Inflation isn’t new, but price rises can still shock. I recently holidayed in the Hamptons, a tony beach area outside New York,

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问题     Inflation isn’t new, but price rises can still shock. I recently holidayed in the Hamptons, a tony beach area outside New York, where I was stunned to pay $800 for a single shopping cart of groceries. Wealthy locals and vacation shoppers notice, but seem not to curb their spending. Everyone else is travelling an hour or more to get groceries outside the resort areas, ordering dry goods from Costco and growing their own produce.
    This story is extreme, but by no means a one-off. To the extent that the wealthy in the US are not yet cutting back on spending, they may be an important and under-explored factor driving the inflation felt by all.
    The top two-fifths of income distribution in the US accounts for 60 per cent of consumer spending, while the bottom two-fifths accounts for a mere 22 per cent, according to 2020 BLS statistics.
    Amazon’s Jeff Bezos can build a half-billion-dollar yacht, and it doesn’t change life for anyone but him. But when the top quintile of Americans as a whole enjoy 80 per cent of the wealth effect from rising stock and home values, I suspect it starts to have a real impact on inflation, and on the overall structure of our economy, which over the course of the past 30 years of real falling interest rates has become highly financialised.
    The US housing market is the best example of the economic and social downsides of extremely financialized growth. Historically, high home prices—which are in part a result of more cash buyers and investors in the market, as well as zoning restrictions and financing trends that favor the rich—mean more people are renting. Rents today are across most of the country.
    The people who tend to rent are those least likely to be able to pay the higher prices. According to 2021 Pew Data, 60 per cent of renters are in the lower quartile of American income. Meanwhile, the Biden White House is doing what it can to buffer inflationary pain for working people. It has been releasing strategic petroleum reserves in a partly successful effort to lower prices at the pump, extending pandemic-era caps on some student loan payments and pushing for antitrust action in areas where corporate concentration may be responsible for some inflationary pressure.
    But more changes are needed. The success of corporate lobbyists in overturning efforts to roll back carried interest loopholes are shameful. Student debt forgiveness—no matter how generous it is—will not change the fact that the cost of four years of private university in the US is nearly double the median family income. Housing markets continue to cry out for major reform.
It can be inferred that the US Administration should________.

选项 A、make a difference to inflation and housing markets
B、crack down on criminal acts of corporate lobbyists
C、continue to implement student debt forgiveness
D、change the educational system of private university

答案A

解析 推断题。根据题干可定位至第七段。A项对应第一句But more changes are needed(但还需要更多的改变)和最后一句Housing markets continue to cry out for major reform(住房市场仍急需重大改革),该项属于解释转述,故正确。B项与第二句The success of corporate lobbyists in overturning efforts to roll back carried interest loopholes are shameful(企业说客成功地推翻了堵住附带收益漏洞的努力,这是可耻的)相悖,该项属于过度推断,故排除。C项与第三句前半句Student debt forgiveness—no matter how generous it is (学生债务减免——无论多么慷慨)相悖,减免也无济于事,该项属于是非混淆,故排除。D项与第三句后半句will not change the fact that the cost of four years of private university in the US is nearly double the median family income (都不会改变这样一个事实:美国私立大学四年的花费几乎是家庭收入中位数的两倍)相悖,该项属于过度推断,故排除。
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