降低您的期望 - 或者

Most U.S. public pension plans expect their portfolios to deliver 7 percent-plus returns. Foundations and endowments expect to spend about 5 percent of their assets in real terms without eating into principal. These expectations are not sustainable.

当然，我看到这些平均回报在我的30年的投资中实现了。但这也是资产价格的独特积极的环境。利率从两位数下降到零附近。美国经济已经提供平均实际增长率为3％，而不是2％左右。而且，由于工资滞后，最重要的，公司利润一直采取更大且大量的GDP份额。

This last factor is most important. Capitalism has become too successful at enriching capitalists at the expense of ordinary workers. Inequality in wealth and income has returned to the levels of the Gilded Age. Real wages for most Americans have stagnated for decades. Large corporations and the very wealthy have seized disproportionate influence over the political and regulatory processes. Ironically (or sadly), those negative impacts have had very positive effects on returns enjoyed by institutional investors.

当我在研究生院时，我被教导了，劳动力占经济馅饼的固定份额。另一种没有泛滥的经济真故。在过去30年中，国民收入的劳动份额下降了4个百分点，而非金融公司利润的份额几乎翻了一番。这种趋势持续，并且可以说是投资者的较大可持续发展挑战，而不是气候变化，因为它的影响更为明显，政治反应将更快，更强大。

There are many hypotheses about the reasons for increased economic inequality, mostly related to technology and globalization. But the cause matters less for investors than the outcome: Returns to capital (shareholders) have grown faster than the overall economy and have led capital to reap a larger share of economic output. And the impact on equity returns has been enormous. In a recent white paper, Bridgewater estimated that rising profit margins have added about 3 percentage points to U.S. equity returns over the past 20 years. That’s close to 2 percent per year on a typical 60-40 institutional balanced portfolio.

But are these historic increased returns to capital sustainable? Only if you are willing to believe that capital can continue to take a larger and larger share of national income and that it’s acceptable for the distribution of income and wealth to become more and more unequal. The math is not especially hard: Corporate profits equal the profit share of GDP times GDP. Hence the growth rate of profits equals the growth rate of GDP plus the growth rate of the profit share. Using some ballpark numbers, it’s tough to expect U.S. equities to deliver more than a 6 percent average return (a 2 percent dividend yield and 4 percent nominal GDP growth) — and that’s with a constant profit share and payout ratio. With the bond market yielding less than 2 percent, that implies about a 4.5 percent rate of return for a 60-40 balanced portfolio. If you think the profit share should decline, then returns will be lower still.

The inference for institutional investors is subtle but clear. Sure, they should seek to maximize their returns. But investors, and asset owners, have to recognize that they collectively incentivize a financial system that encourages increased returns to capital at the expense of labor. When a foundation or university tells its CIO, consultants, and asset managers it “needs” 7 percent-plus returns to support its spending, does it admit to itself that expected returns in this range require the implicit assumption of a rising profit share? (Or else implausibly high alpha.) When a state retirement system sets a goal of 7 percent-plus returns for its pension plan, does it make clear that this is possible only if American workers continue to suffer stagnating real wages? In either case, the message to corporate America is clear: Cut costs (i.e., wages) and grow profit margins.

有些人可能认为投资策略直接将资本转向其最有效的用途将使经济馅饼增长更快。即使资本占馅饼的日益增长的份额，劳动力也会变得更大。但数据不支持这一索赔。除了几十年来，所有跨门的实际工资已持平，因为几十年来，实际GDP的趋势增长和生产力的趋势增长已经完全百分比或更多。劳动力的切片不生长。为什么我们希望这会改变前进？

To be sustainable, the financial system has to deliver socially and politically “fair” outcomes. The current system is not sustainable in part because institutional investors have built-in spending rules and expected rates of return that depend on ongoing shifts of income from labor to capital — shifts that are encouraging an increasing populist backlash. The institutional investment community faces an important choice: Reset return expectations (and spending commitments) to levels that are consistent with a steady or rising labor share of national income, or else tacitly accept rising inequality, with all the associated social and political risks.

更可持续的投资景观是什么样的？资产所有者会花费他们获得的东西，而不是计划赚取他们想要花费的东西。更多的捐赠和基金会将随着时间的推移花费他们的资产。为什么存在于永恒的这么重要？公共养老金计划的赞助人将承认自己，以及纳税人，更多的资源 - 不需要高预期的回报 - 将善于对工人和退休人员的承诺。和资产管理人员将自由于与投资组合企业合作，以提高长期增长结果而不是短期利润。

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Paul O’Brienhas worked as an economist and portfolio manager and most recently was deputy chief investment officer at the Abu Dhabi Investment Authority.Feedback?