A certain local newspaper has 80 employees. Of the employees 3/5 are

Question

A certain local newspaper has 80 employees. Of the employees 3/5 are either journalists or copy editors. How many of the employees are journalists?

1) The newspaper employes more than 10 copy editors
2. There are more than 3 times as many journalists at the paper as there are copy editors

My question is that I think something is wrong w/ the explaination. (This is from Princeton Review). The explaination first states that 3/5 of the 80 (48) can either be the journalists or copy editors. Then later they say that journalists and copywriters together are 48.

mikemcgarry · Answer

Dear joannaecohen , I'm happy to respond. :-)

I agree there's something fishy here. I think the prompt is assuming that no one employee is both a journalist and a copy editor ---in other words, there's no overlap between these two groups. Let x be the number of journalists and y be the number of copy editors. Then, they are saying that x + y = 48. In other words, all the journalists and all the copy editors together form this 48. We could also say that if we selected one person at random from that batch of 48, that person would be either a journalist or a copy editor. If we make that assumption explicit, then it's a valid question. BTW, here's a book review that might interest you: Princeton Review GMAT Book Review: Cracking the GMAT 2017 Does all this make sense? Mike :-)

Joc456 · Answer

mikemcgarry  I thought by saying there were 80 employees that was the total of copywriters and journalists. How would you solve the problem?

BTW i just bought this book for some extra practice questions. It seems like it was a waste of money

mikemcgarry · Answer

Dear joannaecohen I'm happy to respond. :-)

Here's the prompt again. A certain local newspaper has 80 employees. Of the employees 3/5 are either journalists or copy editors. How many of the employees are journalists? The first sentence tells us that there are 80 employees. The second sentence tells us that, of the 80 employees, 3/5 of these 80 employees are either journalists or copy editors. Three-fifths of 80 is 48, so 48 is the number of journalists and copy editors. That's what we know from the prompt. The prompt doesn't actually specify this, but we have to assume that no single individual is both a journalist and a copy editor. If we know about newspapers in the real world, we might be led to that conclusion, but really, the problem should specify that. Statement #1 : The newspaper employs more than 10 copy editors By itself, this tells us nothing. The number of copy editors could be 11, 12, 13, all the way up to 48--a scenario in which there were 49 copy editors and no journalists. It's not clear how such a newspaper would function, but that's at least a possibility from this statement. This statement, alone and by itself, is not sufficient . Statement #2 : There are more than 3 times as many journalists at the paper as there are copy editors If there were 12 copy editors and 36 journalists, the number of journalists would be exactly three times the number of copy editors---this is not allowed by this statement. The number of journalists must be more than three times the number of copy editors. Thus, the number of copy editors must be 11 or less, and all the rest are journalists. For example, if there were 8 copy editors and 40 journalists, the number of journalists would be much more three times the number of copy editors--in fact, it would be 5 times. Here, the number of copy editors could be from 1-11. We can't determine a unique numerical value. This statement, alone and by itself, is not sufficient . Combined : From the first statement, the number of copy editors must be 11 or more. From the second statement, the number of copy editors must be 11 or less. The only value that would work is 11. There are 11 copy editors and 37 copy editors. This way, the number of copy editors is more than 10, and the number of journalists is more than three times the number of copy editors. With both statements, we are able to determine a unique and unambiguous value. Together both statements are sufficient. Answer = (C) Overall, I would say this is good question, except for that missing specification in the prompt. Does all this make sense? Mike :-)

Nikkb · Answer

A certain local newspaper has 80 employees. Of the employees 3/5 are either journalists or copy editors. How many of the employees are journalists?

3/5 * 80 = 48

Of the employees 3/5 are either journalists or copy editors => Among 48 employees are either journalists or copy editors
=> j+e = 48

Find j ?

1) The newspaper employes more than 10 copy editors
so e>10
=> e is 11 or more .
so for e =11 => j = 37
for e=47 => j=1
We dont have any detail about j.
Insufficient

2. There are more than 3 times as many journalists at the paper as there are copy editors
=> j > 3e
for e =12 => j= 36=3e
this implies e has upper limit of e=11<12 => j = 37 > 3e
We don't know lower limit of e or upper limit of j
Insufficient

1+2
By statement 1 => e>10
by statement 2 e < 12
=> e=11 => j =37
Sufficient

Answer: C

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A certain local newspaper has 80 employees. Of the employees 3/5 are

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