SSC CPO 2 July 2017 Afternoon Shift

In the following passage some of the words have been left out. Read the passage carefully and select the correct answer for the given blank out of the four alternatives.

For better or for worse, we are living in a _____ which is based physically on western science and technology. This has _____ consequences for the scientist. Initially he was an _____ force in the unfolding of human _____. This he can no longer be. As Neils Bohr has said, scientists must become _____ of the fact that they are not merely observers, but also actors on the stage of life.

A passage is given with five questions following it. Read the passage carefully and select the best answer to each question out of the given four alternatives.

The size of the workforce in Brazil, the number of kids at home and parents to sustain will obviously have a great impact on the extent of poverty in Brazilian households. In fact, the demographic transition that has been ongoing in Brazil for the past few decades has helped a lot in reducing poverty. Less children were born in poorer families and that's less children that ended up involved in street violence, drugs, gangs and so on. More parents were then able to push their kids to go to school and get an education. Of course, the situation is still pretty bad in Brazilian slums (favelas), but it's estimated that the demographic transition had an impact equivalent to + 0.5% in GDP
growth, which is not bad at all considering that the average GDP growth (per capita) was about 3% per year at the time. And since this transition happened over 30 years, its impact on the economy is equal to around 15% of growth in GDP (over three decades). Overall, the change in the family structure and in Brazilians' lifestyle has had a much greater impact on reducing poverty than the speed of the demographic transition itself. On the other hand, the transition did have an influence on wages (e.g. supply of labor) and interest rates in a way that worsened poverty in Brazil (less overall income).