问答题A BABYLONIAN lamp, by modern standards, shed little light on its surroundings. Nearly 4000 years later it sheds far more on an issue of great interest: the pace of mankind"s material progress. In a new paper, William Nordhaus of Yale University starts by asking what may seem a dull question: do statisticians measure prices accurately? To find out, he studies the economic history of light from Neolithic times to the present. His answer and its implications are startling. Traditional estimates have failed to track the fall in the price of light, especially over the past 200 years. As a result, they overstate today"s price, relative to the price in 1800, not by a few percentage points, nor even by a factor of one or two, but by a factor of about 1000. Even by the standards of economics, that is a large error. The implications are of corresponding size. If the prices of other things are measured as badly as the price of light, it follows that traditional estimates of economic growth are way off the mark. Economists are familiar with the difficulty of measuring changes in prices over time. It seems easy to measure the price of, say, a ball-point pen. But suppose that. a new version comes along that costs twice as much and lasts four times as long. If it catches on, the price of a pen has doubled—but the price of pen-services, as it were, has halved. This second price is the one that should be used to calculate the change in living standards. However, it is often difficult to observe. You need to know not just the change in the prices of the goods but also the change in the services that the goods provide. Measuring that is especially hard when the range of services itself changes over time. (Compare the communication-services provided by a modern telephone with those of one from the 1950s, for instance.) Mr. Nordhaus points out that light has a useful property in this respect. Its service— illumination—does not vary. Babylonians used lamps for much the same reason that modern Americans use incandescent bulbs. With diligence and great ingenuity, Mr. Nordhaus has collected data on the light-services provided down the ages by: burning sticks; fat-and-oil- burning lamps; candles (tallow, sperm-oil, etc); gas lights (various); kerosene lamps; and the many different kinds of electric light. (The unit of measurement is the lumen; a wax candle emits about 13 lumens, a modern 100-watt bulb on 110 bolts about 1,200.) Mr. Nordhaus has also collected data on the prices of these sources of light: the price of a candle, the price of a given quantity of gas or electricity, and so on. Putting the two together yields a true measure for the price of light. In nominal terms, the price of 1,000 lumen-hours has fallen from about 40 cents in 1800 to about one-tenth of a cent today. The black line in the chart plots this series as an index. (The sharp fall at the end of the line marks the introduction of the compact fluorescent bulb.) In real terms, of course, the fall is even sharper: 40 cents in 1800 is worth more than $4 in today"s money. Compare this with a price series calculated using the conventional methods of official statistics—that is, by looking at the prices of goods that provide light rather than at the price of light itself. Mr. Nordhaus stitches together such a series from a variety of official sources. According to this measure, the price of light has fallen in real terms since 1800, but has gone up by 180% in nominal terms (as shown by the white line in the chart). In other words, conventional estimates would put the price of light in 1800 at about four-hundredths of a cent per 1,000 lumen-hour. Mr. Nordhaus" first series shows that the price of light in 1800 was about 1,000 times dearer than that. This staggering difference is par@ an illustration of the effect of compound interest. It represents a drift of roughly 3.6% a year between the official and the true measures of inflation in the price of light, sustained for nearly 200 years. Even so, 3.6% a year is still a lot. If that difference applied across the board, and not just to light, America"s present rates of inflation and economic growth would not be 3% and 4% , respectively. Inflation would be less than zero; and true output (ie, output of the services provided by goods) would be rising at a correspondingly faster rate, of more than 7% a year. All is revealed. How typical is light? The chief cause of the drift between its two price series is technological progress: the efficiency of sources of light has increased continuously and rapidly since 1800, partly because existing techniques were improved and partly because entirely new ones appeared. Conventional measures, even when prepared by careful statisticians who understand the problem, fail to capture these improvements. The question is whether other goods are as strongly affected by technological progress. Many are. Other studies suggest that the upward bias in the measured price of computers is 15% a year, and for capital goods 3%-4% a year. A wide range of big inventions and improvements have been underrepresented or altogether ignored in official price figures; examples cited by Mr. Nordhaus include cars, radios, televisions, air-conditioning, telephones, photocopiers and zippers. The list could be extended indefinitely. To explore the implications, Mr. Nordhaus next calculates two new indices for real wages (wages adjusted for price rises) since 1800. He simply assumes a price bias, good by good, allowing it to vary according to how susceptible each good is to technological change. The "low-bias" index assumes a drift that ranges from zero for goods experiencing little change up to two-thirds of that of light for goods undergoing the most rapid change. The "high-bias" index assumes a drift of 0.5% a year across the board, plus a drift equal to that of light for the most rapidly changing goods. Conventional methods say that America"s real wages have increased by a factor of 13 since 1800. Mr. Nordhaus" low estimate says that the true increase is more than four runes greater. According to his high estimate, it is 75 times greater. America and the world have traveled much farther in the past 200 years than economists have realized—and they are still leaving official statistics far behind.

问答题Shadowed by peril as we are, you would think we"d get pretty good at distinguishing the risks likeliest to do us in from the ones that are statistical long shots. But you would be wrong. We agonize over avian flu, which to date has killed precisely no one in the U.S. , but have to be cajoled into getting vaccinated for the common flu, which contributes to the deaths of 36,000 Americans each year. We wring our hands over the mad cow pathogen that might be in our hamburger and worry far less about the cholesterol that contributes to the heart disease that kills 700,000 of us annually. We pride ourselves on being the only species that understands the concept of risk, yet we have a confounding habit of worrying about mere possibilities while ignoring probabilities, building barricades against perceived dangers while leaving ourselves exposed to real ones. At present, 20% of all adults still smoke; nearly 20% of drivers and more than 30% of backseat passengers don"t use seat belts; two-thirds of us are overweight or obese. We dash across the street against the light and build our homes in hurricane-prone areas, and when they"re demolished by a storm, we rebuild in the same spot. Sensible calculation of real-world risks is a multidimensional math problem that sometimes seems entirely beyond us. And while it may be true that it"s something we"ll never do exceptionally well, it"s almost certainly something we can learn to do better.

问答题Introduce briefly the development of RFID and its possible prospects.

问答题Questions for Reference: 1. With the worsening global financial crisis, university graduates are facing a very serious employment situation. Could you say something about what you or your friends are planning to do to sort out this problem? 2. The government has adopted some measures to help university graduates seek employment. Could you mention one or two of these measures and then comment? 3. One alternative is to apply for government jobs or to set up your own business. Are you planning to become a civil servant or self-employed? Why or why not?

问答题 Henry Ford and the American Automobile Detroit has some of the most beautiful residential neighborhoods in the USA and at the same time some of the most shocking slums. Detroit owes its rapid growth and one-time prosperity to the automobile, and above all to Henry Ford. Henry Ford did not invent the automobile, but he was the first man to mass-produce it, and this made it available to the ordinary man. Many automobiles were being built by the hand at the turn of the century and were much too expensive for all but the wealthy. In 1903 Henry Ford's first mass. produced Model T cars cost $850. By the early 1920s he was able to reduce the price to $350. Between 1903 and 1927 Ford manufactured 15 million Model T Fords and earned a profit of $700 million. His introduction of the Model T automobile revolutionized transportation and American industry. In 1927 he produced his sedan Model A, which was much more comfortable than the open, windswept Model T. Henry Ford was himself a born mechanic and could build a car with his own hands. So he respected his workers and treated them well. In 1914, when the basic wage for an industrial worker in Detroit was $11 a week, Ford announced that he would pay his workers $5 a day. Ford believed in the dignity of work, and did not wish his men to become underpaid robots. He also built them a special town on the outskirts of the city. He is credited with "Fordism": mass production of inexpensive goods coupled with high wages for workers. Ford's basic wage of $5 a day caused not only a wage explosion in the city, it also caused a population explosion. Blacks from the south poured into the city, until there were almost as many blacks in Detroit as whites. Other industries connected with the automobile were attracted to Detroit, and more and more factories sprang up in and around the city. Other automobile corporations also made Detroit their headquarters. General Motors built factories in Detroit as did Chrysler. In the 1960s, one in three people who lived in Detroit worked in the automobile industry. Now many plants have been dispersed to other parts of the States, and unemployment, particularly among blacks, has become a serious problem. But the fortune of the Ford family was already made. As owner of the Ford Motor Company, Ford became one of the richest and best-known people in the world. True to the tradition of the American millionaires, Edsel and Henry Ford Ⅱ gave away half their fortune. They gave $300 million to public education, public television and to social research. Americans depend on the automobile like no other people. The total mileage traveled by American motorists in one year is about one million million miles. At the moment a revolution is going on in the American automobile world. In the 1960s there was a change in fashion in favor of small cars. Many small and medium-sized cars are still being imported especially from Germany and Japan. Now American automobile manufacturers have followed the trend. They are committed to building smaller new cars, as part of a program of energy conservation. All new cars, too, are built so that they can only take unleaded gas. Some of the most dangerous pollutants are being removed from the air in American cities. It remains to be seen, however, if the American automobile industry will ever again regain its former glory.

问答题Power means an ability to do things and control others, to get others to do what they otherwise would not. One can affect others" behavior in three main ways: threats of coercion ("sticks"), inducements and payments ("carrots"), and attraction that makes others want what you want. A country may obtain the outcomes it wants in world politics because other countries want to follow it, admiring its values, emulating its example, or aspiring to its level of prosperity. Because the ability to control others is often associated with the possession of certain resources, politicians and diplomats commonly define power, as the possession of population, territory, natural resources, economic size, military forces, and political stability. For example, in the agrarian economies of eighteenth-century Europe, population was a critical power resource since it provided a base for taxes and recruitment of infantry. Traditionally, the test of a great power was its strength in war. Today, however, the definition of power is losing emphasis on military force and conquest that marked earlier eras. The factors of technology, education, and economic growth are becoming more significant in international power, while geography, population, and raw materials are becoming somewhat less important. In this sense, it is important to set the agenda and attract others in world politics through soft power, which co-opts people rather than coerces them.

问答题In the 1950s, blue jeans became a statement by those who wish to boycott the values of a consumer-based society that was concerned only with acquisition. Blue-jeans-wearing rebels of popular movies were an expression of contempt towards the empty and obedient silence of the Cold- War American; the positive images of American consumer society were under siege. What had been a piece of traditional American culture—blue jeans—became a rejection of traditional culture. These images found an eager audience among those for whom gray suits and formal dresses had been elevated as ideals of the age. In blue jeans, men and boys found relief from the underlying harness required to fit into more formal water. Even some among the middle class slipped into jeans for a sleepy afternoon on the porch.

问答题1979年1月，邓小平应邀访美。美国总统卡特回忆说，邓小平访美是他任总统职务期间最为愉快的经历之一。他说他和邓小平的会谈既愉快又卓有成效。他说邓小平很有魅力，富有幽默感，给人留下了很好的印象。他发现中国人懂得如何表达对自己国家的自豪，却又不显得傲慢。1月29日，卡特总统有如下的日记：我们在肯尼迪中心观看了一场很轻松的演出。后来我和邓、邓的夫人卓琳、罗莎琳以及艾米一起登台与演员们见面。当邓拥抱美国演员，特别是拥抱演唱中国歌曲的小演员时，流露出真诚的感情。他亲吻了许多儿童，后来记者们报道说不少观众甚至感动得流泪了。即使那些反对中美关系正常化的参议员，在观看这次演出之后，也承认他们输了。他们说他们没办法投票反对儿童唱中国歌曲。 卡特总统还描述了另一件事：“我们在最后一个会议上签署了有关领事馆、贸易以及科学、技术、文化交流等方面的协定。那时与会的有人问邓：‘我们决定关系正常化时，中国有反对的人吗?’大家都屏住呼吸，等着邓小平的回答。邓说：‘有的。’他停了一会儿又说：‘中国有一个省强烈反对。那就是台湾。’”

问答题In the latest round of credit-card reforms, issuers and retailers are both playing the consumer-friendly angle. Currently lawmakers are debating whether to cut interchange fees, the tab that merchants pay to card issuers each time a customer uses plastic. While retailers claim they would pass the savings on to shoppers in the form of lower prices, card companies argue the legislation will make credit less convenient and more costly--and they may be right. Merchants have long complained about interchange fees. They say the costs, which amount to roughly 1.6% of every transaction, erode already razor-thin margins. Last year retailers, the main supporters of three bills now working their way through Congress, forked over an estimated $ 48 billion in card fees. "We can't keep absorbing these fees," Kathy Miller, a grocery store owner in Elmore, Vt. , testified at a congressional hearing in early October. In their quest to win over lawmakers, retailers maintain consumers won't get hurt--and may actually benefit. "Our market is extraordinarily competitive," says Mallory B. Duncan, general counsel of the National Retail Federation, a trade group. "If costs go down, that tends to drive down prices. " That's not what happened in Australia, though. In 2003 the country's regulators cut the average interchange fee to around 0.5 % of the total bill, from 1%. But most retailers never dropped their prices, and credit-card issuers jacked up borrowers' fees to make up for the lost revenue, according to a report by CRA International, a consultancy. After the regulation was passed, the annual fee paid by cardholders rose by 22%, to an average of $ 25.65. Annual fees on rewards cards jumped by as much as 77% since issuers' profits took a bigger hit. Australian card companies generally levied a higher interchange fee on rewards cards to cover the added cost of the perk--as they do in the U.S. Analysts worry that retailers and card issuers in the States would respond in much the same way. Already U.S. lenders have been raising rates and tacking on new charges for borrowers following a ban earlier this year from Congress on certain practices, including late-payment penalties. "When the banks have a major source of revenue eliminated, they need to raise [other fees] to make up for that," says David S. Evans, a lecturer at the University of Chicago Law School. Any new rules could make it less convenient for consumers to opt for credit over cash. As part of the proposals, lawmakers are considering whether to let retailers set a minimum payment for purchases with plastic; they now risk paying a hefty fine for doing so. If such changes are made, customers won't be able to pull out their cards all the time. Merchants may also have the option of rejecting a specific card, like a reward card, if they think the interchange fees are too high. Currently retailers must accept all products under a single brand such as Visa. "Consumers want to be able to use their card for any kind of purchase," says Shawn Miles, MasterCard World wide's head of global public policy. The legislation is "anti-consumer. " Such a defense may work A report by the Government Accountability Office, an investigative arm of Congress, due out by Now. 19, is weighing the potential impact of proposed rules on the care-carrying masses. If the GAO finds that only merchants benefit from lower interchange fees, card companies may win. Says Brian Gardner, a vice-president at research firm Keefe, Bruyette & Woods. "If the report comes out and says there is little evidence that [the benefits] would be passed on to consumers, then I think the oxygen gets sucked out of this thing. /1.What are interchange fees? Why does the author say "issuers and retailers are both playing the consumer-friendly angle" (Para. 1) ?

问答题 On Apr. 27, the Dean of Duke's business school had the unfortunate task of announcing that nearly 10% of the Class of 2008 had been caught cheating on a take-home final exam. The scandal, which has cast yet another pall over the leafy, Gothic campus, is already going down as the biggest episode of alleged student deception in the business school's history. Almost immediately, the questions started swirling. The accused MBAs were, on average, 29 years old. They were the cut-and-paste generation, the champions of Linux. Before going to the business school, they worked in corporations for an average of six years. They did so at a time when their bosses were trumpeting the brave new world of open source, where one's ability to aggregate (or rip off) other people's intellectual property was touted as a crucial competitive advantage. It's easy to imagine the explanations these MBAs, who are mulling an appeal, might come up with. Teaming up on a take-home exam: That's not academic fraud, it's postmodern learning, wiki style. Text-messaging exam answers or downloading essays onto iPods: That's simply a wise use of technology. One can understand the confusion. This is a generation that came of age nabbing music off Napster and watching bootlegged Hollywood blockbusters in their dorm rooms. "What do you mean?" you can almost hear them saying. "We're not supposed to share?" That's not to say that university administrators should ignore unethical behavior, if it in fact occurred. But in this wired world, maybe the very notion of what constitutes cheating has to be reevaluated. The scandal at Duke points to how much the world has changed, and how academia and corporations are confused about it all, sending split messages. We're told it's all about teamwork and shared information. But then we' re graded and ranked as individuals. We assess everybody as single entities. But then we plop them into an interdependent world and tell them their success hinges on creative collaboration. The new culture of shared information is vastly different from the old, where hoarding information was power. But professors—and bosses, for that matter—need to be able to test individual ability. For all the talk about workforce teamwork, there are plenty of times when a person is on his or her own, arguing a case, preparing a profit and loss statement, or writing a research report. Still, many believe that a rethinking of the assessment process is in store. The Stanford University Design School, for example, is so collaborative that "it would be impossible to cheat," says D-school professor Robert I. Sutton. "If you found somebody to help you write an exam, in our view that's a sign of an inventive person who gets stuff done. If you found someone to do work for free who was committed to open source, we'd say, 'Wow, that was smart.' One group of students got the police to help them with a school project to build a roundabout where there were a lot of bike accidents. Is that cheating?" That's food for thought at a time when learning is becoming more and more of a social process embedded in a larger network. This is in no way a pass on those who consciously break the rules. With countries aping American business practices, a backlash against an ethically rudderless culture can't happen soon enough. But the saga at Duke raises an interesting question. In the age of Twitter, a social network that keeps users in constant streaming contact with one another, what is cheating?

问答题

问答题What does the author mean by "Starbucks is distinctly second division compared with big leaguers like, say, McDonald's"? According to Mr. Shultz, what is the reason for that?

问答题

问答题

问答题祖国和平统一，乃千秋功业。台湾终必回归祖国，早日解决对各方有利。台湾同胞可安居乐业，两岸各族人民可解骨肉分离之痛，在台诸前辈及大陆去台人员亦可各得其所，且有利于亚太地区局势稳定和世界和平。 当今国际风云变幻莫测，台湾上下众议纷纭。岁月不居，来日苦短，夜长梦多，时不我与。试为贵党计，如能依时顺势，负起历史责任，毅然和谈，达成国家统一，则两党长期共存，互相监督，共图振兴中华之大业。

问答题在改革开放的伟大实践中，我们深刻认识到。在当今世界日趋激烈的竞争中，一个国家、一个民族要发展起来，就必须与时俱进、改革开放、着力发展、以人为本、促进和谐。 世界上没有放之四海而皆准的发展道路和发展模式，也没有一成不变的发展道路和发展模式，必须适应国内外形势的新变化、顺应人民过上更好生活的新期待，结合自身实际、结合时代条 件变化不断探索和完善适合本国情况的发展道路和发展模式，不断增加全社会的生机活力，真正做到与时代发展同步伐、与人民群众共命运。 历史是继续前进的基础，也是开创未来的启示。中国仍然是世界上最大的发展中国家，中国基本实现现代化，实现全体中国人民共同富裕，还有很长的路要走。

问答题

问答题Directions: In this part of the test, you will hear 5 sentences in English. You will hear the sentences ONLY ONCE. After you have heard each sentence, translate it into Chinese and write your version in the corresponding space in your ANSWER BOOKLET.