Critical Reasoning

The committee on sexual discrimination in the workplace has highlighted Supremo Company as a chief offender. Of the twenty senior executives in the firm, only one is a woman. And of the forty junior executives, only five are female.

Supremo could best defend itself against the charges by showing that

A. male and female executives at the same level have the same qualifications
B. they pay the same salary to senior men and senior women
C. ten times more men than women apply for jobs with the company
D. the work pressures and long hours make jobs with the company unattractive to women
E. all job applicants who were rejected had fewer qualifications than those accepted

OA : after discusion

gmatmachoman wrote:The committee on sexual discrimination in the workplace has highlighted Supremo Company as a chief offender. Of the twenty senior executives in the firm, only one is a woman. And of the forty junior executives, only five are female.

Supremo could best defend itself against the charges by showing that

A. male and female executives at the same level have the same qualifications
B. they pay the same salary to senior men and senior women
C. ten times more men than women apply for jobs with the company
D. the work pressures and long hours make jobs with the company unattractive to women
E. all job applicants who were rejected had fewer qualifications than those accepted

OA : after discusion

A- if both males and females have the same qualifications, then the company gives equal opportunity to applicants of both sexes.

B- doesn't confirm that the company does not discriminate based on other factors.

C- Could be that the company still select more women, even if the number of females applicants was higher than that of women.

D- Can't confirm this. Also, it could be attractive to women, but they are not qualified enough.

E- Out of scope.

gmatmachoman wrote:The committee on sexual discrimination in the workplace has highlighted Supremo Company as a chief offender. Of the twenty senior executives in the firm, only one is a woman. And of the forty junior executives, only five are female.

Supremo could best defend itself against the charges by showing that

A. male and female executives at the same level have the same qualifications
B. they pay the same salary to senior men and senior women
C. ten times more men than women apply for jobs with the company
D. the work pressures and long hours make jobs with the company unattractive to women
E. all job applicants who were rejected had fewer qualifications than those accepted

OA : after discusion

C Won't be the correct answer. Becaues even 10:1 --> applied jobs. then It won't answer why 20:1 in senior level? why not selected 20:2?
Ratio is 20:1 (Senior Executive)

. Junior level selection is fine.

40:5 --> 8:1 (Junior Executive )

E is perfect.
[all job applicants who were rejected had fewer qualifications than those accepted]

All other applied are underqualified.. How can you select them.. this is valid reason.. then can easily denfend themselves and win..

D for me.
D in a way proves that number of women at senior and junior executive level is low because there are fewer number of women in the company then men.

E is too broad, it does not include information whether rejected applicants were men or women

C, again only partially explains the situation. The ratio of senior executives is 20:1.and for juniors it 40:5. It explains the reason for higher number of junior women executives but does not explain the ratio of senior women executives.

pandeyvineet24 wrote:D for me.
D in a way proves that number of women at senior and junior executive level is low because there are fewer number of women in the company then men.

E is too broad, it does not include information whether rejected applicants were men or women

C, again only partially explains the situation. The ratio of senior executives is 20:1.and for juniors it 40:5. It explains the reason for higher number of junior women executives but does not explain the ratio of senior women executives.

D is wrong.. "unattractive" --> doesn't mean they don't apply for job.

100 men 90 women applied job.. because job ( why low number of women applied ), because they are unattractive.?

still ratio. 10:9 ???

IMO C

gmatmachoman wrote:The committee on sexual discrimination in the workplace has highlighted Supremo Company as a chief offender. Of the twenty senior executives in the firm, only one is a woman. And of the forty junior executives, only five are female.

Supremo could best defend itself against the charges by showing that

A. male and female executives at the same level have the same qualifications
B. they pay the same salary to senior men and senior women
C. ten times more men than women apply for jobs with the company
D. the work pressures and long hours make jobs with the company unattractive to women
E. all job applicants who were rejected had fewer qualifications than those accepted

OA : after discusion

IMO C because it is the most tangible answer. Something that can be proved on paper. D is more like an opinion ...almost a guess. Even if the job is unattractive, it should reflect in some kind of numbers... like the applicants ratio. Hence 'C'

gmatmachoman wrote:The committee on sexual discrimination in the workplace has highlighted Supremo Company as a chief offender. Of the twenty senior executives in the firm, only one is a woman. And of the forty junior executives, only five are female.

Supremo could best defend itself against the charges by showing that

A. male and female executives at the same level have the same qualifications
B. they pay the same salary to senior men and senior women
C. ten times more men than women apply for jobs with the company
D. the work pressures and long hours make jobs with the company unattractive to women
E. all job applicants who were rejected had fewer qualifications than those accepted

OA : after discusion

IMO C because it is the most tangible answer. Something that can be proved on paper. D is more like an opinion ...almost a guess. Even if the job is unattractive, it should reflect in some kind of numbers... like the applicants ratio. Hence 'C'

gmatmachoman wrote:The committee on sexual discrimination in the workplace has highlighted Supremo Company as a chief offender. Of the twenty senior executives in the firm, only one is a woman. And of the forty junior executives, only five are female.

Supremo could best defend itself against the charges by showing that

A. male and female executives at the same level have the same qualifications
B. they pay the same salary to senior men and senior women
C. ten times more men than women apply for jobs with the company
D. the work pressures and long hours make jobs with the company unattractive to women
E. all job applicants who were rejected had fewer qualifications than those accepted

OA : after discusion

IMO C because it is the most tangible answer. Something that can be proved on paper. D is more like an opinion ...almost a guess. Even if the job is unattractive, it should reflect in some kind of numbers... like the applicants ratio. Hence 'C'

IMO - E because the applicatants were rejected solely on the basis of being qualified for the job.

C - should not be the answer because it says that more men are selected because more men than women apply for the job. IMO - that would be discrimination

I don't think this is a well-designed question, gmatmachoman. Now, I could be wrong, but my guess is that this is not an official GMAT or official LSAT question. Today, a GMAT question would use the phrase "gender discrimination" not "sexual disrcimination." My guess is that the source is 1000cr. Practicing with these questions can do more harm than good.

At any rate, the OA should be choice C.

The charge of discrimination has everything to do with how many men and women were applying in the first place; the (qualified) fraction of the applicant pool that was male versus the (qualified) fraction of the applicant pool that was female.

There are 19 male executives and only 1 female executive. Let's say there were 40 qualified applicants for these executive positions. But if 39 of them were men, it is definitely not the company's fault; if they were able to show this, it would be a perfect defense against the claim of discrimination. But what happens if 20 of the 40 qualified applicants were men, and 20 women? Because 19 of 20 men got the exec jobs but only 1 out of 20 women did, this would reek of gender discrimination.

Choice A is wrong because it assumes that the only way there could be gender discrimination was if there were unqualified men being accepted over qualified women; as the above analysis demonstrates, this is not the only way gender discrimination could take place. This choice neglects to consider the applicant pool, and, thus, on its own, it is not a sufficient defense.

Choice B is also an insufficient defense against the charge. Just ask yourself whether choice B establishes that there wasn't any discrimination.

Choice D has sexist undertones and would never be an accredited response on the GMAT.

Choice E is a bit more tempting. It is good that all applicants rejected had fewer qualifications than those accepted. But does it establish that there was NO gender discrimination? Again, even after rejecting all the unqualified applicants, if there were many MORE qualified women applicants (than qualified male applicants) remaining, the charge of discrimination would clearly have force (since they ended up hiring way more men).

Agree that it is a badly designed question but the answer should still be E

hi testluv

C is a correct choice, but why Choice D cannot be correct ? This question has started to bother me now. I mean my reasoning was if women did not apply for the job, then there are not enough women to promote to executive level. Please explain.

Just searched this question on the internet. found that the Option D has "married women" instead of "women".

thanks
Vineet

mehravikas wrote:Agree that it is a badly designed question but the answer should still be E

yes, on second thought, E is also a weakener. If ALL rejected applicants were less qualified, the company would indeed be able to defend itself. But they would also be able to defend themselves well with Choice C. Would they be able to defend themselves better with choice E than with chioce C? Most likely, yes they would....BUT the GMAT would never make you choose the "better" choice. There is, on the GMAT, one and only one correct answer to each question. Given the definition of weakening that I discussed in my post above, there are, accordingly, two answer choices here that would meet GMAT criterion.

To someone who has been teaching these questions for 5+ years, it is clearly obvious that this is not an official question (GMAT or LSAT) and, more, it is clearly not even a question from a major test prep company.

I maintain that you should only practice on GMAT questions, and questions designed by major test prep companies. Practicing on these questions can HURT you more than it would help you. Anyone can design a passage, a question stem, five answer choices, and then designate one of the choices as "the answer." That isn't hard at all. But designing questions properly so that all ambiguity is removed--so that there is only one objectively correct answer--is a scientific and costly process. In fact, it is the main reason the GMAT costs so much to take.

pandyvineet: I really wouldn't worry about this question! An actual GMAT question would not present an answer choice like D. Now, I am referring to the way choice D was written by the original poster (gmatmachoman). If you think the OP mistranscribed choice D, then why don't you post choice D, and I can have a look at it. But it wouldn't change my opinion of this question.

gmatmachoman wrote:The committee on sexual discrimination in the workplace has highlighted Supremo Company as a chief offender. Of the twenty senior executives in the firm, only one is a woman. And of the forty junior executives, only five are female.

Supremo could best defend itself against the charges by showing that

A. male and female executives at the same level have the same qualifications
B. they pay the same salary to senior men and senior women
C. ten times more men than women apply for jobs with the company
D. the work pressures and long hours make jobs with the company unattractive to women
E. all job applicants who were rejected had fewer qualifications than those accepted

OA : after discusion

This is how I see Option C functions. IMO it does NOT defend Supremo against the charges.
OK let us assume that ten times more men than women apply for jobs with the company .Is that all thosemen have been selected in to the company? Again an element of doubt creeps in. Moreover, even though they (those selected men) are selcted, how can we be assured that they are promoted to senior ot junior executive?May be they can just be trainees..Again element of doubt creeps in to ur so called assumption which is supposed to defend supremo's claim.
Again what is the guarantee that those selected women is not capable enough to reach the postion of senior or Junior executive profile??

Fine Let us come to D:

the work pressures and long hours make jobs with the company unattractive to women ..

Here we could possibly assume that "Senior & junior executive profile "may " involve stringent working hours that makes women less attractive.SO by the way they are not applying or not staying back even for longer time to promoted to higher profiles.

@PandeyVineet, u r rite..even i did googled it..But Our selection of option D logically holds strong when compared to C.
TestLuv, Yeah its not a GMAT Q.I agree with u.