Editorial: The Intercontinental Bank should reallocate the

Question

Editorial: The Intercontinental Bank should reallocate the voting shares of its members in order to more effectively shape global economic policy. For example, China comprises about 15 percent of the world's gross domestic product but has only a 3 percent voting share, whereas Belgium, with less than 1 percent of the global economy, has a 2 percent share.

Which of the following is an assumption upon which the editorial's authors depend in suggesting a way to more effectively shape global economic policy?
(A) The United States has a larger voting share of the Intercontinental Bank than does China or Belgium.
(B) The specific allocation of voting shares factors into the Intercontinental Bank's effectiveness in shaping global economic policy.
(C) Only voting shares that are precisely proportional to each country's contribution to the global economy are appropriate for the Intercontinental Bank.
(D) The Intercontinental Bank is necessary to the maintenance of a prosperous global economy.
(E) As one of the fastest growing economies, China should have a larger voting share in the Intercontinental Bank.

Confused with OA. Will reveal later... Help needed on such CRs with general approach to handle these.

IanStewart · Accepted Answer

I don't think you've correctly identified the conclusion.

First, in any of these 'policy proposal' questions, it is absolutely crucial to identify the *goal* of the policy. Here, a proposal is made so that the bank can 'more effectively shape global economic policy.' The conclusion of the argument is that voting shares should be changed. The assumption then is that voting shares actually matter; they affect how successfully the bank shapes economic policy, which is why B is the correct answer.

To give a simpler example, if I say 'in order to improve your GMAT score, you should do practice problems', I'm assuming that doing practice problems actually has an effect on your GMAT score.

amit2k9 · Answer

Between choices B and C.

B The specific allocation of voting shares 'does not' factors into the Intercontinental Bank's effectiveness in shaping global economic policy. -- crashes the conclusion.

C.Only voting shares that are precisely proportional to each countty's contrlbution to the global economy are appropriate for the Intercontinental Bank. -- the argument talks about the Global Economy and not about the Intercontinental bank.
Does not effect the conclusion.

B is clear here.

vivesomnium · Answer

The argument is on effective shaping of global economic policy
A: talks of US- beyond the scope of the question and argument
D: Talks of the bank being necessary to propsperity of economy -nothing indicates this in the argument
E: china having greater share is not an assumption of the argument, but an implication.
C: is rewording author's argument, but it misses the important part of question- the global economy. argument is saying proportionate allocation is better, FOR SHAPING GLOBAL ECONOMY

B brings that into the picture.

joshnsit · Answer

@Amit2k9 and vivesomnium

Isn't B a simple reformat of conclusion of A? Can an assumption be same as conslusion in an argument?

joshnsit · Answer

@Ian Your example makes sense, though this is a revelation. I always used to assume( :wink:

a bad one

) that conclusions always happen independently of the premises in individual sentences. Stimulus says: The Intercontinental Bank should reallocate the voting shares of its members in order to more effectively shape global economic policy. According to you, I can strip down the highlighted portion to know my actual conclusion. Am I correct? What more baffles me is the language used in question stem. That also seemed a rephrase of conclusion or assumption, whatever we agree to say. As a general direction, should we assume the part in question stem to be conclusion or not? I have posted a similar CR at cr-two-genes-114078.html Does it follow the same logic?

IanStewart · Answer

I replied to the other thread you linked to above. In these 'policy proposal' questions, there is a conclusion (the recommended course of action) and there is a goal (what that course of action is designed to achieve). So in the sentence above, the conclusion is that the Bank should reallocate voting shares. The goal of that proposal is to allow the Bank to 'more effectively shape economic policy'. The person making this proposal must be assuming that the proposal achieves the goal.

subhashghosh · Answer

To add little bit more, the assumption here should strengthen the conclusion. Only B does that. Also, C is an "extreme choice"; the use of "only" suggests so.

joshnsit · Answer

Hey guys. The OA is B here. 
Let me know if OE is needed.

IanStewart · Answer

There is no chance that C is the correct answer to this question; if the book has C as their answer, throw it away and find better material. The stem in no way assumes that voting shares need to be allocated in a way which is *precisely* proportional to a country's economic contribution. In any case, C is not an assumption at all; it's a rephrasing of the conclusion, but using more extreme language. I imagine you meant to say that the answer is B, or perhaps there is a typo in the source.

subhashghosh · Answer

Ian, I don't know how my quote is replaced with that of joshnsit in your reply, I said that B is the correct answer.

HSPA · Answer

B it shall be. 
Kindly do a negation on both B and C. See which negated statement weakens the conclusion.

Conclusion:The Intercontinental Bank should reallocate the voting shares of its members in order to more effectively shape global economic policy.

Negated B: allocation of voting shares has no effect in shaping global economic policy.

Negated C: Voting shares proportional to country's contribution is in-appropriate for the bank.   ... Also kindly look for extreme words like ONLY, MUST.. a few more

Technique : Courtesy - Powerscore bible

IanStewart · Answer

Sorry about that! I quoted joshnsit's post which quoted yours, and I didn't erase the right quote tags in my post. Fixed now.

joshnsit · Answer

I am extremely sorry guys... Mea culpa.. I messed up while closing 2-3 threads where I was posting OAs for all of them. :oops:

I have corrected in my earlier post as well. Thanks for correcting. The OA is B.

joshnsit · Answer

You stand correct. I did a typo here. The source is MGMAT btw. The OA is B.. :roll:

Thoughtosphere · Answer

The statement says that the Int. Con. bank should reallocate the voting shares of its members in order to more effectively shape global economic policy. Then the statement states an example to elaborate on the sentence.

1. Out of scope
2. If we negate this, it would imply that the allocation of voting share does not factors the effectiveness of the bank in shaping the global economy. The whole argument falls flat.
3. This has two flaws. First, the voting shares are not appropriate to the bank. Second, the voting shares are not precisely proportional to country's share. The statement doesn't mention that the share and the GDP proportion should be equal.
4. If we negate this, the statement still stand
5. China was just an example, it can not be included in the assumption.

mvictor · Answer

since this is an assumption type of question, the correct answer should present new information that is in the scope of the passage and that if negated, the conclusion would shatter.

(A) The United States has a larger voting share of the Intercontinental Bank than does China or Belgium.
the argument is not concerned with the fact that US has more voting shares. OFS.

(B) The specific allocation of voting shares factors into the Intercontinental Bank's effectiveness in shaping global economic policy.
if this is not true, then the argument that since C has 15% of WGDP is irrelevant, and cannot be used as an premise to support the conclusion that the voting shares should be changed. looks good so far.

(C) Only voting shares that are precisely proportional to each country's contribution to the global economy are appropriate for the Intercontinental Bank.
which shares are appropriate for the IC is irrelevant and out of scope.

(D) The Intercontinental Bank is necessary to the maintenance of a prosperous global economy.
while it might be true, the author does not assume that.

(E) As one of the fastest growing economies, China should have a larger voting share in the Intercontinental Bank.
this might be something inferred from the argument. Since inferred information cannot be the assumption, E is not correct.

after POE, the only answer choice that looks good is B.

devikeerthan · Answer

B The specific allocation of voting shares 'does not' factors into the Intercontinental Bank's effectiveness in shaping global economic policy. -- crashes the conclusion.

jaisonsunny77 · Answer

Editorial: The Intercontinental Bank should reallocate the voting shares of its members in order to more effectively shape global economic policy. For example, China comprises about 15 percent of the world's gross domestic product but has only a 3 percent voting share, whereas Belgium, with less than 1 percent of the global economy, has a 2 percent share.

The conclusion: The Intercontinental Bank should reallocate the voting shares to more effectively shape global economic policy.

Key idea: If we analyze the conclusion carefully, we get to notice that the author assumes a link between ( reallocation  of voting shares) and ( effectiveness  in shaping global policy)
 
Which of the following is an assumption upon which the editorial's authors depend in suggesting a way to more effectively shape global economic policy?
 
(A) The United States has a larger voting share of the Intercontinental Bank than does China or Belgium.  -  The voting share of the United States is not mentioned anywhere in the passage.  
 (B) The specific allocation of voting shares factors into the Intercontinental Bank's effectiveness in shaping global economic policy. - This is what we are looking for. Hence,  (B) is the right answer choice .   
(C) Only voting shares that are precisely proportional to each country's contribution to the global economy are appropriate for the Intercontinental Bank.  -  it is certainly possible that the Intercontinental bank uses several variables in addition to "allocation of voting rights" to shape economic policy. Moreover, in the context of this passage, we cannot be absolutely certain that 'proportionality of voting shares' is the only variable used by the bank.  
 (D) The Intercontinental Bank is necessary to the maintenance of a prosperous global economy.  -  the passage deals with "shaping economic policy", not with "the prosperity of global economy". What is regarded as a great policy may actually lead to non-expectant results.   
(E) As one of the fastest growing economies, China should have a larger voting share in the Intercontinental Bank.  -  irrelevant to the conclusion drawn

GMAT0010 · Answer

This is another typical correlation - causality problem.
Here, the logic follows:
voting shares -> GDP
But it should not be the other way around. GDP can't cause voting shares
So that makes C wrong
B is the answer

Editorial: The Intercontinental Bank should reallocate the

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Editorial: The Intercontinental Bank should reallocate the

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