美語情景對話 第883期:Economics in Australia 澳大利亞經濟

Maria: So Alex, you're from Australia. What's the economical situation there at the moment?

瑪麗亞：亞歷克斯，你來自澳大利亞。現在澳大利亞的經濟形勢怎麼樣？

Alex: We've actually been very, very lucky in the last couple of years throughout the global financial crisis. We've been, we had a very strong, very positive economic situation. The reason behind that is mainly because of China. They've been buying a lot of our export commodities and as a result, it's been fueling the economy. We didn't have a recession unlike the United States because of the stimulus package as well as China.

亞歷克斯：在這幾年的全球金融危機中，我們國家真的非常非常幸運。我們的經濟形勢強勁又積極。主要原因是因爲中國的貢獻。他們購買了許多我們國家的出口產品，這推動了經濟發展。由於經濟刺激方案和中國的幫助，我們沒有像美國那樣經歷經濟衰退。

So the Government did a very controversial stimulus package which included raising the retirement age up to sixty seven so that was something that wasn't really very much liked. It actually got the Prime Minister booted out of office but nevertheless as a result, a lot of these things that the Government did helped a lot.

澳大利亞政府實施的經濟刺激方案備受爭議，這項方案包括將退休年齡延長至67歲，這項方案不太受歡迎。實際上它讓澳大利亞總理被趕下臺，但是儘管如此，政府的許多措施都大有幫助。

We also have this thing that I think is one of the most exciting things to come out of Australia which is superannuition or superannuation, however you want to say it. It's a sort of mandatory eleven per cent on top of your income which by law you must put into a savings account which is then invested. The investment packages you can actually get, you know, it can be divided between property, between shares, between stock, whatever you want. You can manage it yourself or you can have it managed as well. But the law is you cannot take the money out until you are sixty five. So if you think about this, that's eleven per cent of what every single person is earning. Often families pool their superannuation together, their super, and that is all being invested. It's all being pumped throughout the economy constantly. Yes, it's kind of been pulled out of services and so on and so forth but it's going through. It's providing developmental initiatives and all sorts of stuff like that. So I think that's one of the reasons.

還有一個我認爲是澳大利亞推出的最令人興奮的計劃，那就是退休金計劃。這是一項強制措施，你要將收入的11%存入一個儲蓄帳戶，隨後這筆錢會用於投資。你可以從投資計劃中獲益，可以將這筆錢分別投資於房地產、股份、股票。你可以自己管理，也可以找別人管理。不過法律規定，65歲以前不能將錢取出。你可以想一下，那實際上是一個人收入的11%。通常一個家庭會把養老金放在一起，然後用於投資。這會不斷地爲經濟注入活力。雖然這項服務要拿出收入的一部分，但是確實有益。它提供了發展倡議。我認爲這也是其中一個原因。

I certainly think that we're going to have better standards of living than our parents will unlike so many countries in the world which will just fall flat because they haven't got the structure, the social and the economic architecture to look after themselves in the next couple of years.

我確信我們的生活水平會好於我們父母那代，我們不會像世界上許多國家那樣失敗，因爲它們沒有可以在未來幾年繼續發展的社會結構和經濟結構。

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重點講解：
1. as a result 結果；後果；
例句：As a result, this kind of bird has almost died out.
結果是，這種鳥現在幾乎絕跡了。
2. boot out 解僱；開除；趕出；
例句：Schools are booting out record numbers of unruly pupils.
學校開除了數量空前的難以管教的小學生。
3. and so forth 及諸如此類；等等；
例句：They discussed investments, the state of the economy and so forth.
他們討論了投資和經濟狀況等問題。
4. fall flat 失敗；不成功；
例句：Liz meant it as a joke but it fell flat.
利茲本想開個玩笑，結果卻沒有達到效果。