政治领袖迟早会与现实发生碰撞，新任英国首相安迪·伯纳姆（Andy Burnham）的首次碰撞就发生在本周。他刚一提出大幅扩张福利国家，政府债券收益率便飙升至1998年以来的最高水平。
Political leaders collide with reality sooner or later, and new British Prime Minister Andy Burnham’s first collision arrived this week. No sooner had he proposed a dramatic expansion in the welfare state than government bond yields surged to their highest level since 1998.
伯纳姆先生本周在演讲中向工党（中左翼）的活动人士承诺，如果工党在下次选举（最迟于2029年举行）中获胜，他将创建一项庞大的新的老年护理福利。虽然细节模糊，但他似乎设想“国家护理服务”将涵盖居家健康助理等服务。这个名字令人不寒而栗地让人联想到英国国家医疗服务体系（NHS），后者是英国最著名的普遍福利，以漫长的等待名单、糟糕的癌症治疗结果以及令政府破产而闻名。
Mr. Burnham promised activists in his center-left Labour Party in a speech this week that he’ll create a vast new entitlement for old-age care if Labour wins the next election (due no later than 2029). While details are vague, he seems to envision the “National Care Service” covering in-home health aides and the like. The name is an ominous echo of the National Health Service, Britain’s universal entitlement best known for long wait lists, terrible cancer outcomes, and bankrupting the government.
首相表示，他将通过改革国家养老金来为此买单，国家养老金相当于美国的社会保障制度。细节很复杂（如果你自讨苦吃，可以问问你最喜欢的人工智能来解释“三重锁定”机制）。但主要要点是，伯纳姆先生希望减缓福利的荒谬增长，使其仅以“愚蠢”的速度增长。他的这一计划在自己党内反响极差，因此很可能不会实施。
The Prime Minister says he’d pay for this by reforming the state pension, which is Britain’s equivalent of U.S. Social Security. The details are complicated (ask your favorite artificial intelligence to explain the “triple lock” if you’re a glutton for punishment). But the main takeaway is that Mr. Burnham wants to slow the ridiculous growth of benefits so they’re growing at a merely silly pace. His plan for doing so was received so poorly by his own party that it probably won’t happen.
令人惊讶的是，伯纳姆先生竟然试图提出任何福利改革。他在竞选取代基尔·斯塔默（Keir Starmer）成为工党领袖和首相时，曾不懈地批评玛格丽特·撒切尔时代（1990年结束）的自由市场改革。他的理论，也是英国左翼许多人的共识，是托尼·布莱尔领导工党对撒切尔的遗产过于迁就，而英国36年来的主要问题是国家干预主义（statism）不足。
The surprise is that Mr. Burnham attempted to propose any entitlement reform. He campaigned to replace Keir Starmer as Labour leader and Prime Minister by relentlessly criticizing the free-market reforms of the Margaret Thatcher era, which ended in 1990. His theory, shared by much of the British left, is that Tony Blair led Labour to be too accommodating of Thatcher’s legacy and that Britain’s main problem for 36 years has been not enough statism.