Critical Reasoning

Barnes: The two newest employees at this company
have salaries that are too high for the simple
tasks normally assigned to new employees and
duties that are too complex for inexperienced
workers. Hence, the salaries and the complexity
of the duties of these two newest employees
should be reduced.

Which one of the following is an assumption on
which Barnes’s argument depends?
(A) The duties of the two newest employees are not
less complex than any others in the company.
(B) It is because of the complex duties assigned
that the two newest employees are being paid
more than is usually paid to newly hired
employees.
(C) The two newest employees are not experienced
at their occupations.
(D) Barnes was not hired at a higher-than-average
starting salary.
(E) The salaries of the two newest employees are no
higher than the salaries that other companies
pay for workers with a similar level of
experience.

OA: C

(A) This supports the reason why new employee have higher salary. So this cannot be the answer
(B) This argument again support the reason behing the high salary of new employees and not the Barnes argument.
(C) "The two newest employees are not experienced at their occupations" This should be the assumption which strengthen the Barnes argument.
(D) Barnes salary was not mentioned in the statement.
(E) This argument waeken Barnes argument instead of supporting it.

C is the best choice ...resoning is as follows :-
New employee usually handles simple task and hence high salaries are not justified ..moreover they are not in position to handle complex task thus should not be offered high salary ..

Here the argument assumption is that two new employee dont have pertinent experience and thus should be considered as inexperienced .

Hope that helps !!

B seems to be a nice assumption as otherwise author soudn't have attacked both.

I chose B as well.

My reason was not going with C.
the argument mentions "inexperienced workers" and assumptions are never stated in the argument.

I go with B) too

IMO C) cant be assumption since Barnes mentions that 2 new employees are assigned duties that are too complex for inexperienced
workers. I am thinking the company thinks of these new employees as experienced workers as experienced workers may be new eompoyess of a certain company.

B corelates the salaries and the complexity levels and qualifies for a good assumption .

I must be missing something in this transalation if indeed the OA is correct.

Barnes: The two newest employees at this company
have salaries that are too high for the simple
tasks normally assigned to new employees and
duties that are too complex for inexperienced
workers. Hence, the salaries and the complexity
of the duties of these two newest employees
should be reduced.

premises: too high salary
premises2: too complex for inexperineced

conclusion: salaries reduced....complexities reduced.


Which one of the following is an assumption on
which Barnes’s argument depends?


(C) The two newest employees are not experienced
at their occupations.

try negating C and you will see that the conclusion falters...

Ronnie,
It has to do the interpretation of this sentence(my interpretration above may have been skewed):

The two newest employees at this company
have salaries that are too high for the simple
tasks normally assigned to new employees and
duties that are too complex for inexperienced
workers

I can see now why C) could be an assumption.i.e these 2 workers are inexperienced but the duties assigned to them dont reflect that as they may be complex in nature


Not fully convinced on ruling out B) but hey there can be only one right answer The conslusion never brings up experience and hence the dilemma between B and C

Anyone else?

Here, author played a shell game. Two newest employees can be either experienced or in-experienced. if two newest employees are experienced, then there is not problem.

So, Two newest employees are not experienced. C is the correct answer.

We can do denial test for B and C.

If we negate C, then conclusion will failed. why need to reduce duties? -> No needed. TAKE IT

B has no effect as they have just compared about salary. Duty is main concern. ELIMINATE IT.

Indeed, OA is C.

This is a fairly old post. I came across this question in LSAT prep test and found interesting.

Even though, its clear that (C) is an assumption. Its wasn't clear for a while, why (B) couldn't be an assumption, because on what basis the argument is made to reduce the salary??

I think there are two parallel arguments are present;

The salaries are higher than normal new employee salaries --> so reduce the salary.
[ this argument as assumption that all new employees should be paid similar salaries] and (B) is not the assumption.

There duties complex for an in experienced professional -> so assign simple tasks.
[ This argument has assumption that these are inexperienced employees]

(B) is right
From the argument we get that the salaries of the employees are high as compared to other new joinees, but they were also handling more complex portfolios. Hence salary and complexity of job are related.

Let's deconstruct the CR:

1. Salary paid is too high compared to what is paid to the other new employees with normal tasks
2. Tasks assigned are too complex for the normal inexperienced workers.

There can be an Alternate reasoning that 2 new employees are EXPERIENCED.

But BARNES has reached a CONCLUSION that both the SALARY and the COMPLEXITY of the job SHOULD BE REDUCED

ASSUMPTION: SO BARNES' ASSUMPTION is that the 2 NEW EMPLOYEES are INEXPERIENCED