2013年自考英語(二)課文譯文:歐洲國家的老齡化

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　　歐洲國家的老齡化

　　We have to realise how old, how very old, we are. Nations are classified as "aged" when they have 7 per cent or more of their people aged 65 or above, and by about 1970 every one of the advanced countries had become like this. Of the really ancient societies, with over 13 per cent above 65, all are in Northwestern Europe. At the beginning of the l980's East Germany had 15.6 per cent, Austria, Sweden, West Germany and France had 13.4 per cent or above, and England and Wales 13.3 per cent. Scotland had 12.3 per cent. Northern Ireland 10.8 per cent and the United States 9.9 per cent. We know that we are getting even older. and that the nearer a society approximates to zero population growth, the. older its population is likely to be -- at least, for any future that concerns us now.

　　我們必須認識到我們是多么老。一個國家65歲或65歲以上的老人達到或者超過該國總人口的7%，這個國家就被劃為“老齡化國家”。到1970年左右，世界上所有的發達國家都是老齡化國家。所有真正歷史悠久的國家中，65歲以上老人占全國人口13%以上的國家全位于西北歐。本世紀80年代初，東德有15.6%，奧地利、瑞典、西德和法國占13.4%或更高。英格蘭和威爾士占13.3%。蘇格蘭占12.3%。北愛爾蘭占10.8%，美國占9.9%。我們知道我們越來越老，我們也知道一個社會的人口愈接近零增長，其老齡化愈加嚴重，至少對于我們現在關系密切的未來來說是這樣的。

　　To these now familiar facts a number of further facts may be added, some of them only recently recognised. There is the apparent paradox that the effective cause of the high proportion of the old is births rather than deaths. There is the economic principle that the dependency ratio ?the degree to which those who cannot earn depend for a living on those who can ?is more advantageous in older societies like ours than in the younger societies of the developing world, because lots of dependent babies are more of a liability than numbers of the inactive aged. There is the appreciation of the salient historical truth that the aging of advanced societies has been a sudden change.

　　我們已經知道這些事實，但還有一些不知道，其中一些是近來才知道的。有這樣一個明顯的似是而非的觀點：造成老年人比率高的有效原因是出生人數而不是死亡人數。有這樣一條經濟原則：撫養率――不能掙錢生活的人依靠能掙錢養家的人的程度――在我們這樣的更老齡化的社會里比在發展中世界的較年輕社會里更有利一些。因為大量的尚需撫養的孩子與一定數量的不能工作的老年人相比，更是個負擔。有對這樣一個明顯的歷史真實的正確評價：先進社會的老齡化都是一種突變。

　　If "revolution” is a rapid resettlement of the social structure, and if the age composition of the society counts as a very important aspect of that social structure, then there has been a social revolution in European and particularly Western European society within the lifetime of everyone over 50. Taken together, these things have implications which are only beginning to be acknowledged. These facts and circumstances were well to the fore earlier this year at a world gathering about aging as a challenge to science and to policy, held at Vichy in France.

如果“革命”是對社會結構的迅速重建，如果社會的年齡構成被看作社會結構的一個非常重要的方面，那么在歐洲社會，特別是在西歐社會，每一個年過50的人的一生都經歷過一次社會革命。總的來說，這些事情所包含的意義是人們剛剛開始認識的。這些事實和情況早些時候在法國維希舉行的一個世界大會上被視為對科學和政策的挑戰而置于顯著的地位。

There is often resistance to the idea that it is because the birthrate fell earlier in Western and Northwestern Europe than elsewhere, rather than because of any change in the death rate, that we have grown so old. But this is what elementary demography makes clear. Long life is alt-ring our society, of course, but in experiential terms. We have among us a very much greater experience of continued living than any society that has ever preceded us anywhere, and this will continue. But too much of that lengthened experience, even in the wealthy West, will be experience of poverty and neglect, unless we do something about it.

　　我們的人口之所以老齡化是因為西歐和西北歐的人口出生率比別的地方下降得早，而不是由于人口死亡率方面的任何變化，常有人對此觀點提出異議。但這正是基礎人口學所研究的問題。當然，長壽正改變著我們的社會，但這是根據經驗而來的說法。我們現在所經歷的壽命延長的經驗，比在我們之前的任何社會都多得多，而且這種情況會繼續。但是如果壽命延續過長，即便是在富裕的西方，也要變得貧困不堪、被人忽視，除非我們著手改變它。

　　If you are now in your thirties, you ought to be aware that you can expect to live nearly one third of the rest of your life after the age of 60. The older you are now, of course, the greater this proportion will be, and greater still if you are a woman. Expectation of life is a slippery figure, very easy to get wrong at the highest ages. At Vichy the demographers were telling each other that their estimates of how many old there would be and how long they will live in countries like England and Wales are due for revision upwards.

　　如果你現在30幾歲，你應當知道，你可以有望在活到60歲以后再活上差不多15年。當然，現在你年紀越大，這個比例就會越大;如果你是個婦女的話，這個年紀會更大。人壽期望值是個彈性數字，在猜測最高年齡時，特別容易出錯。在維希，人口學家們都一致認為:他們對像英格蘭和威爾士這樣的國家有多少老齡人口，這些人口有多長的壽命所做的估計，已經到了該把數目往上調整的時候了.

?2013年7月各省市自考成績查詢入口匯總