)濟學(xué)院(LSE)、在恰談出版社(Chatham House)、對著數(shù)個電視攝制組――他馬上還要飛回華盛頓，在國會面前闡述他的新書《三兆美元的戰(zhàn)爭》。不管議員們心存怎樣的芥蒂——必定會有一些——他們將不得不傾聽，因為斯蒂格利茨的權(quán)威地位與一般的作者不可同日而語。作為一位諾貝爾經(jīng)濟學(xué)獎得主，一名在比爾•克林頓的總統(tǒng)經(jīng)濟顧問委員會經(jīng)歷了四年的磨礪，又在世界銀行擔(dān)任了三年首席經(jīng)濟學(xué)家的學(xué)者（在此期間他對全球化發(fā)起了一場影響深遠的批判），斯蒂格利茨能夠?qū)懗鲆槐菊媲械馗淖內(nèi)藗儗ρ巯逻@場戰(zhàn)爭視角的書。《三兆美元的戰(zhàn)爭》揭示所有的人已經(jīng)并將感受到怎樣源自戰(zhàn)爭的影響，不管是華爾街還是英國繁華商業(yè)街、不管是伊拉克平民還是非洲小商人，沒有人能在將來漫長的時間中，逃脫戰(zhàn)爭的影響。
2005年的某一天，斯蒂格利茨和同樣曾任克林頓經(jīng)濟顧問的琳達•比爾姆斯（Linda Bilmes）注意到，國會預(yù)算辦公室對迄今為止的戰(zhàn)爭投入作出的官方估計大約是5000億美元。這個數(shù)字太低了，他們根本無法相信，決定展開一次調(diào)查。他們合著的論文于2006年1月發(fā)表，文章對這個數(shù)字作出了幅度驚人的修正——應(yīng)該是1萬億到2萬億美元之間。根據(jù)斯蒂格利茨現(xiàn)在的說法，即便這個數(shù)字他們也已經(jīng)有意做了一些保留："我們不想讓人覺得太不可思議。"

共和黨人怎么說呢？斯蒂格利茨疲倦地說道：“他們的反應(yīng)不外乎兩種。第一：布什總統(tǒng)的答復(fù)是，‘我們的戰(zhàn)爭不是由那些吹毛求疵(green eye shaded)的會計師或者經(jīng)濟學(xué)家的計算決定的。’我們的回應(yīng)是，‘對，珍珠港事件時你也不是根據(jù)這些計算來決策，但當(dāng)你面對一場有選擇的戰(zhàn)爭，至少應(yīng)該用這些計算來證明你的時機是恰當(dāng)?shù)模愕臏蕚涫浅浞值?。你必須通過計算來判斷是否存在更有效地達到目的的其他方式。第二種批評——這一點我們是承認的——就是我們只考慮了代價，忽略了收益?？墒?，我們看不到任何收益。在我們看來，我們不知道這場戰(zhàn)爭到底有什么好處?！?/p>

探究鋒芒既露，斯蒂格利茨和比爾梅斯繼續(xù)了他們的探索。對一些往往被有意隱藏的帳戶進行為期數(shù)月的跟蹤調(diào)查后，他們發(fā)現(xiàn)布什的伊拉克大冒險保守估計將花去美國——僅僅是美國——3萬億美元。其它國家，包括英國，加在一起可能將花費差不多相同的數(shù)目。隨著調(diào)查的進行，他們?nèi)〉玫某删瓦h不只是得出一個難以置信的數(shù)字：通過詳述流程、制作開銷細目、嚴謹?shù)亓_列出那些目光短淺的預(yù)算決策所造成的后果，他們描繪出了一幅充斥著欺瞞和不誠信的圖景，驅(qū)動著這些欺瞞和不誠信的力量顯然都來自最根源處。他們的發(fā)現(xiàn)，有一些是我們之前已經(jīng)聽說過，有一些我們曾經(jīng)懷疑過，還有一些則是聞所未聞——將這些發(fā)現(xiàn)一起放在情境中，它們的沖擊力是驚人的。沒有幾個人不會覺得——無論發(fā)動戰(zhàn)爭的動機是什么，它的發(fā)展過程在道義上是令人擔(dān)憂的；要想探究其原因，追蹤資金的來龍去脈是一個絕佳的方法。

下個月，美軍在伊拉克的戰(zhàn)爭就是五周年了——這比美國參與2次世界大戰(zhàn)的時間都長。每天的軍事開銷（不包括將來的傷員救治等方面）已經(jīng)比在越南12年消耗總和還要多，是朝鮮戰(zhàn)爭的兩倍。美國每月在伊拉克和阿富汗要耗費160億美元，這些僅僅是用于維持運轉(zhuǎn)的開支（也就是說不包括國防部的常規(guī)開銷）；這相當(dāng)于聯(lián)合國整整一年的預(yù)算。大量的現(xiàn)金消失了——例如媒體廣泛報道的聯(lián)盟駐伊拉克臨時管理當(dāng)局那筆88億美元的伊拉克發(fā)展基金；還有較少見諸報端的，消失在國防部的種種漏洞之間的幾百萬美元——這個部門在過去十年間沒有一次能通過財會審核。一旦規(guī)模超過一家雜貨鋪的大小，國防部的會計制度就無法保證統(tǒng)計的準確性了。基于這樣的制度進行的財務(wù)管理缺陷實在太大，事實上很多時候根本不知道究竟花了多少錢，或者花在了什么地方。

最嚴重的一條誤導(dǎo)性信息是：2007年1月，政府宣布他們大肆鼓吹的"大增兵"行動將耗資56億美元。但這只是作戰(zhàn)部隊四個月的開銷——還有15000～28000名后勤部隊官兵等著開餉，這一點他們沒有提。同時，這組官方數(shù)據(jù)也沒有計入陣亡撫恤或者傷員救治費用，盡管當(dāng)前7：1的傷員與死亡人數(shù)亡比已經(jīng)是美國歷史上的最高。再一次地，國防部選擇了保密和誤導(dǎo)：官方傷亡記錄只列出了戰(zhàn)斗減員。斯蒂格利茨和比爾姆斯在書中指出，針對那些"非戰(zhàn)斗行動"傷亡——直升機墜毀、訓(xùn)練事故以及所有死于疾病的人（醫(yī)療撤運的人員中有三分之二是因為疾?。怯幸豁棇ｉT的、難以被察覺的統(tǒng)計的；那些沒有經(jīng)過空運的傷員，也就是說在戰(zhàn)場上實施治療的，則完全被排除在外了。斯蒂格利茨和比爾梅斯碰巧發(fā)現(xiàn)了一份不完整的清單；為了獲得完整的數(shù)據(jù)統(tǒng)計，退伍軍人機構(gòu)不得不搬出《信息自由法案》（當(dāng)這些數(shù)據(jù)被計入后，傷員與死亡比就上升到15：1）。負責(zé)幫助負傷人員的退伍軍人事務(wù)部在戰(zhàn)爭初期是根據(jù)戰(zhàn)前預(yù)算工作的，因此他們的超支程度已是災(zāi)難性的；至今他們還需要解決越南戰(zhàn)爭的大量遺留問題。許多退伍軍人被迫尋求私立醫(yī)療救治；即便政府承擔(dān)了治療和補助的費用，適格性的舉證責(zé)任也在士兵一方，而不是在政府。三兆美元包括了陣亡撫恤，以及在今后50年里醫(yī)治那些傷勢嚴重程度是軍隊外科醫(yī)生們前所未見的軍人。

通過設(shè)置不同的情境，斯蒂格利茨和比爾姆斯例舉出從這幾兆美元中拿出哪怕一兆能做什么：800萬套住房單元，或者1500萬名公立學(xué)校教師，或為5.3億兒童提供一年的健康保健，或為4300萬學(xué)生提供上大學(xué)的獎學(xué)金。三兆美元本可以解決美國半個世紀的社會保障問題。美國目前每年在非洲花費50億美元，并且正在擔(dān)心在那里會敗給中國的力量。"50億美元大概夠打10天的仗，"斯蒂格利茨說，"這樣的數(shù)字會改變你對一切事物的判斷尺度。"

我問斯蒂格利茨，他的發(fā)現(xiàn)中哪個是最讓他不安的。他笑了，笑得幾乎沒有快意。"事實上有很多——有些我們是持懷疑態(tài)度的，但有些我根本無法相信。"比如說一個工作是保安的簽約工作者一年可以拿到40萬美元，與之相對的，一名士兵一年能拿到4萬。我們能夠想到會有差距，但沒想到差距如此巨大；還有，由于在伊拉克工作的人很難得到保險，所以保險費是由政府支付的；還有，如果這些承包商/簽約工作者負傷或者被殺了，政府還會根據(jù)最高標準支付死亡和傷害補償金。

可以想見，這將迫使軍隊提高入伍附加獎勵的標準（事實上軍隊招募新兵的心情是如此的迫切，以至于他們連被判有罪的重罪犯人都收）。"我們就這樣開始了一場自己和自己的競賽。任何一個腦子正常的人都不會這么做，布什政府這樣做了……因此我無法相信。而這些附加獎勵也不包括在政府所說的開銷里。"

接著他們發(fā)現(xiàn)入伍附加獎勵是有條件的：例如士兵如果在第一個月負傷，就得退還獎勵；還有，"出于顯而易見的原因，士兵要對他們的裝備負責(zé)。如果弄丟了頭盔，你需要賠償。如果你已被炸飛，頭盔也不見了，他們依然會給你寄賬單?！?一個遭受了嚴重的腦損傷的士兵依然被索款12000美元。一些家屬不得不掏錢給他們的孩子買防彈衣，以便在短期內(nèi)節(jié)省政府開支；那些無力支付的人則容易受傷，最終還是由政府來出更多的錢。還有一個情況，直到2006年羅伯特•蓋茨取代唐納德•拉姆斯菲爾德?lián)螄啦块L，國防部才同意用裝配了防地雷伏擊裝甲（MRAP）的車輛取代悍馬，前者抵御路邊炸彈的能力要強得多；截至當(dāng)時，簡易爆炸裝置（IED）已經(jīng)導(dǎo)致1500名美國人喪生。"這種貪小便宜吃大虧的舉動實在讓人難以置信。"

然而從另一個層面看，斯蒂格利茨并不感到意外，因為這樣的決策是在理性上完全捉摸不定的布什政府的一貫作風(fēng)。他說，布什政府的大體行為方式就是一鍋“混合了公司危機救出、公司福利、沒有任何可靠的思想體系基礎(chǔ)的自由市場經(jīng)濟的大雜燴。這種古怪的大雜燴其實促成了在伊拉克的失敗?！庇幸恍┰蛞呀?jīng)被反復(fù)提及了：在鼓吹民主的同時無視國際民主進程；在伊拉克尚未做好準備的情況下推行自由主義。斯蒂格利茨在這個問題上借助了美國國際開發(fā)署寄給他的一封電子郵件，郵件中抱怨財政部阻礙他們的工作。"他們說，"你能幫幫我們嗎？因為我們在努力推動商業(yè)運營，但美國財政部在緊縮信貸，所以現(xiàn)在這個國家沒有錢了。"

Then, of course, there is the administration"s insistence on "sole-source bidding" - awarding vast, multi-year contracts to Halliburton, for example, instead of putting them out to tender. "An academic might say, "How can you be a free market, yet demand single-source contracting?"" asks Stiglitz now, mildly - but this is not the way the current administration operates. We know quite a lot now about contractors" excesses, but it is their economic effect that Stiglitz and Bilmes are interested in, and this seems often to have been malign. Free market ideals had, of course, to apply to Iraq, if not to Halliburton (which received at least $19.3bn in single-source contracts), so Paul Bremer, head of the Coalition Provisional Authority, abolished many tariffs on imports, and capped corporate and income tax. Predictably, this led to general asset-stripping, and exposed Iraqi firms to free competition - meaning that many closed down, putting yet more people out of work. ("The benefits of privatisation and free markets in transition economies are debatable, of course," write Stiglitz and Bilmes in their book; a model of understatement, given that Stiglitz is famous for spelling out the harm sustained by poor countries in his book Globalisation and its Discontents (2002), and lost his job at the World Bank for outspokenly making the argument in the first place.) Many reconstruction jobs, in alignment with US procurement law, went to expensive American firms rather than cheaper Iraqi ones - a further waste of resources (one painting job, for example, cost $25m instead of $5m); these American firms, looking to keep their own costs down and profit margins high, imported cheap labour from such countries as Nepal - even though, at this point, one in two Iraqi men was out of work.
然后當(dāng)然還有政府堅決推行的"單一供應(yīng)商投標"——例如把巨額長期合同交給哈利伯頓公司，而沒有事先貨比三家。斯蒂格利茨委婉地質(zhì)疑道："一個學(xué)者也許會說，"你怎么能在自由市場中提供單一供應(yīng)商合同呢？""——但當(dāng)前這個政府并不是這樣運轉(zhuǎn)的。承包商過剩的問題我們已經(jīng)有了一定的認識，但斯蒂格利茨和比爾梅斯關(guān)心的是它們的經(jīng)濟影響，看起來這影響多數(shù)時候都是負面的。當(dāng)然，必須在伊拉克建立一個自由的市場，即便哈利伯頓不是這樣做（該公司在單一供應(yīng)商合同中得到了至少193億美元）。所以保羅•布雷默（Paul Bremer）廢除了許多進口關(guān)稅，并為企業(yè)稅和所得稅制定了上限。可以預(yù)見的是，這將導(dǎo)致資產(chǎn)剝離的普遍發(fā)生，把伊拉克的企業(yè)暴露在自由競爭之下——這意味著許多公司將倒閉，更多的人失業(yè)。（斯蒂格利茨和比爾梅斯在書中寫道："在轉(zhuǎn)型經(jīng)濟中，私有化和自由市場能起到多大幫助當(dāng)然是存在疑問的"；有一種典型的委婉說法這樣形容斯蒂格利茨，說他在2002年的《全球化和它的不滿》一書中以痛陳窮困國家所承受的傷害而著稱，由于說話口無遮攔容易在一開始就造成爭執(zhí)，他失去了在世界銀行的職位。）依據(jù)美國的采購法，許多重建工作落在了昂貴的美國公司手中，而不是更廉價的伊拉克公司——這是進一步的資源浪費（例如一個油漆刷涂工程花費了2500萬而不是500萬）；這些美國公司為了降低他們的固有成本以獲取更高利潤，從尼泊爾這樣的國家輸入廉價勞工——盡管現(xiàn)在每兩個伊拉克人就有一個失業(yè)。
還有，這一切遵循的不是純粹的新保守主義思想，斯蒂格利茨說："更貼切地說法是方便意識形態(tài)。"最能說明這是一種怎樣的意識形態(tài)的，是另一個讓斯蒂格利茨無法相信的事實——布什在進行戰(zhàn)爭的同時推行減稅政策。在斯蒂格利茨和比爾梅斯看來，這完全是一記陰招。提高稅收，例如像世界大戰(zhàn)時那樣找一套共同奉獻的說辭，會讓美國人意識到他們要為戰(zhàn)爭付出怎樣的代價，會導(dǎo)致抵觸情緒更早地滋生。解決辦法是借貸——借全部的三萬億美元每年的利息達幾千億，到2017年將多出大約又一個萬億美元。這一屆政府9個月后會下臺；后繼的政府和幾代人將要為此買單。
與此同時，斯蒂格利茨和比爾梅斯指出，聯(lián)儲也是迷惑大眾的幫兇，因為它"把利率降得比原本的還要低，對貸款標準的放寬睜一只眼閉一只眼，從而刺激民眾去借更多的錢——同時也花更多的錢。"在這個問題上，阿蘭•格林斯潘鼓勵人們?nèi)ド暾埧勺兝实盅嘿J款，盡管此時的居民儲蓄利率已經(jīng)是自大蕭條以來首次出現(xiàn)負值。個人承擔(dān)著前所未有的債務(wù)，與此同時長期的房地產(chǎn)泡沫又讓他們覺得自己很富有（并且對海外的那些冒失舉動減少了關(guān)注）——此番景象自然也波及到了大西洋的這一邊。
This is not, then, pure neocon ideology at work, says Stiglitz: "Ideology of convenience is a better description." It is an ideology illustrated even more clearly in another fact that Stiglitz can"t believe - that Bush put through tax cuts while going to war. In Stiglitz and Bilmes"s reading, this was downright underhand. Raising taxes, and resorting to the rhetoric of shared sacrifice used in the world wars, for example, would have made Americans more aware of exactly what the war was costing them, and would have provoked opposition sooner. The solution was to borrow the money, at interest of couple of hundred billion dollars a year, which, by 2017, will add up to another trillion dollars or so. This government will be gone in nine months; subsequent administrations, and generations, will have to pay it off.
At the same time, Stiglitz and Bilmes argue, the Federal Reserve colluded in this obfuscation, because it "kept interest rates lower than they otherwise might have been, and looked the other way as lending standards were lowered, thereby encouraging households to borrow more - and spend more." Alan Greenspan, by this account, encouraged people to take on variable-rate mortgages, even as household savings rates went negative for the first time since the Depression. Individuals were taking on unprecedented debt at the same time as a long housing bubble made them feel wealthy (and less concerned with derring-do abroad) - a scenario echoed on this side of the Atlantic.
As we now know, this couldn"t continue - in part because of yet another effect of the war. Whatever the much argued reasons for bombing Baghdad, cheap oil has not been the result. In fact, the price of oil has climbed from $25 a barrel to $100 in the past five years - great for oil companies, and oil-producing countries, who, along with the contractors, are the only beneficiaries of this war, but not for anyone else. After calculations based on futures markets, Stiglitz and Bilmes conclude that a significant proportion of this rise is directly due to the disruptions and instabilities caused by Iraq. This price rise alone has cost the US, which imports about 5bn barrels a year, an extra $25bn per year; projecting to 2015 brings that number to an extra $1.6 trillion on oil alone (against which the recent $125bn stimulus package is simply, as Stiglitz puts it, "a drop in the bucket").

我們現(xiàn)在知道，不能再這樣繼續(xù)下去——戰(zhàn)爭產(chǎn)生的另一個影響也是原因之一。不管轟炸巴格達的那個飽受爭議的理由到底是什么，廉價石油至少不是答案。事實上油價在過去5年間已經(jīng)從每桶25美元躥升至100美元——對石油公司和產(chǎn)油國是件大好事，它們連同承包商是這場戰(zhàn)爭的唯一受益者，其他人都不是。經(jīng)過對未來市場的估計，斯蒂格利茨和比爾梅斯推斷，伊拉克的分裂和不穩(wěn)定是導(dǎo)致這種大幅度增長的直接原因。每年會進口大約50億桶原油的美國，僅因為這項價格的增長，每年就要額外支付250億美元；預(yù)計到2015年僅就石油這一項，這個數(shù)字將增至每年1.6萬億美元（相比之下，最近推出的1250億美元的經(jīng)濟促進計劃用斯蒂格利茨的話說只是"杯水車薪"）。高油價對家庭、城市和國家的預(yù)算造成了直接影響；同時還導(dǎo)致美國的GDP下降。當(dāng)利率終于做出相應(yīng)的上調(diào)時，成千上萬的業(yè)主發(fā)現(xiàn)他們無力償還債務(wù)，引發(fā)了一場聲勢浩大的貸款償還拖欠的風(fēng)潮，把美國經(jīng)濟推向衰退的邊緣，也把諾森羅克銀行拖向了深淵——而一切的后果則留給了英國的房產(chǎn)業(yè)主們和銀行去承受。
Higher oil prices have a direct effect on family, city and state budgets; they also led to a drop in GDP for the US. When interest rates finally rose in response, hundreds of thousands of home owners found that they were unable to keep up payments, triggering the toxic tsunami of defaulted mortgages that has put the US on the brink of recession and brought down Northern Rock - with all the ramifications for British home owners and banks that that has in turn entailed.
Thus, any idea that war is good for the economy, Stiglitz and Bilmes argue, is a myth. A persuasive myth, of course, and in specific cases, such as world war two, one that has seemed to be true - but in 1939, America and Europe were in a depression; there was all sorts of possible supply in the market, but people didn"t have the cash to buy anything. Making armaments meant jobs, more people with more disposable income, and so on - but peacetime western economies these days operate near full employment. As Stiglitz and Bilmes put it, "Money spent on armaments is money poured down the drain"; far better to invest in education, infrastructure, research, health, and reap the rewards in the long term. But any idea that war can be divorced from the economy is also naive. "A lot of people didn"t expect the economy to take over the war as the major issue [in the American election]," says Stiglitz, "because people did not expect the economy to be as weak as it is. I sort of did. So one of the points of this book is that we don"t have two issues in this campaign - we have one issue. Or at least, the two are very, very closely linked together."
And it is the world economy that is at stake, not just America"s. The trillions the rest of the world has shouldered include, of course, the smashed Iraqi economy, the tens of thousands of Iraqi dead, the price, to neighbouring countries, of absorbing thousands of refugees, the coalition dead and wounded (before the war Gordon Brown set aside £1bn; as of late 2007, direct operating costs in Iraq and Afghanistan were £7bn and rising). But the rising price of oil has also meant, accoring to Stiglitz and Bilmes, that the cost to oil-importing industrial countries in Europe and the Far East is now about $1.1 trillion. And to developing countries it has been devastating: they note a study by the International Energy Agency that looked at a sample of 13 African countries and found that rising oil prices have "had the effect of lowering the average income by 3% - more than offsetting all of the increase in foreign aid that they had received in recent years, and setting the stage for another crisis in these countries". Stiglitz made his name by, among other things, criticising America"s use of globalisation as a bully pulpit; now he says flatly, "Yes, that"s part of being in a global economy. You make a mistake of this order, and it affects people all over the world."
And the borrowed trillions have to come from somewhere. Because "the saving rate [in America] is zero," says Stiglitz, "that means that you have to finance [the war] by borrowing abroad. So China is financing America"s war." The US is now operating at such a deficit, in fact, that it doesn"t have the money to bail out its own banks. "When Merrill Lynch and Citibank had a problem, it was sovereign funds from abroad that bailed them out. And we had to give up a lot of shares of our ownership. So the largest shareowners in Citibank now are in the Middle East. It should be called the MidEast bank, not the Citibank." This creates a precedent of dependence, "and whether we become dependent on Middle East oil money, or Chinese reserves - it"s that dependency that people ought to worry about. That is a big change. The amount of borrowing in the last eight years, on top of the borrowing that began with Reagan - that has all changed the US"s economic position in the world."

由此斯蒂格利茨和比爾梅斯指出，任何關(guān)于戰(zhàn)爭對經(jīng)濟有益的想法都是胡謅。這無疑是一種有說服力的胡謅，在某些特定的案例中，例如第二次世界大戰(zhàn)，這種說法看上去是正確的——但在1939年，美國和歐洲正處在蕭條期；市場有充分的供給，但人民沒有足夠的錢去購買。軍備生產(chǎn)意味著就業(yè)機會，更多的人有了更多可支配的收入等等——但當(dāng)前和平時期的西方經(jīng)濟在就業(yè)幾乎飽和的情況下運轉(zhuǎn)。正如斯蒂格利茨和比爾梅斯所說："錢花在軍備上就等于打了水漂"；投資在教育、基礎(chǔ)建設(shè)、科研、衛(wèi)生保健上以求長遠回報要好得多。但是，任何試圖把戰(zhàn)爭和經(jīng)濟剝離開的想法也是幼稚的。斯蒂格利茨說："許多人沒想到經(jīng)濟會超越戰(zhàn)爭成為（美國大選）的關(guān)鍵議題，因為人們沒想到經(jīng)濟會如此的脆弱。某種程度上說我也是這樣的人。所以這本書的觀點之一就是，在這次競選中我們不存在兩個議題——我們只有一個議題，或者至少是兩個聯(lián)系非常非常緊密的議題。
被推向懸崖邊的并非只是美國，而是整個世界經(jīng)濟。當(dāng)然，壓在其它國家肩上的萬億重擔(dān)包括：被摧毀的伊拉克經(jīng)濟、數(shù)以百萬計的死去的伊拉克人、物價，對鄰國來說還要吸收成千上萬的難民，聯(lián)軍的傷亡（戈登•布朗在戰(zhàn)前準備了10億英鎊；截至2007年末，伊拉克和阿富汗的直接運轉(zhuǎn)成本是70億英鎊并且仍在增加）。而在斯蒂格利茨和比爾梅斯看來，油價的上漲同樣也意味著歐洲和遠東的石油進口工業(yè)國要支付大約1.1萬億美元。對發(fā)展中國家來說這是毀滅性的。他們注意到了國際能源署的一項研究，通過對13個非洲國家的采樣他們發(fā)現(xiàn)，油價上漲"導(dǎo)致他們的收入下降了3%，幅度超過了近年他們所接受外國援助的增長量，這有可能導(dǎo)致這些國家再一次陷入危機。"斯蒂格利茨的著名事跡之一就是批評美國把全球化用作布道的幌子；而今他平靜地說："是的，身處于全球經(jīng)濟中就是這樣。你犯下一個決策錯誤，全世界人民都會受牽連。"
當(dāng)然，借貸的幾萬億美元總得有來源。按斯蒂格利茨的說法，"（美國）的儲蓄利率為零，這意味著（戰(zhàn)爭的）資金必須從國外募集。所以，資助美國的戰(zhàn)爭的是中國。"事實上美國目前的嚴重赤字致使它連自己的銀行都保不住。"當(dāng)美林集團和花旗銀行遇到困難的時候，幫助他們脫困的是國外的主權(quán)基金。我們必須放棄許多的所有權(quán)份額?，F(xiàn)在的花旗銀行的頭號股東是中東。它應(yīng)該叫中東銀行，而不是花旗銀行。"這開創(chuàng)了一個依附的先例，"不論我們是在依賴中東石油資金還是中國的儲備金——這種依賴性才是我們應(yīng)該擔(dān)憂的。這個巨大的變化——過去8年的借貸已經(jīng)超過了自里根政府以來的借貸總和——已經(jīng)改變了美國在世界經(jīng)濟中的地位。
So quite apart from the war, does he think a particular kind of unfettered market has had its day? "Yes. I think that anybody who believes that the banks know what they"re doing has to have their head examined. Clearly, unfettered markets have led us to this economic downturn, and to enormous social problems." Combined with the war, whoever inherits the White House faces a crisis of epic proportions. Where do they go from here? "The way that shapes the debate," says Stiglitz, "is that Americans have to say, "Even if we stay for another two years, just two years, and we"re spending $12bn a month up front in Iraq, and it"s costing us another 50% in healthcare, disability, bringing it up to $18bn a month in Iraq, and you look at that in another 24 months, we"re talking about half a trillion dollars more for two years - forgetting about the economic cost, the ancillary costs, the social costs - just looking at the budgetary cost - not including the interest - you have to say, is this the way we want to spend a half a trillion dollars? Will it make America stronger? Will it make the Middle East safer? Is this the way we want to spend it?"

那么除了戰(zhàn)爭，他是否認為一個古怪的無規(guī)則市場正走上舞臺？"是的。我認為要是有誰還相信銀行知道自己在做什么，那他就該去檢查一下腦子。很顯然，這個無規(guī)則市場引發(fā)了我們的經(jīng)濟倒退以及大量社會問題。"再加上戰(zhàn)爭，無論誰接手白宮都將面臨一場前所未有的巨大危機。他們應(yīng)該怎么辦？"辯論應(yīng)該圍繞著這樣一個問題，"斯蒂格利茨說，"美國人應(yīng)該自問，"即便我們再待兩年，只是兩年時間，我們在伊拉克每個月要花去120億美元，健康和傷殘保障需要再花50%，這樣就增加到了180億。過24個月再看，那就是兩年超過5000億的投入——把經(jīng)濟成本、附加成本和社會成本暫時拋在一邊吧——只要看看預(yù)算成本——不包括利息——你會說，5000億美元應(yīng)該就這樣花掉嗎？這樣能讓美國更強大嗎？這樣能讓中東更安全嗎？這是我們想要的投入方式嗎？"
Far better, he suggests, to leave rapidly and in a dignified manner, and to spend some of it on helping Iraqis reconstruct their own country - and the rest on investing in and strengthening the American economy, so that it can retain its independence, and have the wherewithal, at least, to play a responsible role in the world. The book ends with a list of 18 specific reforms arising from Stiglitz and Bilmes"s discoveries, focusing on exactly how to fund and run a war from now on (depend not on emergency funds and borrowing but on surtaxes, for example, so that voters know exactly what it is they are paying for, and can vote accordingly). He has been approached by Barack Obama as a possible adviser should he reach the White House, although he says, "I"ve gone beyond the age where I would want to be in Washington full time. I would be interested in trying to help shape the bigger picture issues, and in particular the issues associated with America positioning itself in the new global world, and re-establishing the bonds with other countries that have been so damaged by the Bush administration."
I suggest, as devil"s advocate, that to count costs in the way he has, and to advise retrenchment, might be seen as encouraging America to return to isolationism. "No. I think that"s fundamentally wrong. The problem with Iraq was that it was the wrong war, and the wrong set of issues. Obama was very good about this. He said, "I"m not against war - I"m just against stupid wars." And I feel very much the same way. While we were worried about WMD that did not exist in Iraq, WMD did occur in North Korea. To use an American expression, we took our eye off the ball. And while we were fighting in Iraq, Afghanistan got worse, Pakistan got worse. So because we were fighting battles that we couldn"t win, we lost battles that we could have." To discover that those lost battles included better healthcare for millions of Americans, a robust world economy, a healthier and more independent Africa, and a more stable Middle East, seems worth a bit of green-eye-shaded number crunching.
他建議盡可能迅速地、有尊嚴地離開，這樣要好的多。把一部分錢用在幫助伊拉克人重建他們的國家——其它的用于注資和鞏固美國經(jīng)濟，從而保持它的獨立性。同時，至少保留一筆資金用于支持美國在世界各地發(fā)揮應(yīng)有的作用。書的末尾處列出了斯蒂格利茨和比爾梅斯研究得出的18個具體的改革方案，著眼于從今往后該如何進行戰(zhàn)爭，如何籌措資金（例如通過附加稅的形式，而不是通過應(yīng)急基金和借貸，這樣選民就能夠知道他們的錢到底用在了什么地方，并據(jù)此進行投票）。巴拉克•奧巴馬已經(jīng)試圖邀請他擔(dān)任顧問，也許即將前往白宮供職，盡管他說："我已經(jīng)過了全職待在華盛頓的年紀了。我對參與大環(huán)境的塑造更感興趣，尤其是事關(guān)美國在這個全新世界中的地位，以及重新建立與其它國家的聯(lián)系的問題——這些聯(lián)系在布什政府治下遭到了破壞。"
本著針鋒相對的立場，我提出如果按照他的方式計算成本，并建議緊縮開支，那似乎會讓美國重新回到孤立主義。"不。我認為這從根本上是錯誤的。伊拉克的問題在于這是一場錯誤的戰(zhàn)爭，一系列錯誤的問題。奧巴馬很清楚這一點。他說，"我不反對戰(zhàn)爭——我只是反對愚蠢的戰(zhàn)爭。"我也有同感。當(dāng)我們?yōu)榱艘晾四切┎淮嬖诘拇笠?guī)模殺傷性武器憂心忡忡時，朝鮮真的出現(xiàn)了大規(guī)模殺傷性武器。用美國人的話說，我們的眼睛沒盯住球。伊拉克一開戰(zhàn)，阿富汗的情況就開始惡化，巴基斯坦就開始惡化。所以，由于我們在打一場不可能獲勝的戰(zhàn)爭，一些本該獲勝的戰(zhàn)役我們就輸了。"當(dāng)我們發(fā)現(xiàn)，我們輸?shù)舻陌閿?shù)百萬美國人提供更好的健康保障，一個富有活力的世界經(jīng)濟，一個更健康更獨立的非洲，一個更穩(wěn)定的中東，那么讓那些吹毛求疵的家伙們多做幾道算術(shù)題似乎還是值得的。

重要數(shù)字

$16bn
The amount the US spends on the monthly running costs of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan - on top of regular defence spending
$138
The amount paid by every US household every month towards the current operating costs of the war
$19.3bn
The amount Halliburton has received in single-source contracts for work in Iraq
$25bn
The annual cost to the US of the rising price of oil, itself a consequence of the war
$3 trillion
A conservative estimate of the true cost - to America alone - of Bush"s Iraq adventure. The rest of the world, including Britain, will shoulder about the same amount again
$5bn
Cost of 10 days" fighting in Iraq
$1 trillion
The interest America will have paid by 2017 on the money borrowed to finance the war
3%
The average drop in income of 13 African countries - a direct result of the rise in oil prices. This drop has more than offset the recent increase in foreign aid to Africa

The true cost of war
http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2008/feb/28/iraq.afghanistan
In 2005, a Nobel prize-winning economist began the painstaking process of calculating the true cost of the Iraq war. In his new book, he reveals how short-sighted budget decisions, cover-ups and a war fought in bad faith will affect us all for decades to come. Aida Edemariam meets Joseph Stiglitz
Fitful spring sunshine is warming the neo-gothic limestone of the Houses of Parliament, and the knots of tourists wandering round them, but in a basement cafe on Millbank it is dark, and quiet, and Joseph Stiglitz is looking as though he hasn"t had quite enough sleep. For two days non-stop he has been talking - at the LSE, at Chatham House, to television crews - and then he is flying to Washington to testify before Congress on the subject of his new book. Whatever their reservations - and there will be a few - representatives will have to listen, because not many authors with the authority of Stiglitz, a Nobel prize-winner in economics, an academic tempered by four years on Bill Clinton"s Council of Economic Advisers and another three as chief economist at the World Bank (during which time he developed an influential critique of globalisation), will have written a book that so urgently redefines the terms in which to view an ongoing conflict. The Three Trillion Dollar War reveals the extent to which its effects have been, and will be, felt by everyone, from Wall Street to the British high street, from Iraqi civilians to African small traders, for years to come.
Some time in 2005, Stiglitz and Linda Bilmes, who also served as an economic adviser under Clinton, noted that the official Congressional Budget Office estimate for the cost of the war so far was of the order of $500bn. The figure was so low, they didn"t believe it, and decided to investigate. The paper they wrote together, and published in January 2006, revised the figure sharply upwards, to between $1 and $2 trillion. Even that, Stiglitz says now, was deliberately conservative: "We didn"t want to sound outlandish."
So what did the Republicans say? "They had two reactions," Stiglitz says wearily. "One was Bush saying, "We don"t go to war on the calculations of green eye-shaded accountants or economists." And our response was, "No, you don"t decide to fight a response to Pearl Harbour on the basis of that, but when there"s a war of choice, you at least use it to make sure your timing is right, that you"ve done the preparation. And you really ought to do the calculations to see if there are alternative ways that are more effective at getting your objectives. The second criticism - which we admit - was that we only look at the costs, not the benefits. Now, we couldn"t see any benefits. From our point of view we weren"t sure what those were."
Appetites whetted, Stiglitz and Bilmes dug deeper, and what they have discovered, after months of chasing often deliberately obscured accounts, is that in fact Bush"s Iraqi adventure will cost America - just America - a conservatively estimated $3 trillion. The rest of the world, including Britain, will probably account for about the same amount again. And in doing so they have achieved something much greater than arriving at an unimaginable figure: by describing the process, by detailing individual costs, by soberly listing the consequences of short-sighted budget decisions, they have produced a picture of comprehensive obfuscation and bad faith whose power comes from its roots in bald fact. Some of their discoveries we have heard before, others we may have had a hunch about, but others are completely new - and together, placed in context, their impact is staggering. There will be few who do not think that whatever the reasons for going to war, its progression has been morally disquieting; following the money turns out to be a brilliant way of getting at exactly why that is.
Next month America will have been in Iraq for five years - longer than it spent in either world war. Daily military operations (not counting, for example, future care of wounded) have already cost more than 12 years in Vietnam, and twice as much as the Korean war. America is spending $16bn a month on running costs alone (ie on top of the regular expenses of the Department of Defence) in Iraq and Afghanistan; that is the entire annual budget of the UN. Large amounts of cash go missing - the well-publicised $8.8bn Development Fund for Iraq under the Coalition Provisional Authority, for example; and the less-publicised millions that fall between the cracks at the Department of Defence, which has failed every official audit of the past 10 years. The defence department"s finances, based on an accounting system inaccurate for anything larger than a grocery store, are so inadequate, in fact, that often it is impossible to know exactly how much is being spent, or on what.
This is on top of misleading information: in January 2007 the administration estimated that the much-vaunted surge would cost $5.6bn. But this was only for combat troops, for four months - they didn"t mention the 15,000-28,000 support troops who would also have to be paid for. Neither do official numbers count the cost of death payments, or caring for the wounded - even though the current ratio of wounded to dead, seven to one, is the highest in US history. Again, the Department of Defence is being secretive and misleading: official casualty records list only those wounded in combat. There is, note Stiglitz and Bilmes in their book, "a separate, hard-to-find tally of troops wounded during "non-combat" operations" - helicopter crashes, training accidents, anyone who succumbs to disease (two-thirds of medical evacuees are victims of disease); those who aren"t airlifted, ie are treated on the battlefield, simply aren"t included. Stiglitz and Bilmes found this partial list accidentally; veterans" organisations had to use the Freedom of Information Act in order to get full figures (at which point the ratio of injuries to fatalities rises to 15 to one). The Department of Veterans Affairs, responsible for caring for these wounded, was operating, for the first few years of the war, on prewar budgets, and is ruinously overstretched; it is still clearing a backlog of claims from the Vietnam war. Many veterans have been forced to look for private care; even when the government pays for treatment and benefits, the burden of proof for eligibility is on the soldier, not on the government. The figure of $3 trillion includes what it will cost to pay death benefits, and to care for some of the worst-injured soldiers that army surgeons have ever seen, for the next 50 years.
By way of context, Stiglitz and Bilmes list what even one of these trillions could have paid for: 8 million housing units, or 15 million public school teachers, or healthcare for 530 million children for a year, or scholarships to university for 43 million students. Three trillion could have fixed America"s social security problem for half a century. America, says Stiglitz, is currently spending $5bn a year in Africa, and worrying about being outflanked by China there: "Five billion is roughly 10 days" fighting, so you get a new metric of thinking about everything."
I ask what discoveries Stiglitz found the most disturbing. He laughs, somewhat mirthlessly. "There were actually so many things - some of it we suspected, but there were a few things I couldn"t believe." The fact that a contractor working as a security guard gets about $400,000 a year, for example, as opposed to a soldier, who might get about $40,000. That there is a discrepancy we might have guessed - but not its sheer scale, or the fact that, because it is so hard to get insurance for working in Iraq, the government pays the premiums; or the fact that, if these contractors are injured or killed, the government pays both death and injury benefits on top. Understandably, this has forced a rise in sign-up bonuses (as has the fact that the army is so desperate for recruits that it is signing up convicted felons). "So we create a competition for ourselves. Nobody in their right mind would have done that. The Bush administration did that ... that I couldn"t believe. And that"s not included in the cost the government talks about."
Then there was the discovery that sign-up bonuses come with conditions: a soldier injured in the first month, for example, has to pay it back. Or the fact that "the troops, for understandable reasons, are made responsible for their equipment. You lose your helmet, you have to pay. If you get blown up and you lose your helmet, they still bill you." One soldier was sued for $12,000 even though he had suffered massive brain damage. Some families have had to buy their children body armour, saving the government costs in the short term; those too poor to afford it sustain injuries that the government then has to pay for. Then there"s the fact that it was not until 2006, when Robert Gates replaced Donald Rumsfeld as secretary of defence, that the DOD agreed to replace Humvees with mine-resistant ambush-protected (MRAP) armoured vehicles, which are much more able to repel roadside bombs; until that time, IEDs killed 1,500 Americans. "This kind of penny-wise, pound-poor behaviour was just unbelievable."
Yet on another level, Stiglitz is unsurprised, because such decisions are of a piece with the thoroughgoing intellectual inconsistency of the Bush administration. The general approach, he says, has been a "pastiche of corporate bail-outs, corporate welfare, and free-market economics that is not based on any consistent set of ideas. And this particular kind of pastiche actually contributed to the failures in Iraq." There are the well-rehearsed reasons: ignoring international democratic processes while advocating democracy; pushing forward liberalisation before Iraq was ready. Stiglitz"s twist on this was the emails he was receiving from the United States Agency for International Development, complaining about the Treasury being obstructive. "They were saying, "Can you help us? Because we"re trying to get businesses to work, but the US Treasury is trying to tighten credit, so there"s no money in this country." "
Then, of course, there is the administration"s insistence on "sole-source bidding" - awarding vast, multi-year contracts to Halliburton, for example, instead of putting them out to tender. "An academic might say, "How can you be a free market, yet demand single-source contracting?"" asks Stiglitz now, mildly - but this is not the way the current administration operates. We know quite a lot now about contractors" excesses, but it is their economic effect that Stiglitz and Bilmes are interested in, and this seems often to have been malign. Free market ideals had, of course, to apply to Iraq, if not to Halliburton (which received at least $19.3bn in single-source contracts), so Paul Bremer, head of the Coalition Provisional Authority, abolished many tariffs on imports, and capped corporate and income tax. Predictably, this led to general asset-stripping, and exposed Iraqi firms to free competition - meaning that many closed down, putting yet more people out of work. ("The benefits of privatisation and free markets in transition economies are debatable, of course," write Stiglitz and Bilmes in their book; a model of understatement, given that Stiglitz is famous for spelling out the harm sustained by poor countries in his book Globalisation and its Discontents (2002), and lost his job at the World Bank for outspokenly making the argument in the first place.) Many reconstruction jobs, in alignment with US procurement law, went to expensive American firms rather than cheaper Iraqi ones - a further waste of resources (one painting job, for example, cost $25m instead of $5m); these American firms, looking to keep their own costs down and profit margins high, imported cheap labour from such countries as Nepal - even though, at this point, one in two Iraqi men was out of work.
This is not, then, pure neocon ideology at work, says Stiglitz: "Ideology of convenience is a better description." It is an ideology illustrated even more clearly in another fact that Stiglitz can"t believe - that Bush put through tax cuts while going to war. In Stiglitz and Bilmes"s reading, this was downright underhand. Raising taxes, and resorting to the rhetoric of shared sacrifice used in the world wars, for example, would have made Americans more aware of exactly what the war was costing them, and would have provoked opposition sooner. The solution was to borrow the money, at interest of couple of hundred billion dollars a year, which, by 2017, will add up to another trillion dollars or so. This government will be gone in nine months; subsequent administrations, and generations, will have to pay it off.
At the same time, Stiglitz and Bilmes argue, the Federal Reserve colluded in this obfuscation, because it "kept interest rates lower than they otherwise might have been, and looked the other way as lending standards were lowered, thereby encouraging households to borrow more - and spend more." Alan Greenspan, by this account, encouraged people to take on variable-rate mortgages, even as household savings rates went negative for the first time since the Depression. Individuals were taking on unprecedented debt at the same time as a long housing bubble made them feel wealthy (and less concerned with derring-do abroad) - a scenario echoed on this side of the Atlantic.
As we now know, this couldn"t continue - in part because of yet another effect of the war. Whatever the much argued reasons for bombing Baghdad, cheap oil has not been the result. In fact, the price of oil has climbed from $25 a barrel to $100 in the past five years - great for oil companies, and oil-producing countries, who, along with the contractors, are the only beneficiaries of this war, but not for anyone else. After calculations based on futures markets, Stiglitz and Bilmes conclude that a significant proportion of this rise is directly due to the disruptions and instabilities caused by Iraq. This price rise alone has cost the US, which imports about 5bn barrels a year, an extra $25bn per year; projecting to 2015 brings that number to an extra $1.6 trillion on oil alone (against which the recent $125bn stimulus package is simply, as Stiglitz puts it, "a drop in the bucket").
Higher oil prices have a direct effect on family, city and state budgets; they also led to a drop in GDP for the US. When interest rates finally rose in response, hundreds of thousands of home owners found that they were unable to keep up payments, triggering the toxic tsunami of defaulted mortgages that has put the US on the brink of recession and brought down Northern Rock - with all the ramifications for British home owners and banks that that has in turn entailed.
Thus, any idea that war is good for the economy, Stiglitz and Bilmes argue, is a myth. A persuasive myth, of course, and in specific cases, such as world war two, one that has seemed to be true - but in 1939, America and Europe were in a depression; there was all sorts of possible supply in the market, but people didn"t have the cash to buy anything. Making armaments meant jobs, more people with more disposable income, and so on - but peacetime western economies these days operate near full employment. As Stiglitz and Bilmes put it, "Money spent on armaments is money poured down the drain"; far better to invest in education, infrastructure, research, health, and reap the rewards in the long term. But any idea that war can be divorced from the economy is also naive. "A lot of people didn"t expect the economy to take over the war as the major issue [in the American election]," says Stiglitz, "because people did not expect the economy to be as weak as it is. I sort of did. So one of the points of this book is that we don"t have two issues in this campaign - we have one issue. Or at least, the two are very, very closely linked together."
And it is the world economy that is at stake, not just America"s. The trillions the rest of the world has shouldered include, of course, the smashed Iraqi economy, the tens of thousands of Iraqi dead, the price, to neighbouring countries, of absorbing thousands of refugees, the coalition dead and wounded (before the war Gordon Brown set aside £1bn; as of late 2007, direct operating costs in Iraq and Afghanistan were £7bn and rising). But the rising price of oil has also meant, accoring to Stiglitz and Bilmes, that the cost to oil-importing industrial countries in Europe and the Far East is now about $1.1 trillion. And to developing countries it has been devastating: they note a study by the International Energy Agency that looked at a sample of 13 African countries and found that rising oil prices have "had the effect of lowering the average income by 3% - more than offsetting all of the increase in foreign aid that they had received in recent years, and setting the stage for another crisis in these countries". Stiglitz made his name by, among other things, criticising America"s use of globalisation as a bully pulpit; now he says flatly, "Yes, that"s part of being in a global economy. You make a mistake of this order, and it affects people all over the world."
And the borrowed trillions have to come from somewhere. Because "the saving rate [in America] is zero," says Stiglitz, "that means that you have to finance [the war] by borrowing abroad. So China is financing America"s war." The US is now operating at such a deficit, in fact, that it doesn"t have the money to bail out its own banks. "When Merrill Lynch and Citibank had a problem, it was sovereign funds from abroad that bailed them out. And we had to give up a lot of shares of our ownership. So the largest shareowners in Citibank now are in the Middle East. It should be called the MidEast bank, not the Citibank." This creates a precedent of dependence, "and whether we become dependent on Middle East oil money, or Chinese reserves - it"s that dependency that people ought to worry about. That is a big change. The amount of borrowing in the last eight years, on top of the borrowing that began with Reagan - that has all changed the US"s economic position in the world."
So quite apart from the war, does he think a particular kind of unfettered market has had its day? "Yes. I think that anybody who believes that the banks know what they"re doing has to have their head examined. Clearly, unfettered markets have led us to this economic downturn, and to enormous social problems." Combined with the war, whoever inherits the White House faces a crisis of epic proportions. Where do they go from here? "The way that shapes the debate," says Stiglitz, "is that Americans have to say, "Even if we stay for another two years, just two years, and we"re spending $12bn a month up front in Iraq, and it"s costing us another 50% in healthcare, disability, bringing it up to $18bn a month in Iraq, and you look at that in another 24 months, we"re talking about half a trillion dollars more for two years - forgetting about the economic cost, the ancillary costs, the social costs - just looking at the budgetary cost - not including the interest - you have to say, is this the way we want to spend a half a trillion dollars? Will it make America stronger? Will it make the Middle East safer? Is this the way we want to spend it?"
Far better, he suggests, to leave rapidly and in a dignified manner, and to spend some of it on helping Iraqis reconstruct their own country - and the rest on investing in and strengthening the American economy, so that it can retain its independence, and have the wherewithal, at least, to play a responsible role in the world. The book ends with a list of 18 specific reforms arising from Stiglitz and Bilmes"s discoveries, focusing on exactly how to fund and run a war from now on (depend not on emergency funds and borrowing but on surtaxes, for example, so that voters know exactly what it is they are paying for, and can vote accordingly). He has been approached by Barack Obama as a possible adviser should he reach the White House, although he says, "I"ve gone beyond the age where I would want to be in Washington full time. I would be interested in trying to help shape the bigger picture issues, and in particular the issues associated with America positioning itself in the new global world, and re-establishing the bonds with other countries that have been so damaged by the Bush administration."
I suggest, as devil"s advocate, that to count costs in the way he has, and to advise retrenchment, might be seen as encouraging America to return to isolationism. "No. I think that"s fundamentally wrong. The problem with Iraq was that it was the wrong war, and the wrong set of issues. Obama was very good about this. He said, "I"m not against war - I"m just against stupid wars." And I feel very much the same way. While we were worried about WMD that did not exist in Iraq, WMD did occur in North Korea. To use an American expression, we took our eye off the ball. And while we were fighting in Iraq, Afghanistan got worse, Pakistan got worse. So because we were fighting battles that we couldn"t win, we lost battles that we could have." To discover that those lost battles included better healthcare for millions of Americans, a robust world economy, a healthier and more independent Africa, and a more stable Middle East, seems worth a bit of green-eye-shaded number crunching.
In figures
$16bn
The amount the US spends on the monthly running costs of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan - on top of regular defence spending
$138
The amount paid by every US household every month towards the current operating costs of the war
$19.3bn
The amount Halliburton has received in single-source contracts for work in Iraq
$25bn
The annual cost to the US of the rising price of oil, itself a consequence of the war
$3 trillion
A conservative estimate of the true cost - to America alone - of Bush"s Iraq adventure. The rest of the world, including Britain, will shoulder about the same amount again
$5bn
Cost of 10 days" fighting in Iraq
$1 trillion
The interest America will have paid by 2017 on the money borrowed to finance the war
3%
The average drop in income of 13 African countries - a direct result of the rise in oil prices. This drop has more than offset the recent increase in foreign aid to Africa

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