单选题 Fancy a three-day weekend--not just once in a while but week in week out? You may think your bosses would never agree to it, but the evidence suggests that employers, employees and the environment all benefit.
The four-day week comes in two flavors. One option is to switch from five 8-hour days to four 10-hour days, meaning overall hours and salaries stay the same. Two years ago, the state of Utah moved all of its employees, apart from the emergency services, to working 4/10, as it has become known. The hope was that by shutting down buildings for an extra day each week, energy bills would be cut by up to a fifth.
The full results of this experiment won"t be published until October, but an ongoing survey of 100 buildings suggests energy consumption has fallen by around 13 percent. The survey also found that 70 percent of employees prefer the 4/10 arrangement, and that people took fewer days off sick.
The second form of the four-day week is to work the same number of hours per day for four days only, with a 20 percent pay cut. With the recession hitting revenues, accountancy company KPMG announced in February that it was offering its 11,000 UK employees the option of a four-day week to avoid job losses. So far 85 percent of employees have applied to join the scheme, and 800 now do a four-day week.
Not everyone will like the idea of working longer days or taking a pay cut in exchange for a 3-day weekend, but it appears most do. According to Rex Facer at Brigham Young University in Provo, Utah, it was the crash of 1929 that led to the five-day week. During the next big financial crisis in the 1970s, there was much talk of moving to a four-day week, but for a variety of reasons that didn"t pan out. "Things are different now," says Facer. "I wouldn"t be surprised if we could get 50 percent or more of the workforce working four-day weeks in the next few years."

单选题 By carrying out the four-day week experiment, the state of Utah alms to ______.

【正确答案】 A

【答案解析】[解析] 第2段。
该段第3句说到犹他州在两年前试行4天工作制，最后一句通过信号词The hope was that说明该试验的目的：节省能源开支(energy bills would be cut)。A为该句的同义替换，reduce对应文中cut，而expenses对应文中bills。
B无原文根据；C是该项试验的内容，或说是带来的结果，不是该试验的出发点；“提高能源效率”与“减少能源的开支”是两码事，减少能源开支并不意味着能源效率就可以提高，故应排除D。

单选题 An ongoing survey shows that ______.

【正确答案】 C

【答案解析】[解析] 第3段。
第3段第2句提到70%的员工更喜欢4天10小时工作制，C是该句的同义改写，approve of“赞许”对应文中prefer，故C为正确答案。
虽然文中第1段最后一句指出雇主能从这种工作制度中获益，但并非是ongoing survey的调查结果，故排除A；由该段第1句可知，13%这一数据的得出是以被调查的100座大楼为依托的，故B中的in Utah范围错误；员工工作效率是否提高文中并未说明，排除D。

单选题 What do we learn about the second form of the four-day week?

【正确答案】 B

【答案解析】[解析] 第4段。
该段第2句提到KPMG向员工提供四天工作制的方案，以保住他们的工作(avoid job losses)，故可知，KMPG这样做的目的是为了避免裁员，故B正确。
A中的first applied无原文根据；由该段第2句可知，KPMG的确是因为经济衰退影响了收益才推行4天工作制的，但并不能说明第二种模式(4天8小时工作制)是在这种情况下产生的，故排除C；文中并未比较员工更喜欢哪种4天工作制，故D也不选。

单选题 It can be inferred from the passage that ______.

【正确答案】 B

【答案解析】[解析] 最后一段。
最后一段第2句提到1929的经济崩溃导致了5天工作制的产生，B为正确答案。
该段第1句提到不是所有人都喜欢以减薪来换取“三日休”，A中的the majority与原文的Not everyone不符；第3句说在上世纪70年代，人们广泛讨论4天工作制的问题，但后来却不了了之(didn"t pan out)，故C错误；D无原文根据。

单选题 What does Facer imply by saying "Things are different now" (Line 5, Para. 5)?

【正确答案】 C

【答案解析】[解析] 最后一段。
该段第1句中的most do及最后一句的wouldn"t be surprise...均表明，与上世纪70年代的情况不同，现在实行4天工作制的可能性非常大，故C为正确答案。
解答句意推断题必须紧扣段落，甚至文章的主题。本题中A、B均与最后一段“4天工作制的可行性”这一主题相距甚远，故可轻易排除；D中的no obstacle说法过于绝对，也在文中找不到依据，故排除。