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Made in the USA: An Export Boom

In his State of the Union address two years ago, President Obama argued that in order to recover from the economic recession, one of the few things the U．S. needed to do was to export more goods around the world. That night, the president unveiled a new goal: to double U．S. exports over the next five years. It would be an increase that the president said would “support two million jobs in America.”

Most economists dismissed the promise at the time as something unrealistic, but two years later, the U．S. is on pace to meet that goal. American exports are up 34 percent since the president gave that speech, and the number continues to rise.

Competitive In A Global Market

Marlin Steel, a metal working business in Baltimore, makes parts that ship all across the world.“ We export to 36 countries，” owner Drew Greenblatt tells All Things Considered Host Guy Raz. “We're working around the clock, and we're growing.”

It's not just advanced manufacturing exports on the rise, but pork, cattle and all kinds of agricultural exports are up as well. Even American craft beer has found an export market.

Flying Dog CEO Jim Caruso says that increasingly, people all over the world are trying the beer from the Maryland-based brewery. Caruso says，“Even in those top beer-producing countries, a competitive American product is finding a market.”

Services Are Exports, Too

Another place exports are coming from is New York City—in particular, the 30^th floor of a Manhattan skyscraper on 5^th Avenue and 52^nd Street. That's where the consulting firm Kurt Solomon lies. It doesn't actually produce a product for export; it provides management advice and strategy.

“Four out of every five Americans is now employed in the service industry，” the nation's top trade official, Ron Kirk says, “Services are a significant part of our exports, and make up about a quarter of our exported goods.” These services can include everything from legal consulting, finance, information technology and even engineering.

And There Are Other Factors

So why has there been an increase of more than 30 percent for exports in almost everything? Part of the increase, at least for the manufacturing side, is due to better technology, says Tyler Cowen, an economist. “A lot of it is being driven by smart machines，” he tells Raz，“The U．S. has high wage rates, which is a disadvantage, but if machines are doing a lot of the work, that doesn't matter.”

China factors a lot in America's export economy, too. “Wages in China have been going up as the country becomes more productive. Thus China is losing the cheap labor advantage it has held for some time.” Cowen says.

Will Jobs Grow, too?

“Companies have become more productive by dismissing workers and lowering costs.” Cowen says, “So I don't view exporting as a way of creating a very large number of jobs, but it will create more profits.”

So not every business or worker is necessarily benefiting from the export boom in the U．S., and Cowen says that could ultimately lead to a polarization(两极) of economic outcomes.

Made In the USA: An Export Boom

根据短文内容,从短文后的选项中选出能填入空白处的最佳选项.选项中有多余选项 

Giving up smoking will most likely add seven years to one’s life. While many people try to give up and fail, it is not an impossible task. Follow these five tips, and you will be well on your way to giving up smoking.

1.Success in all fields of life begins with firm determination. If you are weak in willpower, you can never do anything. However, if you make up your mind, once and for all, that you are giving up the habit, whenever you want a smoke, you will remember your promise and not give in.

2.If you sit around doing nothing there is a higher chance that you will light up a cigarette and relax. Fill your spare time with sports and energetic activities. Try to feel how good it is to get your blood circulating and to breathe in air deeply. If you are not the athletic type, then walking will have the same benefit as other kinds of sports.

3.If going to a bar means that you are going to have a drink and then light up, maybe it is better to avoid that place for the time being. Once you have truly stopped smoking and you feel how good it is, you can go anywhere and not be tempted. But while you are in the transition phase, it is better to carefully choose where you will spend your recreational time.

4.Whenever you get a desire to put a cigarette in you mouth, replace it with something that will help you rather than harm you. Drinking small amounts of water throughout the day is not only a good way to help you give up smoking, but it is also a great way to stay healthy. You should drink eight glasses of water per day, if you can. If you need to put something solid in your mouth, then eat a piece of fruit.

5.Tell them that you are giving up smoking for health reasons. Your true friends will support you and not offer you cigarettes. Your family and loved ones will similarly support your efforts and help you to avoid situations where you may feel you have to smoke because of social pressure.

There are three branches of medicine. One is called "doctor medicine," or "scientific medicine." Scientific doctors try to observe sicknesses, look for logical patterns, and then find out how the human body works. From there they figure out what treatments may work. This kind of medicine is believed to date from the 4th century BC. Although nowadays it is successful, in the ancient world this approach probably did not cure many patients.
A second kind of medicine is called "natural cures," or "folk medicine," in which less educated people try to cure sicknesses with various herbs. These folk healers also use observation and logic, but they are not so aware of it. They try things until they find something that seems to work, and then they keep doing that. Folk medicine flourished（繁荣） long before the development of scientific medicine and was more successful in ancient times than doctor medicine.
The third kind is called "health spas," or "faith healing." Sometimes this may be as simple as touching the holy man and being immediately healed. Other times, a magician may make you a magic charm, or say a spell, to cure you. Some religious groups organize special healing shrines（圣坛） for the sick. In these places people rest, get plenty of sleep, eat healthy food, drink water instead of wine, and exercise in various ways. They also talk to the priests and pray to the gods. If you are feeling depressed or you have been working too hard, going to these places may be just the right thing to make you feel better.
【小题1】Doctor medicine __________.

We are all interested in equality, but while some people try to protect the school and examination system in the name of equality, others, still in the name of equality, want only to destroy it.

Any society which is interested in equality of opportunity and standards of achievement must regularly test its pupils. The standards may be changed — no examination is perfect — but to have no tests or examination would mean the end of equality and of standards. There are groups of people who oppose this view and who do not believe either in examinations or in any controls in schools or on teachers. This would mean that everything would depend on luck since every pupil would depend on the efficiency the values and the purpose of each teacher.

Without examinations, employers will look for employees from the highly respected schools and from families known to them — a form of favouritism will replace equality at the moment. The bright child from an ill-respected school can show certificates to prove he or she is suitable for a job, while the lack of certificate indicates the unsuitability of a dull child attending a well-respected school. This defense of excellence and opportunity would disappear if examinations were taken away, and the bright child from a poor family would be a prisoner of his or her school’s reputation, unable to compete for employment with the child from the favoured school.

The opponents of the examination system suggest that examinations are an evil force because they show differences between pupils. According to these people, there must be no special, different, academic class. They have even suggested that there should be no form of difference in sport or any other area: all jobs or posts should be filled by unsystematic selection. The selection would be made by people who themselves are probably selected by some computer.

1. The word “favouritism” in paragraph 3 is used to describe the phenomenon that         .

2.. What would happen if examinations were taken away according to the author?

3.. The opponents of the examination system will agree that           .

4.. The passage mainly focuses on            .

Made In The USA: An Export Boom

In his State of the Union address two years ago, President Obama argued that in order to recover from the economic recession, one of the few things the U．S. needed to do was to export more goods around the world. That night, the president unveiled a new goal: to double U．S. exports over the next five years. It would be an increase that the president said would “support two million jobs in America.”

Most economists dismissed the promise at the time as something unrealistic, but two years later, the U．S. is on pace to meet that goal. American exports are up 34 percent since the president gave that speech, and the number continues to rise.

Competitive In A Global Market

Marlin Steel, a metal working business in Baltimore, makes parts that ship all across the world. “We export to 36 countries，” owner Drew Greenblatt tells All Things Considered Host Guy Raz. “We're working around the clock, and we're growing.”

It's not just advanced manufacturing exports on the rise, but pork, cattle and all kinds of agricultural exports are up as well. Even American craft beer has found an export market.

Flying Dog CEO Jim Caruso says that increasingly, people all over the world are trying the beer from the Maryland-based brewery. Caruso says，“Even in those top beer-producing countries, a competitive American product is finding a market.”

Services Are Exports, Too

Another place exports are coming from is New York City—in particular, the 30th floor of a Manhattan skyscraper on 5th Avenue and 52nd Street. That's where the consulting firm Kurt Solomon lies. It doesn't actually produce a product for export; it provides management advice and strategy.

“Four out of every five Americans is now employed in the service industry，” the nation's top trade official, Ron Kirk says, “Services are a significant part of our exports, and make up about a quarter of our exported goods.” These services can include everything from legal consulting, finance, information technology and even engineering.

And There Are Other Factors

So why has there been an increase of more than 30 percent for exports in almost everything? Part of the increase, at least for the manufacturing side, is due to better technology, says Tyler Cowen, an economist. “A lot of it is being driven by smart machines，” he tells Raz，“The U．S. has high wage rates, which is a disadvantage, but if machines are doing a lot of the work, that doesn't matter.”

China factors a lot in America's export economy, too. “Wages in China have been going up as the country becomes more productive. Thus China is losing the cheap labor advantage it has held for some time.” Cowen says.

Will Jobs Grow, too?

“Companies have become more productive by dismissing workers and lowering costs.” Cowen says. “So I don't view exporting as a way of creating a very large number of jobs, but it will create more profits.”

So not every business or worker is necessarily benefiting from the export boom in the U．S., and Cowen says that could ultimately lead to a polarization (两极) of economic outcomes.

Made In the USA: An Export Boom