1、考研英语（阅读）-试卷 73 及答案解析(总分：60.00，做题时间：90 分钟)一、Reading Comprehensio(总题数：6，分数：60.00)1.Section II Reading Comprehension（分数：10.00）_2.Part ADirections: Read the following four texts. Answer the questions below each text by choosing A, B, C or D.（分数：10.00）_In the first years of the 21st century, no area of t
2、he American economy has excited more emotion than the property market. First came the excitement of soaring prices. Then spirits came crashing down with the subprime crisis, and now homeowners are agonizing over how far values could fall. An even bigger story , however, may be yet to come. America s
3、hould be bracing itself for the end of the “generational housing bubble“, according to a new study by Dowell Myers and SungHo Ryu of the University of Southern California. As the country“s 78 million baby-boomers retire, the report argues, the housing market will change dramatically. For three decad
4、es baby-boomers have helped push prices up: they settled down, and then bought bigger houses and second homes. But as the first of them celebrate their 65th birthdays in 2011, this may change. The old sell more homes than they buy. The ratio of old to working-age people is expected to grow by 67% ov
5、er the next two decades. Will the younger generation be able to buy all the homes on the market? Young adults make up the bulk of new demand, with most purchasing homes when they reach their early 30s. The flood of elderly people selling their homes, Mr. Myers suggests, may lead to a drawn-out buyer
6、s“ market. Prices may fall further as younger people, perceiving a downturn, delay purchasing. This phenomenon will unfold differently across the country. Some states will begin the sell-off later than others. In 15 southern and western statesincluding the retirement magnets of Florida and Arizon-at
7、he elderly do not become net sellers until their 70s. Expensive states such as California and the cold states of the mid-west and northeast are likely to lose them more quickly. The mismatch between buyers and sellers may be most acute in the rustbelt, where numbers of young people and immigrants ar
8、e rising slowly, if at all, says William Frey of the Brookings Institution, a think-tank. Of course, there may be other outcomes. Suburbs, which swelled with the baby-boomers, may begin to decline. If the building industry contracts, home prices may remain more stable. Or developers may switch to se
9、rving the old, building more compact housing near amenities. Towns may make new efforts to attract immigrants, who already accounted for 40% of the growth in homeownership between 2000 and 2006. Among these unknowns, one thing is more certain: the housing market is about to enter a long period of tr
10、ansition. The youngest baby-boomers will not turn 65 until 2029.（分数：10.00）(1).“An even bigger story“ in Paragraph 1 implies that American property market will（分数：2.00）A.continue to be the most exciting field in the American economy.B.experience more dramatic changes in the following years.C.make spi
11、rits go up with the decreased housing prices.D.have greater impact on the feelings of homeowners.(2).According to Dowell, the baby-boomers（分数：2.00）A.have been more likely to buy bigger and more homes.B.may celebrate their birthdays at the age of 65.C.should welcome the future change by selling more
12、houses.D.have made housing bubbles in the past three decades.(3).The word “drawn-out“(Line 2, Paragraph 3)most probably means（分数：2.00）A.prolonged.B.declined.C.delayed.D.enlarged.(4).William Frey believes that（分数：2.00）A.people in southern states would not lose their homes until 70s.B.people in expens
13、ive states would lose their money more quickly.C.young people and immigrants hardly increase in the rustbelt areas.D.elderly people would not like to retire in Florida and Arizona until 70s.(5).It could be concluded from the passage that（分数：2.00）A.suburbs would decline with increased baby-boomers.B.
14、housing prices would keep steady in the crisis.C.the housing market will experience a period of transformation.D.immigrants will be the majority of homeownership in towns.They are “financial weapons of mass destruction,“ to quote the famous investor Warren Buffett as he surveyed the morning-after de
15、struction of the sub-prime mortgage lending crisis. The continuing destruction can now be called a credit crisisa significant escalation because credit has been the fuel powering the American economy for the past half dozen years. A whole galaxy of credit instruments has now been downgraded to the t
16、une of hundreds of billions of dollars of paper losses. Another immediate effect has been a collapse in cash-out borrowing from home equity from about $700 billion in 2005 to $100 billion to date. At the same time, tighter lending and mortgage standards have contributed to a dramatic decline in resi
17、dential construction from a high of over 2 million units to about 800,000 predicted for next year, with a related decline in employment. A slowdown in consumer spending seems inescapable. What is now seriously in question is the capacity of our financial system to provide enough credit to support th
18、e scale of investment that has maintained our long economic expansion. Coming at a time of soaring oil prices, we may have a simultaneous decline in consumer spending, residential investment, and business investment. The economy was strong in the third quarter but clearly dropping off by the end. We
19、 may be at the finish of not just the long-term borrowing bubble but the long-term spending bubble. The Federal Reserve must get ahead of the curve. Its priority must be to maintain the viability of the credit system and the flow of credit; our postmodern economy is dependent on an ongoing flow of c
20、redit. The problem for the Fed is that monetary policy may be no match for the deep structural contradictions that plague the financial system. We are dealing here with a whole new set of credit instruments that are little understood and therefore extremely difficult to price. The economy is clearly
21、 transitioning to much slower growth, sharply tighter lending standards, a declining housing market, and pressure on consumer spending. People and companies are trying to cope with the debt accumulated during several years of wasteful lending and spending. The real danger from a credit crisis is tha
22、t everyone, from banks to corporations to households, may economize simultaneously. The collapse of values and the risks of the credit squeeze are the worst since the Great Depression. We are going to put the economy“s resilience to a severe test.（分数：10.00）(1).According to the first paragraph, which
23、 of the following seems to be the most serious economic problem now?（分数：2.00）A.The overall economic depression.B.The on-going credit crisis.C.The weapons of mass destruction.D.The investment in housing.(2).The tighter lending and mortgage standards will probably result in（分数：2.00）A.jump of employmen
24、t rate.B.more spending on necessities.C.flexible cash-out borrowing.D.a decrease of units to be built.(3).It is suggested in Paragraph 3 that（分数：2.00）A.the financial system is able to provide enough credit to support the investment.B.the credit issue can be traced back to the economic expansion long
25、 ago.C.the growing oil prices have influenced the business world.D.the borrowing bubble and the spending one will balance the economy.(4).We could learn from the last paragraph that the real danger from a credit crisis is（分数：2.00）A.the loss of houses built on mortgage tending.B.the possibility of ec
26、onomy resilience.C.the bankruptcy of large corporations.D.the pressure on consumer expenditure.(5).Which of the following would be the best title for the text?（分数：2.00）A.The Credit Crisis GrowsB.The Economy TransitionsC.The USA DeclinesD.The Debt SoarsI came to feminism the way some people come to s
27、ocial movements in their early years: out of self-interest. I got on the equality bandwagon because I was a young woman with a streak of ambition a mile wide, and without a change in the atmosphere I thought I was going to wind up living a life that would make me crazy. As my father said not long ag
28、o, “Can you imagine what it would have been like if you had been born 50 years earlier? Your life would have been miserable.“ The great thing was that it was possible to do good for all while you were doing well for yourself. Each of us rose on the shoulders of women who had come before us. Move up,
29、 reach down: that was the motto of those who were worth knowing. But it was not just other women we elevated, but entire enterprises. More women on the staffs and the mastheads of the country“s largest publications changed them. It resulted in newspapers and magazines that covered women as more than
30、 a mixture of recipes and fashion collections. But there“s one question that always lurks around the margins of the battle for equal rights: how will we know when we“ve won? Sometimes it seems like a classic dance of two steps forward, one back. Indra Nooyi, an Indian-born number cruncher, was recen
31、tly named CEO of Pepsi. But that makes her one of only 11 women now running a Fortune 500 company, which works out to slightly more than 2 percent. And Forbes magazine just published an essay titled “Don“t Marry Career Women“ by a male writer who couldn“t see the advantages of a wife who could pay t
32、he mortgage and support the children even if her husband lost his job or suffered a massive coronary. That kind of nonsense takes you back in time, to the early days when women dumped babies on the desk of the mayor of Syracuse to protest the lack of child care. Maybe it was the classic protest slog
33、an “Don“t cook dinnerstarve a rat today,“ but the perception was that the fight for equality was a war against men. But the battle was really against the waste of talent, the waste to society, the waste of women who had certain gifts and goals and had to suppress both. The point was not to take over
34、 male terrain but to change it because it badly needed changing. The depth and breadth of that transformation is what reflects the success of the movement, and by that measure, women are doing well. And so is everyone else.（分数：10.00）(1).The author came to women movement owing to（分数：2.00）A.her intere
35、st in it.B.her father.C.her ambitions.D.her miserable life.(2).The best reason for women“s rise is that（分数：2.00）A.women helped each other in social life.B.more women were employed and achieved success.C.more women succeeded in food and fashion industries.D.a valuable motto encouraged women to strive
36、.(3).According to Paragraph 3, women“s fight for equality is troubled by the problem that（分数：2.00）A.there are fewer women executives in business world.B.it is difficult to define the success of feminist movementC.women can not prove themselves on job.D.men do not want to marry career women.(4).The e
37、xample of Indra Nooyi is cited to show that（分数：2.00）A.women are still the disadvantaged group in the society.B.like men, women can also achieved great success.C.men are still unwilling to marry career women.D.Indian Americans can make great achievements in today“s US.(5).What can we learn from the l
38、ast paragraph?（分数：2.00）A.The fight for women“s equality is a war against men and government.B.The main reason for women“s protest is the lack of child care.C.Feminist movement succeeds in changing the male-dominant society.D.Women have taken over the traditional male terrain and gained equality.In t
39、he days before preschool academies were all but mandatory for kids under 5, I stayed home and got my early education from Mike Douglas. His TV talk show was one of my mother“s favorite programs, and because I looked up to my mother, it became one of my favorites too. Yet I quickly developed my own f
40、ascination with Douglas, who died last week. Maybe it was the plain seta couple of chairs and little elseor maybe it was the sound of people talking about ideas and events rather than telling stories. Whatever it was, to my 4-year-old mind it was all terribly adult, like my mother“s morning coffee.
41、It wasrelatively. The grown-up world I live in now is another matter. Thanks in part to the proliferation and polarization of talk shows in the last 20 years or sothe generation after Douglas and his big-tent gentility went off the airpublic conversations have become scary monsters indeed. Like othe
42、r forms of entertainment, the programming of commercial talk shows today has moved beyond niche to hermetic. The idea of a host booking guests as varied as Jerry Rubin, Malcolm X and Richard Nixonand treating them all with a certain deference, as Douglas didis unheard of. Equally a-mazing is to cons
43、ider that Douglas was a moderate; though he didn“t always share his guests“ views, he nonetheless insisted on everybody having his or her say. What he did, in other words, was more important than who he was. That was probably an easy dictate for an old-school, modest guy such as Douglas to follow. A
44、nd now? Oprah Winfrey is sincere e-nough, but her viewership is a cult of personality, not of people or issues. Like her contemporaries, O-prah chooses her guests and issues to suit her show, rather than allowing guests and issues to be the show. She prefers uplift and empowerment, which is more pal
45、atable than name-calling, the hallmark of Bill O“Reilly or Howard Stem. But spin is spin, and in her own way Oprah gets as tiresome as those guys. Ultimately, these shows fail to convey the fullness of the conversation, the sense that America is one placeor one hostwith many voices at equal volume.
46、That doesn“t mean everybody“s right. But to have everybody engaged and feeling a stake in the outcome of the discussion is priceless. Engagement is nothing less than national security: I felt that as a preschooler, watching Mike Douglas on TV, and I feel it now. The age of irony, they would say, fue
47、led by information that moves at the speed of light, demands a different approach.（分数：10.00）(1).It can be inferred from Paragraph 1 that the author（分数：2.00）A.was influenced by his mother.B.didn“t like preschool academies.C.enjoyed self-taught programs.D.was smart in his childhood.(2).The word “big-t
48、ent“(Line 6, Paragraph 2)is closest in meaning to（分数：2.00）A.sensible.B.tolerant.C.imposing.D.polite.(3).According to Paragraph 3, Mike Douglas（分数：2.00）A.treated guests with great passion.B.satisfied the guests“ requirements.C.highly valued different opinions.D.shared appealing experience of his own.
49、(4).Which of the following is true about Oprah Winfrey?（分数：2.00）A.She is not straightforward with her audience.B.She prefers fashionable and exciting topics.C.She is not quite successful as a talk show host.D.She is less annoying than those who slander others.(5).The author would most probably agree that（分数：2.00）A.people in a conversation should always reach an agreement.B.Mike Douglas has offered a world
