华尔街出新招:免费披萨鼓励美国人储蓄
Wall Street's plan to get people to save more money: Free pizza!
There's a fight in Congress over a new rule that would save Americans an estimated $17 billion a year.
最近,美国国会正在为一项新规定吵得面红耳赤.这项规定估计每年将为美国人节约170亿美元.
The fiduciary rule would require brokers to act in the best interest of clients who are saving for retirement. Brokers would no longer be allowed to push their clients into high-fee funds just because the fund paid them.
这条信托规定,要求经纪人的行为必须符合存储退休金客户的最大利益.经纪人不能仅仅因为收受报酬,就说服客户购买高收费基金.
The Obama administration thinks that Americans could save more for retirement if their brokers weren't allowed to rip them off. The Financial Services Roundtable, a lobbying organization representing banks that oppose the rule, disagrees. It argues that we can fix the problem of Americans not saving enough money if Americans start saving more money -- 10 percent of their income, to be specific.
奥巴马政府认为,如果禁止经纪人剥削他们的客户,美国人就能存储更多的退休金.一家代表银行的游说机构——美国金融服务圆桌组织(FSR)则表示反对.它认为,如果美国人开始存款(具体的说,是收入的10%),存款不足的问题就解决了.
That's an objective, not a policy. But never fear, the FSR has a plan to promote savings: Giving away free pizza to 100 people in Washington, D.C. The group handed out the free pies at an event last week promoting an initiative called "save-a-slice." You're supposed to "save a slice" of your income for retirement. Get it?
这是目标,不是政策.但不用担心,FSR还有一套鼓励存款的政策:在华盛顿特区免费给100个人发披萨.上周,这家组织就在"存一点"计划的宣传现场免费发放了馅饼.你应该为了退休后的生活,"存一点"你的收入.明白?
Or maybe you'd like enter a contest and win $10,000 from the FSR by submitting a video explaining how you plan to save 10 percent of your income.
要么你就参加FSR的比赛,拍一段视频,说说你准备怎么把10%的收入存起来.奖金是1万刀!
"Don't want to spend your retirement eating cat food on toast, win $10,000," for creating a video about it, a promo for the contest intones.
"不想退休后就着面包吃猫粮?来赢取你的1万刀吧!"这是本次比赛的宣传口号.
FSR does have some good ideas -- making retirement plans at companies that offer them automatically enroll employees, for example -- but its big idea is unrealistic. Middle-class incomes have fallen over thelast 15 years, so it's unlikely that regular people have more money to save. The American savings rate, currently just above 5 percent, hasn't been at or above 10 percent for any sustained period in the last 35 years.
FSR有些想法确实不错——例如,企业制定退休计划,从而自动招收员工——但并不现实.中产阶级的收入在过去15年内降低了,因此普通人不可能有更多的钱要存.美国的存款利率目前才是5%多一点.过去35年里,从未稳定在10%之上.
And telling Americans to save more for retirement while trying to stop a rule that would keep Americans saving for retirement from getting swindled by high-fee funds they don't need is exactly the sort of conflicted advice that costs investors billions.
而告诉美国人多储蓄退休金,却不允许规则来防止他们被高收费的基金诈骗,简直就是自相矛盾,最后来买单的还是投资者.