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  3. Defenders of special protective labor legislation for women often maintain that eliminating such laws would destroy the fruits o

Defenders of special protective labor legislation for women often maintain that eliminating such laws would destroy the fruits o

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问题     Defenders of special protective labor legislation for women often maintain that eliminating such laws would destroy the fruits of a century-long struggle for the protection of women workers. Even a brief examination of the historic practice of courts and employers would show that the fruit of such laws has been bitter; they are, in practice more of a curse than a blessing.
    Sex-defined protective laws have often been based on stereotypical assumptions concerning women’s needs and abilities, and employers have frequently used them as legal excuses for discriminating against women. After the Second World War, for example, businesses and government sought to persuade women to vacate jobs in factories, thus making room in the labor force for returning veterans. The revival or passage of state laws limiting the daily or weekly work hours of women conveniently accomplished this. Employers had only to declare that overtime hours were a necessary condition of employment or promotion in their factory, and women could be quite legally fired, refused jobs, or kept at low wage levels, all in the name of "protecting" their health. By validating such laws when they are challenged by lawsuits, the courts have colluded over the years in establishing different, less advantageous employment terms for women than for men, thus reducing women’ s competitiveness on the job market. At the same time, even the most well-intentioned lawmakers, courts, and employers have often been blind to the real needs of women. The lawmakers and the courts continue to permit employers to offer employee health insurance plans that cover all known human medical disabilities except those relating to pregnancy and childbirth.
    Finally, labor laws protecting only special groups are often ineffective at protecting the workers who are actually in the workplace. Some chemicals, for example, pose reproductive risks for women of childbearing years; manufacturers using the chemicals comply with laws protecting women against these hazards by refusing to hire them. Thus the sex-defined legislation protects the hypothetical female worker, but has no effect whatever on the safety of any actual employee. The health risks to male employees in such industries cannot be negligible, since chemicals toxic enough to cause birth defects in fetuses or sterility in women are presumably harmful to the human metabolism. Protective laws aimed at changing production materials or techniques in order to reduce such hazards would benefit all employees without discriminating against any.
    In sum, protective labor laws for women are discriminatory and do not meet their intended purpose. Legislators should recognize that women are in the work force to stay, and that their needs—good health care, a decent wage, and a safe workplace—are the needs of all workers. Laws that ignore these facts violate women’ s rights for equal protection in employment.
According to the passage, special labor laws protecting women workers tend generally to have which of the following effects?
选项 A、They tend to modify the stereotypes employees often hold concerning women.
B、They increase the advantage to employers of hiring men instead of women, making it less likely that women will be hired.
C、They decrease the likelihood that employers will offer more protection to women workers than that which is absolutely required by law.
D、They increase the tendency of employers to deny health insurance and disability plans to women workers.
答案B
解析 对于妇女的惯常思维没有因为法律而变化，所以A项不正确。根据第二段第一句话可知B项正确。从常识判断，雇主是不会主动提出提高妇女权益保护的，所以他们的保护不会比立法前多，故C项是不正确的。D项从文中不能推断出。
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