Update 03_p01_ch02_03.md Simplified Chinese

zh-CN/Economics and Ethics of Private Property Studies in Political Economy and Philosophy/03_p01_ch02_03.md

@@ -1,28 +1,28 @@
 ###
 
-There can be no doubt, then, that taxes invariably reduce production and with this the consumer’s standard of living. Whichever way things are put, there is no escaping the conclusion that taxation is a means of obstructing the formation of wealth and thereby creating relative impoverishment.
+毫无疑问，税收必然会降低生产，并使消费者的生活水平降低。无论采用何种方式，都无法逃避税收是阻碍财富形成并由此产生相对贫困的手段。
 
-This brings me to my second subject: the sociology of taxation. If taxation is an instrument for the destruction of wealth-formation, then the question immediately becomes pressing of how it can be explained that there is taxation; that there is ever more of it; that we have experienced, in particular during the last hundred years, a steady increase not just in the absolute but also in the relative level of taxation; and that the institutions which lead the way in this process, the tax-states of the Western World, have simultaneously assumed ever more powerful positions in the arena of international politics and increasingly dominate the rest of the world.
+这让我想到了我的第二个主题:税收社会学。如果税收是毁灭财富形成的工具，那么问题马上就会变成关于如何解释税收的问题;这是越来越多了;我们所经历的，特别是在过去的一百年中，不仅在绝对而且在相对水平的税收方面稳步增长;而在这一过程中，在西方世界的税收制度中，这些机构，同时在国际政治舞台上扮演了更强大的角色，并逐渐占据了整个世界的主导地位。
 
-With these questions one leaves the realm of economic theory. Economics answers the question “What is the consequence if taxation is introduced?” It deduces its answer from an understanding of the meaning of action and the meaning of taxation as a particular type of action. Why there is taxation is the subject matter of psychology, history, or sociology. Economics, or rather praxeology, recognizes that all actions are determined by ideas, correct or incorrect, good or bad. But it does not attempt to explain what these ideas are and how people come to hold or change them. Rather, it assumes them to be given and aims at explaining the logical consequences that flow from acting upon them, whatever they are. History and sociology ask what these ideas are, how people come to entertain them, and why they act the way they do.[^16]
+有了这些问题，就有了经济学理论的领域。经济学回答了问题"如果引入税收会有什么后果?”它从对行动意义的理解和作为一种特定类型的行为的税收的意义来推断它的答案。为什么存在税收是心理学、历史或社会学的主题。经济学，或更确切地说行为学，认识到所有的行为都是由思想决定的，正确的或不正确的，好的或坏的。但它并没有试图解释这些想法是什么以及人们是如何持有或改变它们的。相反地，它假设它们是给定的，并且旨在解释从作用于它们的逻辑结果，不管它们是什么。历史和社会学问这些想法是什么,人们如何来招待他们,以及他们为什么这样做。[^ 16]
 
-On a highly abstract level the answer to the question why there is steadily increasing taxation is this: The root cause for this is a slow but dramatic change in the idea of justice that has taken place in public opinion.
+在高度抽象的层面上，对于为什么会有不断增加的税收的问题的答案是这样的:这是在公众舆论中发生的正义观念的缓慢而剧烈的变化。
 
-Let me explain. One can acquire property either through homesteading, production, and contracting, or else through the expropriation and exploitation of homesteaders, producers, or contractors. There are no other ways.[^17] Both methods are natural to mankind. Alongside production and contracting there has always been a process of nonproductive and noncontractual property acquisitions. Just as productive enterprises can develop into firms and corporations, so can the business of expropriating and exploiting occur on a larger scale and develop into governments and states.[^18] That taxation as such exists and that there is the drive toward increased taxation should hardly come as a surprise. For the idea of nonproductive or noncontractual appropriations is almost as old as the idea of productive ones, and everyone—the exploiter certainly no less than the producer—prefers a higher income to a lower one.
+让我解释一下。一个人可以通过种宅地、生产和承包获得财产，也可以通过征用和剥削家庭、生产者或承包者来获得财产。没有别的办法。[^ 17]两种方法对人类是自然的。除了生产和承包之外，还一直在进行非生产性和非合同物业收购的流程。就像生产性企业可以发展成企业和企业一样，征用和剥削的业务也可以在更大的规模上发展成为政府和国家。[^ 18]这种税收是存在的，而且对于税收的增加也不应令人感到意外。
 
-The decisive question is this: what controls and constrains the size and growth of such a business?
+决定性的问题是，是什么控制并限制了这种生意的规模和发展?
 
-It should be clear that the constraints on the size of firms in the business of expropriating producers and contractors are of a categorically different nature than those limiting the size of firms engaged in productive exchanges. Contrary to the claim of the public choice school, government and private firms do not do essentially the same sort of business. They are engaged in categorically different types of operations.[^19]
+应该清楚的是，对企业的规模限制在没收生产商和承包商的业务上的限制，与那些限制从事生产性交易的公司的规模是完全不同的。与公立选择学校的观点相反，政府和私营企业并没有做同样的生意。他们从事各种截然不同的业务。[^19]
 
-The size of a productive enterprise is constrained on the one hand by consumer demand (which imposes a definite limit on the total revenue attainable), and on the other hand by the competition of other producers, which continuously forces each firm to operate with the lowest possible costs if it wishes to stay in business. For such an enterprise to grow in size the most urgent consumer wants must be served in the most efficient ways. Nothing but voluntary consumer purchases support its size.
+生产企业的规模一方面受到消费者需求的制约(这对可实现的总收入产生了明确的限制)，另一方面是其他生产商的竞争对手所产生的影响，这不断迫使每个公司在其希望保持业务的情况下，以最低的可能成本运作。对于这种规模增长的企业而言，最迫切的消费者必须以最有效的方式服务。只有自愿的消费者购买支持其规模。
 
-The constraints on the other type of firm, of government or the state, are altogether different. For one thing, it is absurd to say that its size is determined by demand in the same sense as the size of a private firm is determined by demand. One cannot say, by any stretch of the imagination, that the homesteaders, the producers, and the contractors who must surrender part of their assets to a government have demanded such a service. Instead, they must be coerced into accepting it, and this is conclusive proof of the fact that the service is not actually in demand at all. Hence, demand cannot be considered as a limit on the size of government. Insofar as it grows, the state grows by acting in open *contradiction* to demand.
+其他类型的公司、政府或国家的约束完全不同。首先，说它的大小是由需求决定的，这是荒谬的，就像私人公司的规模是由需求决定的一样。不能说，在任何想象的情况下，那些必须把部分资产交给政府的家庭、生产商和承包商都要求提供这样的服务。相反,他们必须被迫接受它,这是确凿的事实证明服务是不实际的需求。因此,需求不能被认为是限制政府规模。在增长的过程中，国家的发展是在公开的矛盾中发展的
 
-The state is also not in the same way constrained by competition as is a productive firm. Unlike such a firm, the state must not keep its cost of operation at a minimum but can operate at above-minimum costs because it is able to shift its higher costs onto competitors by taxing or regulating their behavior. Thus, the size of the state also cannot be considered as constrained by cost competition. Insofar as it grows, it does so in spite of the fact that it is *not* cost-efficient.
+国家也不像生产企业那样受到竞争的限制。与这样的公司不同，政府不应将运营成本维持在最低水平，但可以以高于最低的成本运营，因为它可以通过对其行为征税或调整其成本，将成本转嫁到竞争对手手中。因此，国家的规模也不能被认为受成本竞争约束。在这种情况下，尽管它的成本效益不高，但它还是这样做的。
 
-This, however, is not to say that the size of government is not constrained at all and that the historical fluctuations in the size of states are mere random walks. It only states that the constraints on the firm “government” must be fundamentally different.
+然而，这并不是说政府的规模不受约束，而国家规模的历史波动只是随机漫步。它只指出，制约企业“政府”的制约因素必须根本不同。
 
-Instead of being constrained by cost and demand conditions, the growth of an exploitative firm is constrained by public opinion:[^20] It is not voluntarily supported, but by its very nature employs coercion. On the other side of the same coin, coercion implies creating victims, and victims are not supporters but active or passive resisters of a firm’s size. It is conceivable that this resistance can be lastingly broken by force in the case of one man, or one group of men, exploiting one or maybe two or three others, or another group of roughly the same size. It is inconceivable, however, to imagine that force alone can account for the breaking down of resistance in the actually familiar case of small minorities operating their business of expropriating and exploiting populations tens, hundreds, or thousands of times their size.[^21] For this to happen, such a firm must have public support in addition to its coercive force. A majority of the population must accept its operations as legitimate. This acceptance can range from active enthusiasm to passive resignation. But there must be acceptance in the sense that a majority must have given up the idea of actively or passively resisting any attempt to enforce nonproductive and noncontractual property acquisitions. Instead of displaying outrage over such actions, of showing contempt for everyone who engages in them, and of doing nothing to help make them successful (not to mention actively trying to obstruct them), a majority must actively or passively support them. Only in light of this can it be explained how the few can govern the many. State-supportive public opinion must counterbalance the resistance of victimized property owners to the extent that active resistance appears futile.
+而不是受制于成本和需求条件下,剥削的公司的增长是受到舆论:[^ 20]这不是自愿支持,但从本质上来看雇佣强迫。在同一枚硬币的另一面，胁迫意味着制造受害者，而受害者不是支持者，而是公司规模的主动或被动的抵抗者。可以想象，这种抵抗会在一个人或一群人的情况下，被强行打破，或者是一群人，或者其他两三个人，或者另一群差不多大小的群体。然而，不可思议的是，仅凭这一力量就能解释，在一个熟悉的小少数民族的情况下，在他们的生意中，他们的生意是如何被征用和剥削的，他们的规模是几十个，几百个，甚至是他们的几千倍。[^ 21]要实现这一目标,这样的公司必须有公众支持除了其强制力。大多数人必须接受它的合法经营。这种接纳程度可以从积极主动到消极顺从。但必须接受的是，大多数人必须放弃积极或被动地抵制任何强制实施非生产性和非合同物业收购的想法。大多数人必须主动或被动地支持他们，而不是对这样的行为表现出愤怒，对参与其中的每一个人都表示蔑视，也不采取任何行动来帮助他们成功（更不要说积极地试图阻止他们）。只有在这种情况下，才能够解释少数人如何管理很多人。国家支持的公众舆论必须平衡对受害财产所有者的抵抗程度到积极抵抗的程度是徒劳的。
 
 The state of public opinion also imposes a constraint on the size of the state in another respect. Every firm in the large-scale business of property expropriation must naturally aim to be a monopolist in a definite territory, for one can only prosper in such a business so long as there is something that can be expropriated. However, if competition were allowed in the business of expropriating, there would obviously be nothing left to take. Hence, in order to stay in business, one must be a monopolist.
 
@@ -72,4 +72,4 @@ What has happened regarding the general public’s conception of justice?[^26]
 
 ::::> Nothing appears more surprising to those, who consider human affairs with a philosophical eye, than the easiness with which the many are governed by the few; and the implicit submission, with which men resign their own sentiments and passions to those of their rulers. When we enquire by what means this wonder is effected, we shall find, that as FORCE is always on the side of the governed, the governors have nothing to support them but opinion. It is therefore, on opinion only that government is founded; and this maxim extends to the most despotic and most military governments, as well as to the most free and most popular. The soldan of EGYPT, or the emperor of ROME, might drive his harmless subjects, like brute beasts, against their sentiments and inclination: but he must, at least, have led his *mamalukes*, or *praetorian bands*, like men, by their opinion. (*Essays, Moral, Political and Literary* [Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1971], p. 19)
 
-[^26]: See on the following in particular also Murray N. Rothbard, “Left and Right: The Prospects for Liberty” in idem, *Egalitarianism as a Revolt Against Nature and Other Essays*.
+[^26]: See on the following in particular also Murray N. Rothbard, “Left and Right: The Prospects for Liberty” in idem, *Egalitarianism as a Revolt Against Nature and Other Essays*.