On rickshaws and government failure

论三轮车与“政府失灵”

I first came to Beijing as a student in 2003, when the ubiquity and cheapness of taxis (they were red in those days) was frankly a delight. I could go almost anywhere in Beijing for the price of a can of Coke in London. I don’t remember many rickshaws on the roads. In 2008 I returned to live in Haidian for half a year; again, the only place I remember seeing rickshaws was Houhai, where I looked on them with disdain as absurd throwbacks for tourists. How silly, I thought, to see rickshaws in this busy 21^st century metropolis, with 3.5m cars already on its roads.

2003年，我作为学生第一次来到北京，当时（还是红色）的出租车随处可见，而且价格低廉，着实很爽。花着在伦敦只能买到一罐可乐的钱，我便能打车周游北京。回想起来，那时并没觉得路面上有许多三轮车。2008年，我回到海淀住了半年，当时也只能在后海见到三轮车——那会儿我会用鄙夷的眼光打量它们，认为那是游客才用的落伍工具。我那时觉得， 在繁华的21世纪大都市里，马路上跑着350万辆车，三轮车显得好傻气。

I moved back to Beijing in January this year. China has changed tremendously, of course. Its GDP has doubled; its carbon emissions have doubled; the balance of its population has shifted from rural to urban. But as a Beijing resident, I find two changes have had a particular impact on my life: first, the greater availability of cheese; and second, the lesser availability of taxis. I’d like to write about the second.

今年一月我又搬回北京了。显然，中国发生了翻天覆地的变化，GDP翻倍，碳排量翻倍，人口比例也从农村向城市倾斜。居住在北京，我发现其有两个变化对我的生活影响很大：首先，更容易买到芝士了； 其次，更难打到车了。我想就后者多说几句。

To state the obvious: it’s very difficult to get a taxi in Beijing during the morning and evening rush hours. Lots of people have written on this, and the basic facts are clear: the number of taxis on the road (66,000) has remained constant for years, but demand has increased significantly as incomes have risen. To make things worse, while drivers’ costs, particularly fuel, have risen steadily, until this spring their fares had been held at the same level since 2009; so drivers were reluctant to pick up passengers in heavy (i.e. rush hour) traffic. As many as 10,000 cabs were apparently idle at peak hours. Recent fare rises may help, but will take time to filter through.

显而易见的是，早晚高峰时段在北京很难打到车。许多人曾经就此发表过见解，这其中的基本情况很明了：路上的出租车数量（66,000）已数年未变，但随着收入提升，人们的需求急速上涨。更糟的是，司机的开销——尤其是燃油费——也稳步增长；而从2009年到今年春天为止，出租车的价格从未上调，于是乎司机便不愿意在拥堵的时候（也就是高峰时段）载客。在高峰时段，有1万辆出租车显然是空驶的。最近，车费上涨，这或许会有所缓和，但需要时间渗透。

The market responded to the growing mismatch between supply and demand by diversifying supply – most notably, it’s clear, in the form of rickshaws. So a decade after I first visited, and found a Beijing in which rickshaws seemed a distant memory, they’re back – everywhere. Cycle rickshaws, rickshaws with electric motors, three-wheeled disability carriages, even open-backed three-wheeled minivans all carry passengers. I take a rickshaw to and from work most days.

而市场则以供应方式的多元化来应对这供求之间逐渐增大的不协调——其中最明显的，便是三轮车的使用。于是，在距我第一次来京整十年之际，那些曾在我的北京记忆中感觉很遥远的三轮车卷土重来了，它们无处不在。人力三轮车，电动三轮车，残疾人三轮车，敞开式三轮车都在载客。而我，也几乎每天乘坐三轮车上下班。

At first, I pegged this as a textbook case of overregulation causing retrogression in the quality of a service industry, what Ronald Coase (who died on Monday) called ‘government failure’. It was, I thought, as though the overregulation of airlines had brought about a revival of the biplane, or interference in the telecoms industry had caused people to revert to messenger pigeons.

起初，我认定这是一例典型的监管过度带来某项服务业质量倒退的案例，也就是（周一刚过世的）罗纳德·科斯曾提出过的“政府失灵论”。我觉得，这就像如果对航班过度监管，然后带来双翼飞机的复兴，或者如果对电信产业过度干涉，随之使人们转向使用信鸽一样。

But now I’m not so sure. My daily commute by rickshaw is much quicker than by taxi, as the rickshaw can use cycle lanes. It emits less carbon, and no particulates at street level. And it doesn’t contribute to the number of cars on Beijing’s roads, already up to 5m.

然而现在我的想法动摇了。每天坐三轮车上班比乘出租车快多了，因为可以走单车道。而且碳排放也减少了，也不产生街面微尘颗粒，更不会增加北京道路上的汽车数量——现在已经达到500万辆了。

Quicker, cleaner, greener; I’ve begun to think that by artificially depressing taxi fares to limit inflation, the Beijing city government has unintentionally brought about a sustainable revolution in the capital’s transport. In the context of a war on PM2.5, further limits on car registrations and possibly a congestion charge, perhaps it’s time to make a conceptual leap, and recognize that taxis today are what rickshaws seemed thirty years ago – out of date.

更快捷，更干净，更环保——我开始觉得，北京市政府通过人为压低出租车价格以限制通货膨胀的做法，无意中为首都的交通带来了可持续的变革。在向PM2.5宣战，购车摇号指标将减少，以及有可能征收拥堵费的大环境下，或许正好可以启动观念上的跃进，从而意识到今天的出租车就像三十年前的三轮车一样——已经过时了。

The rickshaw’s day has come again. To paraphrase Orwell: four wheels good, three wheels better.

三轮车的时代再次到来了。改写一句乔治·奥威尔的名言：四轮虽好，三轮更佳。