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26 Apr 2019, 04:02
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Difficulty:
35%
(medium)
Question Stats:
74% (02:02) correct
26%
(02:12)
wrong
based on 11997
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Not Attempted Yet
Editorial: Our city's public transportation agency is facing a budget shortfall. The fastest growing part of the budget has been employee retirement benefits, which are exceptionally generous. Unless the budget shortfall is resolved, transportation service will be cut, and many transportation employees will lose their jobs. Thus, it would be in the employees' best interest for their union to accept cuts in retirement benefits.
Which of the following is an assumption the editorial's argument requires?
(A) The transportation employees' union should not accept cuts in retirement benefits if doing so would not be in the employees' best interest.
(B) The only feasible way for the agency to resolve the budget shortfall would involve cutting transportation service and eliminating jobs.
(C) Other things being equal, it is in the transportation employees' interest to have exceptionally generous retirement benefits.
(D) Cutting the retirement benefits would help resolve the agency's budget shortfall.
(E) The transportation employees' union will not accept cuts in retirement benefits if doing so will not allow more transportation employees to keep their jobs.
CR11741.01
OG2020 NEW QUESTION
Which of the following is an assumption the editorial's argument requires?
(A) The transportation employees' union should not accept cuts in retirement benefits if doing so would not be in the employees' best interest.
(B) The only feasible way for the agency to resolve the budget shortfall would involve cutting transportation service and eliminating jobs.
(C) Other things being equal, it is in the transportation employees' interest to have exceptionally generous retirement benefits.
(D) Cutting the retirement benefits would help resolve the agency's budget shortfall.
(E) The transportation employees' union will not accept cuts in retirement benefits if doing so will not allow more transportation employees to keep their jobs.
CR11741.01
OG2020 NEW QUESTION
Argument Construction
Situation
An editorial indicates that the fastest growing part of a particular city's public transportation agency's budget is employee retirement benefits. The agency's budget has a shortfall. If the shortfall is not resolved, transportation service will be cut and many of the employees will lose their jobs.
Reasoning
What must be true if we are to accept the editorial's conclusion, that it is in the employee's best interest to accept cuts in retirement benefits? If cutting the employees’ retirement benefits would not be sufficient to resolve the budget shortfall, then it may well not be in employees’ best interest to accept such cuts. The reasons given for accepting the cuts are related to the undesirable consequences of a continued shortfall.
(A) The argument is about whether the union's accepting the cuts is in fact in the employees’ best interest, and does not require any assumption about whether employees should accept what is in their best interest.
(B) This is incompatible with an assumption made by the argument. The argument assumes that cutting the retirement benefits of the employees would help resolve the budget shortfall.
(C) The argument would actually be stronger if it were NOT the case that it is in the employees’ interest to have exceptionally generous retirement benefits.
(D) Correct. If cutting retirement benefits would not help resolve the agency's budget shortfall, then cutting those benefits would not help the employees avoid job cuts.
(E) The argument does not depend on assuming anything regarding what factors would motivate the union's acceptance.
Situation
An editorial indicates that the fastest growing part of a particular city's public transportation agency's budget is employee retirement benefits. The agency's budget has a shortfall. If the shortfall is not resolved, transportation service will be cut and many of the employees will lose their jobs.
Reasoning
What must be true if we are to accept the editorial's conclusion, that it is in the employee's best interest to accept cuts in retirement benefits? If cutting the employees’ retirement benefits would not be sufficient to resolve the budget shortfall, then it may well not be in employees’ best interest to accept such cuts. The reasons given for accepting the cuts are related to the undesirable consequences of a continued shortfall.
(A) The argument is about whether the union's accepting the cuts is in fact in the employees’ best interest, and does not require any assumption about whether employees should accept what is in their best interest.
(B) This is incompatible with an assumption made by the argument. The argument assumes that cutting the retirement benefits of the employees would help resolve the budget shortfall.
(C) The argument would actually be stronger if it were NOT the case that it is in the employees’ interest to have exceptionally generous retirement benefits.
(D) Correct. If cutting retirement benefits would not help resolve the agency's budget shortfall, then cutting those benefits would not help the employees avoid job cuts.
(E) The argument does not depend on assuming anything regarding what factors would motivate the union's acceptance.
Quote:
Premises:
Our city's public transportation agency is facing a budget shortfall.
The fastest growing part of the budget has been employee retirement benefits, which are very high.
If budget shortfall is not resolved, transportation service will be cut, and many transportation employees will lose their jobs.
Conclusion: Thus, it would be in the employees' best interest for their union to accept cuts in retirement benefits (which will resolve budget shortfall)
Basically the argument is saying that budget shortfall is increasing while the retirement benefits are too generous. So cut down retirement benefits to take care of shortfall. Else, services will be cut and people will lose their jobs. Hence it is in people's best interest to cut retirement benefits.
We are looking for an assumption - a missing necessary premise
A. The transportation employees' union should not accept cuts in retirement benefits if doing so would not be in the employees' best interest.
Do we need this to be true? No. We don't need to establish that cuts should not be accepted otherwise. It is not required for our current argument. We are not dealing with - what should they do if the cuts are not in their best interests? Our argument only talks about this case in which it is claiming that the cuts are in their best interests.
B. The only feasible way for the agency to resolve the budget shortfall would involve cutting transportation service and eliminating jobs.
Not so. Cutting retirement benefits is a way to resolve budget shortfall and is already discussed in the argument. There could be others. The argument tells us that if the budget shortfall is not resolved, then it will lead to cutting services and eliminating jobs.
C. Other things being equal, it is in the transportation employees' interest to have exceptionally generous retirement benefits.
No. The argument implies that retaining jobs is in the employees' best interest.
D. Cutting the retirement benefits would help resolve the agency's budget shortfall.
Correct. The argument assumes that cutting retirement benefits will fix the problem. That budget shortfall based job cuts will not happen in that case.
E. The transportation employees' union will not accept cuts in retirement benefits if doing so will not allow more transportation employees to keep their jobs.
No, we don't know the conditions under which retirement benefit cuts may or may not be accepted. What the union will do, we don't know. The argument only talks about what it SHOULD do. The argument is not assuming that the employees will not accept cuts if doing so will not allow more of them to keep their jobs. The argument is giving advice to the union on what they should do. The argument is not making any assumptions about what they will accept or not accept.
Answer (D)
Videos on assumption questions: https://youtu.be/O0ROJfljRLU
A pair of difficult assumption questions: https://youtu.be/ZQnhC4d5ODU
A Hard Assumption Ques: https://youtu.be/0j4tovGifIg
01 May 2019, 15:44
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TheRzS
TheRzS Q1 -"doing so" here is indicating "Accepting"
Q2- Negating the option A. rather warps the information or the intent of what is being said, try this
A1. The transportation employees' union should accept cuts in retirement benefits if doing so would not be in the employees' best interest- it rather now intents to say that employees should accept loss
A2. The transportation employees' union should not accept cuts in retirement benefits if doing so would be in the employees' best interest- same here, it intents to say that employees should accept loss
Therefore, it does not hurt the argument rather warps the gist of question stem
would be happy to help in case anything is still unclear
? Hmmmmm.. It seems like there is only one option available as my manager offers: CUT my benefits. Would I still lose my job if my benefits are cut? If so, then CUTTING my benefits does not resolve the budget shortfall then. Hence, It's not my best interest to accept the CUT since either ways i am going to lose my job. 
