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price of baby's clothing

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price of baby's clothing

by Deepthi Subbu » Tue Aug 09, 2011 2:14 am
The price of babies' clothing has dropped in the last two months, due to the entrance of new foreign manufacturers into the market. However, in that time, sales of babies' clothing have decreased significantly when compared to sales in previous months.

Identify the paradox here.


(A) An article came out describing that some babies' clothing is more hypoallergenic than others.

(B) A new line of baby clothing has come out in the last month and is outselling all other companies' offerings.

(C) The number of babies born in the last month is slightly lower than the birth rate was in the month before that.

(D) A general economic downturn has depressed sales in all sectors of clothing.

(E) There was an increase in the number of twins born in the last month as a proportion of the overall birth rate.
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by need720+ » Tue Aug 09, 2011 4:53 am
IMO D
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by Deepthi Subbu » Tue Aug 09, 2011 4:58 am
need720+ wrote:IMO D
How will the downturn in the entire clothing market affect just baby's clothing ? I thought it was so generic. I understand it has got better chances than C ( assumption req - when lesser are babies born where we may have to assume that for every baby only minimum no of clothes be purchased), however isn't it too global ?
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by bblast » Tue Aug 09, 2011 7:25 am
Deepthi Subbu wrote:
need720+ wrote:IMO D
How will the downturn in the entire clothing market affect just baby's clothing ? I thought it was so generic. I understand it has got better chances than C ( assumption req - when lesser are babies born where we may have to assume that for every baby only minimum no of clothes be purchased), however isn't it too global ?

hi, the trap answer is C. But its wrong because the stem says "sales have significantly decreased." -not slightly decreased.

So D is the only feasible option. Does not look promising at once but try eliminating other answers and u will see that D is the only one which brings in info to slightly resolve the discrepancy.
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by smackmartine » Tue Aug 09, 2011 7:38 am
IMO D

One more issue with option C is that it compares birth rate of current month to that of last month. Though decrease in birth rate can be related to decrease in the sales of baby clothing , the result totally is an outside knowledge. Moreover, it may be possible that people started buying more cloths than before. So option C is still weak and doesn't resolve the discrepancy.

D provides an alternative explanation.
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by HSPA » Tue Aug 09, 2011 7:45 am
Hi Smack.. How to get rid of B??
First take: 640 (50M, 27V) - RC needs 300% improvement
Second take: coming soon..
Regards,
HSPA.
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by GmatKiss » Tue Aug 09, 2011 8:31 am
B is specific to a company.

our concern is with the sector not a specific company!
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by Deepthi Subbu » Tue Aug 09, 2011 5:51 pm
Good catch bblast and smack . thanks!
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by smackmartine » Tue Aug 09, 2011 6:26 pm
HSPA wrote:Hi Smack.. How to get rid of B??
Hi HSPA,
I can see two issues in option B

1) If you see option B carefully it says
"A new line of baby clothing has come out in the last month and is outselling all other companies' offerings."

The argument talks about last TWO months --> The price of babies' clothing has dropped in the last TWO months

Even if option B explain the discrepancy for last month , it fails to explain about last to last month's drop in sales. The difference is very subtle but this is what GMAT does. Correct answer must resolve all the discrepancies.

2) While it is possible that the new line of clothing sold more baby clothing than other companies , the statement does not indicate that overall sales of baby clothing decreased. It is implying that sales actually increased,that is totally opposite to what argument says.
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