THE corporate jet gets a lousy press. In the James Bond classic, Goldfinger, the eponymousvillain is sucked out of the window of just such an aircraft. In 2008 the bosses of Detroitsmoribund car companies did themselves no favours when they flew in their gleaming jets toWashington, DC, to beg Congress for bail-outs . And in his presentface-off with the Republicans over the federal debt ceiling, Barack Obama is bashing the jetsagain, because to the man in the street the corporate jet is a perfect proxy for a fat cat. Ivesaid to Republican leaders, you go talk to your constituents and ask them, Are you willing tocompromise your kids safety so some corporate-jet owner can get a tax break?.

　　私人飛機面臨著大量的壓力。在詹姆士?邦德經典電影《金手指》中，臭名昭著的惡棍就是從這樣的飛機窗戶中被吸出去的。2008年，底特律瀕臨倒閉的汽車企業的老板們飛往華盛頓請求國會給予應急措施時，他們乘坐的豪華飛機并沒有給他們帶來一丁點幫助。在他出席的與共和黨關于政府債務限額問題的面對面會議中，巴拉克?奧巴馬再一次猛烈抨擊私人飛機，因為對于大街上的普通民眾來說，私人飛機就是有錢肥貓的最佳代言人。我已經對共和黨領導人說過，你去問問你的選民們這樣一個問題：你們愿意用孩子的安全作為代價來換取某些私人飛機的主人減稅嗎?

　　Needless to say, Mr Obama is now accused by the aircraft manufacturers of scapegoating asuccessful industry that employs more than a million Americans and by the Republicans oflaunching a populist class war. But this raises a question. If an authentic populist movementexists in the United States today, it is not composed of impoverished class warriors braying tosqueeze the rich until their pips squeak. It is the tea-party movement, whose crusade toslash taxes and pare government to the bone far outweighs whatever distaste it might feeltowards those magnificent fat cats in their flying machines.

　　不用說，私人飛機現在肯定指責奧巴馬將一個提供超過一百萬崗位的成功產業作為替罪羊，而且共和黨會指責他發起了一個平民主義的階級斗爭。但這提出了一個問題，如果當今美國存在一個真正的平民運動，那么這將不包括那些尖叫著要將富人榨干的貧民階級勇士們。這是茶黨運動，其改革運動旨在減少稅收和徹底精簡政府，任何不喜歡茶黨運動的都有可能傾向于飛機里的那些重要的大亨們。

　　Why is bashing the rich such an unpopular form of populism in America? The normal answerfalls back on culture. Bill Galston of the Brookings Institution notes that Americans are repelledby the notion of inequality in worth or status. That men are created equal is, after all, self-evident. They are, however, far less perturbed by unequal wealth, a form of inequality that isthe inevitable product of the free-market system in which most still profess an abiding faith.According to Tom Smith, director of the Centre for the Study of Politics and Society at theUniversity of Chicago, surveys still show Americans to be more sympathetic than Europeans tothe idea that unequal pay encourages people to work hard, for example, and less sympatheticto the idea that governments should try to smooth such inequalities out.

　　為何在美國抨擊富人是非常不受歡迎的一種平民主義形式?常規的答案歸根于文化，布魯金斯學會的比爾?蓋爾斯頓指出，美國人對財產和社會地位不平等的說法感到厭惡。畢竟人人生而平等是不言而喻的，但卻被不平等的財富完全打亂。財富不均作為不公平的一種形式，是自由市場體系不可避免的產物，但多數人聲稱仍然對自由市場體系持有不變的信念。根據芝加哥大學政治與社會研究中心主任湯姆?史密斯的調查，發現美國人比歐洲人更加贊同這樣的想法，即不平等的待遇激勵人們更加努力的工作，但是，不贊成政府應當嘗試消除不平等的想法。

　　That said, you might think that the normal answerwould no longer do in such abnormal timesafter agreat recession and with 18m people still looking forwork. And, sure enough, every week brings a floodof complaints in the media about the rich gettingricher while the incomes of the middle class stagnateor fall. A survey for the New York Times has justreported that the median pay for top executives at200 big companies last year was little shy of $11m ayeara mouth-watering 23% rise since 2009. JosephStiglitz, the holder of a Nobel prize in economics,claimed in Vanity Fair that the top 1% of Americans were taking in nearly a quarter of thenations income and controlled 40% of its wealth, though others dispute his numbers.

　　據說，也許你認為常規的答案已經不再適在這個反常的時代大蕭條以及1800萬人口失業。而且，不出所料的是，媒體上每周都有大量的牢騷，抱怨有錢人越來越有錢而中產階級的收入沒有增加或者減少。紐約時報的一份調查顯示，去年，200家大公司的首席執行官的年薪平均為將近1100萬美元自2009年以來，達到令人羨慕的23%的年增長率。諾貝爾經濟學獎得主約瑟夫?斯蒂格利茨在《名利場》一書中聲稱：美國最富有的1%的人口持有將近全美國四分之一的收入并且控制著美國40%的資產，但很多人對他的數據存在爭議。

　　As to whether such disparities should matter, that question has puzzled philosophers at leastsince the Enlightenment. This column proposes no definitive answer this week. The point hereis only that Americans do not seem to mind about the widening inequality of income andwealth as much as you might expect them to in current circumstances. By and large, they havepreferred opportunity to levelling; equality of opportunity rather than equality of outcome.The trouble with this is that America is a long way from providing equal opportunity. Childrenborn into the bottom fifth of the income distribution are nearly five times as likely to end theirlives there as those from families in the top fifth. Indeed, social scientists are no longer surewhether it is still easier to climb the ladder in the classless United States than it is in thesupposedly class-hobbled lands of Western Europe.

　　對于這樣的不公平是否應當引起重視，這個問題自啟蒙運動以來就一直困擾著哲學家們。本專欄在本周不打算給出明確的答案，我們的重點是：當前情況下，似乎只有美國人不關心收入和財富差距越來越大，也許沒有你期待的那么強烈。總體上來說，他們更喜歡機遇而不是公平，更喜歡機遇平等而不是結果平等。這種想法帶來的問題是美國人一直以來提供公平的機遇。收入分配最低的5%的人中，其孩子出生后幾乎有5倍的可能享受與收入最高5%人中的孩子一樣的生活。的確，社會科學家已經不再確定在美國無階級社會中攀登幸福生活的階梯是否要比據稱有等級阻礙的西歐國家更加容易。

　　What are vote-seeking politicians to make of this? That the American people appear to havekept faith in the hardest of times with the idea of leaving it mainly to markets rather thangovernments to allocate lifes material rewards strikes many Republicans as a marvellous thingthe glorious opposite of what happened in the 1930s, when the economically stricken turnedto government for succour. In the case of the recent collapse, runs the Republican argument,misplaced government interventionsuch as the egalitarian nonsense of extending credit forhome-ownership to those who could not really afford itwas at least as much to blame asthe excesses of the private sector. That, to judge by the eruption of the tea-partymovement, is the verdict of many non-aligned Americans too. So the Grand Old Party isbetting on this anti-government wave restoring it to power in 2023.

　　尋求選票的政客們怎么看待這個問題呢?美國人民似乎在最艱難的年代也信心十足，因為他們堅持讓市場而不是政府去分配生活物資獎勵，打擊了很多共和黨人的不可思議事情發生了當20世紀30年代經濟大衰退向政府尋求救援時，所發生的一切的光輝對立面。最近金融危機的事例中，共和黨中爭論不斷，政府干涉錯位諸如將房產擁有者的信貸擴大到那些甚至無力償還的人的荒謬平等主義至少怪罪于私有部門的失誤操作。從茶黨運動的爆發來判斷，也是很多持中立態度的美國人的最終答案。因此，美國共和黨斷言這股反政府浪潮能促使他們在2023年重建他們的政權。

　　THE corporate jet gets a lousy press. In the James Bond classic, Goldfinger, the eponymousvillain is sucked out of the window of just such an aircraft. In 2008 the bosses of Detroitsmoribund car companies did themselves no favours when they flew in their gleaming jets toWashington, DC, to beg Congress for bail-outs . And in his presentface-off with the Republicans over the federal debt ceiling, Barack Obama is bashing the jetsagain, because to the man in the street the corporate jet is a perfect proxy for a fat cat. Ivesaid to Republican leaders, you go talk to your constituents and ask them, Are you willing tocompromise your kids safety so some corporate-jet owner can get a tax break?.

　　私人飛機面臨著大量的壓力。在詹姆士?邦德經典電影《金手指》中，臭名昭著的惡棍就是從這樣的飛機窗戶中被吸出去的。2008年，底特律瀕臨倒閉的汽車企業的老板們飛往華盛頓請求國會給予應急措施時，他們乘坐的豪華飛機并沒有給他們帶來一丁點幫助。在他出席的與共和黨關于政府債務限額問題的面對面會議中，巴拉克?奧巴馬再一次猛烈抨擊私人飛機，因為對于大街上的普通民眾來說，私人飛機就是有錢肥貓的最佳代言人。我已經對共和黨領導人說過，你去問問你的選民們這樣一個問題：你們愿意用孩子的安全作為代價來換取某些私人飛機的主人減稅嗎?

　　Needless to say, Mr Obama is now accused by the aircraft manufacturers of scapegoating asuccessful industry that employs more than a million Americans and by the Republicans oflaunching a populist class war. But this raises a question. If an authentic populist movementexists in the United States today, it is not composed of impoverished class warriors braying tosqueeze the rich until their pips squeak. It is the tea-party movement, whose crusade toslash taxes and pare government to the bone far outweighs whatever distaste it might feeltowards those magnificent fat cats in their flying machines.

　　不用說，私人飛機現在肯定指責奧巴馬將一個提供超過一百萬崗位的成功產業作為替罪羊，而且共和黨會指責他發起了一個平民主義的階級斗爭。但這提出了一個問題，如果當今美國存在一個真正的平民運動，那么這將不包括那些尖叫著要將富人榨干的貧民階級勇士們。這是茶黨運動，其改革運動旨在減少稅收和徹底精簡政府，任何不喜歡茶黨運動的都有可能傾向于飛機里的那些重要的大亨們。

　　Why is bashing the rich such an unpopular form of populism in America? The normal answerfalls back on culture. Bill Galston of the Brookings Institution notes that Americans are repelledby the notion of inequality in worth or status. That men are created equal is, after all, self-evident. They are, however, far less perturbed by unequal wealth, a form of inequality that isthe inevitable product of the free-market system in which most still profess an abiding faith.According to Tom Smith, director of the Centre for the Study of Politics and Society at theUniversity of Chicago, surveys still show Americans to be more sympathetic than Europeans tothe idea that unequal pay encourages people to work hard, for example, and less sympatheticto the idea that governments should try to smooth such inequalities out.

　　為何在美國抨擊富人是非常不受歡迎的一種平民主義形式?常規的答案歸根于文化，布魯金斯學會的比爾?蓋爾斯頓指出，美國人對財產和社會地位不平等的說法感到厭惡。畢竟人人生而平等是不言而喻的，但卻被不平等的財富完全打亂。財富不均作為不公平的一種形式，是自由市場體系不可避免的產物，但多數人聲稱仍然對自由市場體系持有不變的信念。根據芝加哥大學政治與社會研究中心主任湯姆?史密斯的調查，發現美國人比歐洲人更加贊同這樣的想法，即不平等的待遇激勵人們更加努力的工作，但是，不贊成政府應當嘗試消除不平等的想法。

　　That said, you might think that the normal answerwould no longer do in such abnormal timesafter agreat recession and with 18m people still looking forwork. And, sure enough, every week brings a floodof complaints in the media about the rich gettingricher while the incomes of the middle class stagnateor fall. A survey for the New York Times has justreported that the median pay for top executives at200 big companies last year was little shy of $11m ayeara mouth-watering 23% rise since 2009. JosephStiglitz, the holder of a Nobel prize in economics,claimed in Vanity Fair that the top 1% of Americans were taking in nearly a quarter of thenations income and controlled 40% of its wealth, though others dispute his numbers.

　　據說，也許你認為常規的答案已經不再適在這個反常的時代大蕭條以及1800萬人口失業。而且，不出所料的是，媒體上每周都有大量的牢騷，抱怨有錢人越來越有錢而中產階級的收入沒有增加或者減少。紐約時報的一份調查顯示，去年，200家大公司的首席執行官的年薪平均為將近1100萬美元自2009年以來，達到令人羨慕的23%的年增長率。諾貝爾經濟學獎得主約瑟夫?斯蒂格利茨在《名利場》一書中聲稱：美國最富有的1%的人口持有將近全美國四分之一的收入并且控制著美國40%的資產，但很多人對他的數據存在爭議。

　　As to whether such disparities should matter, that question has puzzled philosophers at leastsince the Enlightenment. This column proposes no definitive answer this week. The point hereis only that Americans do not seem to mind about the widening inequality of income andwealth as much as you might expect them to in current circumstances. By and large, they havepreferred opportunity to levelling; equality of opportunity rather than equality of outcome.The trouble with this is that America is a long way from providing equal opportunity. Childrenborn into the bottom fifth of the income distribution are nearly five times as likely to end theirlives there as those from families in the top fifth. Indeed, social scientists are no longer surewhether it is still easier to climb the ladder in the classless United States than it is in thesupposedly class-hobbled lands of Western Europe.

　　對于這樣的不公平是否應當引起重視，這個問題自啟蒙運動以來就一直困擾著哲學家們。本專欄在本周不打算給出明確的答案，我們的重點是：當前情況下，似乎只有美國人不關心收入和財富差距越來越大，也許沒有你期待的那么強烈。總體上來說，他們更喜歡機遇而不是公平，更喜歡機遇平等而不是結果平等。這種想法帶來的問題是美國人一直以來提供公平的機遇。收入分配最低的5%的人中，其孩子出生后幾乎有5倍的可能享受與收入最高5%人中的孩子一樣的生活。的確，社會科學家已經不再確定在美國無階級社會中攀登幸福生活的階梯是否要比據稱有等級阻礙的西歐國家更加容易。

　　What are vote-seeking politicians to make of this? That the American people appear to havekept faith in the hardest of times with the idea of leaving it mainly to markets rather thangovernments to allocate lifes material rewards strikes many Republicans as a marvellous thingthe glorious opposite of what happened in the 1930s, when the economically stricken turnedto government for succour. In the case of the recent collapse, runs the Republican argument,misplaced government interventionsuch as the egalitarian nonsense of extending credit forhome-ownership to those who could not really afford itwas at least as much to blame asthe excesses of the private sector. That, to judge by the eruption of the tea-partymovement, is the verdict of many non-aligned Americans too. So the Grand Old Party isbetting on this anti-government wave restoring it to power in 2023.

　　尋求選票的政客們怎么看待這個問題呢?美國人民似乎在最艱難的年代也信心十足，因為他們堅持讓市場而不是政府去分配生活物資獎勵，打擊了很多共和黨人的不可思議事情發生了當20世紀30年代經濟大衰退向政府尋求救援時，所發生的一切的光輝對立面。最近金融危機的事例中，共和黨中爭論不斷，政府干涉錯位諸如將房產擁有者的信貸擴大到那些甚至無力償還的人的荒謬平等主義至少怪罪于私有部門的失誤操作。從茶黨運動的爆發來判斷，也是很多持中立態度的美國人的最終答案。因此，美國共和黨斷言這股反政府浪潮能促使他們在2023年重建他們的政權。