Television executives recently

Answer choices

1. A

   Weakens, if anything9% picked this

   Most costs of production and distribution of products typically advertised on television are expected to rise 3 to 7

   This is telling us that in addition to the fact that ad time will be more expensive, the production costs of the actual products have also gone up. If a company's costs to make its product have gone up 3 to 7%, then their profit margin has already shrunk. Now if they also have to pay 10-15% more for ads, they might be down to a crazy-small profit margin. To put it another way, the ads are more expensive than before. If you had extra money in your bank account, you probably wouldn't mind that you have to pay 10-15% more than before. But if you have less money in your business's bank account (because you have to pay higher costs to produce and distribute your product), then you'll be more turned off by the higher price of TV advertising time.

   9%
2. B

   Unclear Impact1% picked this

   The system for rating the size of the audience watching any given television advertisement will

   The fact that the system for rating audience size will change tells us nothing. Will it change for the better? Change for the worse? Will it change in a way that makes buying TV advertising time more attractive / less attractive? We have no idea.

   1%
3. C

   Weakens, if anything6% picked this

   Next fall advertising time on television will no longer be available in blocks smaller

   This doesn't sound like the positive-sounding change we'd like to hear about. It sounds more like a negative. You're not able to do something you used to be able to do. In particular, if your business can't afford the higher prices for commercial time, maybe you'd consider switching from a 30 second ad to a 20 second ad, which you can still afford. But if the TV stations discontinue 20 second ads, then you don't really have an option to buy an ad anymore. Thus, this answer sounds like a change that would potentially make it harder for some businesses to buy advertising time, and thus a reason why it might be harder to sell advertising time.

   6%
4. D

   Irrelevant Distinction11% picked this

   The amount of television advertising time purchased by providers of services is increasing, while the amount of such time purchased by

   We don't care whether a commercial is being bought by a provider of a service or a provider of a product. For either type of business, the ad time will cost 10-15% more. For either type of business, buying an advertisement will continue to be profitable. So this doesn't move the needle in either direction.

   11%
5. E

   Correct73% picked this

   A recent survey has shown that the average number of hours people spend watching television is increasing at the rate of

   Why this is right

   This provides an incentive to advertise on TV (an increasingly large audience to see your ads), so it strengthens the idea that it will be at least as easy to sell advertising time next fall. Businesses can think, "Well, ad time now costs 10-15% more than before. But the audience increases by 2% every two months, so from last fall to next fall, the audience size will have gone up about 12%. I guess it's worth paying 10-15% more for ad time, given that it's reaching an audience that's 12% bigger than before."

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

   73%