When unemployed, some careerists take the opportunity to family matters in addition to____

Section B

Directions: There are 2 passages in this section. Each passage is followed by some questions or unfinished statements. For each of them there are four choices marked A, B, C and D. You should decide on the best choice.

Joblessness is far more than an economic misfortune. It can be a psychological disaster for the unemployed and their families. It can cause illness, divide families and create a downward spiral of feelings of worthlessness and lack of self-esteem;

According to research done by M. Harvery Brenner, associate professor of health at Johns Hopkins University, every 1% increase in the unemployment rate translates into 37,000 deaths over the next 6 years, including over 20,000 deaths from heart attacks, 900 suicides and nearly 500 deaths from cirrhosis of the liver. In addition, Brenner estimates that 7,500 unemployed or their families will be admitted to prison after committing a crime or to a mental hospital. "The impact goes well beyond the individual who loses a job," said Brenner. "Stress caused by economic factors affects our national life at every level."

Men who have been socialized as the family breadwinner are especially hard hit by unemployment. They suffer greater depression and anxiety and have a higher possibility of psychotic behavior. than men who are employed. "Nine months seems to be a crucial point when hope and patience give out," said a leading psychologist. After that, "illness, suicide, alcoholism, divorce, and even crime grow at epidemic rate."

Left without a job, many workers feel they have nothing to look forward to. They miss their co-workers and the routine of going to work. For many, the sense of hopelessness grows worse every time they are rejected for a new job. When this happens often enough, the rejection unemployed workers feel may be exacerbated if some friends and neighbors avoid them as if they had a contagious disease.

According to the passage, which of the following is NOT true？

A．Joblessness is an economic misfortune.

B．Joblessness is a psychological disaster for the unemployed and their families.

C．Joblessness can cause the unemployed to commit suicide.

D．Joblessness is a contagious disease.

d as a means of creating job opportunities for unemployed workers and as a "pump priming" device to aid business to revive. It was conceived during the early years of the New Deal Era (1933—1937). By 1933, the number of unemployed workers had reached about 13 million. This meant that about 50 million people—about one-third of the nation—were without means of support. At first, direct relief in the form. of cash or food was provided these people. This made them recipients of government charity. In order to remove this stigma and restore to the unemployed some measure of respectability and human dignity, a plan was devised to create governmentally sponsored work projects that private industry would not or could not provide. This would also stimulate production and revive business activity.

The best way to explain how this procedure is expected to work is to explain how it actually worked when it was first tried. The first experiment with it was the creation of the Works Project Administration (WPA). This agency set up work projects in various fields in which there were many unemployed. For example, unemployed actors were organized into theater projects, orchestras were organized for unemployed musicians, teaching projects for unemployed teachers, and even writers' projects for unemployed writers. Unemployed laborers were put to work building or maintaining roads, parks, playgrounds, or public buildings. These were all temporary work relief projects—rather than permanent work opportunities.

More substantial work projects of a permanent nature were organized by another agency, the Public Works Administration (PWA). This agency undertook the planning of construction of schools, houses, post offices, dams, and other public structures. It entered into contracts with private construction firms to erect them, or it loaned money to local or state governments which undertook their constructions. This created many jobs in the factories producing the material as well as in the projects themselves, and greatly reduced the number of unemployed.

Still another agency which provided work projects for the unemployed was the Civilian Conservation Corps (CCC). This agency provided job opportunities for youths aged 16 to 20 to work in national parks or forests clearing land, guarding against fires, building roads, or doing other conservation work. In the event of a future depression, the federate government might revive any or all of the above methods to relieve unemployment and stimulate business.

The PWA differed from the WPA in that

A．the work projects of the former were carded out by the Federal Government______

B．the government subsidized private industry

C．the number of unemployed was reduced

D．the former was government's first attempt to end hardship due to unemployment

A. There

B.The

C. These :

D.Some

s the State an obligation to ensure that they have work to do？ It is by now increasingly recognized that workers may be thrown out of work by industrial forces beyond their control, and that the unemployed are in some sense paying the price of the economic progress of the rest of the community. But concern with unemployment and the unemployed varies sharply. The issues of duty and responsibility were reopened and revitalized by the unemployment scare of 1971-1972. Rising unemployment and increased stuns paid out in benefits to the workless had reawakened controversies which had been inactive during most of the period of fuller employment since the war ended the Depression. It looked as though in future there would again be too little work to go round, so there were arguments about how to produce more work, how the available work should be shared out, and who was responsible for unemployment and the unemployed.

In 1972 there were critics who said that the State's action in allowing unemployment to rise was a faithless act, a breaking of the social contract between society and the worker. Yet in the main any contribution by employers to unemployment such as laying off workers in order to introduce technological changes and maximize profits tended to be ignored. And it was the unemployed who were accused of failing to honor the social contract, by not fulfilling their duty to society to work. In spite of general concern at the scale to the unemployment statistics, when the unemployed were considered as individuals, they tended to attract scorn and threats of punishment. Their capacities and motivation as workers and their value as members of society became suspect. The unemployed were accused of being responsible for their own workless condition, and doubts were expressed about the State' s obligation either to provide them with the security of work or to support them through Social Security.

Underlying the arguments about unemployment and the unemployed is a basic disagreement about the nature and meaning of work in society. To what extent can or should work be regarded as a service, not only performed by the worker for society but also made secure for the worker by the State, and supported if necessary？ And apart from cash are there social pressures and satisfactions which cause individuals to seek and keep work, so that the workless need work rather than just cash？

What the author proposes to examine is ______.

A．how far the unemployed are to blame for their failure in working and how far it is the State' s fault

B．to what extent the State should insist on the unemployed working if they fail to do so

C．whether being at work is a social duty which the State should ensure everybody carries out

D．whether work should be obligatory, and if so, whether the State or the individual is responsible for the enforced obligation

Passage 4

Questions 16 to 20 are based on the following passage:

Though some people have suggested that women should return to housework in order to leave more jobs for men, the idea has been rejected by both women and men in public opinion polls(民意测验). Lately some union officials have suggested that too many women are employed in type of work more suitable fore men and that women should step aside to make way for unemployed young men. They argue that women — — especially women in their childbearing years actually delay economic development and result in lower productivity, poor quality and inefficiency.

To solve the problem, they have suggested that the working women stay at home while their husbands or brothers were given double wages. They argue that under these circumstances ~families would retain their same level of income, and women could run the house and raise children much better.

The suggestion has been rejected by 9 out of 10 people polled. A hundred persons in a big city were questioned last summer. Out of 50 women, 46 said they were unwilling to leave their jobs, no matter what the situation was. The other 4 said they would like to return home if their jobs could be taken by their sons or daughters. Of 50 men polled, only 6 said they would like to see their wives give up their jobs, if it meant higher wages for themselves.

Some other people have suggested another way died “phased employment theory ”. The theory suggests that a woman worker take leave from her job when she is seven months pregnant(妊娠) and stay off the job until her baby reaches the age of 3. It suggests that women on leave receive 75 percent of their normal salary and be allowed to return to work after the 3—year period. This will benefit children, women, their families and the society. Some of those polled, both women and men, felt the idea is a good one. It definitely seems to be more acceptable than the suggestion that women return to home forever.

16. Some union officials have suggested that women should return home because _________

A. all of them are employed in unsuitable types of work

B. most skilled male workers are now unemployed

C. their participation in work has a bad influence on the economic development

D. nowadays no one can take care of children except women

When people become unemployed, it is loafing often worse than lack of wages.

A．laziness

B．poverty

C．idleness

D．inability

s the State an obligation to ensure that they have work to do？

It is by now increasingly recognized that workers may be thrown out of work by industrial forces beyond their control, and that the unemployed are in some sense paying the price of the economic progress of the rest of the community. But concern with unemployment and the unemployed varies sharply. The issues of duty and responsibility were reopened and revitalized by the unemployment scare of 1971-1972. Rising unemployment and increased sums paid out in benefits to the workless had reawakened controversies which had been inactive during most of the period of fuller employment since the war ended the Depression. It looked as though in future there would again be too little work to go round, so there were arguments about how to produce more work, how the available work should be shared out, and who was responsible for unemployment and the unemployed.

In 1972 there were critics who said that the State's action in allowing unemployment to rise was a faithless act, a breaking of the social contract between society and the worker. Yet in the main any contribution by employers to unemployment such as lying off workers in order to introduce technological changes and maximize profits tended to be ignored. And it was the unemployed who were accused of failing to honor the social contract, by not fulfilling their duty to society to work. In spite of general concern at the scale to the unemployment statistics, when the unemployed were considered as individuals, they tended to attract scorn and threats of punishment. Their capacities and motivation as workers and their value as members of society became suspect. Of all the myths of the Welfare State, stories of the work shy and borrowers have been the least well founded on evidence, yet they have proved the most persistent. The unemployed were accused of being responsible for their own workless condition, and doubts were expressed about the State's obligation either to provide them with the security of work or to support them through Social Security.

Underlying the arguments about unemployment and the unemployed is a basic disagreement about the nature and meaning of work in society. To what extent can or should work be regarded as a service, not only performed by the worker for society but also made secure for the worker by the State, and supported if necessary？ And apart from cash are there social pressures and satisfactions which cause individuals to seek and keep work, so that the workless need work rather than just cash？

It is the author's belief that______.

A．unemployment must lead to inevitable depression of national economy

B．the unemployed are the victims of economical and social development

C．unemployment should be kept under the control of industrial forces

D．the unemployed are not entitled to share the benefits from technological progress

cal yet contentious social policy questions. In many ways, our social statistics exaggerate the degree of hardship. Unemployment does not have the same dire consequences today as it did in the 1930's when most of the unemployed were primary breadwinners, when income and earnings were usually much closer to the margin of subsistence, and when there were no countervailing social programs for those failing in the labor market. Increasing affluence, the rise of families with more than one wage earner, the growing predominance of secondary earners among the unemployed, and improved social welfare protection have unquestionably mitigated the consequences of joblessness. Earnings and income data also overstate the dimensions of hardship. Among the millions with hourly earnings at or below the minimum wage level, the over-whelming majority are from multiple earner, relatively affluent families. Most of those counted by the poverty statistics are elderly or handicapped or have family responsibilities which keep them out of the labor force, so the poverty statistics are by no means an accurate indicator of labor market pathologies.

Yet there are also many ways our social statistics underestimate the degree of labor-market-related hardship. The unemployment counts exclude the millions of fully employed workers whose wages are so low that their families remain in poverty. Low wages and repeated or prolonged unemployment frequently interact to undermine the capacity for self-support. Since the number experiencing joblessness at some time during the year is several times the number unemployed in any month, those who suffer as a result of forced idleness can equal or exceed average annual unemployment, even though only a minority of the jobless in any month really suffer. For every person counted in the monthly unemployment tallies, there is another working part-time because of the inability to find fulltime work, or else outside the labor force but wanting a job. Finally, income transfers in our country have always focused on the elderly, disabled, and dependent, neglecting the needs of the working poor, so that the dramatic expansion of cash and in kind transfers does not necessarily mean that those failing in the labor market are adequately protected.

As a result of such contradictory evidence, it is uncertain whether those suffering seriously as a result of thousands or the tens of millions, and, hence, whether high levels of joblessness can be tolerated or must be countered by job creation and economic stimulus. There is only one area of agreement in this debate—that the existing poverty, employment, and earnings statistics are inadequate for one of their primary applications, measuring the consequences of labor market problems.

Which of the following does the "Labor market problems" refer to？

A．Shortage of jobs providing adequate income.

B．Deficiencies in the training of the work force.

C．Trade relationships among producers of goods.

D．The overall causes of poverty.

more jobs for men, the idea has been rejected by both women and men in public opinion polls (民意测验) . Lately some union officials have suggested that too many women are employed in type of work more suitable for men and that women should step aside to make way for unemployed young men. They argue that women--especially women in their childbearing years actually delay economic development and result in lower productivity, poor quality and inefficiency.

To solve the problem, they have suggested that the working women stay at home while their husbands or brothers were given double wages. They argue that under these circumstances, families would retain their same level of income, and women could run the house and raise children much better.

The suggestion has been rejected by 9 out of 10 people polled. A hundred persons in a big city were questioned last summer. Out of 50 women, 46 said they were unwilling to leave their jobs, no matter what the situation was. The other 4 said they would like to return home if their jobs could be taken by their sons or daughters. Of 50 men polled, only 6 said they would like to see their wives give up their jobs, if it meant higher wages for themselves.

Some other people have suggested another way called "phased employment theory". The theory suggests that a woman worker take leave from her job when she is seven months pregnant (妊娠) and stay off the job until her baby reaches the age of 3. It suggests that women on leave receive 75 percent of their normal salary and be allowed to return to work after the 3-year period. This will benefit children, women, their families and the society. Some of those polled, both women and men, felt the idea is a good one. It definitely seems to be more acceptable than the suggestion that women return to home forever.

Some union officials have suggested that women should return home because ______.

A．all of them are employed in unsuitable types of work

B．most skilled male workers are now unemployed

C．their participation in work has a bad influence on the economic development

D．nowadays no one can take care of children except women