2013年自考英語(二)課文譯文:工作者的補償

　　工作者的補償

　　How can someone, hour after hour, day after day, year in and year out, tighten approximately the same nut to the same bolt and not go mad? That most working people do not, in fact, go mad is due in large measure to a phenomenon so common that it is found wherever people labor in industry: taking it easy. It would take some kind of real mental case to do all the work one could all day long. No one expects it. Taking it easy on the job while someone else covers your work, or "working on and off," as it is usually called in America, is an established part of the working life.

　　一個人怎么能夠一個小時接著一個小時、日復(fù)一日、年復(fù)一年給同樣的螺栓擰緊同樣的螺母而不發(fā)瘋呢?其實，大部分勞動者并沒有發(fā)瘋，很大程度上歸因于無論在哪里工作，都有這樣一個現(xiàn)象，慢慢來。一個人恐怕要有某種真正的精神病才能一整天竭盡全力地干活。沒有人希望那樣。在別人幫你照看你的工作時，你就不緊不慢地干，也就是像美國人通常說的那樣“干干停?！保枪ぷ魃牡囊粋€既定部分。

　　Working on and off, however, has its limits. The rules are infinitely varied, subtle, and flexible, and, of course, they are always changing. Management, up to a certain level at least, is aware of the practice, and in some industries employs entire cadres of people to curtail or pat an end to it. Simultaneously, the workers are subtly doing their best to keep it going and to extend it wherever possible.

　　然而，干干停停有它的限度。規(guī)則林林總總，微妙而靈活，而且一直在變。管理層，至少是一定級別的管理層，已經(jīng)意識到了這種行為，并且雇傭了專職干部來減少或消除工作中干干停停的行為。而同時，工人們又在盡力巧妙地把它保持下去，而且不失時機地加以推行。

　　Every worker has a highly developed sense of how much work is expected of him. When he feels that the expectation is excessive, he tries to do something about it. This instinct has to do with the political nature of work itself, something every modern worker understands. The bosses want more from the worker than they are willing to give in return. The workers give work, and the bosses give money. The exchange is never quite equal, and the discrepancy is called profit. Since the bosses cannot do without profit, workers have an edge. A good worker in a key spot could, so long as he kept up production, take all the coffee breaks he wanted, and the bosses would very likely look the other way. He could also choose to cut down on the coffee breaks, apply himself, and increase production, and then ask for and get more money. But that would be self-defeating, and he knows it. It would also place him in competition with other workers, which would be playing into the bosses’ hands. What he would rather do is create some slack for himself and enjoy his job more.

　　每個工人都深知別人期望他干多少活。當他感到期望過分時，他就試圖找點辦法來對付。這種本能與工作本身的政治屬性有關(guān)，每一個現(xiàn)代工人都明白。老板從工人身上的索取遠遠超出了工人愿意作為回報的付出。工人付出勞動，老板支付報酬。這種交換從來不是很平等的，它們之間的差額稱作利潤。由于老板不能沒有利潤，工人們就占了上風(fēng)。一個在關(guān)鍵崗位的好工人，只要他保持著產(chǎn)量不降低，可以隨心所欲地利用工間休息，而老板很可能裝作沒看見。他也可以縮短工間休息，努力干活，增加生產(chǎn)，然后要求并得到更多的錢。但那是自我作踐的辦法，他也明白這一點，這會使他處于與其他工人對立的地位，那樣無疑對老板有利。他倒寧愿給自己創(chuàng)造一些清閑，更多地享受一下他的工作。

　　At present on the West Coast, when a gang of longshoremen working on cargo start a shift, they often divide themselves into two equal groups and toss a coin. One group goes into the far reaches of the ship?hold and sits around. The other group starts loading cargo, usually working with a vengeance, since each one of them is doing the work of two men. An hour later, the groups change places. In other words, although my fellow longshoremen and I are getting paid for eight hours, on occasion we work only four. If someone reading this feels a sense of moral outrage because we are sitting down on the job, I am sorry. I have searched my mind in vain for a polite way to tell that reader to go to hell.

　　目前在西海岸，當一群裝卸貨物的碼頭工人開始上班時，他們時常將自己平均分成兩組，然后擲硬幣。一組工人到遠遠的船艙邊上閑坐，另一組工人開始裝貨，通常干得很猛，因為每一個人在干兩個人的工作。一小時后，兩組人換班，換句話說，盡管我和我的同伴們拿著8個小時的工資，但有時我們只干4個小時的工作。如果有人看到這里會因為我們怠工而產(chǎn)生道義上的憤慨，我覺得很抱歉。我白白地絞盡腦汁想找到一個禮貌的說法，告訴這位讀者，讓他見鬼去吧。

　　If you are that reader, I would recommend that you abandon your outrage and begin thinking about doing something similar for yourself. You probably already have, even if you won't admit it. White collar office workers, too, have come under criticism recently for robbing their bosses of their full-time services. Too much time is being spent around the Mr. Coffee machine, and some people (would you believe it?) have even been having personal conversations on company time. In fact, one office-system expert recently said that he had yet to encounter a business work place that was functioning at more than about 60 percent efficiency.

　　如果你是那位讀者，我建議你消消氣，開始想想你自己做類似的事?？赡苣阋呀?jīng)這樣做了，即使你不愿意承認。最近，白領(lǐng)辦公人員也因不給老板提供全工時服務(wù)而受到批評。邊喝咖啡邊聊天的時間太多，有些人(你相信嗎?)甚至在上班時間聊天。事實上，一位研究辦公制度的老師最近說，他還沒有碰到過一個工作效率超過60%的業(yè)務(wù)場所。

　　Management often struggles hard to set up a situation where work is done in series: a worker receives an article of manufacture, does something to it, and passes it on to another worker, who does something else to it and then passes it on to the next guy, and so on. The assembly line is a perfect example of this. Managers like this type of manufacture because it is more efficient ?that is, it achieves more production. They also like it for another reason, even if they will not admit it: it makes it very difficult for the worker to do anything other than work.

　　管理層時常努力建立一種連續(xù)工作的環(huán)境，一個工人接到一件產(chǎn)品，做些活兒，把它傳給另一個工人，這個工人接著做，然后把它傳給下一個工人，這樣繼續(xù)下去，生產(chǎn)流水線是這方面的極好例子。管理者們喜歡這種生產(chǎn)方式，因為它更加有效率――就是說，它提高了產(chǎn)量。即使他們不愿意承認，他們喜歡這種生產(chǎn)方式還有另外一個原因：它可以使工人除了干活之外很難做其他事情。

　　Frederick W. Taylor, the efficiency expert who early in this century conducted the time-and-motion studies that led to the assembly-line process, tried to reduce workers to robots, all in the name of greater production. His staff of experts, each armed with clipboard and stopwatch, studied individual workers with a view toward eliminating unnecessary movement. They soon found a great deal of opposition from the workers.

　　生產(chǎn)效率方面的老師弗雷德里克?W?泰勒在本世紀初期進行的時間和運動的研究，產(chǎn)生了生產(chǎn)流水線法，在提高生產(chǎn)力的名義下，試圖把工人變成機器人。他的老師組，每人拿著書寫板和秒表，研究單個工人的動作以去除不必要的動作。不久他們就發(fā)現(xiàn)工人們很反感這樣做。

　　Most people not directly engaged in daily work express disapproval when they hear of people working on and off. A studied campaign with carefully chosen language -- "a full day's work for a full day's pay,?" taking a free ride" -- has been pushed by certain employers to discredit the practice, and their success is such that I rarely discuss it except with other workers. My response is personal, and I feel no need to defend it: If I am getting a free ride, how come I am so tired when I go home at the end of a shift?

　　沒直接從事日常工作的大多數(shù)人，在聽說有人上班干干停停時，都對此表示不贊成。一些雇主精心策劃了一場運動，其用詞頗為講究――干一天工作，拿一天錢，“只拿錢不干活”――他們大獲成功，故而除了跟別的工人說，我基本上不提這回事。我對此事有我個人的看法，我覺得沒有必要為之辯護：如果我只拿錢不干活，我上完一次班回家后怎么會那么累?

?2013年7月各省市自考成績查詢?nèi)肟趨R總

?各地10月自考時間

更多信息請訪問：自學(xué)考試頻道    自學(xué)考試論壇