2014年6月英语六级长篇阅读文章来源

　　|

　　2014年6月全国英语四六级考试于6月14日举行，新东方网四六级频道第一时间更新公布2014年6月英语四六级真题及解析，并邀请北京新东方四六级名师团队进行考后试题解析，请同学们密切关注及。收听新浪微博了解最新消息。

　　本文选自2013年4月9日的 American Enterprise Institute
　　Lessons from a feminist paradise on Equal Pay Day
　　On the surface, Sweden appears to be a feminist paradise. Look at any global survey of gender equity and Sweden will be near the top. Family-friendly policies are its norm — with 16 months of paid parental leave, special protections for part-time workers, and state-subsidized preschools where, according to a government website, “gender-awareness education is increasingly common.” Due to an unofficial quota system, women hold 45 percent of positions in the Swedish parliament. They have enjoyed the protection of government agencies with titles like the Ministry of Integration and Gender Equality and the Secretariat of Gender Research. So why are American women so far ahead of their Swedish counterparts in breaking through the glass ceiling?
　　In a 2012 report, the World Economic Forum found that when it comes to closing the gender gap in “economic participation and opportunity,” the United States is ahead of not only Sweden but also Finland, Denmark, the Netherlands, Iceland, Germany, and the United Kingdom. Sweden’s rank in the report can largely be explained by its political quota system. Though the United States has fewer women in the workforce (68 percent compared to Sweden’s 77 percent), American women who choose to be employed are far more likely to work full-time and to hold high-level jobs as managers or professionals. Compared to their European counterparts, they own more businesses, launch more start start-ups, and more often work in traditionally male fields. As for breaking the glass ceiling in business, American women are well in the lead, as the chart below shows.
　　What explains the American advantage? How can it be that societies like Sweden, where gender equity is relentlessly pursued and enforced, have fewer female managers, executives, professionals, and business owners than the laissez-faire United States? A new study by Cornell economists Francine Blau and Lawrence Kahn gives an explanation.
　　Generous parental leave policies and readily available part-time options have unintended consequences: instead of strengthening women’s attachment to the workplace, they appear to weaken it. In addition to a 16-month leave, a Swedish parent has the right to work six hours a day (for a reduced salary) until his or her child is eight years old. Mothers are far more likely than fathers to take advantage of this law. But extended leaves and part-time employment are known to be harmful to careers — for both genders. And with women a second factor comes into play: most seem to enjoy the flex-time arrangement (once known as the “mommy track”) and never find their way back to full-time or high-level employment. In sum: generous family-friendly policies do keep more women in the labor market, but they also tend to diminish their careers.
　　According to Blau and Kahn, Swedish-style paternal leave policies and flex-time arrangements pose a second threat to women’s progress: they make employers wary of hiring women for full-time positions at all. Offering a job to a man is the safer bet. He is far less likely to take a year of parental leave and then return on a reduced work schedule for the next eight years.
　　I became aware of the trials of career-focused European women a few years ago when I met a post-doctoral student from Germany who was then a visiting fellow at Johns Hopkins. She was astonished by the professional possibilities afforded to young American women. Her best hope in Germany was a government job –– prospects for women in the private sector were dim. “In Germany,” she told me, “we have all the benefits, but employers don’t want to hire us.”
　　Swedish economists Magnus Henrekson and Mikael Stenkula addressed the following question in their 2009 study: why are there so few female top executives in the European egalitarian welfare states? Their answer: “Broad-based welfare-state policies impede women’s representation in elite competitive positions.”
　　It is tempting to declare the Swedish policies regressive and hail the American system as superior. But that would be shortsighted. The Swedes can certainly take a lesson from the United States and look for ways to clear a path for their high-octane female careerists. But most women are not committed careerists. When the Pew Research Center recently asked American parents to identify their "ideal" life arrangement, 47 percent of mothers said they would prefer to work part-time and 20 percent said they would prefer not to work at all. Fathers answered differently: 75 percent preferred full-time work. Some version of the Swedish system might work well for a majority of American parents, but the United States is unlikely to fully embrace the Swedish model. Still, we can learn from their experience.