According to a recent study on financial roles, one-third of high school seniors say that they have "significant financial responsibilities." These responsibilities include, but are not limited to, contributing to food, shelter, or clothing for themselves or their families. At the same time, a second study demonstrates that a crisis in money management exists for high school students. According to this study, 80% of high school seniors have never taken a personal finance class even though the same percentage of seniors has opened bank accounts and one-third of these account holders has bounced a check.
Which of the following conclusions can be properly drawn from the statements above?
A)High schools would be wise to incorporate personal finance classes into their core curricula.
B)At least one-third of high school seniors work part-time jobs after school.
C)The number of high school seniors with significant financial responsibilities is greater than the number of seniors who have bounced a check.
D)Any high school seniors who contribute to food, shelter, or clothing for themselves or their families have significant financial responsibilities.
E)The majority of high school students have no financial responsibilities to their families.
OA C
How can C be correct?? Invalid comparison. We cannot deduce numbers from percentages.
I found D and E correct.
D is correct as it is given in the statement the significant financial responsibilities include, but are not limited to, contributing to food, shelter, or clothing for themselves or their families. So from this we can infer/conclude that "Any high school seniors who contribute to food, shelter, or clothing for themselves or their families have significant financial responsibilities."
E is correct as it is given in the statement one-third of high school seniors say that they have significant financial responsibilities. Therefore from this statement we can conclude that the majority of high school students have no financial responsibilities to their families. Because two-third of high school seniors have no financial responsibility.
Though I do not know among D and E which one to eliminate and why??
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Soumita Ghosh
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Tommy Wallach
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Hey Soumita,
You're absolutely right that we can't infer numbers from percents, but nobody's asking you to do that! There are no numbers in (C)!
Imagine there are 30 people in the class:
10 have significant financial responsibilities
24 have never taken a personal finance class
24 have opened bank accounts
8 (which is 1/3 of 24) have bounced a check
(A) Way too general, even though it may seem like a logical inference.
(B) The passage never discusses part-time jobs after school.
(C) 10 > 8, so this is the answer.
(D) The passage never says that any high school senior who contributes to food, shelter, or clothing has significant financial responsibilities. We'd need to know that they have to do it. It's not a responsibility unless they have to do it.
(E) Be careful. We know that the majority don't have "significant financial responsibilities," but we know nothing about lesser financial responsibilities.
An important side note: If the passage has a bunch of numbers/percents in it, the correct answer will almost always relate to those numbers/percentages. The trap answer on this question is (E), because it also plays off the percents, but (A) and (D) are out for not mentioning any statistics.
Hope that helps!
-t
You're absolutely right that we can't infer numbers from percents, but nobody's asking you to do that! There are no numbers in (C)!
Imagine there are 30 people in the class:
10 have significant financial responsibilities
24 have never taken a personal finance class
24 have opened bank accounts
8 (which is 1/3 of 24) have bounced a check
(A) Way too general, even though it may seem like a logical inference.
(B) The passage never discusses part-time jobs after school.
(C) 10 > 8, so this is the answer.
(D) The passage never says that any high school senior who contributes to food, shelter, or clothing has significant financial responsibilities. We'd need to know that they have to do it. It's not a responsibility unless they have to do it.
(E) Be careful. We know that the majority don't have "significant financial responsibilities," but we know nothing about lesser financial responsibilities.
An important side note: If the passage has a bunch of numbers/percents in it, the correct answer will almost always relate to those numbers/percentages. The trap answer on this question is (E), because it also plays off the percents, but (A) and (D) are out for not mentioning any statistics.
Hope that helps!
-t
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Soumita Ghosh
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@Tommy thanks a lot for your response!!
My understanding is still not clear.
I understood your explanation about option E. But for D your explanation is still not clear.So can you explain it to me in more simple way please.
Secondly regarding percentage number confusion. I found that you derive 24 have never taken a personal finance class out of 30. As my understanding you derive this 24 which is 80% of 30. Then you derive 8 which is 1/3 of 24. As per my knowledge we cannot derive number in this way from percentage or from proportion .The reason is in GMAT critical reasoning we can't infer numbers from percents.
My understanding is still not clear.
I understood your explanation about option E. But for D your explanation is still not clear.So can you explain it to me in more simple way please.
Secondly regarding percentage number confusion. I found that you derive 24 have never taken a personal finance class out of 30. As my understanding you derive this 24 which is 80% of 30. Then you derive 8 which is 1/3 of 24. As per my knowledge we cannot derive number in this way from percentage or from proportion .The reason is in GMAT critical reasoning we can't infer numbers from percents.
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Tommy Wallach
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Soumita!
We are not inferring number from percents! I'm simply showing you how the percent work out by looking at numbers. Percents are always the same, no matter what set of numbers you use. Try it again, or try it with 100, or with x. You'll find that the ratio between the categories will never change.
As for (D), you aren't differentiating between contributing money and having no choice but to contribute money. One is a nice gesture, the other is a responsibility. The passage says:
Hope that helps!
-t
We are not inferring number from percents! I'm simply showing you how the percent work out by looking at numbers. Percents are always the same, no matter what set of numbers you use. Try it again, or try it with 100, or with x. You'll find that the ratio between the categories will never change.
As for (D), you aren't differentiating between contributing money and having no choice but to contribute money. One is a nice gesture, the other is a responsibility. The passage says:
If it's a responsibility, that means they have to do it. But what about a student who just contributes in order to help out? That student could not be said to have a significant financial responsibility. So we can't say that any student who contributes in any way to their family has a significant financial responsibility. It could be a really tiny financial responsibility (give us $5 a month for gas money) for all we know. All we know about is the one-third of students who have a significant financial responsibility. We don't know anything about the other 2/3rds, some of whom may contribute a bit to the household money, but don't have a significant financial responsibility.These responsibilities include, but are not limited to, contributing to food, shelter, or clothing for themselves or their families
Hope that helps!
-t
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ceilidh.erickson
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Tommy makes a really important point here:
Not much to infer here. There many be other responsibilities in addition to the ones listed.
4/5 of seniors have opened a bank account; we can infer 1/5 haven't
So let's list what we know to be true:
1/3 of seniors claim to have significant financial responsibilities; 2/3 don't
4/5 of seniors have never taken a personal finance class; 1/5 have
4/5 of seniors have opened a bank account; 1/5 haven't
4/15 of seniors have bounced checks
You're right that we don't know how many students we actually have. But since we must have a positive number of students, isn't it fair to say that 1/3 of some number is greater than 4/15 of the same number? We can compare those proportions, because they're both proportions of the same whole (all high school seniors).
This is especially true on DRAW CONCLUSION questions. Whenever you're asked to draw a conclusion, you should be asking yourself "what MUST be true?" As you read the argument, keep asking yourself what has to be true based upon the given information.If the passage has a bunch of numbers/percents in it, the correct answer will almost always relate to those numbers/percentages.
We can infer that 2/3 don't claim to have significant financial responsibilities (but we don't know about less significant, not-at-all significant, etc)According to a recent study on financial roles, one-third of high school seniors say that they have "significant financial responsibilities."
These responsibilities include, but are not limited to, contributing to food, shelter, or clothing for themselves or their families.
Not much to infer here. There many be other responsibilities in addition to the ones listed.
Nothing to infer from the first statement (we can only infer from facts, not from opinions). From the second, we can infer that 1/5 (20%) of seniors have taken a personal finance class.At the same time, a second study demonstrates that a crisis in money management exists for high school students. According to this study, 80% of high school seniors have never taken a personal finance class
even though the same percentage of seniors has opened bank accounts
4/5 of seniors have opened a bank account; we can infer 1/5 haven't
1/3 of this 4/5 has bounced a check. In other words, 4/15 seniors have bounced a check.and one-third of these account holders has bounced a check.
So let's list what we know to be true:
1/3 of seniors claim to have significant financial responsibilities; 2/3 don't
4/5 of seniors have never taken a personal finance class; 1/5 have
4/5 of seniors have opened a bank account; 1/5 haven't
4/15 of seniors have bounced checks
You're right that we don't know how many students we actually have. But since we must have a positive number of students, isn't it fair to say that 1/3 of some number is greater than 4/15 of the same number? We can compare those proportions, because they're both proportions of the same whole (all high school seniors).
Ceilidh Erickson
EdM in Mind, Brain, and Education
Harvard Graduate School of Education
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Soumita Ghosh
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@Tommy and ceilidh you both are just great..
We just throw questions and doubts. you people take so much pain to explain us in simpler way.
I love you both !!
We just throw questions and doubts. you people take so much pain to explain us in simpler way.
I love you both !!
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Tommy Wallach
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Awwwww! Thanks, Soumita! : )
-t
-t
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ceilidh.erickson
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Thank you so much! That just made my day 
Ceilidh Erickson
EdM in Mind, Brain, and Education
Harvard Graduate School of Education
EdM in Mind, Brain, and Education
Harvard Graduate School of Education
