Critical Reasoning

Museum visitor: The national government has mandated
a 5 percent increase in the minimum wage paid to
all workers. This mandate will adversely affect
the museum-going public. The museum's revenue
does not currently exceed its expenses, and since
the mandate will significantly increase the
museum's operating expenses, the museum will
be forced either to raise admission fees or to
decrease services.
Which one of the following is an assumption required
by the museum visitor's argument?
(A) Some of the museum's employees are not paid
significantly more than the minimum wage.
(B) The museum's revenue from admission fees has
remained constant over the past five years.
(C) Some of the museum's employees are paid more
than the current minimum wage.
(D) The annual number of visitors to the museum
has increased steadily.
(E) Not all visitors to the museum are required to
pay an admission fee.

[spoiler]OAOA A [/spoiler]

[spoiler]OAOA A [/spoiler]

mariah wrote:[spoiler]OAOA A [/spoiler]

I am not sure about the OA u have quoted.

IMO B

My understanding - national increase in min wage would either increase museum admission fees or decrease service.
inference - since nationwide min wage has to be increased - salary of museum workers at min wage to increase (effecting museum expense)
Assumtion - some museum workers are paid min wage

Ans A

Hey whats the source ?

lsat paper tests (official)

mariah wrote:Museum visitor: The national government has mandated
a 5 percent increase in the minimum wage paid to
all workers. This mandate will adversely affect
the museum-going public. The museum's revenue
does not currently exceed its expenses, and since
the mandate will significantly increase the
museum's operating expenses, the museum will
be forced either to raise admission fees or to
decrease services.
Which one of the following is an assumption required
by the museum visitor's argument?
(A) Some of the museum's employees are not paid
significantly more than the minimum wage.
(B) The museum's revenue from admission fees has
remained constant over the past five years.
(C) Some of the museum's employees are paid more
than the current minimum wage.
(D) The annual number of visitors to the museum
has increased steadily.
(E) Not all visitors to the museum are required to
pay an admission fee.

A tool you can use for assumption questions is the Denial Test.

The correct answer to an assumption question is something that must be true for the argument to hold; an essential building block of the argument.

The opposite of the correct answer will show that the argument is wrong; it will tear the building down.

Let's look at the opposite of (A):

IT IS NOT TRUE THAT some of the museum's employees are not paid significantly more than the minimum wage.

Eliminate the double negatives:

if it's NOT true that SOME are NOT paid significantly more than minimum wage, then

it IS true that ALL of them ARE paid significantly more than minimum wage.

Well, if all the employees make significantly more than minimum wage, who cares if the minimum wage is going up by 5%? Since the visitor's argument is predicated on that 5% bump leading to disaster, the opposite of (A) completely tears the argument apart.

Accordingly, (A) is an assumption and the correct choice.

The Denial Test can be time consuming, so you don't want to use it on every assumption question that you see. The best times to use it are:

1) when you think you have the right answer but just want to double check; and
2) when you have it narrowed down to 2 or 3 choices and need help finding the right one.

The Denial Test can also be used on strengthen, weaken and inference questions.

Stuart Kovinsky wrote:

mariah wrote:Museum visitor: The national government has mandated
a 5 percent increase in the minimum wage paid to
all workers. This mandate will adversely affect
the museum-going public. The museum's revenue
does not currently exceed its expenses, and since
the mandate will significantly increase the
museum's operating expenses, the museum will
be forced either to raise admission fees or to
decrease services.
Which one of the following is an assumption required
by the museum visitor's argument?
(A) Some of the museum's employees are not paid
significantly more than the minimum wage.
(B) The museum's revenue from admission fees has
remained constant over the past five years.
(C) Some of the museum's employees are paid more
than the current minimum wage.
(D) The annual number of visitors to the museum
has increased steadily.
(E) Not all visitors to the museum are required to
pay an admission fee.

A tool you can use for assumption questions is the Denial Test.

The correct answer to an assumption question is something that must be true for the argument to hold; an essential building block of the argument.

The opposite of the correct answer will show that the argument is wrong; it will tear the building down.

Let's look at the opposite of (A):

IT IS NOT TRUE THAT some of the museum's employees are not paid significantly more than the minimum wage.

Eliminate the double negatives:

if it's NOT true that SOME are NOT paid significantly more than minimum wage, then

it IS true that ALL of them ARE paid significantly more than minimum wage.

Well, if all the employees make significantly more than minimum wage, who cares if the minimum wage is going up by 5%? Since the visitor's argument is predicated on that 5% bump leading to disaster, the opposite of (A) completely tears the argument apart.

Accordingly, (A) is an assumption and the correct choice.

The Denial Test can be time consuming, so you don't want to use it on every assumption question that you see. The best times to use it are:

1) when you think you have the right answer but just want to double check; and
2) when you have it narrowed down to 2 or 3 choices and need help finding the right one.

The Denial Test can also be used on strengthen, weaken and inference questions.

Nice explanation Stuart..I still have a doubt though..

In A..how do u quantify 'some'
some can be 5 in a 100..in that case even if they are paid significantly more, increasing the wages of the remaining 95 can increase the overall cost.

tres_desole wrote:Nice explanation Stuart..I still have a doubt though..

In A..how do u quantify 'some'
some can be 5 in a 100..in that case even if they are paid significantly more, increasing the wages of the remaining 95 can increase the overall cost.

Hi,

some always means "at least one" - we can't quantify any more than that.

Since some means "at least one", when we deny (i.e. take the opposite of) some we get "not at least one", which translates as "none".

In this particular question, that results in:

"None of the museum's employees is NOT paid significantly more than minimum wage"

and, eliminating the double negatives:

"All of the museum's employees ARE paid significantly more than minimum wage".