When governments subsidize certain industries, the business owners and

Question

When governments subsidize certain industries, the business owners and employees of those industries benefit but the majority of consumers pay more for those products and find that there are fewer of their tax dollars available for policies they prefer. Unsurprisingly, polling indicates that most people see industry-specific subsidies as unfavorable. Consequently, political candidates would increase their likelihood of being elected if they oppose such subsidies.

The argument above assumes which of the following?

A. Most voters are well-informed about their elected representatives’ positions on subsidies.

B. Those who support subsidies are not significantly more likely to vote than are those who oppose subsidies.

C. Voters are only motivated by the way that policies directly impact themselves personally.

D. Political candidates should only support policies that increase their likelihood of being elected.

E. Subsidies specific to a particular industry do not stimulate the economy enough to benefit employees in other industries.

banerjeerohit92 · Answer

CORRECT ANSWER B.

Here the conclusion is that:-

the likelihood of getting elected is higher if the politician opposes Industry specific subsidies.

A. Most voters are well-informed about their elected representatives’ positions on subsidies...Wrong.. Well informed? Very well. Does it guarantee that they are going to take the trouble of walking under the sun and voting for their favourite cadidate? NO.

B. Those who support subsidies are not significantly more likely to vote than are those who oppose subsidies. ..CORRECT... This is the correct assumption because if we negate this then we see that PEOPLE WHO SUPPORT SUBSIDIES ARE MORE LIKELY TO VOTE THAN ARE THOSE WHO OPPOSE SUBSIDIES. It definitely hurts the conclusion.

C. Voters are only motivated by the way that policies directly impact themselves personally....Wrong. We're are not concerned whether voters are impacted directly or indirectly by the policies. Also, voters' motivation does not talk about the politician's likelihood of getting elected

D. Political candidates should only support policies that increase their likelihood of being elected.-------Wrong. It does not talk about the people who are going to elect them.

E. Subsidies specific to a particular industry do not stimulate the economy enough to benefit employees in other industries. ----Out of scope. We're not concerned about what happens to employees of other industries.

Raksat · Answer

I think the answer should be B 
A: Even if the voters are well informed or not, it doesn't culminate to actual votes. There may be other factors affecting the judgment of the voters.
B: If those who support subsidies are more likely to vote than are those who oppose subsidies, then the politician opposing the subsidies will lose. Hence the negation of argument weakens the conclusion. Therefore, it may be the solution.
C: Directly or indirectly is not the crust of the argument. Hence it can be eliminated. Again this option is bit extreme.
D: Very close. IF B is incorrect then D is definitely the answer. The problem is that the tone is extreme because it speaks about only one strategy and ignores the others that may exist
E: clearly out of scope.

Kurtosis · Answer

Question Type: Assumption

Argument: Political candidates would increase their likelihood of being elected if they oppose such subsidies

A. Most voters are well-informed about their elected representatives’ positions on subsidies. - Negate: Most voters are not well informed about their elected representatives’ positions on subsidies. But even if 40% of the voters are well informed, it will increase the candidates likelihood of winning. The conclusion is about the chances of winning. So, this option doesn't destroy the conclusion when negated.

B. Those who support subsidies are not significantly more likely to vote than are those who oppose subsidies. - Correct. Negate B: Those who support subsidies are significantly more likely to vote than are those who oppose subsidies. This will not increase the candidates likelihood of winning as voters who oppose subsidies are less likely to vote.

C. Voters are only motivated by the way that policies directly impact themselves personally. - Even if they are motivated by policies that impact other aspects, this policy may have an indirect impact on those aspects too.

D. Political candidates should only support policies that increase their likelihood of being elected. - Out of focus. Doesn't talk about the voters impact on the candidates' chances of winning.

E. Subsidies specific to a particular industry do not stimulate the economy enough to benefit employees in other industries. - Irrelevant.

Answer: B

Bunuel · Answer

VERITAS PREP OFFICIAL SOLUTION:

As you assess the argument here looking for gaps in logic, you should see that the main premise in the argument is "in polling, most people find subsidies unfavorable" and the conclusion is that "politicians would therefore be more likely to win if they oppose subsidies." This leaves a pretty large gap: does seeing this one issue as unfavorable mean that most people would actually go and vote for a candidate who opposes that issue?

Anticipate some possible weaknesses in that logic:

-maybe it's an issue most people don't care about very much so it's not a good indicator of how they'll vote

-maybe the people who support subsidies passionately support them and will be sure to vote while those opposed are more apathetic and probably won't vote

However you look at it, recognize that the gap exists between how this particular issue polls and how that will impact votes.

For this reason,  choice (B) is correct . If you hold it up to the Assumption Negation Technique, you get: those who support the subsidies are significantly more likely to vote." If this were true, that would cripple the given argument - the only evidence the argument has is that "most people find subsidies unfavorable" but if polling is not a good indication of who will go and vote, that premise loses its predictive power. As anticipated above, (B) suggests a direct impediment between "polling" and "voting."

Among the incorrect answer choices, (C) and (E) are wrong for essentially the same reason: they each suggest reasons that people might actually prefer the subsidies (in (C) it's "what if they themselves don't benefit but they like what the subsidies do for their neighbors" and in (E) it's "maybe the subsidies actually do benefit most people, after all, if you let them play out"). But in each case the rebuttal is "but the polls already say that they're against subsidies." We have hard evidence in the stimulus that those considerations don't matter: people are against them.

(A) can be rebutted the same way. Even if people aren't well-informed about the issues, they've indicated that they're against the issue (and in real life, who hasn't met someone who's poorly-informed but heavily convicted about an issue?).

Choice (D) is there as a trap for those who tend to hijack the conclusion. Remember: the conclusion only talks about the probability (politicians would be more likely to win) and not what politicians ought to do. Choice (D) deals with what politicians should or shouldn't do, but that doesn't impact the specific conclusion at all, so (D) is incorrect.

Hoozan · Answer

ChiranjeevSingh   GMATNinja

I was down to option A and option B. The reason I let go of option B is because

(B)  Those who support subsidies are not significantly more likely to vote than are those who oppose subsidies.

Negation of (B)  Those who support subsidies are significantly more likely to vote than are those who oppose subsidies.

Now lets say there are 10 people who are supporters while there are 1M who aren't. So we can have a case where 9/10 supporters vote and only a handful of the total op-posers i.e.. 1k/1M vote.

We see that even though supporters are  significantly more likely  to vote (9/10) as compared to op-posers (1K/1M) --This doesn't break the conclusion that "political candidates would increase their likelihood of being elected if they oppose such subsidies."

On the other hand if we see (A)

A.  Most voters are well-informed about their elected representatives’ positions on subsidies.

Negation of A :  Not Most / some voters are well-informed about their elected representatives’ positions on subsidies

If the voters are less informed how would they vote for their candidate based on them opposing the subsidy?

ashmit99 · Answer

VeritasKarishma  could you please help me with @hoozan's point? I have the same doubt and I used the same quantitative reasoning to reject B. 
 GMATNinja   GMATNinja Two  ChiranjeevSingh  @CJAnish- Please see if you can help.

Thanking you in advance.

ChiranjeevSingh · Answer

The gist of the argument is: most people see industry-specific subsidies as unfavorable. Consequently, political candidates would increase their likelihood of being elected if they oppose such subsidies. Other things aside, I see that there is a 'being' in the conclusion

Let's say that I make this argument that since a majority of horses in the world are white and the remaining are black, a white horse is more likely to win a horse race than a black horse. What if somebody says black horses are significantly more likely to participate in a horse race than white horses? My premise was just that there are more white horses than black horses (of course, there is no upper limit to 'most', but the guaranteed information is that it is at least slightly greater than 50% i.e. there are more white horses than black horses). Now, somebody says black horses are significantly more likely to participate. In light of this information and my premise, do we know horses of which color are going to participate more in the races? No. Then, which one is more likely to win? Don't know. That's how the argument breaks down.

KarishmaB · Answer

ashmit99 :

When governments subsidize certain industries, owners and employees of those industries benefit 
But the majority of consumers suffer. 
Unsurprisingly, polling indicates that most people see industry-specific subsidies as unfavorable.

Conclusion: Political candidates would increase their likelihood of being elected if they oppose such subsidies.

Notice the conclusion "candidates would increase your likelihood of being elected" if they oppose subsidies. It is based on the premise that most people do not favour subsidies. 
The question is: do these "most people who oppose subsidies" vote? What if very few of them vote and many of the ones who favour subsidies vote. Then you may be alienating a bigger chunk. Then can we say that you increase your likelihood of being elected? No, we cannot say it. Whether we actually increase or decrease our likelihood will depend on the actual numbers, but we cannot conclude that you will increase your likelihood of being elected. Hence our conclusion fails and that is what (B) says.

A. Most voters are well-informed about their elected representatives’ positions on subsidies.

Negated (A): Most voters are NOT well-informed about their elected representatives’ positions on subsidies.

Doesn't matter. Say only 30% voters are informed. The increase in votes that we are expecting will come from this 30% instead of 100%. The increase in votes may not be a whole lot but it will be an increase. That will increase the likelihood of being elected. It may not be enough to get elected but it will increase the likelihood of getting elected and that is all we are talking about. (A) is only decreasing the overall pool. It is not increasing/reducing relative number of opposers/supporters.

Answer (B)

ashmit99 · Answer

VeritasKarishma

I think in option A also we could get cases in which the answer would come "Don't know."
A case that came to my mind is suppose there are a total of 100 people and 51 are aware and 49 are not. And suppose these people are just aware and don't vote and the 49 are not aware. And these 49 can vote either for a candidate who favours or for a candidate who doesn't. At last we wouldn't know who is more likely to win.

Please guide me where my reasoning is going wrong.
Thanking in advance.

KarishmaB · Answer

Option (A) tells you something about the general public. That would be applicable to everyone if no distinction has been made in the option. The option does not say that opposers are not aware or supporters are not aware. It just says that more than 50% people are aware so we are negating it to mean less than 50% are aware. Who constitutes that less than 50% - the general public - which we have no reason to believe would be anything other than supporters and opposers in the same ratio as that in the complete population. 
What proportion votes and what proportion doesn't has not been introduced in this option.

VerbalBot · Answer

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When governments subsidize certain industries, the business owners and

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