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  3. An industrial society, especially one as centralized and concentrated as that of Britain, is heavily dependent on certain essent

An industrial society, especially one as centralized and concentrated as that of Britain, is heavily dependent on certain essent

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问题    An industrial society, especially one as centralized and concentrated as that of Britain, is heavily dependent on certain essential services: for instance, electricity supply, water, rail and road transport, the harbors. The area of dependency has widened to include removing rubbish, hospital and ambulance services, and, as the economy develops, central computer and information services as well. If any of these services ceases to operate, the whole economic system is in danger. It is this economic inter-dependency of the economic system which makes the power of trade unions (工会) such an important issue. Single trade unions have the ability to cut off many countries’ economic blood supply.
   This can happen more easily in Britain than in some other countries, in part because the labor force is highly organized. About 55 percent of British workers belong to unions, compared to under a quarter in the United States.
   For historical reasons, Britain’ s unions have tended to develop along trade (行业) and occupational lines, rather than on an industry-by-industry basis, which makes a wages policy, democracy in industry and the improvement of procedures for fixing wage levels difficult to achieve.
   There are considerable strains and tensions in the trade union movement, some of them arising from their outdated and inefficient structure. Some unions have lost many members because of their industrial changes.
   Others are involved in arguments about who should represent workers in new trades. Unions for skilled trades are separated from general unions, which means that different levels of wages for certain jobs are often a source of bad feelings between unions. In traditional trades which are being pushed out of existence by advancing technologies, unions can fight for their members’ disappointing jobs to the point where the jobs of other union members are threatened or destroyed. The printing of newspapers both in the United States and in Britain has frequently been halted by the efforts of printers to hold on to their traditional highly-paid jobs.
   Trade unions have problems of internal communication just as managers in companies do, problems which multiply in very large unions or in those which bring workers in very different industries together into a single general union. Some trade union officials have to be re-elected regularly: others are elected, or even appointed, for life. Trade union officials have to work with a system of "shop stewards" (工厂工人代表) in many unions, "shop stewards" being workers elected by other workers as their representatives at factory or work level.
Why is the trade union power crucial in Britain?
选项 A、Because the unions offered a large number of essential services.
B、Because the economy is closely interdependent.
C、Because the unions have been set up for a long time.
D、Because unions in Britain outnumber elsewhere.
答案B
解析 由题干中的“the trade union power crucial in Britain”可以定位到文中第一段的倒数第二句话。该句提到“正是经济体系内部的这种相互依赖才会使工会的权力成为如此重要的一个问题”。故选B。
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