5月15日午間英語新聞：前4個月我國貨物貿易進出口增長5.7%

Gen Z sinking deeper into debt 

生活和教育成本攀升 美國年輕人債務負擔日益沉重

Gen Z risk starting further and further behind previous generations building a life for themselves as soaring rents chew into their disposable income, leaving them deeper in a financial hole they are still digging.

隨著房租飆升，Z世代的可支配收入越來越少，他們的生活水平可能越來越落后于上一代人，在自己挖掘的財務陷阱中越陷越深。

According to new data from credit reporting agency TransUnion, these higher costs, matched with their entry level salaries, have forced young Americans born between 1997 and 2012 to rely much more often on expensive forms of revolving lines of debt—such as credit cards—to make ends meet.

美國征信機構環聯最新數據顯示，生活成本不斷上漲，卻只拿著入門級薪資，Z世代年輕人不得不更頻繁地依賴信用卡等昂貴的循環債務方式來維持生計。

“This is a generation that is feeling financial stress in a more acute way than millennials did a decade ago,” Charlie Wise, head of global research at TransUnion, told the Wall Street Journal.

環聯全球研究負責人查理·懷斯告訴《華爾街日報》：“這一代美國人比十年前的千禧一代感受到了更為沉重的財務壓力?！?/p>

The average open balance on US credit cards for Gen Z consumers grew to $2,834 last year, from $2,248 a decade earlier. 

2023年，Z世代消費者的美國信用卡平均未結余額增至2834美元，而十年前為2248美元。

In Bank of America's annual Better Money Habits survey published in October, nearly three out of four said they have changed their spending habits to offset higher living expenses, by doing such things as cooking at home more frequently, limiting groceries to essential purchases, and spending less on clothes.

在美國銀行去年10月發布的年度“更好的金錢習慣”調查中，近四分之三的人表示，他們已經改變了消費習慣，通過更頻繁地在家做飯、非必要不購買食品雜貨以及減少衣服支出等方式來抵消更高的生活開支。

Should this persist, their finances could create a structural impediment to longer-term US economic growth. An inability to build a financially secure foundation is often reason to delay plans for starting a family, inadvertently contributing to a further drop in US fertility rates, now at their lowest since records began a century ago.

如果這種情況持續下去，他們的財務狀況可能會對美國長期的經濟增長造成結構性障礙。無法建立有保障的經濟基礎往往是推遲組建家庭計劃的原因，這也無意間導致了美國生育率的進一步下降。目前美國生育率處于有記錄的一個世紀以來的最低水平。

重點詞匯：

1.chew

英/t?u?/

美/t?u?/

v.咀嚼，嚼碎；（為了品嘗或因緊張而）不停地嚼，咬；（人或動物）咬，啃

n.咀嚼；口香糖；供嚼用的煙草；咀嚼物

2.offset

英/??fset/

美/???fset/

v.補償，抵銷，抵消；襯托出；使偏離直線方向，使與……不在一條直線上；（墨水，剛印好的頁面）轉印下一頁

n.抵消物，補償；偏離量，偏離距離；（測繪）支距；（電壓或電流的）偏離；側枝，短匐莖；（山的）支脈；（建筑）壁階；膠印法

adj.膠印的，平版印刷的；偏離中心的，偏置的

3.impediment

英/?m?ped?m?nt/

美/?m?ped?m?nt/

n.妨礙，障礙；口吃，結巴

4.inadvertently

英/??n?d?v??t(?)ntli/

美/??n?d?v??rt(?)ntli/

adv.無意地，不經意地

China's foreign trade up 5.7% in first 4 months

海關總署：前4個月我國貨物貿易進出口增長5.7%

China's total imports and exports of goods expanded 5.7 percent year-on-year in the first four months of this year, to 13.81 trillion yuan ($1.91 trillion), data from the General Administration of Customs showed on Thursday.

海關總署5月9日發布的數據顯示，今年前四個月，中國貨物貿易進出口總值13.81萬億元，同比增長5.7%。

From January to April, exports grew 4.9 percent year-on-year to 7.81 trillion yuan, while imports rose 6.8 percent to 6 trillion yuan, the data showed.

今年1月到4月，我國出口7.81萬億元，同比增長4.9%；進口6萬億元，同比增長6.8%。

Private businesses, as evidenced by the data, played a bigger role in fueling the growth of foreign trade in goods. During the period, the trade value of private enterprises took up 54.6 percent of the total, up 2.5 percentage points from the same period last year, while foreign-invested enterprises’ trade constituted 29.1 percent.

數據顯示，民營企業在推動外貿增長方面發揮了更大的作用。2024年前4個月，我國民營企業進出口值占我國外貿比重達54.6%，比2023年同期提升2.5個百分點，同期，外商投資企業進出口值占我外貿總值的29.1%。

Thursday's data also pointed to an uptick in China's imports and exports to the Association of Southeast Asian Nations and the US.

5月9日的數據還顯示，中國對東盟和美國的進出口有所增長。

In the first four months, China's trade with its largest trade partner, ASEAN, rose 8.5 percent year-on-year to 2.18 trillion yuan, accounting for 15.8 percent of the country's total trade value.

今年前4個月，我國與最大貿易伙伴東盟的貿易總值為2.18萬億元，同比增長8.5%，占我國外貿總值的15.8%。

The country's trade in goods with its third-largest trade partner, the US, grew 1.1 percent to 1.47 trillion yuan during the period, while trade with the European Union, its second-largest trade partner, edged down 1.8 percent year-on-year.

同期，我國與第三大貿易伙伴美國的貿易總值為1.47萬億元，增長1.1%，與第二大貿易伙伴歐盟的貿易總值同比下降1.8%。

Highlights of China's trade in goods during the January-April period include a robust increase in exports of machinery and electronic products, accounting for nearly 60 percent of the country's total exports.

值得注意的是，1月到4月，我國機電產品出口強勁增長，占出口比重近6成。

In particular, the export value of automatic data processing equipment, integrated circuits and vehicles, surged 9.7 percent, 23.5 percent and 24.9 percent year-on-year, respectively, during the period.

數據顯示，其中，自動數據處理設備、集成電路和汽車出口總值同比分別增長9.7%、23.5%和24.9%。

重點詞匯：

1.uptick

英/??pt?k/

美/??pt?k/

n.小幅增加，微升；報升（股票成交價格比上一個交易的微高）