Hardin argued that grazing land held in common (that is, open to any

Question

Hardin argued that grazing land held in common (that is, open to any user) would always be used less carefully than private grazing land. Each rancher would be tempted to overuse common land because the benefits would accrue to the individuals, while the costs of reduced land quality that results from overuse would be spread among all users. But a study comparing 217 million acres of common grazing land with 433 million acres of private grazing land showed that the common land was in better condition.

Which of the following, if true and known by the ranchers, would best help explain the results of the study?

(A) With private grazing land, both the costs and the benefits of overuse fall to the individual user.

(B) The cost in reduced land quality that is attributable to any individual user is less easily measured with common land than it is with private land.

(C) An individual who overuses common grazing land might be able to achieve higher returns than other users can, with the result that he or she would obtain a competitive advantage.

(D) If one user of common land overuses it even slightly, the other users are likely to do so even more, with the consequence that the costs to each user outweigh the benefits.

(E) There are more acres of grazing land held privately than there are held in common.

"Hardin" Evaluate Argument Question

GMATNinja · Accepted Answer

Let's start by identifying the discrepancy between Hardin's argument and the results of the study:

According to Hardin, grazing land held in common would always be used less carefully than private grazing land. 
 However, according to the study, the common land was in better condition than the private land.

Now let's look at the details of the passage:

Common grazing land is open to any user. 
 According to Hardin, each individual rancher would be tempted to overuse common land. Why? Because each individual rancher would benefit from overusing the common land. Meanwhile, the  costs  of reduced land quality from overuse would be spread among all users. 
 In other words, if a rancher overuses his/her own private land, he/she will bear the costs of the overuse. But if a rancher overuses common grazing land, the costs will be spread among ALL users. Thus, it seems as though ranchers using common land have more incentive to overuse the land and negatively impact the land quality. 
 But the results of a study, which compared 217 million acres of common grazing land with 433 million acres of private grazing land, showed that the common land was actually in  better  condition. This goes against Hardin's argument. We need an answer choice that explains this discrepancy.

Which of the following, if true and known by the ranchers, would best help explain the results of the study?

This helps explain Hardin's point of view, but it does not explain why the results of the study do not match Hardin's argument. Eliminate (A).

Choice (B) tells us that it if, say, 20 ranchers are sharing some common land, then it is difficult to measure the cost in reduced land quality caused by any one user.

On the other hand, with private land, any cost in reduced land quality could be attributed to the rancher who owns the land. Determining the exact cost might be difficult, but we would not have to worry about dividing up the blame.

This information helps to explain Hardin's position. If (B) were NOT true, it might be easier to point a finger at any one rancher and say, "Hey, your overuse of the common land has cost us all X dollars!" That would make it harder for the ranchers to take advantage of the shared land.

But (B) does not explain the results of the study, so it should be eliminated.

Again, this helps to explain Hardin's position. Choice (C) gives us even more reason to expect that ranchers would try to overuse common land and that the private land would be in better condition. (C) does not explain the results of the study, so it should be eliminated.

According to Hardin, an individual rancher would have an incentive to overuse public grazing lands. Why? Because the rancher would accrue benefits from overusing the land, and the costs of the overuse would be spread among all users.

But according to choice (D), if an individual rancher tries to exploit the common land as described by Hardin, then the other users are likely to overuse the land to an even greater extent. As more and more users start to overuse the common land, the costs of overuse start to outweigh the benefits, even though those costs are spread among all users.

In other words, if only ONE rancher tries to exploit the system, then that rancher will benefit at the expense of the other users. But, if (D) is true and KNOWN by the ranchers, then all of the ranchers are aware that any such attempt will end up costing them in the long run. Thus, despite the temptation described by Hardin, the ranchers would not want to overuse the common land.

(D) explains the discrepancy, so keep this one.

We are not concerned with the number of acres of common and private land. We are only concerned with the  condition  of each type. Choice (E) is irrelevant, so eliminate this one.

(D) is the best answer.

ywilfred · Answer

Conclusion: Common grazing land is in better condition than private grazing land even though common grazing land tend to be overused.

Which of the following, if true and known by the ranchers, would best help explain the results of the study?

(A): With private grazing land, both the costs and the benefits of overuse fall to the individual user. 
- does not explain why common grazing land is in a better shape, or why private grazing land is in a poorer condition

(B): The cost in reduced land quality that is attributable to any individual user is less easily measured with common land than it is with private land. 
- Again provides us with no useful information why common land is in a better shape

(C): An individual who overuses common grazing land might be able to achieve higher returns than other uses can, with the result that he or she would obtain a competitive advantage. 
- out of scope.

(D): If one user of common land overuses it even slightly, the other users are likely to do so even more, with the consequence that the costs to each user outweigh the benefits. 
- If this was true, common land would be less appealing to ranchers and they would rather use private grazing land than common grazing land. The consequence would be a lower quality private grazing land.

(E): There are more acres of grazing hand held privately than there are held in common. 
- not important. All it tells us is there are more private grazing land than common grazing land.

(D) it is.

anandsebastin · Answer

Must be D . Rancher thinking: "Hey, Why shouldn't I let all my cattle graze on the commonland. Oh, wait a minute, if I do that, my neighbors will start doing the same and pretty soon the common land will be bare and I will have to graze all my cattle on my own land. hmmm... maybe that's not such a good idea!" :wink:

AdityaHongunti · Answer

GMATNinja   DmitryFarber

The reason i selected A is that I thought that if the individual costs in individual system is more , then the individuals would be less motivated to keep their area in a better shape... in contrast, the common land ppl share the expenses and so do not have much of a burden to keep the area in a better shape..
now the answer choice A just tells us that in individual system , individuals have to bear more.. the further reasoning i made based on motiavtion is wrong?? or did i take it too far??

GMATNinja · Answer

Yes, you took this one too far. We have to be careful about adding further reasoning to what we're reading. This is one of the toughest things to keep up when taking the GMAT... but it's essential to take in the passage as directly as possible.

To illustrate, here's (A) again:
 
This choice adds more information to Hardin's argument by telling us what happens with  private  grazing land.

However, this choice does not tell us that "individuals have to bear more" (though I could be misunderstanding what you mean by this). It definitely doesn't state or suggest that "individual costs in individual system is more."

(A) says that in a case of overuse, the costs and benefits of that overuse both fall to the individual rancher. That's it. This choice adds no information or explanation about individual motivations. And this choice tells us nothing about how individual ranchers behave when using common grazing land. So there's nothing here that would help explain the study if it were true and known by the ranchers.

I hope this helps!

CRACKGMATNUT · Answer

Hi, Thanks for this explanation. Just a thing here, I am not ale to understand that even if farmers won't be involved in the practice of overgrazing on common land, I am not sure how it will finally justify the paradox of common land to be in Better condotion than private grazeland? Both of them can be at par in quality with this justification, but how does it prove "better" ? I am sure I am missing something here.

GMATNinja · Answer

The question doesn't ask us to "prove" anything at all -- instead, it just asks us which answer choice would "best  help " to explain the results of the study.

(D) does exactly that -- it gives us a reason that farmers wouldn't overuse common land. Does this  prove  why common land is in better shape? Nope, but it doesn't have to go that far. (D) provides some information to help explain the results of the study, while the other answer choices don't help at all. So, (D) is the correct answer.

I hope that helps!

Rail · Answer

I've read this question as a situation in which you have some sort of game theory scenario with D being a Pareto-optimal situation (or, in its weak configuration, a Nash equilibrium). No one could abuse of his part of land since there would be a lose-lose situation in the medium to long term. In short, everyone would need to cooperate to maintain a certain standard, thus avoiding the individual overuse.

That allowed me to choose the right answer and to exclude B since it was off topic.  GMATNinja  what do you think?

The others do not add useful information. (especially E that was the first easy out)

Funny thing this was one of the very rare scenarios in which external knowledge was somehow useful to solve this question.

GMATNinja · Answer

Game theory is a ton of fun, but you definitely don't need outside information to answer GMAT verbal questions, and we recommend staying away from such info as you work through CR problems.

Here, for instance, (B) isn't really "off-topic." We're trying to explain the results of the study in the passage. Does (B) explain why public grazing land is in better shape than private grazing land?

Actually, it makes the results  even more surprising  -- if it's hard to measure how much damage an individual is doing to public land, then it seems like that individual wouldn't be afraid to do damage. No one's going to know the cost of the damage, right? Might as well trample public land all you want.

So, (B) definitely doesn't explain why public land is in better condition than private land, and you can eliminate (B).

I hope that helps!

AcetheGMAT123 · Answer

Hi,

I have a doubt. Please help me out  GMATNinja

The question says that 217 Million Acres of Common Land is compared to 433 Million Acres of Private Land.

Also, Statement E says that there is more privately held land than common land.

From these 2 statements, we can infer that it could be that we have only chosen a part of the total private land (only 433, out of maybe 1000 private total lands), or chosen a small part of the total common Land, and due to that, we've incorrectly arrived at the conclusion that "common lands are in a good condition" when it's not.

So, Option E helps us to explain the discrepancy right? Hardin says that the common lands are overused and they are, actually, overused.

Posted from my mobile device

GMATNinja · Answer

To address option (E), let's start by looking at the question:

Notice that the question isn't asking us to explain the discrepancy  exactly . Rather it's asking us to find something that would explain the study results IF the ranchers knew it to be true.

So does (E) fit the bill? Not exactly. If ranchers knew there was more privately than publicly held land, that knowledge wouldn't explain the results of the study.

But what if the study were wrong? What if the study examined 433 acres of private land that just happened to be in really bad shape? What if private lands as a whole were ACTUALLY in much better shape than public lands? While that could address the discrepancy, notice that (E) isn't telling us that exactly.

All (E) is telling us is that there is more privately held grazing land than publicly held grazing land. But that alone doesn't tell us that the study took non-representative samples of land. To draw that conclusion from (E) would require a big leap that we don't want to make.

Overall, (E) doesn't provide knowledge that, if held by the ranchers, would explain the study results. It also doesn't allow us to draw the conclusion that the study was misleading. For both of those reasons, we can eliminate (E).

I hope that helps!

devadiv · Answer

Thanks for the detailed explanation. I am still confused why (A) is incorrect because if the private grazing land liabilities are falling on an individual user, it does help to explain why the condition will be bad compared to the common grazing ground.

GMATNinja · Answer

Not necessarily. What if the costs of overuse far exceed the benefits? If that's the case and if those costs and benefits both fall on the individual user, then that would be a reason for the individual user to AVOID overusing the land. (A) might be useful if we knew that the benefits outweighed the costs, but that isn't something that we can assume. For a bit more on (A), check out this post: https://gmatclub.com/forum/hardin-argue ... l#p2165638.

agrasan · Answer

Hi  KarishmaB   MartyMurray

To make (C) correct, can we say that we have to make an unwarranted assumption that ranchers would invest good money on common lands (to keep in better condition) for the competitive advantage but we are not given that the investment will be made by them?

MartyMurray · Answer

We cannot make (C) correct that way because the point of (C) is not that a rancher could achieve a competitive advantage by keeping the land "in better condition."

Let's review (C):

(C) An individual  who overuses  common grazing land might be able to achieve higher returns than other users can, with the result that he or she would obtain a competitive advantage.

Notice that the point of (C) is that a rancher who "overuses" common grazing land might obtain a competitive advantage. In such a case, a competitive advantage would be obtained through leaving the land in worse condition, rather than better condition.

So, (C) actually deepens the paradox by indicating that there may be a reason - by doing so, they might obtain a competitive advantage - for ranchers to overuse and, thus, worsen the condition of common grazing land.

KarishmaB · Answer

Hardin argued that common land would be used less carefully than private grazing land. 
Rancher will get the benefit while the cost of degradation (cannot be used effectively later) will be shared by all. So the rancher will try to get as much individual benefit as possible from it. 
In case of private land, overuse will cost him only so he is likely to be more careful.

But the study found that common land is in better shape. Why? We need to explain this paradox. Why are ranchers not misusing the common land?

(A) With private grazing land, both the costs and the benefits of overuse fall to the individual user.

We know this. But why did the study find that common land is in better condition?

(B) The cost in reduced land quality that is attributable to any individual user is less easily measured with common land than it is with private land.

This is as expected too. In case of common land, it would be harder to say who is responsible for how much use/misuse and hence attributing costs is less easily measure. The point is, why are people not misusing common land? This option doesn't answer that.

(C) An individual who overuses common grazing land might be able to achieve higher returns than other users can, with the result that he or she would obtain a competitive advantage.

This is the reason why ranchers would want to misuse common land. They will get higher returns by misusing it and hence get an advantage. Then why are they not doing so? The option doesn't explain.

(D) If one user of common land overuses it even slightly, the other users are likely to do so even more, with the consequence that the costs to each user outweigh the benefits.

This explains. If one user overuses, the other will overuse even more. This means that if the land quality needs to be maintained at 100 but rancher A misuses it and brings it down to 95, rancher B will then misuse even more and bring it down to 80. Rancher C will take it down to 50 and so on. So A's misuse will only lead to higher cost to him than the little bit of extra benefit he got. This explains a reason why no one is misusing the common land.

(E) There are more acres of grazing land held privately than there are held in common.

Irrelevant.

Answer (D)

anushree01 · Answer

love this question.
I missed form the stem that - if true & known  to Rancher 
Also didnt pay attention to option D - it was a if then statement

Usernamevisible · Answer

750-Level CR Drill (Explain the Paradox)

Step 1: Read the stimulus

Hardin argued that grazing land held in common (that is, open to any user) would always be used less carefully than private grazing land.

Theory:
Common ownership → worse maintenance.

---

Each rancher would be tempted to overuse common land because the benefits would accrue to the individuals, while the costs of reduced land quality that results from overuse would be spread among all users.

Mechanism (author's logic):

Individual benefit > Individual cost → overuse.

This is the classic "tragedy of the commons."

---

But a study comparing 217 million acres of common grazing land with 433 million acres of private grazing land showed that the common land was in better condition.

Paradox:

Expected:
Common land worse.

Reality:
Common land better.

---

Prethink (1-2 sentences)

Goal:

Find a reason why rational ranchers would avoid overusing common land, even though individual benefits exist.

Test sentence:

"A rancher will NOT overuse common land because ______."

Use this on every option.

---

Option Drill

(A)

With private grazing land, both the costs and the benefits of overuse fall to the individual user.

Test:

A rancher will not overuse common land because on private land both costs and benefits are individual.

This talks about private land, not why common land became better.

No resolution.

❌ Eliminate.

---

(B)

The cost in reduced land quality that is attributable to any individual user is less easily measured with common land than it is with private land.

Test:

A rancher will not overuse common land because his individual damage is hard to measure.

Actually, if nobody can blame me, I have more incentive to overuse.

Strengthens Hardin.

❌ Eliminate.

---

(C)

An individual who overuses common grazing land might be able to achieve higher returns than other users can, with the result that he or she would obtain a competitive advantage.

This is literally Hardin's argument:

Personal gain from overuse.

Makes the paradox worse.

❌ Eliminate.

---

(D) ✅

If one user of common land overuses it even slightly, the other users are likely to do so even more, with the consequence that the costs to each user outweigh the benefits.

Read carefully:

Overuse by one person →
Everyone else also overuses →
Massive deterioration →
My own losses become bigger than my gains.

Test:

A rancher will NOT overuse common land because once overuse starts, everybody joins in, and the resulting costs exceed the benefits.

Perfect.

It changes the incentive structure:

Overuse is no longer individually profitable.

✅ KEEP.

---

(E)

There are more acres of grazing land held privately than there are held in common.

217 vs 433 million acres already given.

Completely irrelevant to land quality.

❌ Eliminate.

---

Answer

✅ D

---

750-Scorer Pattern Recognition

Hardin's original logic:

Private benefit > Shared cost → overuse.

The correct answer must destroy this inequality.

D says:

Shared retaliation makes total personal cost > personal benefit.

So the incentive flips:

Overuse becomes irrational.

That's exactly how top scorers think.

---

GMAT Takeaway

For Resolve/Explain questions involving incentives:

Original model:

Individual Benefit > Individual Cost

The correct answer often does one of three things:

1. Increase the individual's cost ✅ (THIS QUESTION)
2. Reduce the individual's benefit
3. Introduce a long-term consequence that changes behavior

750 Pattern:

Don't memorize facts—identify the mechanism producing the paradox and look for the answer that breaks that mechanism.

Hardin argued that grazing land held in common (that is, open to any

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GMAT Critical Reasoning (CR) Questions

Hardin argued that grazing land held in common (that is, open to any

Prep Toolkit

615 to 715 in 15 Days (Ria's Strategies)

More than Quant/Verbal Abilities: Speed vs. Accuracy

745 with Only Self-Prep and GMAT Club

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My Rewards