28. The author seems to disapprove of .
[A] the Michigan lawmakers’ endless debating [B] the shutting of schools in Kalkaska
[C] the involvement of the mass media [D] delaying the passage of the school funding legislation
29. We learn from the passage that school authorities in Kalkaska are concerned about .
[A] a raise in the property-tax rate in Michigan [B] reopening the schools there immediately
[C] the attitude of the MEA’s parent organization [D] making a political issue of the closing of the schools
30. According to the passage, the closing of the schools developed into a crisis because of .
[A] the complexity of the problem [B] the political motives on the part of the educators
[C] the weak response of the state officials [D] the strong protest on the part of the students’ parents
Passage Three
Questions 31 to 35 are based on the following passage.
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 this 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. |
