双语阅读英语外刊精讲：未来的美国(附音频)

2018-10-25 12:05:57来源：酷学英语

　　双语阅读是英语学习爱好者的天堂，在双语阅读里，不仅可以了解英美当地文化、习俗，还可以掌握地道英语表达，提高英语综合能力。本期主题：新东方刘琦老师为大家带来《双语阅读英语外刊精讲：未来的美国(附音频)》，与大家一起分享。更多双语阅读资料，可点击查看：《双语阅读：英语外刊阅读精讲汇总》

　　The future of America

　　Bland comfort

　　Why Americans need to beware of becoming complacent

　　America is the land of opportunity, they say. Inspired by the ambition of its Founding Fathers, its people revel in their dynamism. Diversity is their strength, as captured in the national motto- E pluribus unum (“out of many, one”). Americans embrace change and reinvention, and this, they like to think, sets their country apart from Europe or Asia.

　　Tyler Cowen, an economist, believes that this ideal is self-indulgent nonsense. America is losing its vim, he says, and Americans are settling into stagnation. In his new book, “The Complacent Class”, Mr Cowen shows not only that Americans move less now, crossing state lines at around half the average rate that they did between 1948 and 1971, and stay longer in their jobs, but American entrepreneurialism is floundering too. Markets are becoming more concentrated. Fewer new companies are being started, and many struggle to grow. Even in the vaunted technology sector the creation and expansion of new firms peaked in 2000. Sluggish growth in productivity and living standards is making America more like Europe and Japan.

　　On the surface, Americans enjoy more choice than ever before. From over 1400 types of music on Spotify, a music – streaming service, to a swipeable menu of dating options, and rare books available at the click of a button, consumers have never had it so good. But there is a dark side to being able to select the perfect product, neighbourhood or partner. Freedom to choose means that it is ever easier for people to marry, live near of school their children with other people of the same kind. In the South, the proportion of black students in majority-white schools was 44% in 1988; in 2011 that figure was 23%- lower than in 1968. Segregation by income has risen dramatically in the past few decades. The American elite might celebrate diversity in dinner-table conversation, but in practice Americans are cocooning themselves in enclaves of like-minded folk.

双语阅读：英语外刊阅读精讲(附音频)