Logical Reasoning

PT119 · S3 · Q9 Editorial: When legislators discover that

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Editorial: When legislators discover that some public service is not being adequately provided, their most common response is to boost the funding for that public service.

Statements

soft conditional (when .. usually )

Legislators discover that most common a public service is not → response is to adequately provided boost funding

causal (because of this)

Boosting the funding least efficiently of public services being ⇢ run programs inadequately funded most commonly receive more money

Evaluate

There are only two claims, and they are connected with Causal language, so the correct answer will probably reinforce that causal connection.

Let's sketch out the full causal sequence being described, because the answer might just address the unspoken connective tissue.

1. a government bureaucracy is run very inefficiently 2. legislators discover that a public service not being adequately provided by this bureaucracy? 3. legislators most commonly decide to give that service more funding 4. the bureaucracy from #1 receives more funding

Goal

Let's look for the most provable answer, possibly one explaining the missing connection between "least efficiently run government bureaucracy" and .

9.

The statements in the editorial, if true, most strongly support which one of the following?

  1. Correct

    The least efficiently run government

    Why this is right

    This looks good. It connects #1 and #2 in our causal chain. The Overlapping Ingredient in both claims was "a boost/increase in funding", which means that the author is implicitly connecting the other ideas in each claim, "legislators discovering a public service is not being adequately provided" and "least efficiently run government bureaucracies".

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

    78% picked this

  2. When legislators discover that a

    Too Strong: never

    The language in the stimulus is about "the most common response". There is nothing absolute that would allow us to justify never.

    3% picked this

  3. Throughout the time a government

    Too Strong: throughout / repeatedly

    We have a specific Trigger idea that usually leads to a boost in funding: legislators discover a public service not being adequately provided. So in order for this answer to make sense, we'd have to think to ourselves, "Throughout the time a government bureaucracy is run inefficiently, legislators are repeatedly discovering that a public service is not being adequately provided". That's too big a leap to make. This answer is also making a Relative vs. Absolute switch. It might be that ALL bureaucracies are run inefficiently. This paragraph was specifically talking about those run least efficiently.

    12% picked this

  4. If legislators boost funding for

    Unsupported Causal Connection

    We don't have any grounds for thinking that "more funding ? less efficient". The gist of the paragraph is that there's some unfortunate irony that the worst-run programs end up getting money the most, but there was never an implication that getting money is what makes them the worst-run.

    4% picked this

  5. The most inefficiently run government

    Too Strong: most funding

    We only know that the most inefficiently run bureaucracies are the ones most likely to receive funding, but this is saying they are the ones likely to receive the most funding. No information in the paragraph deals with the comparative magnitude of how much funding this or that bureaucracy gets. It could be that the military's bureaucracy, despite being one of the more efficiently run bureaucracies, receives the most funding, simply because the overall budget for the military dwarfs the budget for all other bureaucracies.

    4% picked this

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