评论
打印
Recording Two
录音二
Sweden was the first European country to print and use paper money, but it may soon do away with physical currencies.
瑞典是第一个印刷和使用纸币的欧洲国家，但它可能很快就会摈弃实物货币。
Banks can save a lot of money and avoid regulatory headaches by moving to a cash-free system, and they can also avoid bank robberies, theft, and dirty money.
银行使用无现金系统能节约很多资金并避免很多管理的麻烦，还能避免抢劫、盗窃和洗钱问题。
Claer Barrett, the editor of Financial Times Money, says the Western world is headed toward a world without physical currency.
“Financial Times Money”主编克莱尔·巴雷特称，西方世界正朝着无实物货币的方向发展。
"Andy Holder—the chief economist at The Bank of England—suggested that the UK move towards a government-backed digital currency.
英格兰银行首席经济学家安迪·霍尔德认为，英国在向着政府支撑的数字货币的方向发展。
But does a cashless society really make good economic sense?
但无现金社会真得能带来良好的经济效益吗？
"The fact that cash is being drawn out of society, is less a feature of our everyday lives,
现金正从社会中剥离出去一事，在我们的日常生活中已经越来越不足为奇了，
and the ease of electronic payments—is this actually making us spend more money without realizing it?"
而且电子支付便捷——这种方式是不是实际上让我们在不经意间花了更多的钱？
Barrett wanted to find out if the absence of physical currency does indeed cause a person to spend more, so she decided to conduct an experiment a few months ago.
巴雷特想要找到在没有实物货币的情况下是否真的会让某人花更多的钱的证据，为此，几个月前她决定做一个实验。
She decided that she was going to try to just use cash for two weeks to make all of her essential purchases and see what that would do to her spending.
她决定尝试只使用现金来完成她两周所有必需品的购买，以此查看这种方式对她开销的影响。
She found she did spend a lot less money because it is incredibly hard to predict how much cash one is going to need—she was forever drawing money out of cash points.
她发现她的确花钱更少，因为非常难预测一个人会需要多少现金——所以她总是去自动取款机取钱。
Months later, she was still finding cash stuffed in her trouser pockets and the pockets of her handbags.
几个月后，她发现她的裤袋和手提包的袋子里仍然塞满着现金。
During the experiment, Barrett took a train ride.
实验期间，巴雷特乘了一次火车。
On the way, there was an announcement that the restaurant car was not currently accepting credit cards.
旅途中，火车工作人员宣布餐车目前不接受信用卡支付。
The train cars were filled with groans because many of the passengers were traveling without cash.
火车上一时充满了抱怨声，因为很多乘客都是不带现金旅行的。
"It underlines just how much things have changed in the last generation," Barrett says.
巴雷特说，“它表明自上一代以来发生的巨大的变化。”
"My parents, when they were younger, used to budget by putting money into envelopes—they'd get paid and they'd immediately separate the cash into piles and put them in envelopes, so they knew what they had to spend week by week.
“我父母年轻的时候，常常使用把钱放进信封的方法来进行预算——他们得到工资后，立即把钱分为若干部分，然后把它们装进不同的信封里，因此他们很清楚每周必须支出多少。”
It was a very effective way for them to keep track of their spending.
这是当时他们记录日常支出的非常有效的方式。
Nowadays, we're all on credit cards, we're doing online purchases, and money is kind of becoming a less physical and more imaginary type of thing that we can't get our hands around."
如今，我们全都使用信用卡支付，都会在网上购物，金钱的物理形态越来越淡化，而变为我们不会拿在手边的、更为虚拟的物体了。
Questions 19 to 22 are based on the recording you have just heard.
问题19到22是基于你刚才所听到那段的录音。
Question 19: What do we learn about Sweden?
问题19：我们了解到瑞典的什么信息？
Question 20: What did Claer Barrett want to find out with her experiment?
问题20：克莱尔·巴雷特想通过她的实验弄清楚什么？
Question 21: What did Claer Barrett find on her train ride?
问题21：克莱尔·巴雷特在乘坐火车的时候发现了什么问题？
Question 22: How did people of the last generation budget their spending?
问题22：上一代人是如何进行他们的开支预算的？
译文属可可原创，仅供学习和交流使用，未经允许不得转载
