Lloyd Slocum was unemployed for 18 months, but like hundreds of thousands of Americans, he’s working part time this holiday shop

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问题     Lloyd Slocum was unemployed for 18 months, but like hundreds of thousands of Americans, he’s working part time this holiday shopping season, unloading trucks and stocking shelves for a Bealls store in Port St. Lucie, Fla.
    "It gives you something to look forward to," says Slocum, 29.
    He plans to use cash to buy his father a Christmas present and hopes to move on to a full-time position with Bealls/Burke’s stores, a Sunbelt chain.
    Black Friday, the official start of holiday shopping heat, also kicks off the less-celebrated season of the part-time worker. Retailers(零售商)alone are hiring about 5000,000 seasonal employees this year, most of whom are part time, according to the National Retail Federation. Retailers’ recent shift to opening on Thanksgiving or midnight on Black Friday has intensified the need for part-time workers.
    Holiday jobs offer financial and emotional lifeline for many of thenation’s jobless. They also point up a troubling reality: A near-record number of Americans are working part time throughout the year, even though they would prefer full-time jobs. It’s not just because of the sluggish economy(萧条的经济). Economists cite a broader, longer-term shift toward part-time work as employers cut expenses and more precisely match staffing with the ebbs and flows of customer demand.
    The number of part-timers who really want full-time positions—so-called involuntary part-time employees—has risen from 8.4 million in January to 8.9 million last month, according to theBureau of Labor Statistics. The total has hovered at 8. 5 million to 9 million since early 2009—double the pre-recession level.
    By contrast, the tally of unemployed Americans has stayed flat at about 13.9 million this year and is down from about 15 million in late 2009 as employers have added a modest 2 million or so jobs. The disparity underscores how the nation’s official 9% jobless rate doesn’t fully reflect the toll inflicted by a half-speed economic recovery.
The growing number of part-timers indicates that ______.

选项 A、there is a noticeable shift in attitude toward work
B、theunemployment rate has reached a record high
C、American economy is recovering unsatisfactorily
D、thenation’s official jobless rate is not reliable

答案C

解析 推断题。文章末段说因为自2009年底迄今,雇主们已经增加了两百万个工作岗位,美国官方统计的失业率9%应该不能完全反映受美国经济复苏速度过缓(仅达期望值的一半)影响造成的损失。因此C选项说美国的经济复苏未能达到期望值符合题意,为正确选项。而D选项意为“美国官方统计的失业率不可靠”,这显然是不对的。A选项在文中找不到根据。而B选项中的“reached a record high”(达到新高)显然和文章第五段第二行的“Anear-record number of Americans”(近乎新高的美国人数)有所出入,要知道这里的一词之差“near”成了出题的陷阱,所以在此提醒各位考生,做题时正确定位的同时,还须仔细甄别比对选项和原文才行,万不可粗心大意,造成不必要的失分,因为那样的失分将是非常可惜的。
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