2013年伯克希尔股东会问答：
AUDIENCE MEMBER: My name is Dexter Ang (PH). I’m from Stafford, Virginia.
股东：我的名字是Dexter Ang (PH)。我来自弗吉尼亚州的斯塔福德。
AUDIENCE MEMBER: Hi. I’m Brad Johnston from Minneapolis, Minnesota.股东: 嗨，我是来自明尼苏达州明尼阿波利斯的布拉德·约翰斯顿。
And my question is within the context of a very low interest rate environment that may be sustained for some time and the challenge that insurance companies are facing in that environment with respect to managing their capital, as well as managing their risk and uncertainty when they have future liabilities and potentially the need for liquidity.我的问题是在一个可能会持续一段时间的低利率环境下，保险公司在这种环境下面临的挑战是管理他们的资本，管理他们的风险和不确定性当他们有未来的负债和潜在的流动性需求时。
And maybe you could transcend that down to the individual, as well, who is dealing with a low interest rate environment, trying to manage uncertainty and yet still get some cash return from investments.也许您可以将这一点也应用到个人层面上，那些面对低利率环境、试图管理不确定性，同时又想从投资中获得一些现金回报的人。
I appreciate your concept of selling, you know, some of your shares periodically and being better off to do that rather than take dividends, but many people are dealing with the challenges of cash flow.我很欣赏你的想法，你知道，定期出售你的一些股票，这样做比分红更好，但很多人都在应对现金流的挑战。
沃伦·巴菲特:是的。
AUDIENCE MEMBER: And then — and just one final tag-on. If you could at the end, could you explain what Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke believes he has as a tool in his toolbox called the “term credit facility”?股东：然后，最后一个附加。如果你可以的话，你能解释一下美联储主席本·伯南克认为他的工具箱里有一个叫做“定期信贷安排”的工具吗?
WARREN BUFFETT: No. The answer is I can’t. Can you, Charlie?沃伦·巴菲特:不。答案是我不能。你能吗，查理?
查理·芒格:不。
WARREN BUFFETT: The problem faced by people who have stayed in cash, or cash equivalents, or short-term Treasurys, or whatever, I mean, it is brutal.沃伦·巴菲特: 那些持有现金、现金等价物、短期国债或其他资产的人所面临的问题是残酷的。
The loss — if they live off their income, you know — the loss of purchasing power, it’s just staggering when you get into these low interest rates. They are huge victims of a low-interest policy and a dramatically low-interest policy, you know.如果他们靠收入生活，你知道，当你进入低利率时，购买力的损失是令人震惊的。他们是低利率政策的巨大受害者，而且是非常低的利率政策。
Basically, you know, I’ve written — I wrote back in 2008 to own equities. I mean, it was — equities were cheap.基本上，你知道，我在2008年写过关于持有股票的文章。我的意思是，股票很便宜。
And you were almost certain to get killed, you know, in terms of — for at least a while — we had a promise that the Fed was going to hold rates very low, so it was a great time to own equities.你几乎肯定会被杀，你知道，至少在一段时间内，我们有一个承诺，美联储将把利率保持在非常低的水平，所以这是一个拥有股票的好时机。
And I feel sorry for people that have clung to fixed-dollar investments, particularly short-term ones, during a period like this, and I don’t know what I would do if I were in that position.我为那些坚持固定美元投资，特别是短期投资的人感到遗憾，在这样的时期，我不知道如果我处于那种境地，我会怎么做。
Imagine having, you know, some sum that seemed like a very large amount of money in the past but, you know, a quarter of a percent on a million dollars is $2,500 a year, and that is not what people anticipated when they were saving over the years.想象一下，你知道，有一笔钱在过去看起来是非常大的一笔钱，但是，你知道，一百万美元的0.25个百分点是每年2500美元，这不是人们多年来储蓄时所期望的。
So I — well, anybody I’ve advised, I’ve always felt that owning businesses certainly made sense — more sense — than fixed dollars, under most circumstances.所以我——嗯，我建议过的任何人，我总是觉得，在大多数情况下，拥有企业当然比拥有固定的美元更有意义。
Not every time in my life, but probably 90 percent of the time in my life, it’s made more sense than owning fixed-dollar investments. And it’s certainly made dramatic sense a few years ago when equities were marked down to where they were, you know, terrific buys, and where you could see the prospect that fixed-dollar investments were going to pay very little for a considerable period of time.不是每一次，但在我90%的生活中，这比拥有固定的美元投资更有意义。几年前，当股票价格下跌到一个非常好的买入点，你可以预见到固定收益投资在相当长的一段时间内将支付很少的回报时，这种观点确实具有戏剧性的意义。
And I didn’t anticipate that we would see the kind of rates for the extended period that we have already, and I don’t know how long it will go on.我没有预料到，我们会在目前的较长时期内看到这样的利率，我不知道这种情况会持续多久。
But it’s a real dilemma for people. I get letters — I get a lot of letters — from people that say, you know, “I’ve got $300,000,” and they say, “What should I do?”但这对人们来说确实是一个两难的选择。我收到很多人的来信，他们说，“我有30万美元”，他们说，“我该怎么办?”
So it’s — the fallout from low interest rates has hit millions of people in a very harsh way. And you don’t read much about it and they don’t have much of a voice, but it’s been a good argument for owning productive assets rather than dollars during a period like this.因此，低利率的影响对数百万人造成了非常严重的影响。你很少读到这方面的文章，他们也没有太多的发言权，但这是一个很好的理由，在这样的时期，拥有生产性资产而不是美元。
查理?
CHARLIE MUNGER: Well, they had to hurt somebody, and the savers were convenient.查理·芒格：嗯，他们总得伤害一些人，而储蓄者很方便。
WARREN BUFFETT: What would you do about it?沃伦·巴菲特:你会怎么做?
CHARLIE MUNGER: I would’ve done about what they did.查理·芒格：我大概会做和他们差不多的事情。
WARREN BUFFETT: Yeah, so would I.沃伦·巴菲特:是的，我也是。
CHARLIE MUNGER: I would’ve felt bad about it, but I would have — that’s what I would have done.查理·芒格:我会为此感到难过，但我会——这就是我要做的。
在低利率时期，持有大量现金或货币储蓄的人将付出巨大代价，通货膨胀是一种隐形的税收，随着时间的推移将大幅削弱现金的购买力。这是一个残酷的真相，对于那些把现金藏在床底或埋在地下的辛苦的农民，对于那些把钱全部存在银行（不管活期还是定期）的农民工或小老板。
这就是我们为什么要投资，去积累优质股权，因为我们没有选择。对于希望跟上时代的列车，实现资本稳健增值，提升购买力的人来说，股票市场是一个理想的场所；但对于希望短期暴富的人来说，股票市场是一个无底的深渊。
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