2024年3月11日发(作者：)

1。

Passage One

Questions 51 to 56 are based on the following passage.

Only two countries in the advanced world provide no guarantee for paid leave

from work to care for a newborn child. Last spring one of the two， Australia， gave

up the dubious distinction by establishing paid family leave starting in 2011. I

wasn’t surprised when this didn’t make the news here in the United

States—we’re now the only wealthy country without such a policy.

The United States does have one explicit family policy， the Family and

Medical Leave Act， passed in 1993. It entitles workers to as much as 12 weeks’

unpaid leave for care of a newborn or dealing with a family medical problem。

Despite the modesty of the benefit, the Chamber of Commerce and other business

groups fought it bitterly， describing it as ”government-run personnel

management" and a ”dangerous precedent”。 In fact， every step of the way, as

(usually) Democratic leaders have tried to introduce work—family balance

measures into the law， business groups have been strongly opposed.

As Yale law professor Anne Alstott argues, justifying parental support depends

on defining the family as a social good that， in some sense, society must pay for。

In her book No Exit： What Parents Owe Their Children and What Society Owes

Parents, she argues that parents are burdened in many ways in their lives: there

is ”no exit" when it comes to children。 ”Society expects—and needs—parents

to provide their children with continuity of care， meaning the intensive, intimate

care that human beings need to develop their intellectual， emotional and moral

capabilities. And society expects—and needs—parents to persist in their roles for

18 years, or longer if needed."

While most parents do this out of love， there are public penalties for not

providing care. What parents do， in other words， is of deep concern to the state,

for the obvious reason that caring for children is not only morally urgent but

essential for the future of society. The state recognizes this in the large body of

family laws that govern children’ welfare, yet parents receive little help in

meeting the life—changing obligations society imposes. To classify parenting as a

personal choice for which there is no collective responsibility is not merely to

ignore the social benefits of good parenting； really, it is to steal those benefits

because they accrue (不断积累) to the whole of society as today's children become

tomorrow's productive citizenry （公民）。 In fact, by some estimates, the value of

parental investments in children, investments of time and money （including lost

wages）, is equal to 20-30% of gross domestic product. If these investments

generate huge social benefits—as they clearly do—the benefits of providing more

social support for the family should be that much clearer。

注意：此部分试题请在答题卡2上作答.

52。 What do we learn about paid family leave from the first paragraph？