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Against a backdrop of drastic changes in economy and population structure, younger Americans are drawing a new 21st-century road map to success, a latest poll has found.
Across generational lines, Americans continue to prize many of the same traditional milestones of a successful life, including getting married, having children, owning a home, and retiring in their sixties. But while young and old mostly agree on what constitutes the finish line of a fulfilling life, they offer strikingly different paths for reaching it.
Young people who are still getting started in life were more likely than older adults to prioritize personal fulfillment in their work, to believe they will advance their careers most by regularly changing jobs, to favor communities with more public services and a faster pace of life, to agree that couples should be financially secure before getting married or having children, and to maintain that children are best served by two parents working outside the home, the survey found.
From career to community and family, these contrasts suggest that in the aftermath of the searing Great Recession, those just starting out in life are defining priorities and expectations that will increasingly spread through virtually all aspects of American life, from consumer preferences to housing patterns to politics.
Young and old converge on one key point: Overwhelming majorities of both groups said they believe it is harder for young people today to get started in life than it was for earlier generations. Whlie younger people are somewhat more optimistic than their elders about the prospects for those starting out today, big majorities in both groups believe those "just getting started in life" face a tougher a good-paying job, starting a family, managing debt, and finding affordable housing.
Pete Schneider considers the climb tougher today. Schneider, a 27-yaear-old auto technician from the Chicago suburbs says he struggled to find a job after graduating from college. Even now that he is working steadily, he said." I can't afford to pay ma monthly mortgage payments on my own, so I have to rent rooms out to people to mark that happen." Looking back, he is struck that his parents could provide a comfortable life for their children even though neither had completed college when he was young."I still grew up in an upper middle-class home with parents who didn't have college degrees,"Schneider said."I don't think people are capable of that anymore. "
One cross-generation mark of a successful life is .
【解析】根据题干给出的mark, successful life等词可以定位到第二段的第一句话，successful life可以找到原词，而mark对应milestone，including后面的内容就是这种生活的特征，包含“结婚，有孩子，有家，60岁退休”，和选项对比，只有B项符合原文给出的特征。
It can be learned from Paragraph 3 that young people tend to .
【解析】根据题干给出的段落序号可以定位到第三段，另又提到young people，故可以定位到第三段开头第一句话。题干问的是年轻人倾向于……，题干中的tend在这句话中可以找到同意置换词more likely，句子中后面有5个to do表示年轻人倾向于做什么，所以答案就在这些动词不定式中。和选项对比，只有C项符合原文的含义“婚前或者有孩子之前要有经济保障”，属于同意替换。
The priorities and expectations defined by the young will .
【解析】根据题干给出的the priorities and expectations等词可以定位到第四段的第一句话的中间，that后面的内容是对这两个名词的修饰，故答案应该在这个从句中。和选项对比，只有D项符合原文。
Both young and old agree that .
【解析】根据题干给出的young and old等词可以定位到第五段开头，这句话有冒号，解释key point，所以答案应该在冒号之后，题目问的是他们同意什么，也就是观点，所以可以再缩小范围为believe后面的内容为正确选项的含义。和选项对比，只有D项符合原文，属于同意替换。
Which of the following is true about Schneider?
【解析】根据题干给出的Schenider可以定位到最后一段开头。这段话开头就说这个人认为今天的生活更艰难，后面的内容都在介绍他的生活。因为题干除了这个人名之外并没有给出其他更细定位的信息，可以选择从选项定位入手反推正确答案。C项说到父母的好生活在第四、五句有提到，尤其引号中的内容和选项相符，故为正确答案。