【经济学人】英国税收的提高似乎已成定局丨2017.05.18丨总第914期

TO FINANCE the many costly promises in its manifesto the Labour Party would need to increase taxes significantly. It has promised a steep rise in corporation tax and a higher rate of income tax for those earning more than £80,000 ($104,000) a year. The Liberal Democrats want to add one percentage point to each band of income tax to pay for extra spending on health care.

工党为了给其宣言中的许多代价极高的承诺提供资金，需要大幅增加税收。工党已承诺将大幅提高企业所得税和对那些年收入超过80000英镑（合104000美元）的人征收更高的所得税。自由民主党希望在每一个所得税上增加一个百分点，以支付医疗保健的额外开支。

• manifesto n.（尤指政党或政府的）宣言，声明

The Conservatives, by contrast, like to portray themselves as the party of low taxes. On the campaign trail Theresa May has talked of her low-tax “instinct”. But she has left the door open to higher taxes, in contrast to her party’s promise in 2015 not to increase income tax, VAT or national insurance contributions (a payroll tax which Philip Hammond, the chancellor of the exchequer, is keen to raise).

相比之下，保守派喜欢把自己看作成低税收的政党。在竞选活动中特蕾莎·梅谈到了她的低税收“本能”倾向。但她已经向更高的税收敞开了大门，这与她所在的党在2015提出不增加所得税，增值税或国民保险税的承诺相反（财政大臣菲利普·哈蒙德急于提高工资税）。

• exchequer（英国的）财政部

Regardless of the parties’ manifestos, a look at Britain’s accounts makes one thing clear: whoever wins on June 8th and whatever promises they make now, in the coming years the tax burden is likely to rise to its highest level in decades.

不管各党派的宣言，看一看英国账户就清楚一件事：无论谁在6月8日赢得了，不管他们现在承诺什么，来年税负有可能上升到近几十年来的最高水平。

When the Conservatives came to power in coalition with the Lib Dems in 2010, the government was running a budget deficit worth 10% of GDP.（读者试译句） As ministers went about reducing the deficit in the parliament of 2010-15, most of the adjustment was borne by cuts to public spending rather than by tax rises .

（期待您的翻译，明天会有针对这句话的长难句解析哟~）当一些部长在议会着手减少在2010年-2015年财政赤字时，大多数的调整是由削减公共开支而不是增税。

Departments can make efficiency improvements up to a point, but eventually ever-smaller budgets make it difficult to provide core services. From prisons to the National Health Service, measures of performance started to go south from around 2014, according to a recent report from the Institute for Government, a think-tank. The rate of child poverty, which fell during the 2000s, is now rising sharply, in part because of big cuts in working-age benefits.

部门可以将效率提高到一个点，但最终规模较小的预算难以提供核心服务。根据政府智囊机构最近的一份报告，从监狱到国家卫生服务机构，绩效指标从2014年左右开始上升。儿童贫困率在2000年期间下降，现在急剧上升，部分原因是由于工作年龄福利大幅削减。

Since the election in 2015 the government has subtly adopted a new approach to austerity: less emphasis on spending cuts, more on tax rises. In the average budget or autumn statement since then, the government has called for tax rises four times as big as the average in the parliament of 2010-15. Granted, the personal allowance for income tax has risen. The headline rate of corporation tax has been cut. Yet increases in less-noticed charges such as environmental taxes, stamp duty (a levy on property transactions) and insurance-premium tax (levied on everything from holiday to vehicle insurance) have more than compensated.

自2015大选以来，政府巧妙地采用了一种新的紧缩政策：少关注削减开支，多关注增加税收。在平均预算或秋季声明之后，政府已呼吁比议会在2010-2015年的平均税收增加四倍。的确，个人所得税免税额已上升。公司税的总税率已被削减。然而，增加较少关注的费用，如环境税，印花税（物业交易税）和保险费税（征收的一切从假日到车辆保险）已超过所给的补偿了。

• austerity n.节衣缩食；艰苦朴素

Mr Hammond is fast gaining a reputation as a tax-grabber. In his first budget in March the chancellor pencilled in a reduction in the tax-free allowance for dividend income from £5,000 to £2,000. He also proposed an increase in the national-insurance contributions paid by the self-employed—though this was hastily, and embarrassingly, withdrawn after an outcry from newspapers and Tory backbenchers.

哈蒙德很快赢得作为一个“税收-攫取者者”的名声。财政大臣预计在三月第一个预算中为股息收入从5000英镑到2000英镑减少免税额。他还提出增加在个体国民保险税，虽然这很匆忙，也令人尴尬，但在报社和保守党后座议员的强烈抗议后就撤回了。

• pencil v.用铅笔写

• outcry n.强烈的抗议（或反对）

In all, following recent revisions to official economic forecasts, it is now expected that in 2018-19 the tax burden, expressed as a percentage of GDP, will be at its highest level since the mid-1980s. Mrs May’s “instinct” may well be to lower taxes, but she cannot help being bound by Britain’s unforgiving fiscal arithmetic.

总之，随着最近对官方经济预测的修订，现在预计在2018年-2019年度税负，用GDP的百分比表示，将达到自上世纪80年代中期以来的最高水平。梅的“本能”可能是降低税收，但她不得不被英国无情的财政预算约束。

• arithmetic n.（某形势的）数据统计

翻译 ▍瞐瞐 Ding

审核 ▍瞐瞐

图文编辑 ▍且听风吟

责任编辑 ▍毛毛