Mayor of Plainville: In order to help the economy of Plainsville, I am

The question is asking about citizens group assumption. The conclusion made by citizens group is "you must have interests other than our economy
In mind" and goes on to explain why the group thinks so. Now let us analyze options in the light of these:

A: clearly not assumed
B: the use of the word "must" in the conclusion points to this assumption. Correct.
C: the citizens group will say -- we never meant that!! The focus is new highway versus Business park to bring new business. Also how does it affect
Our conclusion?
D: clearly out of contention
E: too strong!!! Citizens group will again say --- we never meant that!!

ALWAYS FOCUS ON THE CONCLUSION!!
B is the citizens groups assumption as it directly relates to the conclusion of the citizens group.

KUDOS PLEASE!!

[quote="Gmat1008"]Mayor of Plainville: In order to help the economy of Plainsville, I am using some of our tax revenues to help bring a major highway through the town and thereby attract new business to Plainsville.

Citizens' group: You must have interests o&er than our economy in mind. If you were really interested in helping our economy, you would instead advocate the revenues to building a new business park, since it would bring in twice the business that your highway would.

The argument by the citizens' group relies on which one of the following assumptions?
(A) Plainsville presently has no major highways running through it.
(B) The mayor accepts that a new business park would bring in more new business than would the new highway.
(C) The new highway would have no benefits for Plainsville other than attracting new business.
(D) The mayor is required to get approval for all tax revenue allocation plans from the city council.
(E) Plainsville economy will not be helped unless a new business park of the sort envisioned by the citizens' group


The question is asking about citizens group assumption. The conclusion made by citizens group is "you must have interests other than our economy
In mind" and goes on to explain why the group thinks so. Now let us analyze options in the light of these:

A: clearly not assumed
B: the use of the word "must" in the conclusion points to this assumption. Correct.
C: the citizens group will say -- we never meant that!! The focus is new highway versus Business park to bring new business. Also how does it affect
Our conclusion?
D: clearly out of contention
E: too strong!!! Citizens group will again say --- we never meant that!!

ALWAYS FOCUS ON THE CONCLUSION!!
B is the citizens groups assumption as it directly relates to the conclusion of the citizens group.

KUDOS PLEASE!!

how do you negate this statement??

Plainsville's economy will not be helped unless a new business park of the sort envisioned by the citizens' group is built.

is it

Plainsville's economy WILL be helped IF a new business park of the sort envisioned by the citizens' group is built.

some help would be appreciated.

Yes, you are right, negation will be like this:
Plainsville's economy WILL be helped IF or WHEN a new business park of the sort envisioned by the citizens' group is built.
---

Conclusion of citizens: Mayor has interests other than economy of P.
If mayor believe that highway is benefical for economy of P and didn't know that business park brings more money - than conclusion is wrong.
So for conclusion be right we should find answer that explicitly says that mayor know about more beneficial possibility of building business park and therefore propose highway for other interests.

Answer is B

Could someone please shed some light on this?

There can be 2 sides/opposing views/Assumptions for this argument -

1. Mayor's assumption : Effect of building an highway to the Economy is more than building new Business parks.
2. Citizens' assumption : Positive effect of building new Business parks is more than building highway.

Only contenders for the correct answer are (B) and (E)...

(E) states that building new business park is the only possible course of action for improving the economy of Plainsville , hence we may reject this option...

Thus correct answer is in line of our Pre thinking, option (B)

Here is my analysis:

Mayor of Plainville Conc: In order to help the economy, I will built a major Hwy to attract new business to Plainsville.

Citizens' group's Conc: You must have interests o&er than our economy in mind.
P1: If you were really interested in helping our economy, you would use money to build a new BP.
P2: BP would bring twice the business that Hwy would.

Pre-thinking
Find citizen's assumption
1st Falsify Citizens' conc: In which scenario Mayor don't have interest other than Plainvile' economy?
Well, if he didn't acknowledge that BP would bring more benefits for the economy that does the Hwy.
So the assumption would be that Mayor knows about the better benefits that would bring the BP.

Answer choice Analysis
The argument by the citizens' group relies on which one of the following assumptions?
(A) Plainsville presently has no major highways running through it. Irrelevant.
Even if Plainsville don't have major highways, Citizen's assumption is based on the knowledge of the better benefits that BP would bring to the economy.

(B) The mayor accepts that a new business park would bring in more new business than would the new highway. Correct!
Aligned with pre-thinking. If negated, the conclusion of the group of citizens is weaken.

The core of the CG's argument is:
P: new business park would bring in twice the business that the highway would
thus
C: The mayor, in suggesting to build the highway, must have some interest beyond the city's economy in mind.

(A) "No" is too extreme. It doesn't matter whether there are currently no major highways or some. It could still be true that building the new major highway would attract new business.

(B) This is a weird answer, but the CG does need to believe that the mayor is aware of and in agreement that a new business park would attract more business than the new highway.

Here's a quick analogy:
Paul: I'm gonna ask Betty to the prom.

Dave: Well, you must be picking your prom date for reasons beyond attractiveness, because Veronica is more attractive than Betty.

Dave is assuming a couple things:
1. Paul is aware that Veronica exists (if he isn't, he could very well be picking Betty based purely on attractiveness; Betty just happens to be the most attractive girl he knows)

2. Paul would agree that Veronica is more attractive than Betty (if he doesn't, then he could still be picking Betty based purely on attractiveness).

Now, obviously, attractiveness sounds more subjective than "which proposed course of action would bring in more business". But those are still speculative ideas, not facts. So both of these assumptions still apply to the Mayor.

Has the Mayor ever heard of this new business park idea? If not, then she might be picking the highway based on it being the most economically beneficial proposal she's aware of.

Does the Mayor accept that the new business park would bring in more business? If she doesn't, then she might be picking the highway because she believes it to be the most economically beneficial proposal.

(C) Why does the Citizens' Group have to assume that the ONLY benefit of the new highway to Plainsville is attracting new business?

They don't. I agree that if there are other economic benefits besides attracting new businesses, that would indeed weaken the Citizens' Group's argument. BUT, the negation of (C) is not "the new highway would have some ECONOMIC benefits other than attracting new business". The negation of (C) is just "the new highway would have SOME benefit other than attracting new business." That statement is not precise enough to hurt the Citizens' Group's argument.

(D) is out of scope; whether the mayor is "required to get approval" is irrelevant to the CG's argument.

(E) This is again extreme ("unless"). The CG acknowledges that the economy would be helped by the new highway, just half as much as the new business park would help.

Mayor of Plainville: In order to help the economy of Plainsville, I am using some of our tax revenues to help bring a major highway through the town and thereby attract new business to Plainsville.

Citizens' group: You must have interests o&er than our economy in mind. If you were really interested in helping our economy, you would instead advocate the revenues to building a new business park, since it would bring in twice the business that your highway would.

The argument by the citizens' group relies on which one of the following assumptions?

(A) Plainsville presently has no major highways running through it. -The conclusion is that mayor is interested in things other than in improvement of economy. Number of major highways has no bearing on the conclusion.
(B) The mayor accepts that a new business park would bring in more new business than would the new highway. -Correct. This proves that even though mayor knows that business parks are a better solution, still he is willing to build a highway.
(C) The new highway would have no benefits for Plainsville other than attracting new business. -Too strong statement. Also it has no impact on the argument. If only it weakens the stand of citizens.
(D) The mayor is required to get approval for all tax revenue allocation plans from the city council. -Out of scope
(E) Plainsville economy will not be helped unless a new business park of the sort envisioned by the citizens' group is built. -This is again too strong statement.

The argument being made by the citizens’ group is that the mayor must have ulterior motives in building a highway, since building a business park would be better for his stated goal behind building the highway (attracting business). This is an assumption question, we need to see which of these assumptions is required for the argument to hold up.

D is obviously irrelevant and can be discarded. A is not an assumption at all, it is a stated fact. Same can be said for E. C is irrelevant whether or not the highway would have any benefits other than attracting new businesses is irrelevant. The conclusion is concerned with the mayor’s motives and the amount of business that the business park will bring to Plainville, compared to the amount that the highway will bring. PoE tells us that B is the right answer but we can also take a closer look at it. This assumption is necessary because if the Mayor does not accept that the business park will bring more business to Plainville, than the highway will, it means that the mayor has no other interests in mind. The mayor legitimately just thinks that the highway is what is best for Plainville’s economy.

Understanding the argument - ­
Mayor of Plainville: In order to help the economy of Plainsville, I am using some of our tax revenues to help bring a major highway through the town and thereby attract new business to Plainsville. - Plan/Goal. 

Citizens' group: You must have interests other than our economy in mind. - Conclusion 
If you were really interested in helping our economy, you would instead advocate the revenues to building a new business park, since it would bring in twice the business that your highway would. - Supporting premise. 

The argument by the citizens' group relies on which one of the following assumptions?

We need to find a missing premise or necessary/minimum condition. 

(A) Plainsville presently has no major highways running through it. - weakener. 

(B) The mayor accepts that a new business park would bring in more new business than would the new highway. - ok. He is willingly choosing the highway over the business park. 

(C) The new highway would have no benefits for Plainsville other than attracting new business. - Out of scope. 

(D) The mayor is required to get approval for all tax revenue allocation plans from the city council. - out of scope. 

(E) Plainsville economy will not be helped unless a new business park of the sort envisioned by the citizens' group is built. - No such minimum condition is established that only if this happens that happens. At best, it can be a strengthener for the supporting premise, but in a sense, the Citizen's group already coveys that. Wrong.