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  3. Answer questions by referring to the economies of three Northern European countries. Note: When more than one answer is requ

Answer questions by referring to the economies of three Northern European countries. Note: When more than one answer is requ

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问题     Answer questions by referring to the economies of three Northern European countries.
    Note: When more than one answer is required, these may be given in any order. Some choices may be required more than once.
    A = Sweden
    B = Norway
    C = Finland
    In which country can you find…
A
Sweden
    With the value of exports amounting to 30 percent of its GDP, Sweden is highly dependent on free international trade to maintain its living standard. In 1991 Sweden attached its currency to the European Currency Unit (ECU), and in 1995 it became a full member in the European Community (EC). Sweden also has to cope with problems of competitiveness that have caused industry to invest much more abroad than at home. Most of Sweden’s large industrial companies today are transnational, and some employ more people abroad than in Sweden, where production costs are high.
    Employment in agriculture, forestry, and fishing has declined since the mid-20th century. Employment in industry reached a peak in 1960, but the tertiary sector (including services and administration) has become the main growth area, the expanding public sector being one of its major components. Female participation in the workforce is high compared to most other countries.
    Sweden is noted for its liberal employee benefit plans. The normal statutory work week is 40 hours, but actual work hours per employee in Swedish industry is among the lowest in Europe. The minimum amount of annual paid vacation is five weeks and two days. In addition, there are other legal grounds for paid absence. Employers pay additional fees of more than 43 percent of gross wages for statutory social benefits, including pensions.
B
Norway
    The Norwegian economy is dependent largely on the fortunes of its important petroleum industry. Thus, it experienced a decline in the late 1980s as oil prices fell, but by the late 1990s it had rebounded strongly, benefiting from increased production and higher prices. Norway reversed its negative balance of payments, and the growth of its gross national product (GNP)—which had slowed during the 1980s—accelerated. By the late 1990s Norway’s per capita GNP was the highest in Scandinavia and among the highest in the world. In an effort to reduce economic down turns caused by drops in oil prices, the government in 1990 established the Government Petroleum Fund, into which budget surpluses were deposited for investment overseas.
    Only about one-fifth of Norway’s commodity imports are food and consumer goods; the rest consists of raw materials, fuels, and capital goods. The rate of reinvestment has been high in Norway for a number of years. This is reflected in the relatively steady employment in the building and construction industry. Rapid growth, however, has been registered in commercial and service occupations, as is the case in most countries with a high standard of living.
    Fewer than 5 percent of the industrial companies in Norway have more than 100 employees. Nonetheless, they account for half of the industrial labour force and for more than half of production. The smaller companies are usually family-owned, whereas most of the larger ones are joint-stock companies. Foreign interests control companies accounting for about 10 percent of total production. Only a few larger concerns are state-owned, and even these are usually run with almost complete independence. However, the government traditionally has had a significant ownership control over major economy sectors, such as oil, telecommunications, power, and transport, but from the end of the 1990s many such companies were partially or fully privatized.
C
Finland
    Finland’s economy is based primarily on private ownership and free enterprise; in some sectors, however, the government exercises a monopoly or a leading role. After World War II Finland was still only semi-industrialized, with a large part of the population engaged in agriculture, mining, and forestry. During the early postwar decades, primary production gave way to industrial development, which in turn yielded to a service and information-oriented economy. The economy grew especially rapidly in the 1980s, as the country exploited its strong trading relations with both eastern and western European countries. By the early 1990s, however, the country was experiencing economic recession, largely because the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991 deprived Finland of its chief trading partner. The economy began a slow recovery in the mid-1990s, as Finland refocused its trade primarily toward Western Europe.
    The Finnish government derives most of its revenue from taxes on income and property, sales taxes, and excise duties. About two-fifths of the government’s expenditures are for education and social services, including housing and health care. This pattern of expenditure is markedly different from the years following World War II; then much of the Finnish annual budget went to paying war reparations and to rebuilding the nation’s infrastructure.
    Finland has subscribed to the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade since 1949 and to the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development since 1969. It became first an associate (1961) and later a full member (1986) of the European Free Trade Association before leaving that organization to join the European Union in 1995. Finland also became a member of the constituent European Community (until 1903 called the European Economic Community), with which it had maintained a free-trade agreement since 1974.
选项 A、 
B、 
C、 
答案B
解析 答案出处在文章第二部分(Norway)第一段第四句"By the late 1990s Norway’s per capita GNP was the highest in Scandinavia"．由此可知，直到二十世纪九十年代末，挪威的人均国民生产总值仍居斯堪的纳维亚半岛首位。故B为正确答案。
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