Modern governments claim a monopoly over the creation of cash, and this is often said to be the wellspring of their economic power. But the state’s grip on the money supply is weaker than it seems. In the UK, notes and coins adorned with images of the Queen’s head may be the most visible instruments of economic exchange, but they comprise less than a 20th of the money supply. Much of the rest consists of bank deposits – in effect, private debts that financial institutions owe their customers. These deposits function like money; they can be transferred from person to person with the flick of a pen, the wave of a card or even a mobile phone. Yet they are created by private contracts between citizens, not by government fiat.

现代政府垄断了创造现金的权利，这常被称为是它们经济权力的来源。但政府对货币供应的控制不如表面上那么强。在英国，印刻有女王头像的纸币和硬币或许是最看得见的经济交易媒介，但它们只占货币供应量的不到二十分之一。其余的货币供应主要由银行存款组成——实际上，这是金融机构欠客户的私人债务。存款起到货币的作用，只需笔一挥、卡一刷，甚至用手机操作，它便能从一个人的户头转移到另一个人的户头。但存款是由公民之间的私人合同创造出来的，不是政府法令创造出来的。

Writing in these pages, Martin Wolf has argued for the abolition of such “private money”. Our economies would be more stable, he believes, if money creation were left entirely to the state. It is an alluring proposal; the monetary system is fiendishly complicated, and simple solutions to complex problems are often attractive. But it is misguided.

马丁•沃尔夫(Martin Wolf)在专栏中撰文提出废除此类“私币”(private money)。他认为，如果将货币创造完全交给政府，我们的经济将更稳定。这是颇具诱惑力的提议；货币体系之复杂令人无从下手，而复杂问题的简单解决办法通常很诱人。但他的提议是错误的。

When an account holder gives a bank some cash in return for an increased deposit balance, the bank keeps only a tiny fraction of what it has received in the form of liquid reserves. The rest is lent out to borrowers, who in turn deposit the money, creating still more private money. Because borrowers pay interest, this process leads to the peculiar position that I both receive interest on my current account balance and pay no charges for the bank’s transaction services.

银行账户持有人将现金交给银行，换取存款余额增值，银行将所得资金的仅仅一小部分保留为流动准备金。其余则贷给借款人，借款人再将资金存入银行，创造出更多的私币。由于借款方需要支付利息，上述过程便形成了一种特殊的局面：我一方面可以获得活期存款的利息，一方面无需为银行的交易服务付费。

Abolishing private money would stop “fractional reserve” banking in its tracks. Banks would have to match deposits pound for pound with cash instead of loans. Account holders would have to pay charges and would receive no interest on their deposits. The gains from creating money that currently accrue to banks and their customers would instead be pocketed by the state. This could help fund public spending, reducing the government’s borrowing requirement or perhaps eliminating it altogether.

如果废除私币，以“部分准备金”为基础的银行业将戛然而止。对每一英镑的存款，银行都必须持有相应现金，而不能发放贷款。账户持有人得支付费用，存款也不会产生利息。创造货币的收益目前归于银行及其客户，但如果废除私币，收益将归政府。这可以为公共支出提供资金，减少政府的借款需求，或许还能直接消除借款的需求。

But this is no recipe for monetary stability. On the contrary: it is striking how many of the great inflations of the past were caused by profligate or greedy governments indulging in deficit financing – and destructive wars have been financed this way, too.

但这不是实现货币稳定的诀窍。恰恰相反：值得注意的是，历史上的多次严重通胀均由浪费贪婪、大举通过赤字融资的政府造成。毁灭性的战争也是以这种方式融得经费的。

Since the 1970s economists have been persuaded that government borrowing should be funded transparently through bond issues and not stealthily through money creation. Allowing the state to pay for its activities by minting fresh cash would undo the progress that has been made.

自20世纪70年代以来，经济学家渐渐相信，政府应当通过发行债券这种透明的方式借款，而不是偷偷摸摸地通过创造货币来获得资金。如果允许政府通过印新钞来为自己的活动买单，将破坏之前所取得的一切进步。

There is another difficulty with the proposal to ban fractional reserve banking: it is manifestly unenforceable. It is all very well to say that, when money changes hands, it must be government money – notes, coins, or balances in non-interest-bearing accounts that are not used to finance any form of lending. But, how can the government realistically stop balances in investment accounts being reassigned? People cannot be prevented from giving away what is theirs, and the recipients of such largesse cannot be banned from offering goods or services in return.

禁止以部分准备金为基础的银行业，还有另一个难点：显然难以执行。可以易手的货币必须是政府货币——纸币、硬币、无利息账户（不可为贷款提供融资）的余额，这点说起来容易。但是，政府实践上如何能防止投资账户的余额被重新分配？我们不能阻止人们赠出自己的财富，也不能禁止这些“赠与”的获得者反过来提供商品或服务。

Perhaps the government could criminalise the use of government-issued notes and coins in a fractional reserve system. But this would not stop the determined financier. In many countries, mobile phone credits are used as a medium of exchange. One day, a successor to Bitcoin might serve that purpose. Or Britons hankering after interest-bearing bank accounts might start using dollars or euros instead of pounds. What is to stop them from lending such things to a bank, or to stop the bank from lending to others in turn? Very little: unless there was a prohibition on any lending on of any good that could be construed as money.

或许，在部分准备金体系中，政府可以对法定纸币和硬币的使用定罪。但这不会吓退那些意志坚定的金融家。在许多国家，手机预付话费被用作交易媒介。有朝一日，比特币(Bitcoin)的某种后继者可能也会承担这种功能。渴望付息银行账户的英国人可能开始使用美元和欧元，放弃英镑。有什么能防止他们将这些具有货币功能的东西借给银行，或是阻止银行将之借给他人？没什么能阻止，除非禁止出借任何可被理解为货币的商品。

There would be one big difference between this samizdat system of fractional reserve banking and what we have today: it could go broke, because there would be no central bank on hand to bail out the deposit-taking institutions in an emergency. This would encourage prudence. Perhaps we should abolish central banks rather than fractional reserve banking – but that is an argument for another day.

这种地下的部分准备金银行体系与我们现在的体系有一点显著不同：它可能会破产，因为在紧急情况下，没有央行为吸储机构纾困。这一点会促进审慎。