Below America‘s waters,there is a junkyard(垃圾场).Every year, thousands of boats and ships sink or are abandoned in the U.S.and most of them are never found back again.’You go to any harbor in the country and you‘ll find abandoned ships,’ said Doug Helton, Director of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA). NOAA data suggests there are at least 10,000 abandoned ships along the U.S. coast, but experts predict there can be far more.Abandoned ships damage the ecosystem(生态系统）long after they‘ve sunk. They produce toxic chemicals harming or destroying sea life and, by entering the food chain, the chemicals are finally digested by humans. Sometimes they help the growth of new sea life that threatens the present local ecosystem. On Palmyra Atoll, for example, a ‘population explosion’ of corallimorph, an aggressive creature similar to coral, killed almost all the coral growing around a fishing boat that sank in 1991. The corallimorph were probably attracted to the leaching iron produced by the abandoned boat, growing fast and threatening other sea life on the reef.Of course, there are governmental policies to prevent people from abandoning boats and ships. State laws fine (罚款) and sometimes jail those irresponsible ship owners. However, there’s a big financial problem regarding retrieving(回收）and recycling sunken ship: it takes owners on average $5,000 to $10,000 to retrieve a 40-foot yacht, while the fines for abandonment are much lower - only $100. Besides, definitions of ‘abandonment’ are quite different among states, which means that ship owners can sometimes sink boats and get off the responsibility. Meanwhile, federal law deals with only pollution caused by ships, not with ship abandonment itself.The environmental impact of undersea boats and ships can’t always be seen easily from the shore, says Helton. It would help if owners of small fishing boats as well as big ships could keep in mind that ‘ when a boat or ship is lost, it’s not gone.1.The main idea of the passage is（）.A、poisonous chemicals‘ influences on sea lifeB、policies of retrieving abandoned shipsC、how corallimorph threatens coralD、the sunken ships and its trouble2. According to the passage, abandoned ships damage the ecosystem in these ways EXCEPT（）.A、producing toxic chemicalsB、entering the food chainC、helping corallimorph growD、poisoning the fishing boat3.The example of corallimorph is to show how abandoned ships（）.A、produce toxic chemicals which harm sea lifeB、foster new sea life threatening the ecosystemC、are protected under governmental policiesD、are retrieved and recycled in cheaper ways4.The third paragraph implies that（）.A、The fact that sunk ships can never be repaired.B、There are no financial problems of retrieving sunken ships.C、It doesn’t matter if we don’ t have a common definition of ‘abandonment’.D、Federal laws concerned only with pollution.5.The Helton‘ s attitude to lost ships is（）.A、indifferentB、disapprovingC、supportiveD、worried

Which of the sentences below use the rhetorical device of repetition？

A、What’s Wrong with Our Press？

B、Television may not have a Lippmann or a Reston, but then, what papers in America can claim an Eric Sevareid, a Walter Cronkite, a Huntley or a Brinkley, or—although he is invisible—an Edward Morgan？

C、Among the leading commentators on television, you find no Pegler, no Winchell, no Fulton Lewis, Jr..

D、Change means trouble, change means work, change means cost.

PART 5

Read the text below and choose the correct word for each space. For each question, mark the letter next to the correct word — A, B, C or D — on your answer sheet.

The History of Film

The world's first film was shown in 1895 by two French brothers, Louis and Auguste Lumi6re. Although it only (26)______ of short, simple scenes, people loved it and films have (27)______ popular ever since. The first films were silent, with titles on the screen to (28)______ the story.

Soon the public had (29)______ favourite actors and actresses and, in this (30)______ the first film stars appeared. In 1927, the first 'talkie', a film with sound, was shown and from then on, the public (31)______ only accept this kind of film.

Further improvements continued, particularly in America, (32)______ produced 95% of all films. With the arrival of television in the 1950s, (33) ______ people went to see films, but in (34)______ years cinema audiences have grown again. More countries have started to produce films that influence film-making and there are currently (35)______ national film industries.

A．consisted

B．contained

C．belonged

D．held

for about $ 780 million, a move that reflects his efforts to slash his financial stake in the media giant.

After the close of regular trading yesterday, Turner sold a block of 60 million shares to Goldman Sachs & Co. for $ 13.07 per share, or 31 cents below the stock's closing price yesterday. Goldman was said by Wall Street sources to be offering the stock to major investors for $ 13.15.

An outspoken critic of the corporation, Turner remains AOL Time Warner's largest individual shareholder, with 45 million shares, and a member of its board of directors. A spokeswoman for Turner referred questions to AOL Time Warner.

At his peak Turner owned about 130 million shares, but he lost billions of dollars in wealth and grew bitter after the stock plunged following the merger of America Online and Time Warner in January 2001.

Turner, who initially supported the merger, later expressed outrage over revelations that America Online had manipulated its financial results. The Securities and Exchange Commission is investigating AOL, and the corporation has acknowledged discovering tens of millions of dollars of overstated revenue.

Turner resigned as vice chairman earlier this year and has been spending less of his time on AOL Time Warner matters. He stepped down after achieving his goal of pressuring America Online founder Steve Case to resign as the corporation's chairman. Case said he was giving up the post to avoid a braising public battle for reelection at next week's annual meeting.

In the effort to oust Case, Turner teamed up with Gordon Crawford, the senior media portfolio manager at Capital Research & Management, the largest institutional shareholder in AOL Time Warner. Capital Research has indicated it will vote against Case's election to remain on the board of directors next week--a position that analysts said should not affect the outcome. Turner, meanwhile, has said he will support the management slate that includes Case and will make Richard D. Parsons the company's chairman and chief executive.

Turner, a visionary who started Cable News Network, is in the midst of rolling out a new chain of restaurants, Ted's Montana Grill, featuring bison burgers. He recently moved his residence from Georgia to Florida for estate planning purposes and is spending time and money on his independent film company, which lost millions of dollars on a lengthy movie about the Civil War.

From the first three paragraphs, we learn that ______.

A．Goldman has made a profit from this transaction of shares with Turner

B．Turner always expresses his dissatisfaction with the corporation openly

C．Goldman bought the block of shares in order to become a member of the board

D．Turner sold a large portion of his shares to retreat from the media business

Benefit Payments to American Workers

German Chancellor (首相)Otto Von Bismarck may be most famous for his military and diplomatic talent, but his legacy (遗产) includes many of today's social insurance programs. During the middle of the 19th century, Germany, along with other European nations, experienced an unprecedented rash of workplace deaths and accidents as a result of growing industrialization. Motivated in part by Christian compassion (怜悯)for the helpless as well as a practical political impulse to undercut the support of the socialist labor movement.' Chancellor Bismarck created the world's first workers' compensation law in 1884.

By 1908, the United States was the only industrial nation in the world that lacked workers' compensation insurance. America's injured workers could sue for damages in a court of law, but they still faced a number of tough legal barriers. For example, employees had to prove that their injuries directly resulted from employer negligence and that they themselves were ignorant about potential hazards in the workplace. The first state workers' compensation law in the country passed in 1911, and the program soon spread throughout the nation.

After World War Ⅱ, benefit payments to American workers did not keep up with the cost of living. In fact, real benefit levels were lower in the 1970s than they were in the 1940s, and in most states the maximum benefit was below the poverty level for a family of four. In 1970, President Richard Nixon set up a national commission to study the problems of workers' compensation. Two years later, the commission issued 19 key recommendations, including one that called for increasing compensation benefit levels to 100 percent of the states' average weekly wages.

In fact, the average compensation benefit in America has climbed from 55 percent of the states' average weekly wages in 1972 to 97 percent today. But, as most studies show, every 10 percent increase in compensation benefits results in a 5 percent increase in the numbers of workers who file for claims. And with so much more money floating in the workers' compensation system, it's not surprising that doctors and lawyers have helped themselves to a large slice of the growing pie.

The world's first workers' compensation law was introduced by Bismarck______.

A．for fear of losing the support of the socialist labor movement

B．out of religious and political considerations

C．to speed up the pace of industrialization

D．to make industrial production safer

Passage two 2016年6月英语六级卷一试题

What can be done about mass unemployment？ All the wise heads agree: there’re no quick or easy answers. There’s work to be done, but workers aren’t ready to do it—they’re in the wrong places, or they have the wrong skills, Our problems are “structural, ”and will take many years to solve.

But don’t bother asking for evidence that justifies this bleak view. There isn’t any. On the contrary, all the facts suggest that high unemployment in America is the result of inadequate demand. saying that there’re no easy answers sounds wise. But it’s actually foolish: our unemployment crisis could be cured very quickly if we had the intellectual clarity and political will to act. In other words, structural unemployment is a fake problem, which mainly serves as an excuse for not pursing real solutions.

The fact is job openings have plunged in every major sector, while the number of workers forced into part-time employment in almost all industries has soared. Unemployment has surged in every major occupational category. Only three states. With a combined population not much larger than that of Brooklyn, have unemployment rates below 5%. So the evidence contradicts the claim that we’re mainly suffering from structural unemployment. Why, then, has this claim become so popular？

Part of the answer is that this is what always happens during periods of high unemployment—in part because experts and analysts believe that declaring the problem deeply rooted, with no easy answers, makes them sound serious.

I’ve been looking at what self-proclaimed experts were saying about unemployment during the Great Depression; it was almost identical to what Very Serious People are saying now. Unemployment cannot be brought down rapidly, declared one 1935 analysis, because the workforce is“unadaptable and untrained. It cannot respond to the opportunities which industry may offer. ”A few years later, a large defense buildup finally provided a fiscal stimulus adequate to the economy’s needs—and suddenly industry was eager to employ those“unadaptable and untrained”workers.

But now, as then, powerful forces are ideologically opposed to the whole idea of government action on a sufficient scale to jump-start the economy. And that, fundamentally, is why claims that we face huge structural problems have been multiplying: they offer a reason to do nothing about the mass unemployment that is crippling out economy and our society.

So what you need to know is that there’s no evidence whatsoever to back these claims. We aren’t suffering from a shortage of needed skills, We’re suffering from a lack of policy resolve. As I said, structural unemployment isn’t a real problem, it’s an excuse—a reason not to act on America’s problems at a time when action is desperately needed.

51. What does the author think is the root cause of mass unemployment in America？

A)Corporate mismanagement.

B)Insufficient demand.

C)Technological advances.

D)Workers’ slow adaptation.

52. What does the author think of the experts’ claim concerning unemployment？

A)Self-evident.

B)Thought-provoking.

C)Irrational.

D)Groundless.

53. What does the author say helped bring down unemployment during the Great Depression？

A)The booming defense industry.

B)The wise heads’ benefit package.

C)Nationwide training of workers.

D)Thorough restructuring of industries.

54. What has caused claims of huge structural problems to multiply？

A)Powerful opposition to government’s stimulus efforts.

B)Very Serious People’s attempt to cripple the economy.

C)Evidence gathered from many sectors of the industries.

D)Economists’ failure to detect the problems in time.

55. What is the author’s purpose in writing the passage？

A)To testify to the experts’ analysis of America’s problems.

B)To offer a feasible solution to the structural unemployment.

C)To show the urgent need for the government to take action.

D)To alert American workers to the urgency for adaptation.

Today the world's economy is going through two great changes, both bigger than an Asian financial crisis here or a European monetary union there.

The first change is that a lot of industrial_67_is moving from the United States, Western Europe and Japan to _68 _countries in Latin America, South-East Asia and Eastern Europe. In 1950, the United States alone _69_ for more than half of the world's economy output. In 1990, its _70_ was down to a quarter. By 1990, 40% of IBM's employees were non-Americans; Whirlpool, America's leading _71_ of domestic appliances, cut its American labor force _72_ 10%. Quite soon now, many big western companies will have more _73_ (and customers) in poor countries than in rich _74_ .

The second great change is _75_, in the rich countries of the OECD, the balance of economic activity is _76_ from manufacturing to _77_. In the United States and Britain, the _78_ of workers in manufacturing has _79_ since 1900 from around 40% to barely half that. _80_ in Germany and Japan, which rebuilt so many _81_after 1945, manufacturing's share of jobs is now below 30%. The effect of the _82 is increased _83_ manufacturing moves from rich countries to the developing ones, _84_ cheap labor _85_ them a sharp advantage in many of the _86_ tasks required by mass production.

67. A. product B. production C. products D. productivity

68. A. other B. small C. capitalistic D. developing

69. A. accounted B. occupied C. played D. shared

70. A. output B. development C. share D. economy

71. A. state B. consumer C. representative D. supplier

72. A. by B. at C. through D. in

73. A. products B. market C. employees D. changes

74. A. one B. ones C. times D. time

75. A. what B. like C. that D. how

76. A. ranging B. varying C. swinging D. getting

77. A. producing B. products C. servicing D. services

78. A. proportion B. number C. quantity D. group

79. A. changed B. gone C. applied D. shrunk

80. A. Furthermore B. Even C. Therefore D. Hence

81. A. armies B. weapons C. factories D. countries

82. A. question B. manufacturing C. shift D. rebuilding

83. A. with B. as C. given D. if

84. A. while B. whose C. who's D. which

85. A. give B. is giving C. gives D. gave

86. A. repetitive B. various C. creative D. enormous

Section Ⅱ Reading Comprehension

Part A

Directions: Read the following four texts. Answer the questions below each text by choosing A, B, C or D. Mark your answers on the ANSWER SHEET. (40 points) Text 1 It is curious that StephenKoziatekfeels almost as though he has to justify his efforts to give his students a better future. Mr.Koziatek is part of something pioneering. He is a teacher at a New Hampshire high school where learning is not something of books and tests and mechanical memorization, but practical. When did it become accepted wisdom that students should be able to name the 13th president of the United States but be utterly overwhelmed by a broken bike chain？

As Koziatek knows,there is learning in just about everything. Nothing is necessarily gained by forcing students to learn geometry at a graffitied desk stuck with generations of discarded chewing gum. They can also learn geometry by assembling a bicycle.

But he’s also found a kind of insidious prejudice. Working with your hands is seen as almost a mark of inferiority.Schools in the family of vocationaleducation“have that stereotype..that it’s for kids who can’t make it academically,”he says.

On one hand,that viewpoint is a logical product of America’s evolution.Manufacturing is not the economic engine that it once was.The job security that the US economy once offered to high school graduates has largely evaporated.More education is the new principle.We want more for our kids,and rigitfully so.

But the headlong push into bachelor’s degrees for all -and the subtle devaluing of anything less-misses an important point:That’s not the only thing the American economy neds.Yes,a bachelor’s degree opens more doors.But even now,54 percent of the jobs in the country are middle-skill jobs,such as construction and high-skill manufacturing.But only 44 percent of workers are adequately trained.

In other words,at a time when the working class has turned the country on its political head,frustrated that the opportunity that once defined America is vanishing,one obvious solution is staring us in the face.There is a gap in working-class jobs,but the workers who need those jobs most aren’t equipped to do them.Koziatek’s Manchester School of Technology High School is trying to fill that gap.

Koziatek’s school is a wake-up call.When education becomes one-size-fits-all,it risks overlooking a nation’s diversiy of gifts.

21.A brokan bike chain is mentioned to show students’ lack of______.

A.mechanical memorization

B.academic training

C.practical ability

D.pioneering spirit

22.There existsthe prejudice that vocational education is for kids who______.

A.are financially disadvantaged

B.are not academically successful

C.have a stereotyped mind

D.have no career motivation

23.We can infer from Paragraph 5 that high school graduates______.

A.are entitled to more “ducational privileges

B.are reluctant to work in manufacturing

C.used to have more job opportunities

D.used to have big financial concerns

24.The headlong push into bacheloi’s degrees for all_____.

A.helps create a lot of middle-skill jobs

B.may narrow the gap in working-class jobs

C.is expected to yield a better-trained workforce

D.indicates the overvaluing of higher education

25.The author’s attitude toward Koziatek’s school can be described as_____.

A.supportive

B.disappointed

C.tolerant

D.cautious

In America, it's hard to enter college, but easy to graduate.()

A.above

B.below

C.under

D.beyond

, ______.

A. as America's greatest writer

B. was America's greatest writer

C. America's greatest writer

D. to have been America's greatest writer

The McDonald's has become one of the symbols of America's cultural export.()