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Register now and save up to $200 Available with Beat the GMAT members only code • Magoosh Study with Magoosh GMAT prep Available with Beat the GMAT members only code • Free Practice Test & Review How would you score if you took the GMAT Available with Beat the GMAT members only code • 5-Day Free Trial 5-day free, full-access trial TTP Quant Available with Beat the GMAT members only code • 1 Hour Free BEAT THE GMAT EXCLUSIVE Available with Beat the GMAT members only code • Free Trial & Practice Exam BEAT THE GMAT EXCLUSIVE Available with Beat the GMAT members only code ## Consumer Price Index (CPI) measures the average prices of This topic has 4 expert replies and 5 member replies gmattesttaker2 Legendary Member Joined 14 Feb 2012 Posted: 641 messages Followed by: 8 members Thanked: 11 times #### Consumer Price Index (CPI) measures the average prices of Sat Jun 14, 2014 9:27 pm Hello, For Question 2 here, I am thinking that CPI-U for electricity in July was 0.5 and in August it was 0.7 due to the 0.2 increase. Hence, %age increase is 40%. Is this correct? For Question 3, the OA says that there was change in the CPI-U from May 2010 to Sep. 2010. Since it is 0 for May and Sep 2010 I was not clear. Can you please explain this? OA: Yes No No Thanks a lot, Sri Attachments This post contains an attachment. You must be logged in to download/view this file. Please login or register as a user. Need free GMAT or MBA advice from an expert? Register for Beat The GMAT now and post your question in these forums! ### GMAT/MBA Expert Rich.C@EMPOWERgmat.com Elite Legendary Member Joined 23 Jun 2013 Posted: 8842 messages Followed by: 463 members Thanked: 2825 times GMAT Score: 800 Sun Jun 15, 2014 12:54 am Hi Sri, The description at the top of the table reads "Seasonally adjusted changes from the PRECEDING MONTH", which means that the number in the box is the percent increase/decrease in price of an item relative to the prior month. For question 2, the CPI-U for electricity in July was 0.5; this means that the price of electricity was .5% HIGHER in July than in June. The CPI-U for electricity in August was 0.2; this means that the price of electricity was .2% HIGHER in August than in July. This statement asks if the increase from July to August was .5% higher. This means that the answer to this question is NO. For question 3, we need to look at the CPI-U for "all items less food and energy." This statement asks if there was NO CHANGE from May through September. We can see from the table that there were 3 "changes" (in May, June and July), so the answer to this question is NO. GMAT assassins aren't born, they're made, Rich _________________ Contact Rich at Rich.C@empowergmat.com Thanked by: gmattesttaker2 gmattesttaker2 Legendary Member Joined 14 Feb 2012 Posted: 641 messages Followed by: 8 members Thanked: 11 times Sat Jun 28, 2014 5:43 pm Rich.C@EMPOWERgmat.com wrote: Hi Sri, The description at the top of the table reads "Seasonally adjusted changes from the PRECEDING MONTH", which means that the number in the box is the percent increase/decrease in price of an item relative to the prior month. For question 2, the CPI-U for electricity in July was 0.5; this means that the price of electricity was .5% HIGHER in July than in June. The CPI-U for electricity in August was 0.2; this means that the price of electricity was .2% HIGHER in August than in July. This statement asks if the increase from July to August was .5% higher. This means that the answer to this question is NO. For question 3, we need to look at the CPI-U for "all items less food and energy." This statement asks if there was NO CHANGE from May through September. We can see from the table that there were 3 "changes" (in May, June and July), so the answer to this question is NO. GMAT assassins aren't born, they're made, Rich Hello Rich, Thank you very much for the excellent explanation. Best Regards, Sri Boredguy1543 Newbie | Next Rank: 10 Posts Joined 13 Oct 2015 Posted: 5 messages Wed Oct 21, 2015 1:42 pm gmattesttaker2 wrote: Hello, For Question 2 here, I am thinking that CPI-U for electricity in July was 0.5 and in August it was 0.7 due to the 0.2 increase. Hence, %age increase is 40%. Is this correct? For Question 3, the OA says that there was change in the CPI-U from May 2010 to Sep. 2010. Since it is 0 for May and Sep 2010 I was not clear. Can you please explain this? OA: Yes No No Thanks a lot, Sri I hated this question, since I got it wrong. The reason I got it wrong was the wording of the question. It clearly states ' For each following, select YES if the statement is INFERABLE from the given information. ' So basically, I thought it was like Data Sufficiency where we didn't need to solve it, and see if we have the information to solve it. So for the first question, I clicked yes instead of no, since there's information that you can obtain from it to get the right answer. crescendo85 Junior | Next Rank: 30 Posts Joined 13 Feb 2016 Posted: 18 messages Thanked: 1 times Fri Mar 18, 2016 11:11 pm Hello Rich Small confusion. For each following, select YES if the statement is INFERABLE from the given information else select NO. Shouldnt answer be YES for all these 3 answers. Its not a true false question. It just asks you if the information is sufficient to answer these. ### GMAT/MBA Expert DavidG@VeritasPrep Legendary Member Joined 14 Jan 2015 Posted: 2387 messages Followed by: 115 members Thanked: 1123 times GMAT Score: 770 Sat Mar 19, 2016 4:31 am crescendo85 wrote: Hello Rich Small confusion. For each following, select YES if the statement is INFERABLE from the given information else select NO. Shouldnt answer be YES for all these 3 answers. Its not a true false question. It just asks you if the information is sufficient to answer these. "Inferable" and "sufficient to answer" are not the same thing. Take a simple example. Say x = 9. This would be sufficient to answer the question "Is x prime?" However, if we were asked, "Can we infer that x is prime?" the answer is "no," we can't. So to summarize: Sufficient = we definitively know the answer to the question. Inferable = we can deduce that the statement in question is true. _________________ Veritas Prep | GMAT Instructor Veritas Prep Reviews Save$100 off any live Veritas Prep GMAT Course

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### GMAT/MBA Expert

DavidG@VeritasPrep Legendary Member
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Sat Mar 19, 2016 4:34 am
See here for another example in which a test-taker was struggling to differentiate between inferable and sufficient - this may help clarify the distinction: http://www.beatthegmat.com/ir-inference-question-from-gmat-software-t288804.html

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crescendo85 Junior | Next Rank: 30 Posts
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Sat Mar 19, 2016 4:36 am
Thanks for prompt reply
Its better now. Cant they just ask us "Is it true or false"
But well noted. You mean read inferable as true except cases where there is no way to find this information from table - in that case say False.

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Rich.C@EMPOWERgmat.com Elite Legendary Member
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Sat Mar 19, 2016 9:22 am
Hi crescendo85,

IR questions have a lot in common with CR questions, so it might help to think of IR prompts in those terms. In a CR Inference question, you're looking for an answer that logically 'flows' from the given information (meaning, which answer is logically 'true') - the same idea applies to this prompt. From what you described, you were dealing with this prompt in the same way that you would deal with a DS question (and that's not applicable here).

GMAT assassins aren't born, they're made,
Rich

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WorthPursuit Newbie | Next Rank: 10 Posts
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Mon Oct 23, 2017 1:48 pm
I had the same problem with this question in regards to the phrasing of "yes if the statement is inferable from the given information." I don't agree with the wording but I'll accept it. Thanks for the clarification.

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