2015考研英语阅读民主阵营的兵工厂_大学英语阅读

2015考研英语阅读民主阵营的兵工厂

　　作为美国企业研究所的智囊学者，赫尔曼援引的生产统计数字至今仍让人震撼不已。战争准备在仓促间蹒跚起步，但到了1941年，当德国和日本先后入侵俄罗斯与偷袭珍珠港美国海军基地时，一切都发生了变化。到1942年年底，美国的战争物资产量已经超过了德国、意大利和日本三大轴心国的总和。到1944年，美国每5分钟就能生产一架飞机，每天能让50艘商船下水，每个月能让8艘航母投入战斗。

　　As a combative anti-Keynesian, Mr Herman scorns the notion that such triumphsresulted from the dictates of an interventionist Roosevelt administration. He often citesinstead the free-market ideas of Adam Smith to support his claim that it was the profitmotive that inspired Americas feats of mass production.

　　有人认为这样的胜利是持干涉主义理念的罗斯福政府独裁的结果。赫尔曼是凯恩斯理论的坚定反对者，他对此嗤之以鼻。反之，他时常引用亚当?斯密的自由市场理念支持自己的看法：是逐利的动机促成了美国大规模生产的壮举。

　　The business heroes in his history are mostly immigrants or high-school dropouts andoften both. Two tower above the rest: William Big Bill Knudsen, a General Motorsexecutive who was once a teenage clerk in a bicycle business in Copenhagen, and HenryKaiser, who began work at 16 as a travelling salesman for a dry-goods store in Utica, NewYork. Knudsen headhunted corporate innovators and persuaded them to give up their payand perks to join him as dollar-a-year men in Washington. Kaiser recruited a can-do teamfrom such blue-chip American companies as Lockheed, Bechtel-McCone, Chrysler, Boeing andGeneral Electric to produce everything from dams to tanks to ships to steel. Each executivereceived an annual fee of $1.