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The relationship between formal education and economic growth in poor countries is widely misunderstood by economists and politi

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问题     The relationship between formal education and economic growth in poor countries is widely misunderstood by economists and politicians alike. Progress in both areas is undoubtedly necessary for the social, political and intellectual development of these and all other societies; however, the conventional view that education should be one of the very highest priorities for promoting rapid economic development in poor countries is wrong. We are fortunate that it is, because building new educational systems there and putting enough people through them to improve economic performance would require two or three generations. The findings of a research institution have consistently shown that workers in all countries can be trained on the job to achieve radical higher productivity and, as a result, radically higher standards of living.
    Ironically, the first evidence for this idea appeared in the United States. Not long ago, with the country entering a recession and Japan at its pre-bubble peak, the U. S. workforce was derided as poorly educated and one of the primary causes of the poor U. S. economic performance. Japan was, and remains, the global leader in automotive-assembly productivity. Yet the research revealed that the U. S. factories of Honda, Nissan, and Toyota achieved about 95 percent of the productivity of their Japanese counterparts as a result of the training that U. S. workers received on the job.
    More recently, while examining housing construction, the researchers discovered that illiterate, non-English-speaking Mexican workers in Houston, Texas, consistently met best-practice labor productivity standards despite the complexity of the building industry’s work.
    What is the real relationship between education and economic development? We have to suspect that continuing economic growth promotes the development of education even when governments don’t force it. After all, that’s how education got started. When our ancestors were hunters and gatherers 10, 000 years ago, they didn’t have time to wonder much about anything besides finding food. Only when humanity began to get its food in a more productive way was there time for other things.
    As education improved, humanity’s productivity potential increased as well. When the competitive environment pushed our ancestors to achieve that potential, they could in turn afford more education. This increasingly high level of education is probably a necessary, but not a sufficient, condition for the complex political systems required by advanced economic performance. Thus poor countries might not be able to escape their poverty traps without political changes that may be possible only with broader formal education. A lack of formal education, however, doesn’t constrain the ability of the developing world’s workforce to substantially improve productivity for the foreseeable future. On the contrary, constraints on improving productivity explain why education isn’t developing more quickly there than it is.
It is stated in Paragraph 1 that the construction of a new education system______
选项 A、challenges economists and politicians.
B、takes efforts of generations.
C、demands priority from the government.
D、requires sufficient labor force.
答案B
解析 事实细节题。在第一段作者主要谈论了靠优先发展教育来促进经济发展是错误的看法，而世界各国的工人经过了劳动培训可以获取高生产率进而带来更高的生活水平。解答细节题时同样明显背离中心的选项可首先排除，即先可排除A和C：依据第一段的倒数第二句because building new educational systems there and putting enough people through them toimprove economic performance would require two or three generations，由此可知建立教育体系在当前是不可能，而这种建立需要几代人的努力才能实现，故选B。
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