Critical Reasoning

Recently a court ruled that current law allows companies to reject a job applicant if working in the job would entail a 90 percent chance that the applicant would suffer a heart attack. The presiding judge justified the ruling, saying that it protected both employees and employers.

The use of this court ruling as part of the law could not be effective in regulating employment practices if which of the following were true?

(A) The best interests of employers often conflict with the interests of the employees.

(B) No legally accepted methods exist for calculating the risk of a job applicant having a heart attack as a result of being employed in any particular occupation.

(C) Some jobs might involve health risks other than the risk of heart attack.

(D) Employees who have a 90 percent chance of suffering a heart attack may be unaware that their risk is so great.

(E) The number of people applying for jobs at a company might decline if the company, by screening applicants for risk of heart attack, seemed to suggest that the job entailed high risk of heart attack.

Be exact when making predictions. Here the right answer will give us a reason that the law will not be effectively enforced (not a reason that the law is bad). So the right answer will show that it is not possible to figure out which applicants have a 90% chance of heart attacks and which don't. I go through the answers in detail in the full solution below (taken from the GMATFix App).



-Patrick

kobel51 wrote:Recently a court ruled that current law allows companies to reject a job applicant if working in the job would entail a 90 percent chance that the applicant would suffer a heart attack. The presiding judge justified the ruling, saying that it protected both employees and employers.

Judgement - Companies can reject application of job applicants who have a 90% chance of a heart attack.

Judge - It protects both the Employer and Employee.

The use of this court ruling as part of the law could not be effective in regulating employment practices if which of the following were true?

(A) The best interests of employers often conflict with the interests of the employees.

Irrelevant.

(B) No legally accepted methods exist for calculating the risk of a job applicant having a heart attack as a result of being employed in any particular occupation.

If there exists no well accepted legal method for calculating risk of heart attack associated with job in any particular occupation then how is the Judgement effective ?

Looks good.

(C) Some jobs might involve health risks other than the risk of heart attack.

Out of scope.

(D) Employees who have a 90 percent chance of suffering a heart attack may be unaware that their risk is so great.

Out of scope and irrelevant as well.

(E) The number of people applying for jobs at a company might decline if the company, by screening applicants for risk of heart attack, seemed to suggest that the job entailed high risk of heart attack.

Irrelevant and Out of scope .


Hence IMO [spoiler](B)[/spoiler]

(B) No legally accepted methods exist for calculating the risk of a job applicant having a heart attack as a result of being employed in any particular occupation.


*Sometimes limitations in the types of job you can do may help to keep you healthy, particularly for jobs that are physically strenuous.

(C) Some jobs might involve health risks other than the risk of heart attack.

Does health risks vs. heart attacks have different rulings?

ardz24 wrote:(B) No legally accepted methods exist for calculating the risk of a job applicant having a heart attack as a result of being employed in any particular occupation.


*Sometimes limitations in the types of job you can do may help to keep you healthy, particularly for jobs that are physically strenuous.

(C) Some jobs might involve health risks other than the risk of heart attack.

Does health risks vs. heart attacks have different rulings?

I'm not certain I understand your question, but you seem to be asking why C is incorrect. We're trying to evaluate the effectiveness of a court ruling that allows companies to reject job applicants who have a 90% chance of having a heart attack. The fact that some jobs pose health risks other than heart attacks isn't terribly relevant here, and if you think about it, how could that not be true? Of course some jobs pose health risks! That doesn't tell us if it's fair/effective/plausible for companies to rule out candidates because there's supposedly a 90% chance a candidate would suffer a heart attack.