Critical Reasoning

repeat question from past but re-posting because i cant understand this.

Question goes like this:

Current farm policy is institutionalized penalization of consumers. It increases food prices for middle- and low-income families and costs the taxpayer billions of dollars a year.
Which of the following statements, if true, would provide support for the author's claims above?
I. Farm subsidies amount to roughly $20 billion a year in federal payouts and $12 billion more in higher food prices.
II. According to a study by the Department of Agriculture, each $1 of benefits provided to farmers for ethanol production costs consumers and taxpayers $4.
III. The average full-time farmers have an average net worth of over $300,000.
(A) I only
(B) II only
(C) III only
(D) I and II only
(E) I, II, and III

People answered D.

I choose A. I totally disagree to III but have doubts on II. I will explain why.

Q says support author's claim.

Author's claim:

Policy increases food prices for middle- and low-income families and costs the taxpayer billions of dollars a year.

Now i doubt II because it talks about ethanol production. and ethanol is not food, it is SPIRIT.

Can someone clarify

This is actually a fact-based question dealing with the real world and some outside knowledge would be helpful here.

The situation in the United States currently is that the U.S. Congress has passed laws that subsidize the production of ethanol (which is a type of alcohol made from corn that is mixed with gasoline). Because the production of corn for ethanol means that less land is devoted to food crops, then the U.S. farmers sell fewer crops each year resulting in higher prices. In fact, the United Nations has called for the U.S. to end this practice since it is responsible for starvation in parts of Africa and even for increased rice prices around the world.

So the subsidy of ethanol is considered a farm subsidy and is directly responsibly for higher food prices since the corn is taken out of the food market. Also, the actual subsidies cost money to taxpayers.

So choice B (is assuming) and stating the above...

This is certainly not a type of question that I have ever seen on the GMAT and I think could use another round of editing to remove some assumptions!

Hope that helps!

That is a good explanation.

But II offers no info about the quantum of costs, specifically that it is in "billions"

$1 subsidy costs $4 but what if the government only provides a $10 subsidy.... for the costs to run into billions and II to work one will have to assume subsidies are usually very large so that (times 4) - costs get close to "billions"

Strengthen questions always have a gray area - they rarely provide 100 pc support --- and for that reason I find them amongst the most challenging (for some reason I find weaken Qs slightly easier though they are conceptually the same in reverse order) ---- but specifically in this context aren't we assuming too much by thinking 'subsidies/benefits by their nature are very large' for II and thus option D to work? (real world knowledge we are not supposed t carry into the Q)

I... clearly has "billions" so there is no dispute about that one...

Remember "Strengthen" means just that. The answer has to "strengthen" the argument, i.e. make it more likely to be correct, not "prove" it.