Essay #17.  549   

Many people believe that becausewages are lower in developing countries than in developed countries,competition from developing countries in goods traded internationally will sooneliminate large numbers of jobs in developed countries.  Currently, developed countries' advancedtechnology results in higher productivity, which accounts for their higherwages.  Advanced technology is beingtransferred ever more speedily across borders, but even with the latesttechnology, productivity and wages in developing countries will remain lowerthan in developed countries for many years because developed countries havebetter infrastructure and better-educated workers.  When productivity in a developing countrydoes catch up, experience suggests that wages there will rise.  Some individual firms in developing countrieshave raised their productivity but kept their wages (which are influenced byaverage productivity in the country's economy) low.  However, in a developing country's economy asa whole, productivity improvements in goods traded internationally are likely tocause an increase in wages.  Furthermore,if wages are not allowed to rise, the value of the country's currency willappreciate, which (from the developed countries' point of view) is theequivalent of increased wages in the developing country.  And although in the past a few countries havedeliberately kept their currencies undervalued, that is now much harder to doin a world where capital moves more freely.

Question #56.

The primary purpose of the passageis to

(A) identify the origin of a commonmisconception

(B) discuss the implications of agenerally accepted principle

(C) present information relevant inevaluating a commonly held belief

(D) defend a controversialassertion against a variety of counterarguments

(E) explain under what circumstancesa well-known phenomenon occurs

Essay #18.  560   

A recent study has provided cluesto predator-prey dynamics in the late Pleistocene era.  Researchers compared the number of toothfractures in present-day carnivores with tooth fractures in carnivores thatlived 36,000 to 10,000 years ago and that were preserved in the Rancho La Breatar pits in Los Angeles.  The breakagefrequencies in the extinct species were strikingly higher than those in thepresent-day species.

In considering possibleexplanations for this finding, the researchers dismissed demographic biasbecause older individuals were not overrepresented in the fossil samples.  They rejected preservational bias because atotal absence of breakage in two extinct species demonstrated that thefractures were not the result of abrasion within the pits.  They ruled out local bias because breakagedata obtained from other Pleistocene sites were similar to the La Breadata.  The explanation they consider mostplausible is behavioral differences between extinct and present-day carnivores--inparticular, more contact between the teeth of predators and the bones of preydue to more thorough consumption of carcasses by the extinct species.  Such thorough carcass consumption implies tothe researchers either that prey availability was low, at least seasonally, orthat there was intense competition over kills and a high rate of carcass theftdue to relatively high predator densities.

Question #59.  560-01  (24039-!-item-!-188;#058&000560-01)

The primary purpose of the passageis to

(A) present several explanationsfor a well-known fact

(B) suggest alternative methods forresolving a debate

(C) argue in favor of acontroversial theory

(D) question the methodology usedin a study

(E) discuss the implications of aresearch finding

紧邻的两道prep文章主旨题，第一题选C不选implication，第二题选了implication。不明白？？？

不懂implication怎么用的？求指教