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Flaw in the reasoning

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Flaw in the reasoning

by GMATMadeEasy » Sat Jun 04, 2011 8:03 am
Absenteeism among employees has decreased steadily over the past several years. Two possible explanations have been offered. First, improved health insurance has allowed employees to maintain better health. Second, improved working conditions have improved morale, leading to less desire to avoid work. However, since absenteeism has also decreased at companies with poor or no health insurance and poor working conditions, one must conclude that the cause of the decrease is the increased tendency of employers to deduct missed days from employees' paychecks.

Which of the following indicates a flaw in the reasoning above?

A> Employees who lack health insurance often have low morale.

B> Companies with poor working conditions are most likely to deduct pay for missed work days.

C> Most employees are not honest about the reasons that they miss work.

D> The definition of absenteeism is not clear.

E> Improved health care, improved working conditions, and fear of losing money are not the only possible explanations for decreased absenteeism.


Could someone explain how to handle this please.
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by champmag » Sat Jun 04, 2011 8:20 am
IMO:B

The argument concludes by saying that loss of pay causes the employees to reduce absenteeism. However the argument fails to differentiate this policy between the two kinds of companies mentioned: One that have good working conditions and insurance, second that have poor working conditions and no insurance.

If companies of the second kind are likely to deduct pay for each absent day, then employees will not take a leave. However this is not mentiones explicitly in the argument that this practice of deducting pay for absenteeism is happening in which of the two companies.

Choice B mentions this explicitly and indicates a flaw.
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by cans » Sat Jun 04, 2011 10:36 pm
reasoning: the cause of the decrease is the increased tendency of employers to deduct missed days from employees' paychecks
a) irrelevant
b) this explains why companies with poor working conditions have decreased absenteeism.
Thus weakens the argument. (improved health insurance and improved working conditions means decreased absenteeism and pay deducting method in poor working conditions means decreased absenteeism there)
c) irrelevant
d) irrelevant
e) we are concerned only with these 3 explanations.
IMO B
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by chilledlife » Sat Jun 04, 2011 11:53 pm
Conclusion: Decrease in absenteeism is because of employer's tendency to deduct missed days from employee paychecks.

Question is asking us to find a flaw ie weaken the above conclusion. So I need to look for an answer which suggests absenteeism is for a reason other than the deduction of missed days from the employee pay.

A> Employees who lack health insurance often have low morale. Out of Scope.

B> Companies with poor working conditions are most likely to deduct pay for missed work days. This will strengthen the conclusion. We need to find a reason other than the cut in employee pay for missed days. Incorrect.

C> Most employees are not honest about the reasons that they miss work. We do not know this from the passage. It does not help us in weakening the conclusion either. Incorrect.

D> The definition of absenteeism is not clear. We do not want to know the definition but a reason for the absenteeism. Irrelevant.

E> Improved health care, improved working conditions, and fear of losing money are not the only possible explanations for decreased absenteeism. Yes. There is another factor which is responsible for the decrease in absenteeism. This is the correct answer.
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by David@VeritasPrep » Sun Jun 05, 2011 5:57 am
Got a PM on this one.

OA is E.

First of all the source of this Manhattan GMAT. It is always nice when the source is indicated.

Secondly, this question has been discussed before with TestLuv adamantly arguing that the question itself is flawed because it should be a weaken question. Here is that link https://www.beatthegmat.com/tough-one-t48836.html

GMATMadeEasy asks how we handle this question. When you see the "flaw" in the question stem you are looking for what the author has done wrong. What is the jump or gap? - what do they take for granted? - what are the shifts in language?

This is a common type of invalid conclusion. Here is the setup. The stimulus will say "X" has happened. "A" is not the cause, so therefore "B" must be.

For example, "Ohio State University is ranked lower than University of Michigan in nearly all academic programs. The cause for this is not the fact that Ohio State has lower funding levels so the cause must be that the quality of faculty if lower at Ohio State than at Michigan."

Do you see the flaw? There are not only two possible causes for Ohio State being ranked lower than Michigan. It could be the quality of the students is much lower. It could be that Ohio State focuses too much on athletics and not on academics. And so forth...

So we can see that there are more than two possible causes.

In this question the assumption is that there are only three possible causes and if two are undermined than it is the third. But this is not the case. There may be other reasons for decreased absenteeism. It may be that there is an "attendance award" like U.S. students often get in elementary school. Or there may be some other cause.
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by GMATMadeEasy » Sun Jun 05, 2011 6:17 am
@David. Thank you so much. You are my CR guru.

Thanks for covering how to handle flaw in the reasoning question. I will get back to you after applying your suggestions to all OG12 questions and on GMATPrep questions.

Looking at the post with explanation from TestLuv, I understand that the answer choice 'E' should be written without NOT.

that is
Improved health care, improved working conditions, and fear of losing money are the only possible explanations for decreased absenteeism.

In fact, this was also my question as I found the original choice wrong.Could you confirm that is how this should be ?
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by vikram4689 » Sun Jun 05, 2011 7:17 am
Hi,

Had 'NOT' been missing in choice E, choice would be incorrect because then choice would in fact STRENGTHEN the argument and prove that author has made the correct conclusion. BUT our job is to find FLAW and by choosing E we are saying that there can be other reason for absenteeism.

Regarding TEST LUV. he has explained the subtle difference b/w weaken & flaw ques. by saying that WEAKEN ques should present new fact whereas FLAW ques should determine the flaw by explaining the FLAWED METHOD OF REASONING of the author and not by stating new facts. So TEST LUV changed the language of the option E but i main idea behind the options was same ,i.e. there are other reasons for absenteeism.

Hope that helps.
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by David@VeritasPrep » Sun Jun 05, 2011 11:59 am
Vikram4689 has said it exactly...

You do need the "not" or else you would strengthen.
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