II. Choose the best answer to complete each gap in the text.

The impact of technology not only on the ___ (1) of business, but on the economy in general is ___ (2) illustrated by the development and use of the Internet. By 1997, ___ (3) some 40 million people and 25 000 firms used the Internet, and this figure was rising ___ (4) over 10 per cent per month. The commercial possibilities of the Internet ___ (5) from the selling of information and services, to global forms of catalogue shopping where you can ___ (6) through a business’s product range (or surf the net) and use your credit card number to pay. The Internet is just one example of how technology and technological change are ___ (7) the whole structure and organisation of business, the ___ (8) of work for the worker, and the ___ (9) of business and hence the competitive ___ (10) of national economies.

1. a) practise 2. a) brightly	b) need b) vividly	c) necessity c) probably	d) practice d) evidently
3. a) worldly	b) everywhere	c) elsewhere	d) worldwide
4. a) by	b) to	c) for	d) on
5. a) change	b) fluctuation	c) range	d) drive
6. a) examine	b) see	c) follow	d) browse
7. a) drawing	b) finding	c) becoming	d) shaping
8. a) experiment	b) nature	c) experience	d) ideas
9. a) product	b) productivity	c) production	d) productiveness
10. a) performance	b) work	c) acting	d) action

III. In most of the lines below there is one extra word. It is either grammatically incorrect or does not fit in with the sense of the text. Some lines, however, are correct. If there is an extra word in the line, write out the extra word in CAPITAL LETTERS.

01 Can workers who are displaced from high-tech

02 industries not as simply find jobs in other parts of the

03 economy? There are two problems over here. The first is

04 that of a structural unemployment. Displaced workers

05 may not have the skills to take up its work elsewhere.

06 Clearly up what is needed is a system of retraining that

07 enables only workers to move to alternative jobs. The

08 second is that of income distribution. If the only

09 alternative jobs are more relatively low-skilled ones in the

10 service sector (cleaners, porters, shelf packers,

11 checkout assistants, etc.), the displaced workers may

12 have to accept for a considerable cut in wages.

Do people volunteer to be unemployed

The distinction between voluntary and

Involuntary unemployment

I. Read the text. Some parts of the texts have been taken out. These extracts are listed below. Complete each gap with the appropriate extract. One sentence does not belong in any of the gaps.

a) “Voluntary” unemployment tends to imply that the blame for unemployment lies with the unemployed person and not with “market forces” or with inadequate government policies.

b) Workers want to work at the current wage, but there are not enough jobs available.

c) It occurs when the demand for certain types of labour fluctuates with the seasons of the year.

d) Workers can hardly be said to have volunteered for these changes in demand.

e) According to these economists, then, only demand-deficient unemployment would be classed as involuntary.

A distinction made by some economists is that between voluntary and involuntary unemployment. Many economists would regard equilibrium unemployment as voluntary. If people choose not to accept a job at the going wage, even though there are jobs available, then in a sense they could be said to have voluntarily chosen to be unemployed. Disequilibrium unemployment, according to these economists, would be classed as involuntary. ___ (1)

Some economists would also include classical unemployment as voluntary. If people, through their unions, have chosen to demand a higher wage than the equilibrium wage, then they could be said to have collectively “volunteered” to make themselves unemployed. ___ (2)

Some economists go even further and argue that all unemployment should be classed as voluntary. If the cause of disequilibrium unemployment is a downward stickiness in real wage rates, then workers, either individually or collectively, are choosing not to accept work at a lower wage.

Other economists would go to the other extreme and claim that all disequilibrium unemployment and most equilibrium unemployment is involuntary. Structural unemployment, for example, results from changes in demand and/or supply patterns in the economy and a resulting mismatching of unemployed workers’ skills to the person specifications of vacant jobs. ___ (3) True, people can be retrained, but retraining takes time, and in the meantime they will be unemployed. Similarly with frictional unemployment, if the cause of some people being unemployed is initial ignorance of job opportunities and hence the time it takes to search for a job, they cannot be said to have volunteered to be initially poorly informed.

The terms “voluntary” and “involuntary” unemployment are not only ambiguous, they are also unfortunate because they have strong normative overtones. ___ (4) While in one sense, at a low enough wage rate there would probably be a job for virtually any unemployed person, the unemployed cannot be said to be voluntarily unemployed if they are choosing to turn down jobs at pitifully low wages.

Although the concepts of voluntary and involuntary unemployment are commonly used, for the above reasons we shall avoid them.