Logical Reasoning

PT124 · S2 · Q21 Labor representative: Social historians have

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Labor representative: Social historians have shown conclusively that if workers strike when the working conditions at their jobs are poor, those conditions usually significantly improve after five years.

Given that ...

Workers in this industry know that .

And given that working conditions are poor.

Why is it that ...

They refuse to strike?

Evaluate

We'd think that these workers would want to strike, thinking that the usual "result" of striking is improved working conditions five years later.

But maybe that improvement is a coincidence. It's a fact that working conditions are improved, not that the strike played a causal role in improving them.

And it's only usually the case that strikes are followed by improvement. Maybe these workers think that their current situation is more likely to play out like the minority of times in which a strike doesn't lead to better conditions.

Goal

Let's look for a reason they don't want to strike: - a bad thing about strikes - they don't think strikes will cause improvement - something special is occurring that makes them think THEY wouldn't have good luck with a strike - or something else

21.

Which one of the following, if true, most helps to resolve the apparent discrepancy described by the labor representative?

  1. Until recently it was widely

    No Impact Cheats Paradox

    It doesn't matter if there once was an era when workers didn't know strikes were followed by improved working conditions. Because we already know that THESE workers know. It would be cheating the paradox if we acted like, "the reason these workers won't strike is because they don't realize that strikes are usually followed by better conditions."

    6% picked this

  2. Most factories in this industry

    Weaker Impact

    Could the idea of frequently changing ownership be a reason why the workers don't want to strike? Perhaps, since maybe workers would feel like there's no point in striking to negotiate better terms with the owners, if there are just going to be new owners in a couple years. But for that to be a compelling reason not to strike, we'd have to add in the assumption that, "If you think your factory is going to change ownership, you wouldn't think it was worth it to strike". That's not terrible; there's some common sense there. But it's not as strong as (D)'s idea that, "If you think you're only going to work in this industry for three years, then you wouldn't care about striking (knowing it takes five years for working conditions to actually improve)."

    4% picked this

  3. Working conditions in many other

    Irrelevant Comparison: other industries

    The paradox is only about this industry, where strikes are usually followed by better working conditions. It doesn't matter if other industries don't follow that pattern. We want to know why workers in this industry don't want to strike, given that they know this pattern holds within their industry.

    2% picked this

  4. Correct

    Workers typically plan to work

    Why this is right

    If you know that strikes are usually followed five years later by better working conditions, but you're only planning to work three years, then what's the point in striking? You won't be at this job long enough to enjoy the improved working conditions five years from now.

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

    81% picked this

  5. Wages in this industry have

    No Impact Cheats Paradox

    We might think, "since wages are increasing, there's no incentive to strike!" But we were told that the working conditions are poor, so there's definitely an incentive to strike. If we told ourselves otherwise, we'd be cheating the paradox.

    7% picked this

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