Fun for the Masses – IELTS Reading Answers

'Fun for the Masses' is a real Reading test passage that appeared in the IELTS. By solving and reviewing Sample Reading Questions from past IELTS papers, you can ensure that your Reading skills are up to the mark. As you will be assessed on your reading skills, it is important for you  to understand the passage structure for better reading speed and accuracy. To score well in the IELTS Reading section, focus on skills such as skimming main ideas, scanning for exact details, recognizing paraphrased content and understanding different arguments. With diligent practice, you can elevate your preparation, build confidence to attempt different question types, and improve your overall band scores.

Types of Questions in ‘Brain Activating’

The IELTS Reading section includes different question types to evaluate your reading abilities. Therefore, knowledge of these would result in better performance and increase your work efficiency. Remember to always start reading the questions first so that you can grasp the requirements of each question type and choose the right method for answering. The following are the questions which you will have to answer for the passage on ‘Fun for the Masses’.

• IELTS Reading Matching Headings [Q.15-Q.21]
• IELTS Reading Sentence Completion [Q.22-Q.26]
• IELTS Reading Multiple Choice Questions [Q.27] 

IELTS Reading Passage on ‘Fun for the Masses’

Fun for the Masses

A Are you as affluent as you used to be? Despite 6 years of comfortable economic growth, Americans fret about that question. Business analysts who plumb government wage statistics agree that Americans’ wages, as regular in increase- modify dollars, have stood up more slowly in the past vicennial than in earlier times, and that some toilers’ real wages have really fallen. They also agree that by almost any measure, wage is issued less fairly than it used to be. Neither of those assert, however, sheds much illumination on whether lifestyles are increasing or falling. This is due to ‘ lifestyle’ being a highly shapeless notion. Measuring how many residents is relatively easy, at least in contrast with measuring how better they live.

B A recent paper by Dora Costa, an economist at the Massachusetts organization of automation, looks at the lifestyle discussion from an uncommon direction. Rather than fret about wages, Ms Costa tested Americans’ recreational practice over the past hundredfold. She finds that residents of all wage levels have regularly increased the amount of time and money they allocate to having entertainment. The issuing of dollar wage may have become more titled in not long ago, but time off is more evenly laid than ever.

C Ms Costa founded her testing on utilization study dating back down to 1888. The industrial toilers in that year spent, on average, tripartite of their wages for clothing, food and shelter. Less than 2% of the average household wage was spent on time off but that average hid huge discrepancy. The portion of a household budget that was spent on having entertainment rose steeply with its wage: the lowest-wage household in the working- standard for example spent barely1% of their forecast on recreation, while higher  salaried workers spent more than 3%. Only that final group could provide such spendthrifts as theater and concert shows, which were comparatively much more costly than they are today.

D Since those days, time off has regularly become less of an opulence. By 1991, the average family was required to allocate only 38% of its income to the origin requirements, and was able to spend 6% on recreation. Besides, Ms Costa finds that the share of the household budget spent on time off now stands up much less steeply with income than it used to. At the dawn of this hundredfold a family’s recreational payout was to rise by 20% for every 10% rise in income. By 1972-1973, a 10% income gain guided to a 15% rise in recreational payout, and the increase fell to only 13% in 1991. What this implicit is that Americans of all wages are now able to payout much more of their money on having entertainment.

E One clear cause is that actual income overall has stood up. If Americans in general are affluent, their utilization of amusement goods is less likely to be pretentious by swaps in their income. But Ms Costa reckons that stand up incomes are answerable for, at most, half of the exchanging form of time off pay out. Much of the relaxation may be due to the reality that poverty-stricken Americans have more leisure than they used to. In infancy low-wage toilers faced exceedingly long hours and enjoyed few days off. But since the 1940’s the less qualified (and lower paid) have toilers ever- hardly any hours, giving them more time to enjoy time off chasing.

F Effortlessly, Americans have had a growing number of recreational chances to select from. Public investing in sports complicated, parks and golf courses has made time off inexpensive and more reachable. So too has automation alteration. Where hearing to music used to implicitly pay for show tickets or possess a piano, the origination of the radio made music reachable to everyone and effectively free. Compact discs, videos and other equipment have broadened the choice even further.

G At a time when many business analysts are pointing impeach fingers at automation for causing a broader imbalance in the payment of qualified and unqualified toilers, Ms Costa’s testing  gives it a much more impartial face. High wage earners have always been able to provide entertainment. By over-casting the price of amusement, automation has improved the quality of living of those in the under end of the income issue. The suggestion of her solutions is that once recreation is taken into account, the variation in America's lifestyle may not be broadened so much after all. 

H These findings are not leakproof. Ms Costa's results  commit totally upon what is precisely classed as recreational spending. Reading is a sample. This was the most familiar time off activity for toil men in 1888, considered for one-fourth of all recreational expenditure. In1991, reading took only 16% of the relaxation dollar. Yet the American Department of Labour’s sending surveys do not differentiate between the buy of a mathematics tome and that of a finest- selling novel. Both are categorized as recreational spending. If more money is being spent on textbooks and executive books now than in years, this could make ‘ recreational’ expenditure seem more powerful than it in fact is.

I Even though Ms Costa tries to label this issue by showing that her outcomes still clasp even when difficult categories, such as books, are removed from the example, the strain is not absolutely removed. Nevertheless, her broad result looks equitable. Recreation is more obtainable to all and less dependent on income. On this estimate at least, the imbalance in living standards has fallen.

Questions 15-21

15 Paragraph A...................................

16 Paragraph B...................................

17 Paragraph C...................................

18 Paragraph D...................................

19 Paragraph F...................................

20 Paragraph G...................................

21 Paragraph H...................................

Questions 22-26

22 It is easier to determine …………………………… than living standards.

23 A decrease in …………………………… during the 20th century led to a bigger investment in leisure.

24 According to Ms Costa, how much Americans spend on leisure has been directly affected by salaries and ……………………………

25 The writer notes both positive and negative influences of ……………………………

26 According to the writer, the way Ms Costa defined …………………………… may have been misleading.

Questions 27

27 The writer thinks that Ms Costa

1. provides strong evidence to support her theory.
2. displays serious flaws in her research methods.
3. attempts to answer too many questions.
4. has a useful overall point to make.

Answer with Keyword Location for ‘Fun for the Masses’

Excellent work! Dive into the keywords and its location which will help you to get closer to your desired IELTS Band Score. Such analysis of each question shows how the keywords in the questions are connected to the passage. This will improve how paraphrasing works and identifying typical misleading information which will help develop better reading methods. The answers with explanations for the passage on ‘Fun for the Masses’ are given below in the table.