having more of their own children. A number of them have tried, some more successfully than others. But it is not a simple matter of offering financial incentives or providing more child care. Modern urban life in rich countries is not well adapted to large families. Women find it hard to combine family and career. They often compromise by having just one child.
[J] And if fertility in ageing countries does not pick up? It will not be the end of the world, at least not for quite a while yet, but the world will slowly become a different place. Older societies may be less innovative and more strongly disinclined to take risks than younger ones. By 2025 at the latest, about half the voters in America and most of those in western European countries will be over 50—and older people turn out to vote in much greater numbers than younger ones. Academic studies have found no evidence so far that older voters have used their power at the ballot box to push for policies that specifically benefit them, though if in future there are many more of them they might start doing so. [K] Nor is there any sign of the intergenerational warfare predicted in the 1990s. After all, older people themselves mostly have families. In a recent study of parents and grown-up children in 11 European countries, Karsten
Hank of Mannheim University found that 85% of them lived within 25km of each other and the majority of them were in touch at least once a week. [L] Even so, the shift in the centre of gravity to older age groups is bound to have a profound effect on societies, not just economically and politically but in all sorts of other ways too. Richard Jackson and Neil Howe of America's CSIS, in a thoughtful book called The Graying of the Great Powers, argue that, among other things, the ageing of the developed countries will have a number of serious security implications. [M] For example, the shortage of young adults is likely to make countries more reluctant to commit the few they have to military service. In the decades to 2050, America will find itself playing an ever-increasing role in the developed world's defence effort. Because America's population will still be growing when that of most other developed countries is shrinking, America will be the only developed country that still matters geopolitically (地缘政治上).
Ask me in 2020 [N] There is little that can be done to stop population ageing, so the world will have to live with it. But some of the consequences can be alleviated. Many experts now believe that given the right policies, the effects, though grave, need not be catastrophic. Most countries have recognised the need to do something and are beginning to act. [O] But even then there is no guarantee that their efforts will work. What is happening now is historically unprecedented.
Ronald Lee, director of the Centre on the Economics and Demography of Ageing at the University of California, Berkeley, puts it briefly and clearly: “We don't really know what population ageing will be like, because nobody has done it yet.”
注意：此部分试题请在答题卡 2 上作答。
46. Employers should realise it is important to keep older workers in the workforce.
47. A recent study found that most old people in some European countries had regular weekly contact with their adult children. 48. Few governments in rich countries have launched bold reforms to tackle the problem of population ageing.
49. In a report published some 20 years ago, the sustainability of old-age pension systems in most countries was called into doubt.
50. Countries that have a shortage of young adults will be less willing to send them to war.
51. One-child families are more common in ageing societies due to the stress of urban life and the difficulties of balancing family and career.
52. A series of books, mostly authored by Americans, warned of conflicts between the older and younger generations.
53. Compared with younger ones, older societies tend to be less innovative and take fewer risks.
54. The best solution to the pension crisis is to postpone the retirement age.
55. Immigration as a means to boost the shrinking labour force may meet with resistance in some rich countries.
Section C Directions: There are 2 passages in this section. Each passage is followed by some questions or unfinished statements. For each of them there are four choices marked A), B), C) and D). You should decide on the best choice and mark the corresponding letter on Answer Sheet 2 with a single line through the centre.
Passage One Questions 56 to 60 are based on the following passage. For most of the 20th century, Asia asked itself what it could learn from the modern, innovating West. Now the question must be reversed: what can the West's overly indebted and sluggish (经济滞长的) nations learn from a flourishing Asia? Just a few decades ago, Asia's two giants were stagnating (停滞不前) under faulty economic ideologies. However, once China began embracing free-market reforms in the 1980s, followed by India in the 1990s, both countries achieved rapid growth. Crucially, as they opened up their markets, they balanced market economy with
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