6. Demographers doing research for an international
economics newsletter claim that the average per
capita income in the country of Kuptala is sub-
stantially lower than that in the country of Bahlton.
They also claim, however, that whereas poverty is
relatively rare in Kuptala, over half the population
of Bahlton lives in extreme poverty. At least one of
the demographers’ claims must, therefore, be wrong.

The argument above is most vulnerable to which of
the following criticisms?
(A) It rejects an empirical claim about the average
per capita incomes in the two countries
without making any attempt to discredit that
claim by offering additional economic evidence.
(B) It treats the vague term “poverty” as though it
had a precise and universally accepted meaning.
(C) It overlooks the possibility that the number of people
in the two countries who live in poverty could be the
same even though the percentages of the two
populations that live in poverty differ markedly.
(D) It fails to show that wealth and poverty have the
same social significance in Kuptala as in Bahlton.
(E) It does not consider the possibility that incomes
in Kuptala, unlike those in Bahlton, might all
be very close to the country’s average per
capita income.

paraphrase...for eg..there are 1000 poor out of 10000000000 in K and 100 poor out of 200 in B. K per capita < B per capita

This is only possible if ...there is lesser variation in incomes earned in K
while in B .. out of the 100 not poor, a majority of them could be millionaires.

So K's per capita income stays close to the actual incomes...while in B..you have a big difference in the incomes..

E is best

C....We dont know what the percentages are...we dont know how poverty levels are defined in K and B...C may not work here.

IMO it is E also. There could be a super-duper rich upper class whose incomes are high enough to skew the average higher than the other country even though there is a substantial number of people just under the povertly level.
_________________

Best,

AkamaiBrah
Former Senior Instructor, Manhattan GMAT and VeritasPrep
Vice President, Midtown NYC Investment Bank, Structured Finance IT
MFE, Haas School of Business, UC Berkeley, Class of 2005
MBA, Anderson School of Management, UCLA, Class of 1993