The short-term and long-term interests of a business often conflict;

Question

The short-term and long-term interests of a business often conflict; when they do, the morally preferable act is usually the one that serves the long-term interest. Because of this, businesses often have compelling reasons to execute the morally preferable act.

Which one of the following, if assumed, enables the conclusion of the argument to be properly drawn?

(A) A business’s moral interests do not always provide compelling reasons for executing an act.
(B) A business’s long-term interests often provide compelling reasons for executing an act.
(C) The morally preferable act for a business to execute and the long-term interests of the business seldom conflict.
(D) The morally preferable act for a business to execute and the short-term interests of the business usually conflict.
(E) When a business’s short-term and long-term interests conflict, morality alone is rarely the overriding consideration.

AndrewN · Accepted Answer

Hello again,  adkikani , and thank you for tagging me. (I like to respond if no one else has done so and taken the breath out of me.) I read through your reasoning, and the only parts I find need a little refinement are your negations. In choice (A), for example, the original  do not always  already means  sometimes . The negation would be to remove  not , as in,  A business's moral interests always provide... . Likewise, in choice (B), the opposite of  often provide  is not  never , but something more along the lines of  seldom provide  or  do  not  often provide . You still walked away with the correct answer, so you are on the right track, but you have to be careful when negating not to take it too far and distort the meaning of the negated answer. On another question, an improper negation could lead you down the wrong path.

- Andrew

Bunuel · Answer

EXPLANATION FROM Fox LSAT

The missing link here seems to be, “Businesses have compelling reasons to serve their long-term interests.” If this is true, and if (as given) morally preferable acts usually serve the long-term interests, then I would have to agree that businesses often have compelling reasons to execute the morally preferable act. We have a strong prediction, so let’s scan the answer choices and see if it’s there.

A) Huh? Not what we’re looking for.

B) This is close, because it ties together “compelling reasons” and “long-term interests.” It’s almost what we predicted.

C) This isn’t as good as B, because it doesn’t tie together compelling reasons and long-term interests. Just because two things “don’t conflict” doesn’t mean you should do them both.

D) Just because a morally preferable act and a short-term interest conflict doesn’t mean that the morally preferable act doesn’t also conflict with the long-term interest, or that there isn’t some alternative path that can be taken besides pursuing the long- or short-term interests. I still like B better.

E) This could only weaken the argument.

So B is our answer.

adkikani · Answer

VeritasKarishma generis MentorTutoring

Can you validate my reasoning ?

Quote:

Which one of the following, if assumed, enables the conclusion of the argument to be properly drawn?

I need to find assumption for this question.

Quote:

The short-term and long-term interests of a business often conflict; when they do, the morally preferable act is usually the one that serves the long-term interest. Because of this, businesses often have compelling reasons to execute the morally preferable act.

Since it is an assumption question, I would like to search for any gap / missing link between premise and conclusion.

Conclusion: In case of conflict between short-term and long-term interest, business choose long term ones
to EXECUTE action for COMPELLING reasons
Premise:(marked by premise indicator: because) Morally preferable act = Long term interest.

Cool, but what if morally preferable act do not provide a compelling enough reason to execute the act?
Then my conclusion shall break down. With this thought, let's see what answer choices have to say:

Quote:

(A) A business’s moral interests do not always provide compelling reasons for executing an act.

Negating gives: A business’s moral interests sometimes provide compelling reasons for executing an act.
So what, does my conclusion break down? Nope. OUT

Quote:

(B) A business’s long-term interests often provide compelling reasons for executing an act.

Negating gives: A business’s long-term interests never provide compelling reasons for executing an act.

If there are no compelling reasons to execute an act from long term interests, then why would business actually execute it?
My conclusion breaks down when I negate this. KEEP

Quote:

(C) The morally preferable act for a business to execute and the long-term interests of the business seldom conflict.

One of highest picked INCORRECT ans. Before even negating it (the morally preferable act for a business to execute and the long-term interests of the business never conflict.) , I simply do not care whether a morally preferable act and long term interests conflict.
I care about compelling reasons to execute the act. This is an out of scope answer.
OUT

Quote:

(D) The morally preferable act for a business to execute and the short-term interests of the business usually conflict.
(E) When a business’s short-term and long-term interests conflict, morality alone is rarely the overriding consideration.

Same reasoning as C, this is beyond the scope of argument and I do not care about frequency of conflict as in D
or an overriding consideration as in E. OUT

I guess working on scope of argument works faster than negating main verb of answer choices.

ajaygaur319 · Answer

In the above question OA is B but B is already stated in the passage and an assumption is something which shouldn't be stated in the passage. It should be extra information. C seems to be the right answer.

GMATWhizTeam · Answer

ANALYSIS

Given:
• In business, short-term and long-term interests frequently clash.
• At such times, the act that is backed by morality is the one that usually helps to provide long term benefits to the business.
•  Conclusion:  Businesses have forceful/strong reasons to carry out the morally preferable act
•  Supporting reason: Because the morally preferred act provides long-term benefits to the business.

PRE-THINKING 
1. The author’s conclusion is based on the premise that morally preferred act provides long-term benefits to the business.
2.  Missing Link: 
a. If we look at the premise or supporting reason and the conclusion, we will see that 
i. There is no connection provided between long term interests and how “compelling reasons” work towards achieving “long term interests”. The passage does not really say that businesses are motivated to look at long-term interests.
ii.  What if, the businesses are not interested in achieving long-term benefits but are satisfied by short-term gains? What if businesses are not motivated by long-term interests when in a situation of conflict ? In that case, the businesses will not be choosing morally preferable acts that provide long term interests.
iii.  Assumption : Businesses are often motivated by long-term interests when choosing to carry out an act.

ANSWER CHOICE ELIMINATION:

(A) A business’s moral interests do not always provide compelling reasons for executing an act.
 It is the long term interests that must provide strong reason for choosing a moral act. The concern of the argument is not the moral interests of a business. This choice merely distorts the information given in the passage to cause confusion.
Incorrect Choice)

(B) A business’s long-term interests often provide compelling reasons for executing an act.
 This choice is in line with the pre-thought assumption. The long term interests provide motivation/compelling reasons to carry out an act.
Correct Choice.
 
(C) The morally preferable act for a business to execute and the long-term interests of the business seldom conflict.
 The passage is not concerned with a clash between moral act and long-term interest. This choice is out of scope.
Incorrect Choice.
 
(D) The morally preferable act for a business to execute and the short-term interests of the business usually conflict.
 The passage is not concerned with the clash between moral act and short-term conflicts. This choice is also out of scope.
Incorrect Choice.
 
(E) When a business’s short-term and long-term interests conflict, morality alone is rarely the overriding consideration.
 Per this choice only morality is not the usual deciding factor. This is almost the opposite of what the premise intends to convey. And even if there are other factor, they are out of the scope of this argument.
Incorrect Choice.

KarishmaB · Answer

- The short-term and long-term interests of a business often conflict; 
- Morally preferable act is usually the one that serves the long-term interest.

Conclusion: So, businesses often have compelling reasons to execute the morally preferable act.

We need an assumption - a gap in logic. 
The argument tells us that morally preferable act is the one that serves long time. It concludes that hence, businesses have a good reason to execute morally preferable act. We would not be able conclude this without assuming that long term interest is good reason for businesses - that businesses want to serve their long term interests. This is what option (B) says.

(A) A business’s moral interests do not always provide compelling reasons for executing an act.

We are assuming that long term interests are a compelling reason.

(C) The morally preferable act for a business to execute and the long-term interests of the business seldom conflict.

The argument tells us that morally preferable act is usually the one that serves the long-term interest. This is not an assumption.

(D) The morally preferable act for a business to execute and the short-term interests of the business usually conflict.

Again, seems to be an implication of the argument. It is not an assumption.

(E) When a business’s short-term and long-term interests conflict, morality alone is rarely the overriding consideration.

Is morality a consideration, we don't know.

Answer (B)

tkorzhan18 · Answer

GMATNinja , Why we should eliminate D ?
If morally preferable act and short term interest are not in conflict, it means that long term interest is not the only cause for morally preferable act. Therefore, it would weaken the conclusion.

Basshead · Answer

Conclusion: Businesses often have compelling reasons to execute the morally preferable act.

What's the gap here? Notice that the stimulus does not state  compelling reasons  except in the conclusion. We need to address this.

Only A and B contain 'compelling reasons'.

A goes against the conclusion; B is the missing piece of the puzzle.

unraveled · Answer

The short-term and long-term interests of a business often conflict; when they do, the morally preferable act is usually the one that serves the long-term interest. Because of this, businesses often have compelling reasons to execute the morally preferable act.

Which one of the following, if assumed, enables the conclusion of the argument to be properly drawn?

The last sentence is the conclusion or an inference drawn from previous sentence. However, it makes a jump creating a gap that must be an assumption.

(A) A business’s moral interests  do not always provide  compelling reasons for executing an act. - WRONG. Exactly the opposite of what we are looking for.
(B) A business’s long-term interests  often provide compelling reasons  for executing an act. - CORRECT. If not(not often), then inference/conclusion can't be drawn.
(C) The morally preferable act for a business to execute and the long-term interests of the business  seldom  conflict. - WRONG. Tempting but 'seldom' is too far to consider.
(D) The morally preferable act for a business to execute and the  short-term interests  of the business  usually  conflict. - WRONG. Two highlighted texts go against the option.
(E) When a business’s short-term and long-term interests conflict,  morality alone is rarely the overriding consideration . - WRONG. Irrelevant at best.

Answer B.

GMATNinja · Answer

Let's start by identifying the conclusion: "businesses often have  compelling reasons  to execute the  morally preferable act ." To support this conclusion, the author states that "the morally preferable act is usually the one that serves the  long-term interest ."

The question asks for an assumption that "enables the conclusion to be properly drawn." In other words, we're looking for a statement that is SUFFICIENT to allow us to draw the conclusion. Let's consider (D):

Notice that the argument doesn't have anything to do with  short-term interests . It simply concludes that "businesses often have compelling reasons to execute the morally preferable act." And it reaches this conclusion because "the morally preferable act is usually the one that serves the  long-term interest ."

Since  short-term interests  are irrelevant to the argument, we can eliminate (D).

Let's consider (B):

To support the conclusion, the author states that "the morally preferable act is usually the one that serves the long-term interest." So if "a business’s  long-term interests  often provide compelling reasons for executing an act," and if the  morally preferable act  serves long-term interests, then it follows that "businesses often have compelling reasons to execute the morally preferable act."

Because (B) enables the conclusion to be properly drawn, it's correct.

I hope that helps!

VerbalBot · Answer

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The short-term and long-term interests of a business often conflict;

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