课后作业——图标临摹联系

6.4 阅读理解课后作业 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 and mark the corresponding letter on Answer Sheet 2with a single line through the centre. Passage One Questions 1 to 5 are based on the following passage. "Sugar, alcohol and tobacco," economist Adam Smith once wrote, "are commodities which are nowherenecessaries of life, which have become objects of almost universal consumption, and which are, therefore, extremely popular subjects of taxation. " Two and a half centuries on, most countries impose some sort of tax on alcohol and tobacco. With surging obesity levels putting increasing strain on public health systems, governments around the worldhave begun to toy with the idea of taxing sugar as well. Whether such taxes work is a matter of debate. A preliminary review of Mexico's taxation found afall in purchases of taxed drinks as well as a rise in sales of untaxed and healthier drinks. By contrast,a Danish tax on foods high in fats was abandoned a year after its introduction, amid claims that consumers were avoiding it by crossing the border to Germany to satisfy their desire for cheaper, fattier fare. The food industry has, in general, been firmly opposed to 'such direct government action. Nonetheless, the renewed focus on waistlines means that industry groups are under pressure to demonstrate their products are healthy as well as tasty. Over the past three decades, the industry has made some efforts to improve the quality of its offerings. For example, some drink manufacturers have cut the amount of sugar in their beverages. Many of the reductions over the past 30 years have been achieved either by reducing the amount of sugar, salt or fat in a product, or by finding an alternative ingredient. More recently, however, some companies have been investing money in a more ambitious undertaking: learning how to adjust the fundamental make-up of the food they sell. For example, having salt on the outside, but none on the inside, reduces the salt content without changing the taste. While reformulating recipes (配方) is one way to improve public health, it should be part of a multisided approach. The key is to remember that there is not just one solution. To deal with obesity, a mixture of approaches-including reformulation, taxation and adjusting portion sizes-will be needed. There is no silver bullet. 1. What did Adam Smith say about sugar, alcohol and tobacco? A) They were profitable to manufacture. B) They were in ever-increasing demand. C) They were subject to taxation almost everywhere. D) They were no longer considered necessities of life. 2. Why have many countries started to consider taxing sugar? A) They are under growing pressure to balance their national budgets. B) They find it ever harder to cope with sugar-induced health problems. C) The practice of taxing alcohol an~ tobacco has proved both popular and profitable. D) The sugar industry is overtaking alcohol and tobacco business in generating profits. 3. What do we learn about Danish taxation on fat-rich foods? A) It did not work out as well as was expected. B) It gave rise to a lot of problems on the border. C) It could not succeed without German cooperation. D) It met with firm opposition from the food industry. 4. What is the more recent effort by food companies to make foods and drinks both healthy and tasty? A) Replacing sugar or salt with alternative ingredients. B) Setting a limit on the amount of sugar or salt in their products. C) Investing in research to find ways to adapt to consumers' needs. D) Adjusting the physical composition of their products. 5. What does the author mean by saying, at the end of the passage, "There is no silver bullet" (Line 4, Para. 7)? A) There is no single easy quick solution to the problem. B) There is no hope of success without public cooperation. C) There is no hurry in finding ways to solve the obesity problem. D) There is no effective way to reduce people's sugar consumption. Passage Two Questions 6 to 10 are based on the following passage. You may have heard some of the fashion industry horror stories: models eating tissues or cottonballs to hold off hunger, and models collapsing from hunger-induced heart attacks just seconds after they step off the runway. Excessively skinny models have been a point of controversy for decades, and two researchers say a model's body mass should be a workplace health and safety issue. In an editorial released Monday inthe American Journal of Public Health, Katherine Record and Bryn Austin made their case forgovernment regulation of the fashion industry. The average international runway model has a body mass index (BMI) under 16-low enough to indicate starvation by the World Health Organization's standard. And Record and Austin are worried not just about the models themselves, but about the vast number of girls and women their images influence. "Especially girls and teens," says Record. "Seventy percent of girls aged 10 to 18 report that they define perfect body image based on what they see in magazines." That's especially worrying, she says, given that anorexia (厌食症) results in more deaths than does any other mental illness, according to the National Institute of Mental Health. It's commonly known that certain diseases are linked with occupations like lung disease in coal miners. Professional fashion models are particularly vulnerable to eating disorders resulting from occupational demands to maintain extreme thinness. Record's suggestion is to prohibit agents from hiring models with a BMI below 18. In April, France passed a law setting lower limits for a model's weight. Agents and fashion houses who hire models with a BMI under 18 could pay $82,000 in fines and spend up to 6 months in jail. Regulating the fashion industry in the United States won't be easy, Record says. But with the new rules in France, U.S. support 'could make a difference. "A designer can't survive without participating in Paris Fashion Week", she says, adding, "Our argument is that the same would be true of New York Fashion Week" 6. What do Record and Austin say about fashion models' body mass? A) It has caused needless controversy. C) It is the focus of the modeling business. B) It is but a matter of personal taste.D) It affects models' health and safety. 7. What are Record and Austin advocating in the Monday editorial? A) A change in the public's view of female beauty. B) Government legislation about models' weight. C) Elimination of forced weight loss by models. D) Prohibition of models eating non-food stuff. 8. Why are Record and Austin especially worried about the low body mass index of models? A) It contributes to many mental illnesses. B) It defines the· future of the fashion industry. C) It has great influence on numerous girls and women. D) It keeps many otherwise qualified women off the runway. 9. What do we learn about France's fashion industry? A) It has difficulty hiring models.C) It allows girls under 18 on the runway. B) It has now a new law to follow.D) It has overtaken that of the United States. 10. What does Record expect of New York Fashion Week? A) It will create a completely new set of rules. C) It will differ from Paris Fashion Week. B) It will do better than Paris Fashion Week.D) It will have models with a higher BMI. Passage Three Questions 11 to 15 are based on the following passage. As a person who writes about food and drink for a living, I couldn't tell you the first thing about Bill Perry or whether the beers he sells are that great. But I can tell you that I like this guy. That's because he plans to ban tipping in favor of paying his servers an actual living wage. I hate tipping. I hate it because it's an obligation disguised as an option. I hate it for the post-dinner math itrequires of me. But mostly, I hate tipping because I believe I would be in a better place if pay decisions regarding employees were simply left up to their employers, as is the custom in virtually every other industry. Most of you probably think that you hate tipping, too. Research suggests otherwise. You actually love tipping! You like to feel that you have a voice in how much money your server makes. No matter how the math works out, you persistently view restaurants with voluntary tipping systems as being a better value, which makes it extremely difficult for restaurants and bars to do away with the tipping system. One argument that you tend to hear a lot from the pro-tipping crowd seems logical enough: the service is better when waiters depend on tips, presumably because they see a benefit to successfully veiling their contempt for you. Well, if this were true, we would all be slipping a few 100-dollar bills to our doctors on the way out their doors, too. But as it turns out, waiters see only a tiny bump in tips when they do an exceptional job compared to a passable one. Waiters, keen observers of humanity that they are, are catching on to this; in one poll, a full 30% said they didn't believe the job they did had any impact on the tips they received. So come on, folks: get on board with ditching the outdated tip system. Pay a little more up-front for your beer or burger. Support Bill Perry' s pub, and any other bar or restaurant that doesn't ask you to do drunken math. 11. What can we learn about Bill Perry from the passage? A) He runs a pub that serves excellent beer. C) He gives his staff a considerable sum for tips. B) He intends to get rid of the tipping practice.D) He lives comfortably without getting any tips. 12. What is the main reason why the author hates tipping? A) It sets a bad example for other industries. B) It adds to the burden of ordinary customers. C) It forces the customer to compensate the waiter. D) It poses a great challenge for customers to do math. 13. Why do many people love tipping according to the author? A) They help improve the quality of the restaurants they dine in. B) They believe waiters deserve such rewards for good service. C) They want to preserve a wonderful tradition of the industry. D) They can have some say in how much their servers earn. 14. What have some waiters come to realize according to a survey? A) Service quality has little effect on tip size. B) It is in human nature to try to save on tips. C) Tips make it more difficult to please customers. D) Tips benefit the boss rather than the employees. 15. What does the author argue for in the passage? A) Restaurants should calculate the tips for customers. B) Customers should pay more tips to help improve service. C) Waiters deserve better than just relying on tips for a living. D) Waiters should be paid by employers instead of customers. Passage Four Questions 16 to 20 are based on the following passage. In the past, falling oil prices have given a boost to the world economy, but recent forecasts forglobal growth have been toned down, even as oil prices sink lower and lower. Does that mean the link between lower oil prices and growth has weakened? Some experts say there are still good reasons to believe cheap oil should heat up the worldeconomy. Consumers have more money in their pockets when they're paying less at the pump. They spend that money on other things, which stimulates the economy. The biggest gains go to countries that import most of their oil like China, Japan and India. Butdoesn't the extra money in the pockets of those countries' consumers mean an equal loss in oil-producing countries, cancelling out the gains? Not necessarily, says economic researcher Sara Johnson."Many oil producers built up huge reserve funds when prices were high, so when prices fall they will draw on their reserves to support government spending and subsidies (补贴) for their consumers. " But not all oil producers have big reserves. In Venezuela, collapsing oil prices have sent its economy into free-fall. Economist Carl Weinberg believes the negative effects of plunging oil prices are overwhelming the positive effects of cheaper oil. The implication is a sharp decline in global trade, which has plunged partly because oil-producing nations can't afford to import as much as they used to. Sara Johnson acknowledges that the global economic benefit from a fall in oil prices today is likely lower than it was in the past. One reason is that more countries are big oil producers now, so the nations suffering from the price drop account for a larger share of the global economy. Consumers, in the U.S. at least, are acting cautiously with the savings they're getting at the gaspump, as the memory of the recent great recession is still fresh in their mind. And a number of oil-producing countries are trimming their gasoline subsidies and raising truces, so the net savings for global consumers is not as big as the oil price plunge might suggest. 16. What does the author mainly discuss in the passage? A) The reasons behind the plunge of oil prices. B) Possible ways to stimulate the global economy. C) The impact of cheap oil on global economic growth. D) The effect of falling oil prices on consumer spending. 17. Why do some experts believe cheap oil will stimulate the global economy? A) Manufacturers can produce consumer goods at a much lower cost. B) Lower oil prices have always given a big boost to the global economy. C) Oil prices may rise or fall but economic laws are not subject to change. D) Consumers will spend their savings from cheap oil on other commodities. 18. What happens in many oil-exporting countries when oil price go down? A) They suspend import of necessities from overseas. B) They reduce production drastically to boost oil prices. C) They use their money reserves to back up consumption. D) They try to stop their economy from going into free-fall. 19. How does Carl Weinberg View the current oil price plunge? A) It is one that has seen no parallel in economic history. B) Its negative effects more than cancel out its positive effects. C) It still has a chance to give rise to a boom in the global economy. D) Its effects on the global economy go against existing economic laws. 20. Why haven't falling oil prices boosted the global economy as they did before? A) People are not spending all the money they save on gas. B) The global economy is likely to undergo another recession. C) Oil importers account for a larger portion of the global economy. D) People the world over are afraid of a further plunge in oil prices.