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  3. The high unemployment rates of the early 1960s occasioned a spirited debate

The high unemployment rates of the early 1960s occasioned a spirited debate

游客2025-04-12  25
问题     The high unemployment rates of the early 1960s occasioned a spirited debate with,in the economics profession. One group found the primary cause of unemployment in slow growth and the solution in economic expansion. The other found the major explanation in changes that had occurred in the supply, and demand for labor and stressed measures for matching demand with supply.
    The expansionist school of thought, with the Council of Economic Advisers as its leading advocates, attributed the persistently high unemployment level to a slow rate of economic growth resulting from a deficiency of aggregate demand for goods and services. The majority of this school endorsed the position of the Council that tax reduction would eventually reduce the unemployment level to 4% of the labor force with no other assistance. At 4%, bottlenecks in skilled labor, middle-level manpower, and professional personnel were expected to retard growth and generate wage-price pressures. To go beyond 4% .the interim goal of the Council,it was recognized that improved education,training and retraining,and other structural measures would be required. Some expansionists insisted that the demand for goods and services was nearly satiated and that it was impossible for the private sector to absorb a significant increase in output. In their estimate,only the lower-income fifth of the population and the public sector offered sufficient outlets for the productive efforts of the potential labor force. The fact that the needs of the poor and the many unmet demands for public services held higher priority than the demands of the marketplace in the value structure of this group no doubt influenced their economic judgments.
    Those who found the major cause of unemployment in structural features were primarily labor economists,concerned professionally with efficient functioning of labor markets through programs to develop skills and place individual workers. They maintained that increased aggregate demand was a necessary but not sufficient condition for reaching either the CEA’s 4% target or their own preferred 3%. This pessimism was based, in part on the conclusion that unemployment among the young,the unskilled, minority groups, and depressed geographical areas is not easily attacked by increasing general demand. Further, their estimate of the numbers of potential members of the labor force who had withdrawn or not entered because of lack of employment opportunity was substantially higher than that of the CEA. They also projected that increased demand would put added pressure on skills already in short supply rather than employ the unemployed,and that because of technological change,which was replacing manpower, much higher levels of demand would be necessary to create the same number of jobs.
    The structural school,too,had its hyperenthusiasts:Fiscal conservatives who,as an alternative to expansionary policies,argued the not very plausible position that a job was available for every person, provided only that he or she had the requisite skills or would relocate. Such extremist positions aside, there was actually considerable agreement between two main groups,though this was not recognized at the time. Both realized the advisability of a tax cut to increase demand, and both needed to reduce unemployment below a point around 4%. In either case,the policy implications differed in emphasis and not in content. [br] According to the passage.there was a good deal of agreement between the expansionist and structuralist theories on____.
选项 A、how to reduce unemployment in the 1960s
B、how to reduce unemployment to 4 percent
C、what role the government played in reducing unemployment
D、how to eliminate structural deficiencies
答案 B
解析 主旨题。A项“如果降低60年代的失业率”；B项“如何将失业率降至4％”；C项“政府在降低失业率中所起的作用”；D项“如何消除结构性缺陷”。最后一段中“Both realized the advisability of a tax cut toincrease demand，and both needed to reduce unemployment below a point around 4％”表明两组人群都认为4％的失业率是评价其对社会的影响的分水岭，故选B。
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