Question

Homeownership has let us down. For generations, Americans believed that owning a home was undoubtedly good. Our political leaders hammered home the point. Franklin Roosevelt held that a country of homeowners was “unconquerable.” Homeownership could even save babies, save children, save families and save America. A house with a lawn and a fence wasn’t just a nice place to live in or a risk-free investment; it was a way to shape a nation. No wonder leaders of all political types wanted to spend more than $100 billion a year on subsidies（補(bǔ)助）and tax breaks to encourage people to buy.

But the dark side of homeownership is now all too apparent: Indeed, easy lending stimulated（刺激）by the cult of homeownership may have triggered（引起）the financial crisis. Housing remains a drag on the economy. Existing-home sales in April dropped 27% from the previous month, worsening fears of a double-dip. And all that is just the obvious tale of a housing bubble and what happened when it popped. The real story is deeper and darker still.

For the better part of a century, politics, industry and culture lined up to create a fetish of the idea of buying a house. Homeownership has done plenty of good over the decades; it has provided stability to tens of millions of families. Yet by idealizing the act of buying a home, we have ignored the downsides. In the bubble years, lending standards slipped dramatically, allowing many Americans to put far too much of their income into paying for their housing. And we ignored longer-term phenomena too. Homeownership contributed to the hollowing out of cities and kept renters out of the best neighborhoods. It fed America’s overuse of energy and oil. It made it more difficult for those who had lost a job to find another. Perhaps worst of all, it helped us become casually self-deceiving: By telling ourselves that homeownership was a pathway to wealth and stable communities and better test scores, we avoided dealing with these frightening issues head-on.

Now, as the U.S. recovers from the biggest housing bust（破產(chǎn)）since the Great Depression, it is time to rethink how realistic our expectations of homeownership are—and how much money we want to spend chasing them. Many argue that homeownership should not be a goal pursued at all costs.

1.Political leaders wanted to spend money encouraging people to buy houses because______.

A．owning a home was undoubtedly good

B．homeownership could shape a country

C．houses could save families and America

D．homeownership was unconquerable

2.The underlined sentence in Para. 2 means ______.

A．homeownership has quite a lot of bad effects

B．there might be another housing breakdown in the U.S.

C．the existing-home sales will keep decreasing in the U.S.

D．the result of homeownership is much worse than it appears

3.It can be inferred from Para. 3 that ______.

A．Americans choose to live out of urban areas

B．it is the way to wealth to have one’s own house

C．it is hard for Americans to get a home loan

D．homeownership has made many people out of work

4.What is the author’s attitude towards homeownership?

A．Cautious.          B．Ambiguous.        C．Favorable.         D．Optimistic.

 

Answer 1

【答案】

63-66 BDAA

1.B

2.D

3.A

4.A

【解析】

試題分析：

1.B 細(xì)節(jié)題。根據(jù)第一段后三行it was a way to shape a nation. No wonder leaders of all political types wanted to spend more than $100 billion a year on subsidies（補(bǔ)助）and tax breaks to encourage people to buy.說明homeownership是如此的重要，甚至能夠塑造一個國家，故B正確。

2.D 推理題。根據(jù)本段后4行Existing-home sales in April dropped 27% from the previous month, worsening fears of a double-dip. And all that is just the obvious tale of a housing bubble and what happened when it popped. The real story is deeper and darker still.說明現(xiàn)在的homeownership已經(jīng)給社會經(jīng)濟(jì)帶來了很多負(fù)面的影響，引起了經(jīng)濟(jì)危機(jī)，所引起的問題要比表面上更加嚴(yán)重，故D正確。

3.A 推斷題。根據(jù)第三段7,8行Homeownership contributed to the hollowing out of cities and kept renters out of the best neighborhoods.說明很多美國人都走出了城市，住到了鄉(xiāng)下去。故A說法正確。

4.A 推理題。作者在文章中客觀的講述了homeownership的好處以及給我們的社會帶來的不好的地方，使用他對于homeownership的態(tài)度是很謹(jǐn)慎小心的。故A說法正確。

考點：考查了經(jīng)濟(jì)類短文閱讀

點評：本文客觀地講述了homeownership給我們帶來的好處與壞處，講述了homeownership的重要性。本文的難點在于考生對于話題內(nèi)容的不熟悉，不容易完全理解整個文章。對于推理題的考查較多，在審題的時候要抓住題目的關(guān)鍵所在，結(jié)合各選項中的信息詞做適當(dāng)?shù)乇葘Γ�再從文章上下文的含義出發(fā)，做出準(zhǔn)確細(xì)致的判斷。