美国下一届政府将面临更多挑战(2/2)

英语自学网

美国已然债台高筑，然而婴儿潮一代退休之后的各项福利将加据财政赤字。
Hints:
Laurence Kotlikoff
Social Security
Medicare and Medicaid
Undersecretary of Commerce
Robert Shapiro
PS: 采访部分结巴处不用写重复出现的词。
组长：蓝色三叶草
校对：trans0829
翻译&注解：cherryxyr
答疑：betty0925Also unsustainable is the nation's rising debt, now approaching $15 trillion.
Add to that the increasing burden on American taxpayers as millions of baby boomers - those born between 1946 and 1964 - reach retirement age.
Economist Laurence Kotlikoff: "This is gonna be $40,000 per person in today's dollars in about 15 years. Multiply that by 78 million baby boomers - you're talking about $3 trillion per year or so in today's dollars, each year to pay the baby boomers their Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid benefits."
It's a scenario Kotlikoff says will eventually bankrupt the country if political leaders do nothing. But finding agreement will be difficult.
With the majority of election spending now being financed by the top one half of 1% of the American population, former U.S. Undersecretary of Commerce Robert Shapiro says a handful of wealthy donors can now dictate who gets what done in Congress.
"What that is doing is exacerbating a polarization, which has developed in the last 15 years and a polarization that is particularly dangerous because it's polarization that coincides with a nearly even division of the country."
While the panel insists the slowly recovering U.S. economy remains among the most dynamic and most resilient in the world, Shapiro says today's polarized climate could lead to political paralysis on the most important economic issues of the day.同样不可持续的还有国家日益膨胀的债务，目前美国的债务已达到15万亿美元。
除此之外，数百万出生于1946到1964年间的美国婴儿潮一代人达到退休年龄，纳税人的负担将日益加重。
经济学家劳伦斯•柯特利科夫说：“按目前的美元计算，在未来大约15年里要向每个人提供4万美元，再乘以7800万的婴儿潮人数，每年用于婴儿潮一代的社会安全福利、联邦医疗保险和医疗补助福利等支出将达到约3万亿美元。”
柯特利科夫说，如果政治领袖不采取行动，这一情形终将使国家破产。但是，政治领袖之间很难意见统一。
鉴于当前的大部分竞选经费由占美国人口0.5%的最富裕的人资助，美国前商务部副部长罗伯特•夏皮洛说，如今少数富有的资助人可以对国会发号施令。
“这使极端化问题加剧，这一问题在过去15年间显现了出来。而且，这种极端化尤其危险，因为美国还同时存在着势均力敌的分歧力量。”
尽管这个经济专家组坚称经济复苏缓慢的美国仍是世界上最有活力和修复能力的经济体之一，但夏皮罗称，如今的极端化氛围可能会使美国在当前最重要的经济问题上陷入政治瘫痪。