2007年英语专业八级真题_答案(6)

The early hints that this promise might be broken on a large scale came in the 1980s. U.S. business had become uncompetitive globally and began restructuring massively, with huge Layoffs. The trend accelerated in the 1990s as the bastions of corporate welfare faced reality. IBM ended it's no-layoff policy. AT&T fired thousands, many of whom found such a thing simply incomprehensible, and a few of whom killed themselves. The other supposed guarantors of our economic security were also in decline. Labour-union membership and power fell to their lowest levels in decades. President Clinton signed a historic bill scaling back welfare. Americans realized that Social Security won't provide social security for any of us.

A less visible but equally significant trend a affected pensions. To make costs easier to control, companies moved away from defined benefit pension plans, which obligate them to pay out specified amounts years in the future, to defined contribution plans, which specify only how much goes into the play today. The most common type of defined-contribution plan is the 401(k). the significance of The 401(k) is that it puts most of the responsibility for a person's economic fate back on the employee. Within limits the employee must decide how much goes into the plan each year and how it gets invested --the two factors that will determine how much it's worth when the employee retires.

Which brings us back to Enron? Those billions of dollars in vaporized retirement savings went in employees' 401(k) accounts. That is, the employees chose how much money to put into those accounts and then chose how to invest it. Enron matched a certain proportion of each employee's 401(k) contribution with company stock, so everyone was going to end up with some Enron in his or her portfolio; but that could be regarded as a freebie, since nothing compels a company to match

shareholders charge top management with illegally covering up the company's problems, prompting investors to hang on when they should have sold. Second, Enron's 401(k) accounts were locked while the company changed plan administrators in October, when the stock was falling, so employees could not have closed their accounts if they wanted to.

But by far the largest cause of this human tragedy is that thousands of employees were heavily overweighed in Enron stock. Many had placed 100% of their 401(k) assets in the stock rather than in the 18 other investment options they were offered. Of course that wasn't prudent, but it's what some of them did.

The Enron employees'' retirement disaster is part of the larger trend away from guaranteed economic security. That's why preventing such a thing from ever happening again may be impossible. The huge attitudinal shift to I'll-be-taken-care-of took at least a generation. The shift back may take just as long. It won't be complete until a new generation of employees see assured economic comfort as a 20th- century quirk, and understand not just intellectually but in their bones that, like most people in most times and places, they're on their own

36.

why does the author say at the beginning “The miserable fate of Enron's employees will be a landmark in business history…”?

[A] Because the company has gone bankrupt. [B] Because such events would never happen again. [C] Because many Enron workers lost their retirement savings. [D] Because it signifies a turning point in economic security.

[参考答案] D

[详细解答]

推断题。本文开篇提到安然公司的倒闭使得成千员工的退休金没了着落。首段末句指出：这是解读20世纪最大胆的承诺之一的最新转变。英文首段的篇章功能通常为引入主题，这里没有明确指出文章主题，因此第二段会出现全文主旨，首句指出：这个承诺就是保证发达国家中每个人的经济安全，甚至是经济上的舒适。结合首段末句中的tam可以判断[D]是作者该段首句的含义，故为答案。[A]和[C]为简单事实，非深刻内涵，排除。

37.

According to the passage, the combined efforts by governments, layout unions and big corporations to guarantee economic comfort have led to a significant change in ________.

[A] people's outlook on life. [B] people's life styles. [C] people's living standard [D] people's social values.

[参考答案] A

[详细解答]

细节题。第二段提到政府、工会、大公司为了保证人们的经济安全所采取的措施，倒数第三句指出：这些措施累积起来的效果就是成百万的人在生活方面有了根本的改变，人们的态度有了颠覆性的改变，这种改变是人类历史上最巨大的改变之一。最后两句具体说明态度的改变。这部分中的attitude和stance与[A]中的outlook相近，故该项为答案。

38.

[A] the corporate lay-offs. [B] the government cuts in welfare spending. [C] the economic restructuring. [D] the warning power of labors unions.

[参考答案] B

[详细解答]

推断题。第三段首句指出这种提供经济安全的承诺从20世纪80年代开始大规模地被打破了。第二句提到两个原因：美国公司的全球竞争力下降；美国公司开始大规模重组。之后开始举例进行说明，首先提到解雇员工，然后第四段提到退休金，可见退休金计划的改变也是企业经济重组的部分内容，故[C]为答案。[A]与退休金计划改变为并列关系，非包含关系。这里提到的是企业退休金，与政府福利计划和工会无关，排除[B]和[D]。

39.

Thousands of employees chose Enron as their sole investment option mainly because ________.

[A] The 401(k) made them responsible for their own future. [B] Enron offered to add company stock to their investment. [C] their employers intended to cut back on pension spending. [D] Enron's offer was similar to a defined-benefit plan.

[参考答案] B

[详细解答]

推断题。倒数第二段指出上千的员工大量投资安然股票，许多人100％投资股票，而不去选择其它投资方式。这里虽然没有明确指明原因，但倒数第四段末句隐含着因果关系：安然公司将员工的401缴款按照一定比例配发公司股票，因此每人的投资组合中都有一些安然的股票。而这被当作是免费的东西。由此可以推定，许多员工只选择安然股票是因为他们认为有便宜可占，故[B]为答案。[A]是对401退休金计划的解释， …… 此处隐藏：4841字，全部文档内容请下载后查看。喜欢就下载吧 ……