Politician: It has been proposed that the national parks

A. The political aspect of the privatisation is not being discussed here. It is the benefit to the customers that is being discussed.
B. Nothing that says that it won’t benefit the customers.
C. People can benefit without knowing whether it is run by private or not. To weaken it, one must establish that a particular case will not benefit the customer.
D. The size of the customer base is irrelevant.
E. Argument says that privatisation allowed competition among companies which improved quality given to customers. But id there is no competition, the assumption falls flat. Hence E.

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Politician - Privatization of the tele industry has benefited consumers by allowing competition. Service have improved and prices have gone down.
Conclusion - Privatization of the national parks would probably benefit park visitors as well.

We need to weaken this. We can do that by showing how what works for tele industry may not work for national parks.

(A) It would not be politically expedient to privatize the national parks even if doing so would, in the long run, improve service and reduce the fees charged to visitors.

Political expediency is irrelevant. The argument doesn't deal with what is best politically.

(B) The privatization of the telecommunications industry has been problematic in that it has led to significantly increased unemployment and economic instability in that industry.

We are only talking about the measure benefitting customers. Rest of the impact is irrelevant.

(C) The vast majority of people visiting the national parks are unaware of proposals to privatize the management of those parks.

Irrelevant whether people know or not.

(D) Privatizing the national parks would benefit a much smaller number of consumers to a much smaller extent than did the privatization of the telecommunications industry.

Doesn't matter. As long as it will benefit consumers to some extent, the argument holds. It doesn't do much either for or against the argument. But if we had to pick one, it helps the argument by saying that consumers will be benefitted. To weaken, we need to increase the probability that consumers will not be benefitted.

(E) The privatization of the national parks would produce much less competition between different companies than did the privatization of the telecommunications industry.

This tells us that the factor that benefitted tele consumers (competition) may not play out that well in case of national parks. Hence the consumers may not benefit.

Answer (E)

the argument assumes national parks works the similar way as telecommunication industry.We can predict the answer as something that weakens this assumption.

that is national parks and telecommunication industries are structurally different.

only option E comes near that

thats irrevelent. we are not considering the general public.

Therefore, the privatization of the national parks would probably benefit park visitors as well

As we wait for the experts to chip in, please allow me to give my two cents -

Argument: Benefit to consumers due to increased competition.

(D) Privatizing the national parks would benefit a much smaller number of consumers to a much smaller extent than did the privatization of the telecommunications industry. -> This strengthens the argument. WHY: even if benefit is small, the benefit is still there, hence the proposal holds.

In Contrast,
(E) The privatization of the national parks would produce much less competition between different companies than did the privatization of the telecommunications industry. -> This weakens the argument, as it hurts the cause(more competition) stated to bring the desired outcome(benefit to consumer). If the national parks industry has less competition to start with, the desired outcome is in doubt hence the argument doesn't hold.

Hope this helps.

Let me know if you have any more queries here.

"(B) The privatization of the telecommunications industry has been problematic in that it has led to significantly increased unemployment and economic instability in that industry.

We are only talking about the measure benefitting customers. Rest of the impact is irrelevant."

VeritasKarishma, why do we assume that unemployment and economic instability is not impacting customers therein not benefitting customers? This seems plausible, and hence is weakening the argument. Is it because that the argument is centred on customers of the industry and not the general public associated with the industry? If yes, can you please help me understand how to formulate this kind of thinking for GMAT, where we are focused on the specific impact (as stated in question stem) instead of using common sense to bridge the gaps?

CR questions have a very narrow scope. We need to stick to that scope only.
A discussion on any topic can and usually does involve a vast number of factors. A CR question focusses on one or two of those factors only. The other factors are irrelevant to that discussion.

If someone makes a point that "A is good for B", you can support it by saying "Yes, B has been flourishing since A arrived" or you can oppose it by saying "No, B has taken more sick leaves since the arrival of A". But can you oppose the point by saying that "C is good for B?" No. That is not our argument at all. C may or may not be, we don't care.
Our focus has to be on A and B only.

Similarly, an argument that says, "This change will improve my financial position." needs to be countered with how it can worsen my financial situation. Whether this change is good/bad for me in the dept of health/personal relationships/long term career prospects etc is irrelevant to this argument.

Similarly, in our original question, if we are talking about the benefit to the customers, we need to focus on that. Whether it harms the workers of the industry is irrelevant to our argument. We are not being mean here; we are just keeping to the point we are discussing. Don't let your emotions and goodwill interfere. Its impact on workers could be another discussion and the topic for another argument.

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