2022年考研英语一阅读 Text 4 原文翻译及答案解析

The personal grievance provisions of New Zealand’s Employment Relations Act 2000 (ERA) prevent an employer from firing an employee without good cause. Instead, dismissals must be justified. Employers must both show cause and act in a procedurally fair way.

新西兰《2000年雇佣关系法》（ERA）的个人申诉条款禁止雇主在没有正当理由的情况下解雇员工。相反，解雇必须是正当的。雇主必须既说明理由，又以程序公正的方式行事。

Personal grievance procedures were designed to guard the jobs of ordinary workers from “unjustified dismissals”. The premise was that the common law of contract lacked sufficient safeguards for workers against arbitrary conduct by management. Long gone are the days when a boss could simply give an employee contractual notice.

个人申诉程序旨在保护普通工人的工作免受“无正当理由解雇”。其前提是合同普通法缺乏足够的保障措施，使工人免受管理层任意行为的侵害。老板仅凭合同通知就能解雇员工的日子早已一去不复返。

But these provisions create difficulties for businesses when applied to highly paid managers and executives. As countless boards and business owners will attest, constraining firms from firing poorly performing, high-earning managers is a handbrake on boosting productivity and overall performance. The difference between C-grade and A-grade managers may very well be the difference between business success or failure. Between preserving the jobs of ordinary workers or losing them. Yet mediocrity is no longer enough to justify a dismissal.

但当这些条款应用于高薪经理和高管时，会给企业带来困难。正如无数董事会和企业主所证明的那样，限制公司解雇表现不佳的高薪经理是提升生产力和整体绩效的刹车。C级和A级经理之间的差异很可能就是企业成败之别。也关系到普通工人工作是得以保留还是失去。然而，平庸已不足以成为解雇的正当理由。

Consequently — and paradoxically — laws introduced to protect the jobs of ordinary workers may be placing those jobs at risk.

因此——且矛盾的是——旨在保护普通工人工作的法律可能正将那些工作置于风险之中。

If not placing jobs at risk, to the extent employment protection laws constrain business owners from dismissing under-performing managers, those laws act as a constraint on firm productivity and therefore on workers’ wages. Indeed, in “An International Perspective on New Zealand’s Productivity Paradox” (2014), the Productivity Commission singled out the low quality of managerial capabilities as a cause of the country’s poor productivity growth record.

即使没有将工作置于风险中，就雇佣保护法限制企业主解雇表现不佳的经理而言，这些法律是对公司生产力的约束，从而也是对工人工资的约束。事实上，在《新西兰生产力悖论的国际视角》（2014年）中，生产力委员会特别指出管理能力质量低下是该国生产力增长记录不佳的原因。

Nor are highly paid managers themselves immune from the harm caused by the ERA’s unjustified dismissal procedures. Because employment protection laws make it costlier to fire an employee, employers are more cautious about hiring new staff. This makes it harder for the marginal manager to gain employment. And firms pay staff less because firms carry the burden of the employment arrangement going wrong.

高薪经理本身也无法免受ERA无正当理由解雇程序所造成的伤害。因为雇佣保护法使解雇员工成本更高，雇主在招聘新员工时更为谨慎。这使得边缘经理更难获得就业。而且公司支付员工更少，因为公司承担雇佣安排出错的负担。

Society also suffers from excessive employment protections. Stringent job dismissal regulations adversely affect productivity growth and hamper both prosperity and overall well-being.

社会也因过度的雇佣保护而受害。严格的解雇规定对生产力增长产生不利影响，并阻碍繁荣和整体福祉。

Across the Tasman Sea, Australia deals with the unjustified dismissal paradox by excluding employees earning above a specified “high-income threshold” from the protection of its unfair dismissal laws. In New Zealand, a 2016 private members’ Bill tried to permit firms and high-income employees to contract out of the unjustified dismissal regime. However, the mechanisms proposed were unwieldy and the Bill was voted down following the change in government later that year.

在塔斯曼海对岸，澳大利亚通过将收入超过指定“高收入门槛”的员工排除在其不公平解雇法的保护之外来应对无正当理由解雇悖论。在新西兰，一项2016年的私人议员法案试图允许公司和高薪员工退出无正当理由解雇制度。然而，所提出的机制笨拙，该法案在同年晚些时候政府更迭后被否决。