《考研英语阅读理解100篇 基础版》第6章　教育类 Unit 73

Both the House and the Senate have recently passed bills to reform student lending，and observers think a final bill may land on the president's desk in a month．Democrats have always been critical of federal interest-rate subsidies to private lenders，which is how student loans are organised．They are spurred on by scandal—many lenders like Student Loan Xpress have been caught handing illegal kickbacks to college aid officials—and by the fact that a private-equity consortium，led by J．C．Flowers，is in the process of buying out Sallie Mae，the largest student lender. This has put a spotlight on the fat margins of the $85 billion-a-year student-loan industry，where Sallie Mae's five-year average return on equity was an astonishing 52% per year. 
At present the federal government subsidises student loans in two ways．First，the government lends through the William D．Ford direct loan programme，which competes with private lenders and has about a quarter of the student-loan market．Second，private lenders get subsidies that allow them to lower the interest rates they charge students．In the past，lenders have successfully resisted proposed reductions to their subsidies of as little as ten basis points by threatening to leave the market．Now the bills are proposing to reduce subsidies by 50-55 basis points. 
The principal terms of both bills are sensible．They increase the maximum“Pell Grant” for low-income students from $4,050 currently to $5,400 by 2011．The funding comes by cutting about $18 billion-19 billion in lender subsidies over five years．Next，graduates’ loan repayments are capped at a manageable percentage of income and all debt is cancelled after 25 years of repayment．Finally，the bills provide more loan forgiveness for graduates who enter public-service careers，including police，firefighters，nurses and inner-city teachers．Taken together，these are the biggest changes since the student-loan system was created，in 1965，as part of Lyndon Johnson's Great Society programmes. 
The biggest risk in cutting the interest-rate subsidies is that banks may leave student lending en masse，or that smaller lenders may be forced out of the market．This would mean few choices for students and possibly a large number of borrowers swamping the government programme．“Congress still wants lending to be profitable，just not too profitable,” says Ajita Talwalker of TICAS，a non-partisan institute that studies the accessibility and affordability of higher education．This may prove a tough balancing act，since no one knows what the right number is. 
Critics still find the bills defective．Higher-education costs have risen much faster than inflation or aid increases，so students have been paying more out-of-pocket and taking more private loans．Yet both bills do little to tackle the rise in tuition costs．Richard Vedder of Ohio University points out that productivity is a major problem; professors in many schools have a weekly teaching workload that is a third lighter than 40 years ago，but their pay and benefits have increased．All sides agree there needs to be more transparency in costs and an element of price competition．As far as the bills at hand are concerned，many experts are calling for the House to drop its entitlement programmes，which make certain spending mandatory，and to direct the money to the Pell Grants. 
注（1）：本文选自Economist； 
注（2）：本文习题命题模仿对象为2001年真题Text 2和Text 4第4题（本习题第5题）。 
1．The expression“land on the president's desk” （Line 2，Paragraph 1）means that _______. 
A) something flies to or drops on the president's desk 
B) something is put on the president's desk for decoration 
C) something is sent for the president's approval 
D) something is presented to the president as a gift 
2．Cutting the interest-rate subsidies is risky because _______. 
A) it might leave students few choices to borrow money 
B) it might lead to a huge loss for banks and private lenders 
C) it might make government programmes less profitable 
D) it might damage the whole student-loan system 
3．The writer mentioned the“50-55 basis points” at the end of the 2nd paragraph to show that _______. 
A) government will support their own programmes rather than private lenders 
B) the government is unwilling to subsidize private lenders 
C) private lenders fail to lobby the congressmen 
D) the Congress is determined to make some big changes 
4．It can be indicated from the last paragraph that ______. 
A) the increase of high-education cost is mainly due to inflation in recent years 
B) the bill is believed by some people to be unpromising since it does not grasp the key problem 
C) the rising tuition cost is solely caused by the decreasing productivity of university professors 
D) more competition will be soon introduced into the market of students’ loan thanks to the bill 
5．Toward the issue of student lending and high-education costs，the attitude of many experts seems to be _______. 
A) indifferent 
B) unsatisfactory 
C) objective 
D) biased