阿根廷與理性預期運動

去年阿根廷哈維爾·米雷 (Javier Milei) 當選的激動人心的消息在比特幣社區和自由主義者圈子中獲得了廣泛讚譽。阿根廷數十年的惡性通貨膨脹應該會導致人們對央行過度印鈔自然產生懷疑，而看到政治能夠遵循這個基本邏輯令人欣慰。

Last year brought exciting news with the election of Javier Milei in Argentina, an event that was met with broad acclaim throughout the Bitcoin community and libertarian circles. Given Argentina's decades of hyperinflation, one might expect a natural skepticism towards excessive central bank money printing. It is reassuring to see that politics can follow this basic logic. This was a big win for the sound money movement, of which Bitcoin is a part. The election of the former TV commentator to head of state is a warning call to all central bankers everywhere, and a ripple of hope that democracies can in fact check the power of government bureaucrats.

去年，哈維爾·米雷 (Javier Milei) 在阿根廷當選，帶來了令人興奮的消息，這一事件受到了比特幣社區和自由主義者圈子的廣泛讚譽。鑑於阿根廷數十年的惡性通貨膨脹，人們可能自然而然地對央行過度印鈔表示懷疑。令人欣慰的是，政治能夠遵循這個基本邏輯。這是穩健貨幣運動的一大勝利，比特幣就是其中的一部分。這位前電視評論員當選國家元首是對世界各地所有央行行長的警告，也是對民主國家實際上能夠遏制政府官僚權力的希望的漣漪。

Argentina and modern macroeconomics

阿根廷與現代宏觀經濟學

Argentina also played an outsized role in the war of ideas battled in academic economics over the last 30 years. The giants of this field like Robert Lucas, Thomas Sargent, and Ed Prescott were all at the University of Chicago economics department.

阿根廷在過去 30 年學術經濟學的思想戰爭中也發揮了巨大的作用。羅伯特·盧卡斯（Robert Lucas）、托馬斯·薩金特（Thomas Sargent）、埃德·普雷斯科特（Ed Prescott）等這一領域的巨頭都曾就職於芝加哥大學經濟系。

Lucas offered the official critique of central bank stabilization policy in his Nobel-winning article “Expectations and the Neutrality of Money.” He makes a technical contribution establishing a new area of mathematics applied to macroeconomics, following in the footsteps of John Muth. Lucas was a master storyteller and his main idea emerges a simple parable even kids can understand.

盧卡斯在其諾貝爾獎獲獎文章《預期與貨幣中性》中對央行穩定政策提出了官方批評。他追隨約翰·穆斯 (John Muth) 的腳步，做出了技術貢獻，建立了應用於宏觀經濟學的數學新領域。盧卡斯是一位說故事的大師，他的主要想法是一個連孩子都能理解的簡單寓言。

Imagine a community of people at a circus who magically receive an extra $20 bill in their pocket. At first, everyone delights in the new money, and they buy more cotton candy, roller coaster rides, and hot dogs. New money now circulates throughout the circus, and yet the total supply of goods and services remains fixed. Over time, prices have only one way to go: up. There may be some adjustment time, but the increase in price is inevitable. And so purchasing power falls, and the general price level will rise.

想像馬戲團裡的一群人神奇地在口袋裡收到了額外的 20 美元鈔票。起初，每個人都對新錢感到高興，他們買了更多的棉花糖、過山車和熱狗。現在，新資金在整個馬戲團中流通，但商品和服務的總供應量仍然固定。隨著時間的推移，價格只有一個方向：上漲。可能會有一些調整時間，但漲價是不可避免的。因此購買力下降，整體物價水準將會上升。

But here's the rub: people are rational, so they know this will happen. Therefore, at the moment that everyone receives their $20 bill, they know in advance that everything will ultimately be $20 more expensive. And so it's impossible to fool them into spending more now. In economic terms, these rational expectations will not lead to changes in real consumption. This was a broad critique against Keynesian economics, which argued that increasing the money supply can in fact fool people. Keynesian economics gave a carte blanche to central bankers to manage the money supply to try to induce economic growth. But Lucas argued that such an exercise is a fool's errand. You can't trick people into changing their real consumption or investment if they are smart enough to form rational expectations about the future.

但問題是：人們是理性的，所以他們知道這會發生。因此，當每個人收到 20 美元的鈔票時，他們預先知道所有東西最終都會貴 20 美元。因此，現在不可能欺騙他們增加支出。從經濟角度來看，這些理性預期不會導致實際消費改變。這是對凱因斯主義經濟學的廣泛批評，凱因斯主義經濟學認為增加貨幣供應量實際上可以愚弄人們。凱因斯主義經濟學賦予央行總裁管理貨幣供應以試圖促進經濟成長的全權。但盧卡斯認為這樣的做法是徒勞無功的。如果人們夠聰明，能夠對未來形成理性預期，那麼你就無法欺騙人們改變他們的實際消費或投資。

The rational expectations movement took hold in economics in the '70s and '80s at the freshwater schools of Carnegie Mellon, the University of Minnesota, and the University of Chicago as a pushback against the saltwater schools of Harvard and MIT. Lucas and Sargent often referenced the hyperinflation in Argentina as the prime example of central banking run amok. The University of Chicago at the turn of the century imported dozens of PhD students from Argentina who had lived this daily experience of hyperinflation where prices change not by the quarter or month, but by the week or day. And it's a sad tale that 25 years on, the same is true.

理性預期運動在 70 年代和 80 年代在卡內基美隆大學、明尼蘇達大學和芝加哥大學的淡水學院盛行，作為對哈佛大學和麻省理工學院鹹水學院的反擊。盧卡斯和薩金特經常將阿根廷的惡性通貨膨脹視為中央銀行失控的典型例子。芝加哥大學在世紀之交從阿根廷引進了數十名博士生，他們每天都經歷過惡性通貨膨脹，價格變化不是按季度或按月變化，而是按週或按天變化。這是一個悲傷的故事，25 年過去了，情況依然如此。

Rational Expectations and Bitcoin

理性預期和比特幣

It is a loss to the academy that Robert Lucas died, as he pioneered many of the early critiques against central banks. But how does rational expectation square with Bitcoin? This answer is subtle and nuanced. At one level, rational expectations are a strong critique of central banks, as is Bitcoin. So, they have a common enemy. They are both critiquing the poor choices that inevitably ensue from human beings managing their own money supply. For Lucas, aiming to stabilize the macroeconomy by tinkering with the interest rate every six weeks is a waste of time, and ineffective.

羅伯特·盧卡斯的去世是學術界的損失，因為他是許多早期對央行批評的先驅。但理性預期如何與比特幣一致呢？這個答案是微妙而細緻的。在某種程度上，理性預期是對央行的強烈批評，比特幣也是。所以，他們有一個共同的敵人。他們都在批評人類管理自己的貨幣供應而不可避免地產生的糟糕選擇。對於盧卡斯來說，透過每六週調整一次利率來穩定宏觀經濟的目標是浪費時間，而且是無效的。

But the arguments for Bitcoin go further. Bitcoin's issuance schedule is a strong endorsement of a very specific kind of money supply, one that is predictable and unchangeable. In rational expectations, money does not matter, because people are too smart to be fooled by changes in money. For Bitcoin, money supply does matter, and it's vital that everyone knows the supply in advance and that it cannot be altered. So at some level, there are different assumptions about the rationality of people. Lucas argued that people are too rational to be fooled by an errant central bank, while Satoshi assumed (in the design choices of his protocol) that people are not rational enough to completely adjust to bad central bank policies, which is why a fixed and unchangeable money supply is better.

但支持比特幣的論點更進一步。比特幣的發行時間表是對一種非常特殊的貨幣供應的強烈認可，這種貨幣供應是可預測且不可改變的。在理性預期中，金錢並不重要，因為人們太聰明，不會被金錢的變化所愚弄。對於比特幣來說，貨幣供應量確實很重要，而且至關重要的是每個人都必須事先知道供應量並且無法更改。所以在某種程度上，人們對理性有不同的假設。盧卡斯認為，人們太理性了，不會被錯誤的央​​行愚弄，而中本聰則假設（在他的協議的設計選擇中）人們沒有足夠的理性來完全適應不良的央行政策，這就是為什麼一個固定且不可改變的政策。

An erratic monetary policy, such as those adopted by central banks recently, can damage individual investors and tear the social fabric. The roller coaster ride of interest rates constantly shifting between easy and tight money has a profound impact on an otherwise unknown but essential component of the economy: the allocation of our human capital. The search for yield induces individual investors to gamble in the stock market, and young students to pursue careers in trading rather than producing goods and services in the real economy. A fixed

不穩定的貨幣政策，例如央行最近採取的貨幣政策，可能會損害個人投資者並撕裂社會結構。利率的過山車般的變化，不斷地在寬鬆貨幣和緊縮貨幣之間轉換，對經濟中一個未知但重要的組成部分產生了深遠的影響：我們的人力資本的配置。對收益的追求促使個人投資者在股票市場上賭博，而年輕學生則從事交易職業，而不是在實體經濟中生產商品和服務。一個固定的