精彩书摘
News Report One
[1]The United States central bank has raised an important interest rate by one-fourth of 1 percent. The federal funds rate, a rate paid by banks for short-term loans, is now one-half of 1 percent.
Janet Yellen, the first woman to lead the Federal Reserve System, spoke after the announcement. The decision was based on a few factors, Yellen said. Economic growth is expected to continue in the U.S. Another reason to increase interest rates, Yellen noted, was the low official rate of inflation. The central bank has said its target inflation rate is 2 percent. [2]It says that rate would help support employment and keep prices stable. However, inflation currently is not at the target rate, but below 1 percent. The federal reserve chief also said the strong labor market provided another reason to raise rates. The U.S. economy is adding about 200,000 jobs each month.
1 What is the news report mainly about?
[B] 【详解】题目问新闻主旨。新闻开篇便说“美国央行将一项重要利率提高了0.25个百分点”，之后解释了加息原因。B“美国央行提高了利率”将首句加以提炼，去掉具体的数据，表明了全文主旨。
【干扰项排除】新闻中虽然提到加息决定是由美国央行作出的，但没有说该机构是货币政策决策者，且这也与新闻主题无关，故A错误。C“美国的经济增长有望持续”只是新闻的一个细节，是加息的原因之一，不是全篇新闻的主旨，故C错。D“美国经济每年新增约20万个就业岗位”，新闻说的是“每月”，且并未概括出新闻的核心，故D错。
2 What do we learn about the target inflation rate set by the central bank?
[D] 【详解】题目询问由美国央行设定的target inflation rate“目标通胀率”的相关信息。新闻提到央行将target inflation rate设定在2%，央行表示该通胀率有助于支持就业（help support employment）和保持物价稳定（keep prices stable），D中的price stability与后者对应，其中的stability是stable的名词形式。
【干扰项排除】target inflation rate是一个固定值，不是持续上升的，A中的expected to grow对应的是美国的经济增长，故A错误。B中“低于1%”是现有的通胀率，央行设定的是在2%，故B错误。C逻辑颠倒，新闻提到加息的原因是提高通胀率，故可知是银行利率（interest rates）可影响通胀率，而不是通胀率影响银行利率，C错误。
