中文摘要：

本文整理1885-2008年世界各国的经常账户数据,从规模和分散度两个维度研究全球失衡问题.第一,全球失衡并不是新近发生的现象.全球失衡的规模变化与国际货币体系变迁存在显著关联.第二,全球失衡并没有出现向更多国家扩散的趋势,而是始终集中在少数主要国家.第三,世界主要国家在快速成长期间都是伴随着经常账户顺差的积累,逆差国的产生则与一国的经济发展模式和国际货币体系密切相关.

英文摘要：

This paper investigates the scale and coverage of Global Imbalances by exploi ring world historical data from 1995 to 2008. First, Global Imbalances is not a recent phe nomenon. Secondly, Global Imbalances is always contributed by only a small fraction of important countries in the world, and shows no obvious trend of diffusion. Thirdly, current ac- count surplus and deficit are long-term phenomenon. Many of the fast-growing countries in the world are associated with accumulation of current account surplus, while long-term deficit countries usually show its own special characteristic of economic growth or have strong rela- tionship with international monetary system.