Critical Reasoning

The media claim that the economy is entering a phase of growth and prosperity. They point to lower unemployment rates and increased productivity. This analysis is false, though. The number of people filing for bankruptcy has increased every month for the last six months, and bankruptcy lawyers report that they are busier than they have been in years.

Which of the following is an assumption on which the argument depends?
a Unemployment rates are not useful indicators of growth and prosperity.
b Economic growth cannot be measured in terms of productivity.
c Legislation has not been recently passed to make legal bankruptcy easier to obtain.
d There has not been an increase in the number of bankruptcy lawyers.
e The media often misrepresent the current state of economic affairs.


Source : MGMAT Cat Test 5

OA is C

Are u sure we need to think this far !

This is just normal defender answer, it defends the argument by ruling out the possibility to weaken it!

A/B - Only go back to first line, ignore rest of the story
D - Nonsense
E - There is no conclusion drawn in the story

C - Best answer

The media claim that the economy is entering a phase of growth and prosperity. They point to lower unemployment rates and increased productivity. This analysis is false, though. The number of people filing for bankruptcy has increased every month for the last six months, and bankruptcy lawyers report that they are busier than they have been in years.

Which of the following is an assumption on which the argument depends?

This is an assumption question. And as we know when the correct answer choice in an assumption question is logically negated it weakens/destroys the argument.

a Unemployment rates are not useful indicators of growth and prosperity.
INCORRECT : Logical negation = Unemployment rates are useful indicators of growth and prosperity. (does not weaken/destroy the argument)

b Economic growth cannot be measured in terms of productivity.
INCORRECT : Logical negation = Economic growth can be measure in terms of productivity (does not weaken/destroy the argument)

c Legislation has not been recently passed to make legal bankruptcy easier to obtain.
CORRECT : Logical negation = Legislation has been recently passed to make legal bankruptcy easier to obtain (BANG ON !!.. THIS DESTROYS THE ARGUMENT)

d There has not been an increase in the number of bankruptcy lawyers.
INCORRECT : Logical negation : There has been an increase in the number of bankruptcy lawyers (does not weaken/destroy the argument)

e The media often misrepresent the current state of economic affairs.
INCORRECT : The media often represents the current state of economic affairs (does not weaken/destroy the argument)


Hope this helps : )

In my Opinion...The assumption is something which is not stated in the argument but eventually supports/ strengthens the conclusion and hence the argument strong and meaningful. It should not logically weakens/destroys the argument..
C - fills the logical gap.
The main conclusion --> The number of people filing for bankruptcy has increased every month for the last six months, and bankruptcy lawyers report that they are busier than they have been in years
Assumption --> Legislation has not been recently passed to make legal bankruptcy easier to obtain.
C fills the logical gap why lawyers are so busy because Legislation has not been recently passed to make legal bankruptcy easier to obtain

Hence C is a correct choice.

prinit wrote:In my Opinion...The assumption is something which is not stated in the argument but eventually supports/ strengthens the conclusion and hence the argument strong and meaningful. It should not logically weakens/destroys the argument..
C - fills the logical gap.
The main conclusion --> The number of people filing for bankruptcy has increased every month for the last six months, and bankruptcy lawyers report that they are busier than they have been in years
Assumption --> Legislation has not been recently passed to make legal bankruptcy easier to obtain.
C fills the logical gap why lawyers are so busy because Legislation has not been recently passed to make legal bankruptcy easier to obtain

Hence C is a correct choice.

True. That is what i meant..... When a correct assumption answer choice is NEGATED, THE NEGATED ANSWER CHOICE WILL WEAKEN THE ARGUMENT... This is a technique prescribed in Powerscore CR Bible.

Thanks komal for that! I tend to forget to apply the negation technique for assumption questions. Do you recommend immediately going to the negation technique with all assumption CR Q's?

bigmonkey31 wrote:Thanks komal for that! I tend to forget to apply the negation technique for assumption questions. Do you recommend immediately going to the negation technique with all assumption CR Q's?

Powerscore CR does not recommend using negation technique on all the assumption CR q's. I take a flexible approach to solve CR Qs....I jumped to negation technique on this one cause i thought its a reasonable thing to do on this q.

I am leaning more towards C, but I'm not sure about it.