每天一篇经济学人 | Top of the charts 排名第一（2022年第

In financial terms the past year has been bad for almost everyone. Inflation of 10% year-on-year across the rich world has slashed household incomes. Investors have lost out as global stockmarkets have plunged by 20%. Yet this poor aggregate performance hides wide differences: some countries have done pretty well.

从财务角度来说，过去的一年对几乎所有人来说都是糟糕的一年。发达国家10% 的年通货膨胀率使家庭收入大幅下降。随着全球股市暴跌20%，投资者损失惨重。然而，这种糟糕的总体表现掩盖了巨大的差异: 一些国家做得相当好。

To assess these differences, The Economist has compiled data on five economic and financial indicators—gdp, inflation, inflation breadth, stockmarket performance and government debt—for 34 mostly rich countries. We have ranked each economy according to how well it has done on these measures, and created an overall score. The table at the end of this article shows the rankings. It includes some unexpected results.

为了评估这些差异，《经济学人》整理了34个主要是发达国家的5项经济和金融指标数据，即GDP、通货膨胀、通货膨胀广度、股市表现和政府债务。我们根据每个经济体在这些指标上的表现进行了排名，并给出了一个总分。本文末尾的图表展示了排名。它包括一些意想不到的结果。

For the first time in a while, the economic party is happening in the Mediterranean. Top of our list is Greece. Other countries that plumbed the economic depths in the early 2010s, including Portugal and Spain, also score highly. They are not the only pleasant surprises. Despite political chaos, Israel did well. Meanwhile, despite political stability, Germany is an underperformer. Two Baltic countries, Estonia and Latvia, which won plaudits in the 2010s for speedy reforms, come bottom.

一段时间以来，地中海地区第一次迎来了经济盛宴。排名第一的是希腊。包括葡萄牙和西班牙在内的其他国家在2010年代初经济下滑的国家，得分也很高。它们并不是唯一的惊喜。尽管以色列政治混乱，但其表现不错。与此同时，虽然德国政治稳定，但其表现不佳。在2010年代因快速改革而赢得赞誉地爱沙尼亚和拉脱维亚这两个波罗的海国家排名垫底。

gdp, usually the best measure of economic health, is our first indicator. Norway (helped by high oil prices) and Turkey (by a boom in sanctions-busting trade with Russia) have done better than most. The fallout from covid-19 also looms large. Thanks to strict lockdowns and a collapse in tourism, a year ago much of southern Europe was in dire straits, so the region was due a decent year. Visits to the Balearics recently rebounded beyond their pre-pandemic level. As your correspondent discovered on a recent trip to Ibiza, the island is so busy it is difficult to book a taxi or find a spot at a half-decent restaurant.

GDP通常是衡量经济健康状况的最佳指标，它也是我们的第一个衡量指标。挪威(得益于高油价)和土耳其(得益于与俄罗斯违反制裁的贸易繁荣)比大多数国家情况更好。covid-19的影响也很严重。由于严格的封锁和旅游业的崩溃，一年前南欧大部分地区都陷入了困境，所以该地区今年应该是不错的一年。最近前往巴利阿里群岛的游客数量超过了疫情前的水平。正如本刊记者在最近一次伊维萨岛之旅中发现的那样，该岛非常热闹，热闹到很难订到出租车，也很难在一家还算过得去的餐厅找到位置。

Ireland probably had a strong year, though one not nearly as strong as gdp numbers suggest. The activities of big multinational companies, many registered there for tax purposes, have for years distorted the figures. By contrast, America’s gdp numbers are misleadingly weak: in recent quarters official statisticians have struggled to account for the impact of enormous stimulus packages.

爱尔兰可能经历了强劲的一年，尽管没有GDP数据显示的那么强劲。大型跨国公司的活动多年来扭曲了这些数据，其中许多公司是出于税务目的在爱尔兰注册的。相比之下，美国的GDP数据却低得令人难以置信: 最近几个季度，官方统计人员一直在努力解释巨额刺激计划的影响。

More granular data fill in the picture. Our second measure is the change in the price level since the end of 2021. Away from the world’s attention, some countries have seen low inflation. In Switzerland consumer prices have risen by just 3%. The country’s central bank, helped along by a strong currency, responded rapidly to the rise in prices earlier this year. Countries which have non-Russian energy sources—such as Spain, which gets much of its gas from Algeria—have also done better than average. Those reliant on Vladimir Putin for fuel have truly suffered. In Latvia average consumer prices have risen by a fifth.

更细的数据都在这张图中。我们的第二个指标是自2021年底以来的价格水平变化。在世界瞩目之外，一些国家出现了低通胀。瑞士的消费价格仅上涨了3%。在强劲货币的帮助下，该国央行在今年早些时候对价格上涨做出了迅速反应。拥有非俄罗斯能源来源的国家（比如西班牙，其大部分天然气来自阿尔及利亚）的表现也高于平均水平。那些依赖弗拉基米尔•普京提供燃料的国家确实遭受了损失。拉脱维亚的平均消费价格上涨了五分之一。

Our third measure also relates to inflation. It calculates the share of items in each country’s inflation basket where prices have risen by more than 2% in the past year. This provides an indication of how entrenched inflation is—and therefore hints at how quickly inflation will fall over the coming year. Some countries that suffer from high headline inflation have nonetheless been able to limit its breadth. In Italy, for instance, average consumer prices have risen by 11% this year, yet “only” two-thirds of its inflation basket has above-target inflation. Japanese inflation also looks like it may fade away. Britain is in more trouble. The price of every category in its basket is rising fast.

我们的第三个指标也与通货膨胀有关。它计算了在每个国家的通货膨胀篮子中，去年价格上涨超过2%的物品所占的份额。这表明了通胀的根深蒂固程度，因此也暗示了未来一年通胀率将以多快的速度下降。尽管如此，一些遭受高总体通胀的国家仍能够限制通胀的广度。以意大利为例，今年平均消费价格上涨了11%，然而“只有”三分之二的通货膨胀篮子高于目标通胀。日本的通货膨胀看起来也可能会消退。英国的麻烦更大。其篮子里每一类商品的价格都在快速上涨。

People’s sense of economic well-being does not just come from prices in the shops. They also look at the value of their pension pots and stock portfolios. In some countries it has been a terrible year for these sorts of investments. Share prices in both Germany and South Korea are down by nearly a fifth in 2022, double America’s decline. Swedish stocks have done even worse. Yet there are a few spots of strength. Norway’s stockmarket is up on the year. So is Britain’s, which is populated by the sort of dull, plodding companies that tend to be rewarded when economic times are tough. A fall in the value of the pound has also increased the value of foreign sales.

人们的经济幸福感不仅仅来自商店里的价格。他们还会考虑养老金和股票投资组合的价值。在一些国家，今年对这类投资来说是糟糕的一年。2022年，德国和韩国的股价都将下跌近五分之一，跌幅是美国的两倍。瑞典股市的表现更糟。但也有一些国家有优势。挪威股市今年上涨。英国的股市也是如此，因为英国都是那种沉闷、缓慢的公司，在经济困难时期，这些公司往往会得到回报。英镑贬值也增加了海外销售额。

Our final measure concerns the change in net government debt as a share of gdp. In the short run ministers are able to paper over economic cracks by increasing spending or cutting taxes. However this can create more debt and thus the need to turn the fiscal screws in the future. Some governments have spent extravagantly to cope with the cost-of-living squeeze. Germany has allocated funds worth about 7% of gdp to help with sky-high energy costs, meaning its debt-to-gdp ratio has risen. Other countries have pulled back from the splurge, helping to right the fiscal ship. Assisted by high inflation, public debt in southern European countries seems to be on the way down.

我们的最后一个衡量指标是政府净债务占GDP比重的变化。在短期内，部长们可以通过增加支出或减税来掩盖经济裂缝。然而，这可能会产生更多的债务，从而需要在未来拧紧财政螺丝。为了应对生活成本的紧缩，一些政府已经大手笔花钱。德国已经拨出了约占GDP 7%的资金来帮助解决高企的能源成本，这意味着德国的债务占GDP的比例已经上升。其他国家已经停止了挥霍，帮助扭转了财政状况。在高通胀的推动下，南欧国家的公共债务似乎正在下降。

Will the gap between 2022’s winners and losers persist in 2023? Before long southern Europe’s economic growth, weighed down by rapidly ageing populations and high debts, will surely fall back to the region’s usual less-than-stellar levels. And there are hopeful signs that in countries such as America and Britain high inflation may finally be easing, which would help them up the rankings.

2022年的赢家和输家之间的差距会持续到2023年吗? 不久之后，受快速老龄化人口和高额债务的拖累，南欧的经济增长肯定会回落到该地区通常不那么出色的水平。有迹象表明，在美国和英国这样的国家，高通货膨胀可能最终会缓解，这将有助于他们提高排名。

Along other dimensions, differences are likely to persist, not least when it comes to those countries reliant on Mr Putin for their energy supplies. Against the odds, many managed to replenish their stores of natural gas before winter set in—but only by paying outrageous prices. With supplies now largely cut off, the coming year will be a lot more difficult. That will be a big concern in the Baltics, but less so on the other side of Europe. It is hard to worry about gas supplies while eating a giant plate of squid on an Ibicencan beach.

在其他方面，差异可能会持续存在，尤其是在那些依赖普京能源供应的国家。尽管困难重重，许多人还是设法在冬天来临之前补充了他们的天然气储备，但他们支付了高得离谱的价格。由于目前供应基本被切断，未来一年将更加困难。这将是波罗的海国家的一个大问题，但在欧洲的另一边就不那么令人担忧了。当你在伊维萨岛海滩上吃着一大盘鱿鱼时，你很难担心天然气供应问题。