The correct answer - A
Passage Analysis:- Abolition of regulation of airfares (prices) by the government has increased competition among airlines
- Author's claim: This will eventually lead to compromises in airline safety
- Author's logic: Anxiety to reduce fares in a competitive market will tempt airline companies to reduce cost by compromising safety (lesser safety inspections, less routine maintenance work)
What do we need to do? Weaken the prediction that de-regulation of airfares will ultimately compromise airline safety?
Prethinking:What new information will weaken our belief in the notion that with abolition of fare regulation, airline companies will compromise airline safety?
The core logic of the author is that airlines will reduce fares by compromising safety. The underlying reason for reducing fares is to attract more customers. But what if customers are at least as safety conscious as they are price conscious, if not more?
In such a case, safety aspects are the customers top priority. This would reduce our belief that airlines will compromise safety just so as to be able to reduce fares.
Option Choice Analysis:(A) Consumers select an airline as much on the basis of its safety record as on the basis of its fares.Correct. as per prethinking. This reduces our belief in the given prediction.
(B) There are a number of mechanical problems that cannot be detected in the routine inspection of aircraft.
This tells us that even routine inspections are not perfect. But does this tell us that routine inspections are useless, better avoided (companies may as well save the cost in such a case)? No. Even given option B, several other safety issues may be avoided by doing routine inspections, which indicates that routine inspections are useful. It strengthens the belief that companies will continue to do routine inspections, rather than weaken.
(C) The amount of commercial air traffic has increased significantly since the regulation of airfares was abolished.
This only indicates that more customers may be using planes (assuming the increase in air traffic corresponds to an increase in customer demand). But this tells us nothing about the safety aspect, and whether safety was compromised to save costs. Irrelevant to the conclusion
(D) The number of airline bankruptcies has increased since the regulation of airfares was abolished.
This may at some level indicate that airline companies, in a bid to be competitive may have slashed prices to kill out competition, leading to some bankruptcies. But this again tells us nothing about the safety aspect. Was safety compromised to reduce cost? Which is why it is not relevant to the conclusion.
(E) When airfares were regulated, airlines were more inclined to invest in the development of new aircraft.
This tells us where the airlines wanted to invest their money. This is not really related to where the airlines wanted to reduce costs, which is what the argument is all about. Irrelevant.
Hope this helps.
Regards
Harsha
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