Test Item File- Practice Test Bank - The Politics of Power,Katznelson,7e

TEST BANK

Politics of Power
A Critical Introduction to American Government

SEVENTH EDITION

, TEST BANK

Politics of Power
A Critical Introduction to American
Government

SEVENTH EDITION

, MULTIPLE CHOICE

1. What percent of the U.S.’s total income is earned by the richest 20 percent of the country’s
households?
A. approximately 20 percent
B. approximately 30 percent
C. approximately 40 percent
D. more than 50 percent
E. more than 80 percent

ANS: D DIF: Moderate REF: Page 3 TOP: Introduction MSC: Remembering

2. What percent of the U.S.’s total income is earned by the poorest 20 percent of U.S. households?
A. approximately 3 percent
B. approximately 9 percent
C. approximately 15 percent
D. approximately 20 percent
E. approximately 50 percent

ANS: A DIF: Difficult REF: Page 3 TOP: Introduction MSC: Remembering

3. Since 1980, the gap between rich and poor in the United States has
A. decreased a lot.
B. decreased a little.
C. stayed about the same.
D. increased.
E. been so difficult to measure that there’s no way of knowing whether the gap has decreased,
increased, or remained the same.

ANS: D DIF: Moderate REF: Page 3 TOP: Introduction MSC: Applying

4. Compared to the gap between high and low incomes in the United States, the wealth gap is
A. much smaller.
B. slightly smaller.
C. about the same.
D. greater.
E. so difficult to measure that it’s impossible to make such comparisons.

ANS: D DIF: Easy REF: Page 3 TOP: Introduction MSC: Applying

5. In 2011, the top 1 percent of income earners in the United States owned about ______________ of the
nation’s wealth.
A. 5 percent
B. 25 percent
C. 40 percent

, D. 60 percent
E. 80 percent

ANS: C DIF: Moderate REF: Page 3 TOP: Introduction MSC: Remembering

6. Compared with other economically developed countries, the gap between rich and poor in the United
States is
A. greater.
B. about the same.
C. slightly less.
D. much less.
E. so difficult to measure that it’s impossible to make such comparisons.

ANS: A DIF: Easy REF: Page 4 TOP: Introduction MSC: Applying

7. According to the text, the lopsided distribution of income and wealth is or was a central concern of
______________.
A. the Tea Party movement
B. the Occupy Wall Street movement
C. the Business Roundtable
D. the Federalists
E. the abolitionist movement

ANS: B DIF: Easy REF: Page 4 TOP: Introduction MSC: Remembering

8. According to the text, the most powerful predictor of an individual’s health and mortality is that
individual’s ______________.
A. genetics
B. exposure to carcinogens
C. smoking
D. social class position
E. race

ANS: D DIF: Moderate REF: Page 4 TOP: Introduction MSC: Remembering

9. As a result of the election of Barack Obama, the country’s first black president, people of color now
A. earn as much as whites.
B. live as long as whites.
C. are less victimized by street crime than whites are.
D. are as well educated as whites are.
E. experience similar conditions as before; the income and wealth of people of color has not
significantly improved since the election of Barack Obama.

ANS: E DIF: Moderate REF: Page 5 TOP: Introduction MSC: Applying

10.According to the text, the Titanic offers a powerful metaphor for U.S. society and politics for all of the
following reasons except
A. like the Titanic, the U.S. political system is doomed to fail.