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- 2023-08-16 发布于四川
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[考研类试卷]考研英语(阅读)模拟试卷58
Part A
Directions: Read the following four texts. Answer the questions below each text by
choosing A, B, C or D. (40 points)
0 Hostess Brands is not dead just yet, but the prospects for the companys survival are
now dim at best. Hostess—which still makes iconic food products like Twinkies and
Ding Dongs—filed for bankruptcy back in January for the second time in eight years, in
an attempt to get out from under a pile of debt and labor obligations. But last week, after
Hostess put in place a contract that the bakers union said would end up cutting wages
and benefits between twenty-seven and thirty-two per cent, that union went on strike.
Hostess claims the strike has irreparably damaged production and made it impossible for
it to continue operating. As a result, on Friday the company asked a bankruptcy judge to
allow it to liquidate the company.
Management, of course, blames the companys demise on the greedy, unreasonable
unions. But, while the strike may well have sent Hostess over the edge, the hard truth is
that it probably should have gone out of business a long time ago. The company has been
steadily losing money, and market share, for years. And its core problem has not been
excessively high compensation costs or pension contributions. Its core problem has been
that the market for its products changed, but it did not. The simple truth is that this kind
of failure is regularly found in the creative destruction process.
The problem, of course, is that that destruction is going to make the lives of thousands
of workers upside down. And to the extent, then, that Hostesss demise shows us
something important about the plight of organized labor today, its not that greedy
workers have brought on their own demise. Its rather that one of organized labors
biggest challenges over the past four decades has been that union strength was
concentrated in industries and among companies that, though once
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