It’s beating pre-pandemic predictions.
1 Americans might be reluctant to believe it, but on paper, the U.S. economy is doing pretty well. So well, in fact, that we’re performing better than forecasts made even before the pandemic began. 2 The nation’s employers added another 199,000 jobs in November, the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics reported on Friday. This means that overall employment is now 2 million jobs higher than was expected by now in forecasts made way back in January 2020 by the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office. 3 The job market isn’t the only front on which we have bested forecasts made before the pandemic. The overall size of the economy, as measured by gross domestic product, is larger than it was expected to be around now. The International Monetary Fund says that U.S. gross domestic product is higher today, in inflation-adjusted terms, than it had expected at the beginning of 2020. The IMF ran these calculations for countries around the world, and found the United States was an outlier in beating the organization’s pre-covid forecasts. 4 So why did well-regarded professional forecasters underestimate the strength of the economy? And how is it that jobs and GDP are doing better than they expected, even as inflation has been unmistakably worse? 5 To some extent, all these things are related. Forecasters obviously did not anticipate the pandemic. They also did not anticipate the unprecedentedly enormous government response to the coronavirus. When the public health crisis hit and disemployed millions of American workers, policymakers implemented unusually generous fiscal and monetary stimulus. 6 Such measures helped get people back to work sooner, and avoided the long, painful effort back to normal that had followed the Great Recession. Thus, faster job growth. They also massively amplified consumer demand, at a time when the productive capacity of the economy (i.e., companies’ ability to make and deliver the things their customers want) couldn’t keep up. Employers faced all kinds of shortages — of products, materials, workers — and consumers anxious to buy stuff raised the prices of whatever inventory companies actually had available. Thus, faster price growth. 7 If you had asked me back in January 2020 how Americans might feel about an economy with an “extra” 2 million jobs, unemployment less than 4 percent, and inflation just over 3 percent, I probably would have guessed the public would be pretty content. However people are still furious about the extra price growth they’ve already endured to date, and unimpressed by all that extra job growth. Maybe it’s human nature for people to view better jobs or pay as things they’ve earned, while a painful price increase is something inflicted upon them — even if both are, to some extent, two sides of the same coin.
🔗 Texto adaptado de:
🔗 Available at: https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2023/12/08/jobs-report-economy-beats-pandemicpredictions/. Retrieved on: Dec. 12, 2023.
In the sentence “Maybe it’s human nature for people to view better jobs or pay as things they’ve earned, while a painful price increase is something inflicted upon them — even if both are, to some extent, two sides of the same coin.” (Text I, paragraph 7), the word both refers to
“human nature” and “people”
“better jobs and pay” and “human nature”
“a painful price increase” and “people”
“people” and “things they’ve earned”
“better jobs and pay” and “a painful price increase”
Questão 12 • Gabarito: (E)
A banca destaca a palavra “both” e pergunta diretamente a que elementos anteriores do texto esse pronome se refere.
Portanto, a operação cognitiva não consiste em descobrir o significado de both. O candidato precisa rastrear o pronome e localizar seus dois referentes no contexto.
“better jobs or pay”
Referente 2:
“a painful price increase”
both
=
os dois referentes anteriores
A alternativa identifica corretamente os dois elementos retomados por both: os melhores empregos ou salários e o aumento doloroso dos preços.
A própria continuação do período confirma a leitura: “both are [...] two sides of the same coin”. O autor estabelece uma relação entre dois fenômenos: melhores empregos/salários e aumento dos preços.
🔎 Pronoun Tracking / Contextual Referents
O candidato precisa localizar no contexto os dois elementos que funcionam como referentes de both. Essa operação caracteriza diretamente 09. Textual Reference.
❌ 11. Distorção de Sentido
A alternativa seleciona dois elementos muito próximos sintaticamente, mas que não correspondem aos dois fenômenos comparados pelo autor. Both não retoma “human nature” nem “people”.
❌ 11. Distorção de Sentido
O primeiro elemento participa da relação referencial, mas human nature não é o segundo referente. O texto contrapõe ganhos econômicos a perdas decorrentes do aumento dos preços.
❌ 11. Distorção de Sentido
Embora a painful price increase seja um dos referentes corretos, people não é o outro. O pronome both exige dois elementos de natureza comparável dentro da construção apresentada.
❌ 11. Distorção de Sentido
A alternativa confunde participantes da construção com os conteúdos efetivamente comparados. Both não retoma as pessoas nem a expressão “things they’ve earned”, mas os dois fenômenos econômicos mencionados.
✅ CORRETA — 09. Textual Reference
Os dois elementos são exatamente os referentes de both. O autor afirma que melhores empregos ou salários e aumentos dolorosos de preços são, em certa medida, “two sides of the same coin”.
Esta questão não exige que o candidato procure um significado de dicionário para both. O sentido básico de “ambos” já é conhecido. A dificuldade está em determinar ambos o quê?
O procedimento correto é fazer o rastreamento para trás: localizar os dois elementos semanticamente compatíveis que antecedem o pronome e que podem ser retomados conjuntamente.
+
a painful price increase
↓
BOTH
↓
os dois elementos anteriores
A expressão “two sides of the same coin” funciona como uma confirmação semântica poderosa.
Se são two sides, necessariamente existem dois elementos sendo colocados em relação: de um lado, better jobs or pay; de outro, a painful price increase.
A questão avalia 09. Textual Reference, tendo como Peça Operativa Cognitiva Principal Pronoun Tracking / Contextual Referents. O pronome both retoma os dois elementos econômicos apresentados anteriormente: better jobs or pay e a painful price increase. A expressão posterior “two sides of the same coin” reforça essa relação, indicando que os dois fenômenos, embora percebidos de maneira diferente pelo público, estão relacionados.
thematic: Lexical Context
theme: 09. Textual Reference
contentTopic: 14. Economy, Inflation & Fiscal Policy
subtheme: Economy, Inflation, Fiscal Policy, Public Spending
Peça Operativa Principal: 🔎 Pronoun Tracking / Contextual Referents