2016年12月英语六级真题答案（第2套）

Any veteran nicotine addict will testify that fancy packaging plays no role in the decision to keep smoking. So, it is argued, stripping cartons of their branding will trigger no mass movement to quit.

But that isn't why the government — under pressure from cancer charities, health workers and the Labour party — has agreed to legislate for standardised packaging. The theory is that smoking should be stripped of any appeal to discourage new generations from starting in the first place. Plain packaging would be another step in the reclassification of cigarettes from inviting consumer products to narcotics (麻醉剂).

Naturally, the tobacco industry is violently opposed. No business likes to admit that it sells addictive poison as a lifestyle choice. That is why government has historically intervened, banning advertising, imposing health warnings and punitive (惩罚性的) duties. This approach has led over time to a fall in smoking with numbers having roughly halved since the 1970s.

Evidence from Australia suggests plain packaging pushes society further along that road. Since tobacco is one of the biggest causes of premature death in the UK, a measure that tames the habit even by a fraction is worth trying.

So why has it taken so long? The Department of Health declared its intention to consider the move in November 2010 and consulted through 2012. But the plan was suspended in July 2013. It did not escape notice that a lobbying firm set up by Lynton Crosby, David Cameron's election campaign director, had previously acted for Philip Morris International, (The prime minister denied there was a connection between his new adviser's outside interests and the change in legislative programme.) In November 2013, after an unnecessary round of additional consultation, health minister Jane Ellison said the government was minded to proceed after all. Now we are told Members of Parliament (MPs) will have a free vote before parliament is dissolved in March.

Parliament has in fact already authorised the government to tame the tobacco trade. MPs voted overwhelmingly in favour of Labour amendments to the children and families bill last February that included the power to regulate for plain packaging. With sufficient will in Downing Street this would have been done already. But strength of will is the missing ingredient where Mr. Cameron and public health are concerned. His attitude to state intervention has looked confused ever since his bizarre 2006 lament (叹惜) that chocolate oranges placed seductively at supermarket check-outs fueled obesity.

The government has moved reluctantly into a sensible public health policy, but with such obvious over-cautiousness that any political credit due belongs to the opposition. Without sustained external pressure it seems certain Mr. Cameron would still be hooked on the interests of big tobacco companies.

What a waste of money! In return for an average of £44,000 of debt, students get an average of only 14 hours of lecture and tutorial time a week in Britain. Annual fees have risen from £1,000 to £9,000 in the last decade, but contact time at university has barely risen at all. And graduating doesn't even provide any guarantee of a decent job; six in ten graduates today are in non-graduate jobs.

No wonder it has become fashionable to denounce many universities as little more than elaborate con-tricks (耳扇术). There's a lot for students to complain about; the repayment threshold for paying back loans will be frozen for five years, meaning that lower-paid graduates have to start repaying their loans ; and maintenance grants have been replaced by loans, meaning that students from poorer backgrounds face higher debt than those with wealthier parents.

Yet it still pays to go to university. If going to university doesn't work out, students pay very little — if any — of their tuition fees back; you only start repaying when you are earning £21,000 a year. Almost half of graduates — those who go on to earn less — will have a portion of their debt written off. It's not just the lectures and tutorials that are important. Education is the sum of what students teach each other in between lectures and seminars. Students do not merely benefit while at university; studies show they go on to be healthier and happier than non-graduates, and also far more likely to vote.

Whatever your talents, it is extraordinarily difficult to get a leading job in most fields without having been to university. Recruiters circle elite universities like vultures (兀鹰). Many top firms will not even look at applications from those who lack a 2.1, i.e., an upper-second class degree, from an elite university. Students at university also meet those likely to be in leading jobs in the future, forming contacts for life. This might not be right, but school-leavers who fail to acknowledge as much risk making the wrong decision about going to university.

Perhaps the reason why so many universities offer their students so little is they know studying at a top university remains a brilliant investment even if you don't learn anything. Studying at university will only become less attractive if employers shift their focus away from where someone went to university — and there is no sign of that happening anytime soon. School-leavers may moan, but they have little choice but to embrace university and the student debt that comes with it.