СибУПК вар 3 THE MARKET ECONOMY

СИБИРСКИЙ УНИВЕРСИТЕТ
ПОТРЕБИТЕЛЬСКОЙ КООПЕРАЦИИ Вариант 3 работа 2
1. Прочитайте и переведите текст.
THE MARKET ECONOMY Have you ever walked through a busy street market? People push their way through crowds of others in order to reach the stalls first. The air is full of deafening shouts. Stall owners yell to advertise their goods. Buyers cry out their orders. It's hard to imagine, but behind this noisy confusion is a very logical economic theory: the market economy.
The market economy is sometimes called the free market. A free market is not controlled in any way by a government. It is also free fr om the influence of custom or tradition. In a free market, the only reason why things are bought and sold is because there is a demand for them. Prices for goods and services are simply what people are prepared to pay. The market economy is not really controlled by anyone. It controls itself.
The street market where we began has many of the characteristics of the free market. Customers arrive at the market with a shopping list of things they need. They also come with an idea of how much they are prepared to pay. Stall owners sell what customers demand, and try to get the highest price they can for it. Supply and demand control what is on the market and how much it sells for. In the wider economy, we are all customers, and the stall owners are like companies.
The role of the company in the free market is to supply what people want. However, companies need an incentive. The incentive is profit. There are two ways for companies to make a profit. The first way is to raise their prices. The second way is to reduce their production costs. And this brings us to two more features of the market economy: competition and technology.
Competition exists in a free market because, theoretically, anyone can be a producer. This means that companies have to compete with each other for a share of the market. Competition is good for consumers because it helps to control prices and quality. If customers aren't happy with a product or service, or if they can't afford it, they will go to a competitor.
Technology exists in a free market because producers need ways to reduce their costs. They cannot buy cheaper raw materials. Instead, they must make better use of time and labour. Technology is the use of tools and machines to do jobs in a better way. This helps companies produce more goods in less time and with less effort. The result: more profit.
People often think that most economies are free markets. However, at the macroeconomic level, a truly free market economy does not exist anywhere in the world. This is because all governments set limits in order to control the economy. Some governments set many limits, other governments set very few, but they all set some. For this reason, a true market economy is only theoretical. Nevertheless, many of the features of the market economy do exist in most societies today.
2. Ответьте на вопросы по тексту.
a) Who controls a market economy?
b) Who decides what to produce and sell in a market economy?
c) Why is competition a good thing?
d) Why does technology exist in a market economy?
e) Are there true market economies in the world today? Why?
3. Заполните пропуски в предложениях одним из слов, предложен-ных ниже.a) Production … are the amount of money companies spend to make a product.
b) A … economy is one wh ere a government decides what can be bought and sold and/or how it is done.
c) When there is a demand we… prices but we … them if we want to sell something quickly.
d) If there is only one producer in the market, there is no …
e) Supply and … control what is on the market and how much it sells for.
f) I can‘t … that car – it‘s far too expensive.
g) Businesses … their products in the media to attract more cus-tomers.
h) The main incentive for businesses in a market economy is mak-ing a ….
i) Technology is one of the main … of the market economy.
Задание 4. Переведите предложения на русский язык, обращая внимание на функции инфинитива.
a) One of the fundamental decisions to be taken by entrepreneurs concerns the geographical location of their enterprises.
b) In order to increase profits, the company developed a new prod-uct and launched it successfully in the market.
c) To enter this market requires a lot of hard work.
d) The sales director claimed to have found three new customers.
e) There are nation-wide schemes to encourage industrial invest-ment.
Задание 5. Переведите предложения на русский язык, обращая внимание на формы и функции герундия.
a) His taking part in the development of the new system was a great help to us.
b) Opening up economies bring a problem of keeping a good bal-ance of trade.
c) By cutting the number of employees a company has a quick-acting method of reducing costs.
d) The company risks losing money if it makes investment in this venture.e) Retail price index is calculated by recording increases in prices for a range of goods and services.
Задание 6. Переведите предложения на русский язык, обращая внимание на формы и функции причастия.
a) Monetary policy is one of the tools used by the government to control the economy.
b) Purchases made using credit cards are now a huge proportion of total spending in many countries.
c) Structural unemployment occurs when changing public tastes and advances in technology cause a fall in demand for some types of work.
d) In a country suffering from inflation people have lower dispos-able incomes.
e) Having laid off 50 employees, the company reduced costs and managed to survive.
7. Переведите предложения на русский язык, обращая внимание на типы условных предложений.
a) If money incomes rise by 5 per cent, but over the same period prices rise by 10 per cent, real income will have fallen.
b) If the supplier of such a commodity were to raise the price, many buyers would turn to the close substitutes.
c) We would have to reduce our workforce if the bank refused to extend our credit.
d) If the market for our products expands, we will have a 20 per cent increase in turnover next year.
e) If we had installed the equipment, we would have become more competitive.