Logical Reasoning

PT103 · S3 · Q4 The government has spent heavily

A free, expert breakdown of this official LSAT Logical Reasoning question.

  • Save & drill this skill build targeted practice sets from questions like this one

  • Video walkthroughs watch every question solved step by step

  • 81 official LSATs as questions, timed sections & full-length tests

The government has spent heavily to clean groundwater contaminated by toxic chemical spills.

Main Conclusion

More of the government's budget should be redirected to preventing spills.

Intermediate Conclusion

It makes little sense that the entire yearly budget for chemical spill prevention is less than the amount spent annually on one typical cleanup site.

Evidence

Prevention is far more effective than cleanup. The government has spent a ton already to clean spill sites, not even one of them is completely cleaned, and the amount spilled each year surpasses the amount cleaned.

Evaluate

When we do Role and Main Conclusion, we read the paragraph with the awareness that on most of these, the Conclusion comes earlier, Support comes after / last.

We also know to be more on guard when it comes to possible Intermediate Conclusions.

The "yet" indicates an Author's Pivot (but, yet, however, after all). She starts by complaining about clean-up efforts.

Then we get the big Opinion Indicator "should" in the 3rd sentence. Since this is a prescriptive recommendation (yes, that was redundant), it feels like our author's main purpose in writing the paragraph.

Does our author Support this opinion? Why should more of the government's budget be redirected to preventing spills.

Because, the cleanup effort is not even keeping pace with rate of new spills, they currently spend less on prevention each year than they spend on just ONE cleanup site each year, and prevention is far more effective than cleanup.

The word "Since" (of FABS fame .. for, after all, because, since) indicates that the 1st half of the last sentence is a Premise supporting a Conclusion in the 2nd half.

But we could only call this an Intermediate Conclusion, since it was still part of the Support for the overall Main Conclusion, .

Goal

The claim the question stem is asking us about is that 3rd sentence, which is our Main Conclusion.

4.

The proposal about how the government's budget should be redirected plays which one of the following roles in the argument?

  1. It represents an unsupported speculation.

    Contradicted: unsupported

    This is not a speculation, it's a recommendation. And it's very supported. In fact, it's so supported it's the Main Conclusion.

    1% picked this

  2. It both supports another claim

    Wrong Role

    This answer describes an Intermediate Conclusion, but the claim they're asking us about is the Main Conclusion. The Main Conclusion isn't supporting any other claim.

    7% picked this

  3. Correct

    It is the claim that

    Why this is right

    "The claim that the argument as a whole is structured to support" is another way of saying the Main Conclusion, which is what we were looking for.

    Skill tested: Role · how this choice captures the argument's function is the move to repeat next time.

    85% picked this

  4. It is a presupposition on

    Presuppositions Aren't Visible

    It's always kind of funny when a Role question calls one of the explicit claims we say an "assumption / presupposition", since those are invisible.

    3% picked this

  5. It presents an objection to

    Out of Scope: another proposal

    We could say that this claim presents a recommendation that runs counter to a current practice. But their isn't any "other proposal" mentioned in the argument. There is just the status quo -- spending very little on prevention and very much, ineffectively, on cleanups -- and there's the author's suggestion.

    4% picked this

Continue the review in LSAT Lab

Save this question, watch the video walkthrough, and drill similar questions in your LSAT Lab account.

LSAT Lab

Turn this review into a targeted study plan.

Save this question, drill more like it, watch the video walkthrough, and track your progress in your LSAT Lab account.

Start practicing free