Is the International Monetary Fund becoming less sanguine on China’s housing market? Qilai Shen/Bloomberg

　　國際貨幣基金組織（International Monetary Fund，簡稱IMF）開始不那么看好中國房市了嗎？

　　Writing in a post on the IMF’s blog, China mission chief Nigel Chalk appears unimpressed with Beijing’s year-long fight to control housing prices.

　　在IMF博客的一篇文章中，IMF中國事務主管喬克（Nigel Chalk）似乎對北京歷時一年的房價控制戰(zhàn)不以為然。

　　What’s the problem? Chalk argues that China faces a potent cocktail of ingredients pushing house prices up:

　　問題是什么？喬克認為，中國存在一系列強有力的因素在推動房價上漲：

　　* High domestic savings, and limited opportunities to take cash offshore

　　* Limited domestic savings options and bank deposit rates below the rate of inflation

　　* No property tax or capital gains tax, which makes it cheap to buy and hold property

　　* Rapid growth, high wages and urbanization, which mean real demand continues to grow *

　　國內(nèi)儲蓄額高，資金離岸的機會有限

　　* 國內(nèi)儲蓄選項有限，銀行存款利率低于通脹率

　　* 沒有地產(chǎn)稅或資本利得稅，導致購買和持有地產(chǎn)的成本較低

　　* 經(jīng)濟增長快、工資高和城市化，這意味著實際需求持續(xù)增長

　　The government’s crackdown on high housing prices has had some success. But Chalk believes that the restrictions on speculators introduced so far treat the symptoms, not the causes, of the malaise.

　　政府抑制高房價的舉措取得了一定的成功。但喬克認為，迄今為止推出的限制投機者的措施是治標不治本。

　　What is required is a more comprehensive approach:

　　中國需要的是一個更全面的方法：

　　※Ultimately, the solution has to involve higher interest rates (on both deposits and loans), efforts to create a broader set of financial assets for the population to invest in, and a broad-based property tax that covers the majority of China’s housing stock.§ “

　　歸根結(jié)底，解決辦法必須包括上調(diào)利率（包括存款和貸款），努力創(chuàng)造一組更廣泛的金融資產(chǎn)供人們來投資，并對中國大部分住宅資產(chǎn)全面征收房產(chǎn)稅。”

　　There might be some progress on one of those fronts: A rapid expansion in bank’s wealth management products gives households an alternative to real estate if they want an investment that beats inflation.

　　其中一個方面或許有一定進展：對于以對抗通脹為投資目的的家庭，銀行理財產(chǎn)品的迅速擴張為他們提供了一個除房地產(chǎn)之外的選擇。

　　But with interest rates for most depositors still significantly below the level of inflation, and experiments in property tax falling off the policy agenda, progress elsewhere is strictly limited. China’s policy makers might need to invest in a larger fluffy hammer.

　　但由于大多數(shù)儲戶的利率仍遠遠低于通脹水平，并且在房產(chǎn)稅方面的嘗試逐漸淡出政策議程，因此其它方面的進展極其有限。中國的決策者可能需要使用一個更大的軟錘子。