In order to protect its budding printer industry, Country X's governme

In order to protect its budding printer industry, Country X's government plans to ban all printer imports. Several thousand concerned citizens protested, claiming that such a ban will inevitably result in a sharp rise in the prices of printer retail prices.

Inference question where we can't bring outside information. Eliminate those options which are not explicitly stated in the passage.

A. Implementing the government's plan will result in a drop of sales of printers in Country X. - We don't know if the sale will drop. Sales might remain constant or decrease. Incorrect

B. The prices of imported printers are very competitive in relation to those of the printers manufactured in Country X. Correct. We can infer this for sure.

C. If the government does not reverse its plan, it will lose the support of voters. Again outside information. Govt may lose or may not we are not sure of this. Incorrect

D. Implementing the government's plan will leave citizens no choice but to illegally import printers. Outside information. Incorrect.

E. The government's plan will lead to a severe shortage of printers in Country X. Outside information. Incorrect

IMO B

I think the two closest are B and E.

Discarded E because the shortage is neither discussed nor is an inevitable outcome. There could be a sharp rise in prices but not necessarily due to a severe shortage. Severe shortage is very extreme. It could also be if there is no competition, and the local producers have increased their prices.

IMO B is the answer

Ban import printers --- > What can lead to increase in prices of printers?

A. Implementing the government's plan will result in a drop of sales of printers in Country X.
Yes possible that there would be drop in sales then why citizens need to protest if they no longer buy these printers

B. The prices of imported printers are very competitive in relation to those of the printers manufactured in Country X.
Correct: This option makes sense . if the price is competitive because of import, It makes sense when the import is banned, there are chances of increase in price.
This options seems correct

C. If the government does not reverse its plan, it will lose the support of voters.
They protest and yes government may lose support . But how does it matter to price . Moreover this is no inference based on given statements

D. Implementing the government's plan will leave citizens no choice but to illegally import printers.
Not necessary that only this option is available

E. The government's plan will lead to a severe shortage of printers in Country X.
Not necessary, maybe people didn’t buy before local printers and it is possible there are already enough local printers in market

Hence B is the correct answer.

Only answer B is even plausible as a right answer here, but it's not a proper inference from the passage, for two important reasons.

For one, all we know is that "several thousand people claim" that prices will go up (and this is several thousand people in a country that could have a population of millions). Are these "several thousand people" right? We have no evidence one way or the other. The passage only tells us what a few thousand people claim is true. When you only know that some people claim prices will rise, you can't correctly infer that prices actually will rise.

But even if we did know printer prices will rise, I still don't follow why we'd infer B is true. It's easy to imagine a situation with two companies, domestic printer manufacturer D, and a foreign manufacturer F where right now, F's prices are not competitive, so most or all people are presumably buying D's printers. But when F is no longer in the market because of an import ban, D now has an effective monopoly and can freely raise its prices, something it couldn't do before because raising prices would then have made F's prices competitive and F would have cut into D's sales. So I'm not sure why answer B is a correct inference from the passage -- yes, it certainly could be true, but when we're asked to draw an inference, we're asked to find something stronger than that.

Topic of discussion: Govt. plans to restrict import of printers in order to boost it's own printer industry. People think that this will give rise to increased printer prices. Why? The in-house printer industry gets the monopoly and regulates the printer prices.

Which of the following can be most properly inferred from the passage?


A. Implementing the government's plan will result in a drop of sales of printers in Country X. -
It's nowhere mentioned in the passage!
B. The prices of imported printers are very competitive in relation to those of the printers manufactured in Country X.
Yes, people have a preference of buying cheap imported printers and that's why are concerned with the ban!

C. If the government does not reverse its plan, it will lose the support of voters.
Too far-fetched! It's nowhere mentioned in the passage!

D. Implementing the government's plan will leave citizens no choice but to illegally import printers.
It's nowhere mentioned in the passage!

E. The government's plan will lead to a severe shortage of printers in Country X.
It's nowhere mentioned in the passage!
IMO, (B)!

In order to protect its budding printer industry, Country X's government plans to ban all printer imports. Several thousand concerned citizens protested, claiming that such a ban will inevitably result in a sharp rise in the prices of printer retail prices.

Which of the following can be most properly inferred from the passage?

A. Implementing the government's plan will result in a drop of sales of printers in Country X. -> we never know it. Incorrect.

B. The prices of imported printers are very competitive in relation to those of the printers manufactured in Country X. -> It is likely our answer. Let's keep it.

C. If the government does not reverse its plan, it will lose the support of voters. -> Irrelevant.

D. Implementing the government's plan will leave citizens no choice but to illegally import printers. -> Irrelevant.

E. The government's plan will lead to a severe shortage of printers in Country X. -> We never know the demand and supply to conclude the shortage.

So, I think B.

Which of the following can be most properly inferred from the passage?

Pre-thinking: The question asks for an inference from the passage, which means nothing additional needs to be added to the passage. All points mentioned in the passage need to be carefully considered while selecting one of the Options, which can be inferred.

A. Implementing the government's plan will result in a drop of sales of printers in Country X. -- 'Several thousand concerned citizens protested' cannot be assumed to translate to drop in demand or drop in sales. Drop Option A.

B. The prices of imported printers are very competitive in relation to those of the printers manufactured in Country X. -- Since the protesters are claiming that a band will lead to sharp rise in prices of printers, it can be indeed be inferred that imported printers would be costing lesser or are prices competitively. Keep Option D.

C. If the government does not reverse its plan, it will lose the support of voters. -- Only thousand of citizens protested and not a majority. Protests should be translated to loss of support of voters. Drop Option C.

D. Implementing the government's plan will leave citizens no choice but to illegally import printers. -- No such mention or indication in the passage. Irrelevant. Drop Option D.

E. The government's plan will lead to a severe shortage of printers in Country X. -- The passage speaks about prices and there's no mention of demand. Drop Option E.

Answer should be Option B.

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