In Country X, all citizens eligible to vote must do so or face stiff f

Question

In Country X, all citizens eligible to vote must do so or face stiff fines. Because voting in Country X is mandatory, over 99 percent of the eligible voters voted in the last election. Thus, the winner of the last election is truly the people’s choice.

Which of the following identifies an assumption in the author’s argument?

A. In Country X, voters are allowed to vote for a candidate of their choice.

B. If Country X did not make voting mandatory, few people would vote.

C. Only in countries where voting is mandatory do people vote the way they wish to vote.

D. Country X is a true democracy, despite the fact that all people are forced to vote.

E. Only in countries where voting is not mandatory do the winners of elections truly reflect the people’s choice.

Kurtosis · Answer

A. In Country X, voters are allowed to vote for a candidate of their choice. - Correct - Negate A: Voters are not allowed to vote for a candidate of their choice. Conclusion breaks down.

B. If Country X did not make voting mandatory, few people would vote. - Incorrect - Out of scope

C. Only in countries where voting is mandatory do people vote the way they wish to vote. - Incorrect - Out of scope

D. Country X is a true democracy, despite the fact that all people are forced to vote. - Incorrect - Out of scope - Country X may have a Communist regime. But the leader can still be the people's choice.

E. Only in countries where voting is not mandatory do the winners of elections truly reflect the people’s choice. - Incorrect - Out of scope again.

IMO answer is A.

sun01 · Answer

In Country X, all citizens eligible to vote must do so or face stiff fines. Because voting in Country X is mandatory, over 99 percent of the eligible voters voted in the last election. Thus, the winner of the last election is truly the people’s choice.

Conclusion : winner of the last election is truly the people’s choice.

Supporting premise : voting in Country X is mandatory ----------> over 99 percent of the eligible voters voted

Missing piece of information : voters always cast vote in favor of his/her election candidate/regional representatives.

Which of the following identifies an assumption in the author’s argument?

In Country X, voters are allowed to vote for a candidate of their choice. -Yes.

If Country X did not make voting mandatory, few people would vote. : not an assumption. it's a sequel to conclusion.

Only in countries where voting is mandatory do people vote the way they wish to vote. -- not relevant

Country X is a true democracy, despite the fact that all people are forced to vote. -- OFS

Only in countries where voting is not mandatory do the winners of elections truly reflect the people’s choice-Opposite of what has been stated in argument

UJs · Answer

I Agree with others (IMO answer is A)

A. In Country X, voters are allowed to vote for a candidate of their choice. - Voters are not allowed to vote for a candidate of their choice. Conclusion breaks down.  Correct 
B. If Country X did not make voting mandatory, few people would vote.  - doesn't matter 
C. Only in countries where voting is mandatory do people vote the way they wish to vote.  - not releated 
D. Country X is a true democracy, despite the fact that all people are forced to vote.  - Democracy or not, its not helping to prove people's choice  
E. Only in countries where voting is not mandatory do the winners of elections truly reflect the people’s choice.  - interesting choice, but its not related to countries where voting is mandatory.

E --> This one is tempting (as people tend to negate it as - what is true for countries with non-mandatory voting is false for countries with mandatory voting - but that's not correct, hence not releated

daboo343 · Answer

Conclusion:  the winner of the last election is truly the people’s choice. 
 
Premise: over 99 percent of the eligible voters voted in the last election 
Here the argument links voting percentage to winner of last election (winner is people choice)
Just assume what if people are forced to vote a particular candidate. In that case the conclusion must be shattered

Correct In Country X, voters are allowed to vote for a candidate of their choice.
 Just negate this answer choice . After negating one can find that the conclusion tear apart.

Incorrect If Country X did not make voting mandatory, few people would vote.
It has no bearing on the conclusion.

Incorrect Only in countries where voting is mandatory do people vote the way they wish to vote. 
This conclusion doesn't help conclusion in any way.

Incorrect Country X is a true democracy, despite the fact that all people are forced to vote. 
It has no bearing the conclusion

Only in countries where voting is not mandatory do the winners of elections truly reflect the people’s choice.

Spovil · Answer

A is the correct answer

Conclusion: Thus, the winner of the last election is truly the people’s choice.
Premise: over 99 percent of the eligible voters voted in the last election.

The argument can be broken down or understood in 2 smaller and simpler parts People allowed to vote (1) & People allowed to vote of their choice (2)

(1) is anyways compulsory, but, nothing has been said about (2) in premise. Whereas, conclusion cites (2)

Consider a case: Politicians are as good as hooligans, who have abducted one person from each family and have asked to vote rest of the people in favor of a person, who the politician wants. So, even though, rest of the people are voting, they do not vote a person of their choice. The choice is forced on them. Option - A covers up for this gap.

Shiv2016 · Answer

Premise: in country X, all citizens…..fines.
Premise: Because voting ….last election.
Conclusion: Therefore, the winner of the last election is truly the people’s choice.
The author directly states that the winner of last election is people’s choice.
But what if people just voted to avoid stiff fines and had no personal liking for any candidate. That is they voted for anyone whether they liked him or not.

Pre-thinking: Voters voted for their favourite candidate and thus made the winner of their choice.
Here the assumption can be an option that removes a possible weakener as mentioned above and show people’s interest in voting.

Choice A states that voters are allowed to vote for their favourite candidate.
Let’s negate this choice: In Country X, voters are NOT allowed to vote for a candidate of their choice. 
If this is true then the conclusion is flawed because this negation creates a gap in the logical structure. 
Therefore option A is correct.

Option B does not state anything about voters candidate preference. Therefore out of scope.

Option C states that in countries where voting is mandatory do people vote they wish to vote.
‘wish to vote’ does not tell us anything about the preference for a particular candidate and how this ‘wish’ makes the winner peoples choice. INCORRECT.

Choice D is out of scope and does not have any impact on the conclusion.

Choice E when negated supports the conclusion. INCORRECT.

chesstitans · Answer

stuck with A and C; other option choices are out of scope.
C is incorrect b/c of "the way they wish to vote" and even if C is true, there is no guarantee people will vote for the person they want.
Using negation of A, the conclusion is no longer true.

prateekchugh · Answer

OFFICIAL EXPLANATION

Step 1: Identify the Question Type 
The question stem contains the classic telltale word “assumption,” so we can be confident that this is an Assumption question.

Step 2: Untangle the Stimulus 
The argument concludes that the winner of the election is the people’s choice. This is based on the evidence that nearly every eligible voter voted in the election and that voting is mandatory in Country X.

Step 3: Predict the Answer 
But just because everyone voted doesn’t mean that the winner is truly the people’s choice. In fact, if voting is compulsory, people might be forced to vote in an election in which they don’t prefer any of the candidates. The author’s claim about the election depends on the assumptions that citizens of Country X are able to vote for whomever they like, that their votes express their preference, and that their votes will be tallied honestly and accurately.

Step 4: Evaluate the Choices 
(A) reflects our prediction nearly verbatim. (B) tells us that Country X may be justified in requiring its citizens to vote, but that does nothing to prove that the winner of the election is the people’s choice. As for (C), even if people vote for candidates of their choice in countries where voting is not mandatory, this argument could still be made. (C) also doesn’t demonstrate anything about Country X specifically, so it’s not the assumption we’re looking for. (D) is tempting—but it requires the assumption that a “true democracy” is one in which the winner of any election is “the people’s choice.” Because the term “true democracy” is not defined in the answer choice or in the stimulus, (D) is out of scope. (E) is the exact opposite of what we’re seeking, because it would suggest that the winner of the election in Country X would not be the people’s choice. Choice (A) is the correct answer.

VerbalBot · Answer

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In Country X, all citizens eligible to vote must do so or face stiff f

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In Country X, all citizens eligible to vote must do so or face stiff f

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