一個(gè)大一新生的煩惱：

I’m gearing up for my freshman year of college, and I’m trying to decide which language to study. I’d like to pick the language that will be most practical. If you had to pick just one, which would you recommend?
-Freshman
親愛的艾米莉，
我正在為我的大一生活做準(zhǔn)備，并且我在試著選定要學(xué)習(xí)的語言。我想選一門最實(shí)用的語言。如果你要選一門語言來學(xué)習(xí)的話，你會(huì)推薦哪種語言呢？

?

經(jīng)濟(jì)學(xué)家Emily Oster的回答：

As someone who took six years of Latin, I am not sure I am the best source for information on what language will be practical, but I’ll give it a try.
作為一個(gè)學(xué)習(xí)了6年拉丁語的人，我不確定自己是否是提供實(shí)用語言信息的最佳人選，不過我會(huì)試試看。

First, let me say I don’t think you are thinking about this quite the right way. You asked me about what language would be most practical. This suggests you’re thinking about only one side of the choice: the benefit side. Making the optimal choice requires thinking about both benefits and costs. In this case, I’d argue there may be very different costs to acquiring proficiency in different languages. It is a lot harder for most English-speakers to learn Japanese than to learn Spanish.
首先，我得說我認(rèn)為你考慮問題的方式不對(duì)。你問我什么語言最實(shí)用，這說明你只考慮了這項(xiàng)選擇的一個(gè)方面：有益的一面。做出最佳選擇需要考慮收益和成本兩個(gè)方面。在這種情況下，我得說，要熟練掌握不同的語言可能會(huì)有不同的代價(jià)。對(duì)多數(shù)講英語的人而言，學(xué)日語就比學(xué)西班牙語要困難地多。

But let’s start with the benefits. The benefits of a new language arise from the new people you can interact with in your new language. If maximizing this was your only goal, Mandarin would be the best choice: This is the native language for 14% of the world’s population, and most of those people do not speak English, so it’s win-win.
不過咱們先說說益處吧。學(xué)一門新語言的好處取決于你在學(xué)習(xí)新語言的過程中可以與之互動(dòng)的新朋友。如果使這個(gè)優(yōu)勢(shì)最大化是你唯一的目標(biāo)，那么普通話會(huì)是最佳的選擇：這是占世界人口14%的人民的母語，而且他們多數(shù)人不講英語，所以這是一種雙贏。

Another language is Spanish, the native language of 5.8% of the world’s population, followed by English, Hindi, and Arabic.
另一種語言就是西班牙語，這是占世界人口5.8%的人民的母語，然后是英語、印地語和阿拉伯語。

You might also consider how influential a given language is likely to be in the future, based on an area’s anticipated economic growth. Mandarin retains an advantage here, given that China is important economically. Spanish has the advantage of being spoken in a larger number of countries, although the total GDP of these countries is less than half that of China alone (roughly $11 trillion in US dollars). On the benefit side, I think we’re down to Mandarin and Spanish.
基于一個(gè)地區(qū)預(yù)期的經(jīng)濟(jì)增長(zhǎng)，你可能也會(huì)考慮特定的語言可能會(huì)對(duì)你的未來產(chǎn)生多大的影響。鑒于中國(guó)在經(jīng)濟(jì)上的重要性，在這一方面，普通話依然有優(yōu)勢(shì)。西班牙語的優(yōu)勢(shì)是更多國(guó)家的人講這門語言，雖然這些國(guó)家的國(guó)內(nèi)生產(chǎn)總值合起來還不到中國(guó)國(guó)內(nèi)生產(chǎn)總值的一半（約11萬億美元）。在優(yōu)勢(shì)這一方面，我認(rèn)為我們只剩下普通話和西班牙語可以選擇了。

On the cost side, Mandarin is a difficult language to learn, particularly as an adult. Learning to say “Ni Hao” and “xiexie” will endear you to a few locals in Shanghai, but it’s unlikely you’ll get far enough in Mandarin to find your knowledge of it truly useful. By contrast, Spanish is considerably easier for native English speakers, and it’s a lot more likely you’ll reach some level of mastery. In the end, I’d say unless you are a truly gifted linguist, Spanish is the most practical choice.
而在成本這一方面，普通話很難學(xué)，特別是對(duì)成年人而言。學(xué)習(xí)說“你好”和“謝謝”可以讓上海的一些本地人喜歡你，但是，你對(duì)普通話的掌握未必能達(dá)到對(duì)你真正有用的程度。相比之下，西班牙語對(duì)母語是英語的人來說要容易的多，而且你對(duì)這門語言的掌握程度更有可能達(dá)到精通的水準(zhǔn)。最后，我得說，除非你真的是一個(gè)語言天才，否則西班牙語會(huì)是最實(shí)用的選擇。

Of course, if you want something which is really useful, you might consider a new computer language, instead. I hear good things about JavaScript.
當(dāng)然，如果你想學(xué)習(xí)真正有用的東西，你可以考慮學(xué)一門新的計(jì)算機(jī)語言。我聽說JavaScript（一種程序語言）還不錯(cuò)。

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