how business leaders get political power in 19th托福聽力原文翻譯及問題答案

how business leaders get political power in 19th托福聽力原文翻譯及問題答案

一、how business leaders get political power in 19th 托福聽力原文：

NARRATOR: Listen to part of a lecture in an American history class.

FEMALE PROFESSOR: We've been talking about the transformation... the industrialization of the United States economy in the nineteenth century. As the country shifted from an agricultural to an industrial base, political power shifted, too. Businesses became...a lot of power went, went, went, went from the government into, into the hands of business leaders.

So, why did this happen? How did an elite group, a few business giants, how did they end up dominating, controlling a number of important national industries in the last quarter of the nineteenth century. How did they get to be so dominant? How did they figure out... how did they take advantage of the new industrialization of American society?

Well consider the example of Andrew Carnegie and the steel industry.

We've already discussed the development of a national network, a, a national system of railroads. Well, this growth created a tremendous demand for steel; a national railroad system needs a lot of railroad tracks, right? And Carnegie seized the opportunity. He built the world's most modern steel mill. And he came up with a system of business or-organization called vertical integration.

Vertical integration just means that all... every single activity of a particular industry's processing is performed by a single company. In the case of the steel industry, this means the mining of iron ore, the transportation used to get ore from the mine to the mill, turning the ore into the steel, the manufacturing process, and sales. Carnegie controlled all of these; he practiced vertical integration on such a large scale that he practically owned the whole steel industry. This of course gave him a lot of political clout. Just a quick sketch, but you get the idea, right? Here’s another example—John D. Rockefeller.

Rockefeller owned an oil refinery, but he wanted to expand his business. Since there was lots of competition in the industry, he thought the smart way to go about it would be to buy his competitors' businesses. But, at the time, it was illegal for one corporation to control another. So, what he did was, he created an organizational structure called a trust.  A trust is—oh, well, I don't have to go into that now.

What matters is that a trust created a single, central management team, and that team directed the activities of what otherwise still appeared to be independent companies. This new, ah, legal entity worked so well that at one point, Rockefeller controlled 90 percent of the country's oil refineries, which again gave him lots of political power.

So you've got two different approaches to expanding a business, and both were quite effective. Of course, these weren't the only two examples; a number of big businesses run by powerful individuals developed across, oh, a wide range of industries, like railroads, food processing, electricity but what they all had in common was... the government let them operate pretty much how they wanted to.

So why did they do that? Why did the government keep such a low profile and allow individuals to gain so much control of the industries? Well, obviously, they had the wealth and the power to influence political leaders.

But also, the truth is that these industry leaders made a significant contribution. Their investments in technologies led to the development of many new production techniques, which strengthened the economy. And, many of them gave lots of money to charity; Andrew Carnegie was particularly admired for his generosity.

But there was one thing in particular that gave them power, and that's . . . they were beneficiaries, probably the biggest beneficiaries of, of, of, uh, a theory, a dominant political theory in the nineteenth century, something called laissez-faire doctrine. Laissez-faire roughly means “l(fā)et it alone,” and that pretty much summarized the theory's philosophy. The idea was that government should leave business alone, allow it to operate unregulated. Legislatures weren't supposed to pass a lot of laws, or worry about regulating business practices. When people did challenge a company's business conduct, I mean, I mean in court cases, well, the few laws that did exist were usually interpreted in favor of business interests.

But, over time, it started becoming increasingly obvious, and troubling to the public, that some of these big companies simply had too much control. There were criticisms that owners had too much opportunity to exploit workers, workers and consumers, because they could control prices and wages. And small business owners and small farmers couldn't compete.

So there was bad press, bad publicity. Enough that the government eventually felt it had to do something. So it passed two key pieces of legislation. One law was designed to regulate the prices set by the railroads. Another made it illegal for trusts to be used to limit competition. Both were aimed squarely at reducing the exclusive control that existed in some industries.

二、how business leaders get political power in 19th 托福聽力中文翻譯：

旁白：在美國歷史課上聽一節(jié)課的一部分。

女教授：我們一直在談?wù)撧D(zhuǎn)型。。。十九世紀(jì)美國經(jīng)濟(jì)的工業(yè)化。隨著國家從農(nóng)業(yè)基地轉(zhuǎn)向工業(yè)基地，政治權(quán)力也隨之轉(zhuǎn)移。企業(yè)變得。。。大量的權(quán)力從政府轉(zhuǎn)移到商業(yè)領(lǐng)袖手中。

那么，為什么會發(fā)生這種情況？一個精英集團(tuán)，幾個商業(yè)巨頭，如何在十九世紀(jì)的最后四分之一占據(jù)主導(dǎo)地位，控制著許多重要的民族工業(yè)。他們是怎么變得如此占主導(dǎo)地位的？他們怎么知道。。。他們是如何利用美國社會的新型工業(yè)化的？

我們以安德魯·卡內(nèi)基和鋼鐵業(yè)為例。

我們已經(jīng)討論了國家鐵路網(wǎng)的發(fā)展，國家鐵路系統(tǒng)。嗯，這種增長創(chuàng)造了對鋼鐵的巨大需求；一個國家的鐵路系統(tǒng)需要很多鐵軌，對嗎？卡內(nèi)基抓住了這個機(jī)會。他建造了世界上最現(xiàn)代化的鋼廠。他提出了一個叫做垂直整合的商業(yè)或組織體系。

垂直整合只是意味著所有。。。特定行業(yè)加工的每一項活動都由一家公司執(zhí)行。就鋼鐵行業(yè)而言，這意味著鐵礦石的開采、將礦石從礦山運(yùn)到工廠的運(yùn)輸、將礦石轉(zhuǎn)化為鋼鐵、制造過程和銷售?？▋?nèi)基控制了所有這些；他大規(guī)模實(shí)施垂直整合，幾乎擁有了整個鋼鐵行業(yè)。這當(dāng)然給了他很大的政治影響力。只是一個簡單的草圖，但你明白了，對吧？這是另一個約翰·D·洛克菲勒的例子。

洛克菲勒擁有一家煉油廠，但他想擴(kuò)大業(yè)務(wù)。由于該行業(yè)競爭激烈，他認(rèn)為明智的做法是收購競爭對手的業(yè)務(wù)。但是，在當(dāng)時，一家公司控制另一家公司是非法的。所以，他所做的是，他創(chuàng)建了一個叫做信托的組織結(jié)構(gòu)&nbsp；信任是哦，好吧，我現(xiàn)在不必再談這個了。

重要的是，信托公司創(chuàng)建了一個單一的中央管理團(tuán)隊，該團(tuán)隊負(fù)責(zé)管理看似獨(dú)立的公司的活動。這個新的，啊，法律實(shí)體運(yùn)作得如此之好，以至于洛克菲勒一度控制了該國90%的煉油廠，這再次給了他很大的政治權(quán)力。

所以你有兩種不同的方法來拓展業(yè)務(wù)，而且都非常有效。當(dāng)然，這不是僅有的兩個例子；許多由有權(quán)勢的個人經(jīng)營的大企業(yè)跨越了，哦，廣泛的行業(yè)，如鐵路、食品加工、電力，但他們的共同點(diǎn)是。。。政府讓他們按照自己的意愿運(yùn)作。

那他們?yōu)槭裁催@么做？為什么政府保持如此低調(diào)，并允許個人獲得如此多的行業(yè)控制權(quán)？很明顯，他們擁有財富和權(quán)力來影響政治領(lǐng)導(dǎo)人。

但事實(shí)是，這些行業(yè)領(lǐng)導(dǎo)者做出了重大貢獻(xiàn)。他們對技術(shù)的投資導(dǎo)致了許多新生產(chǎn)技術(shù)的發(fā)展，從而加強(qiáng)了經(jīng)濟(jì)。而且，他們中的許多人向慈善機(jī)構(gòu)捐贈了大量資金；安德魯·卡內(nèi)基（AndrewCarnegie）的慷慨尤其令人欽佩。

但有一件事給了他們力量，那就是。他們是受益者，可能是一種理論的最大受益者，一種十九世紀(jì)占主導(dǎo)地位的政治理論，一種叫做自由放任主義的理論。自由放任大致意味著“別管它”，這大致概括了該理論的哲學(xué)。當(dāng)時的想法是，政府應(yīng)該讓企業(yè)獨(dú)善其身，允許其不受監(jiān)管地運(yùn)營。立法機(jī)構(gòu)不應(yīng)該通過很多法律，也不應(yīng)該擔(dān)心監(jiān)管商業(yè)慣例。當(dāng)人們質(zhì)疑一家公司的商業(yè)行為時，我的意思是，我的意思是，在法庭案件中，確實(shí)存在的少數(shù)法律通常被解釋為有利于商業(yè)利益。

但是，隨著時間的推移，一些大公司的控制權(quán)太大，這一點(diǎn)開始變得越來越明顯，并讓公眾感到不安。有人批評業(yè)主有太多機(jī)會剝削工人、工人和消費(fèi)者，因?yàn)樗麄兛梢钥刂苾r格和工資。小企業(yè)主和小農(nóng)戶無法競爭。

所以有壞的新聞，壞的宣傳。足以讓政府最終感到必須采取行動。因此，它通過了兩項關(guān)鍵的立法。有一項法律是為了規(guī)范鐵路制定的價格。另一項法案規(guī)定，利用信托限制競爭是非法的。兩者都是為了減少

三、how business leaders get political power in 19th 托福聽力問題：

Q1:1.What is the lecture mainly about?

A. Ways that new managerial techniques hastened the industrialization of American society in the nineteenth century

B. Ways that the United States government tried to regulate business practices in the nineteenth century

C. Reasons that business leaders gained political power in the late nineteenth-century United States

D. A comparison of the management styles of Andrew Carnegie and John D. Rockefeller

Q2:2.Why does the professor discuss vertical integration?

A. To explain how Andrew Carnegie gained control of the steel industry

B. To describe the most typical organization for businesses in the nineteenth century

C. To explain how John D. Rockefeller organized the oil industry

D. To explain the origins of the business trust

Q3:3.In what two ways did business leaders make a positive contribution to the United States in the nineteenth century? Click on 2 answers.

A. They invested in new production technologies.

B. They raised wage levels.

C. They improved safety conditions.

D. They supported charitable causes.

Q4:4.According to the professor, what is the main reason that some businesses were able to become powerful during the nineteenth century?

A. The government assisted businesses when they had financial difficulties.

B. Taxation was based upon the profitability of a business.

C. The government did not impose many regulations on businesses.

D. Some government officials once held influential positions in large businesses.

Q5:5.Why did the government pass new laws aimed at businesses?

A. To correct mistakes made by the judicial system

B. To respond to complaints from the public

C. To increase employment rates

D. To increase tax revenue from large industries

Q6:6.What does the professor imply about the term “trust” when she says this:

A. She should not have mentioned the term.

B. It is unnecessary to explain the details of the term.

C. She wants the students to explain the term to her later.

D. She wants to discuss a different term.

四、how business leaders get political power in 19th 托福聽力答案：

A1:正確答案：C

A2:正確答案：A

A3:正確答案：AD

A4:正確答案：C

A5:正確答案：B

A6:正確答案：B

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