Confused about OG-72

lenghong

Large national budget deficits do not cause large trade deficts. If they did, countries with the largest budget deficits would also have the largest trade deficits. in fact, when defict figures are adjusted so that different countries are reliably comparable to each other, there is no such correlation.

If the statements above are all true, which of the following can properly be inferred on the basis of them?

A Countries with large national budget deficts tend to restrict foreign trade.

B Reliable comaprisons of the deficts figures of one country with those of another are impossbile.

C Redusing a  country's national budget deficit will not necessarily result in a lowering of any

trade deficit that country may have

D When countries are ordered from largest to smallest in terms of population, the smallest countries generally have the smallest budget and trade deficit

E Countries with the largest trade deficits never have similarly large national budget deficits

Dear XDJM, could you explain the meaning of the text above? What does "If they did" mean?

I can hardly figure out the meaning of 题干。

谢谢先！

linyuanlyn

IMO，财政赤字不会导致贸易赤字。就是说前者不是后者发生的原因，两个赤字无关系。也就是讲前者上升的话，后者可以上升，不变，或者下降。所以E说的就是前者上升，后者也刚好处于上升的一种状态的可能性。

victoria_cc

谢谢,
如果只把握结论就好了，你又是如何理解OG里E的解释;

Finally, it is consistent with the passage that countries with the largest trade deficits sometimes have similarly large budget deficits (choice E).

bodkicker

原文不清楚，我们也不需知道，只要知道最后一句话there is no such correlation.就可以，前面半句说说如何调整没关系。

victoria_cc

我不太明白文章最后一句：In fact, when deficit figures are adjusted so that different countries are reliably comparable to each other, there is no such correlation.

这里，deficit figures是指budget deficits and trade deficits还是指trade deficits? 此句和文章结论的推理关系？

thx！

bodkicker

“这种关系是指第一句话所说的大的国家预选赤字没有引起大的国家贸易赤字。”如果如你所述，那不存在这种关系意思岂不变成：预算赤字会引起贸易赤字。这和原文第一句话（结论）相反。事实上，原文第一句话是结论，第二句话用反正法（假设不是这样）证明结论是对的。第三句话（IN FACT，讲事实），用正面论证法证明结论是对的。即先讲一个结论，再用正反论证方法证明该结论是对的

lenghong

我觉得应该是“当这些赤字被调整到不同的国家有可比性时，便不存在这种关系“这种关系是指第一句话所说的大的国家预选赤字没有引起大的国家贸易赤字。 而非您说的--- 预算赤字导致贸易赤字。