Q24 - A park's user fees

[chengyihanqvq]

Could someone please elaborate this question to me? I chose E based on my intuition but I don't quite understand the underlying assumption of this argument.

Thanks for your help in advance!

[christine.defenbaugh]

Thanks for posting, chengyihanqvq!

To sort out a principle-conform question, first we have to unravel what the principle really is! Let's extract that from the stimulus:

The stimulus describes an almost paradoxical situation, where park fees are increased, revenues decrease, but park maintenance improves. Say what? First, you'd think if park fees increase, that would *increase* revenues; but if it didn't, you might expect that decrease in revenues to be bad for park maintenance, but apparently it isn't. The principle here is the underlying explanation for this weirdness.

So, to break this out, we have:

Action ----> Expected effect --> Final Goal
(fee inc.)--> (inc. revenue)----> (better parks)

And then:

Action ----> opposite effect --> still final goal
(fee inc.)--> (dec. $$ & visitors)---> (better parks)

The reason, or principle, is that in the 'opposite effect' scenario, the NEED for the revenue for the parks decreases. So, we have less $$, but we need less $$ to do the same job, so it's all good! That's how we can still, weirdly, end up at the final goal.

So, we have an original goal that's (oddly) STILL being met, albeit in a very unexpected way.

(E) plays out the same, almost paradoxical game.

So, to break this out, we have:

Action ----> Expected effect --> Final Goal
(fee inc.)--> (inc. revenue)----> (better book repair)

And then:

Action ----> opposite effect --> still final goal
(fee inc.)--> (dec. $$ & patrons)---> (better book repair)

Once again, the explanation is that with fewer library patrons, there's less need for book repair, so less $$ is okay!

None of the other answer choices quite match this pattern!

(A) Here, the bad effect (profits decrease) is a side effect of the original goal (market share increase). In our original pattern, 'bad effect' only looked bad, and then actually caused the final goal.

(B) This scenario defies expectations, but not in the same way as our stimulus. What we might have expected was that the:

Early close ---> fewer customers ---> dec. revenue

And what actually happens is:

Early close ---> more? customers ---> inc. revenue

This situation does not have an original goal that's still being met, but in any unexpected way.

(C) Like , this original goal (inc mass transit use) has a negative side effect (mass transit deterioration). We don't want a negative side effect, we need a seemingly negative result, that nonetheless gets us to our original goal.

(D) There's really nothing terribly unexpected here. Even if the new revenue were totally surprising, just like (A) and (C), it would merely be an unexpected side effect. It's not an unexpected way to get to our original goal.


It's easy to get turned around on questions like this! Sometimes just laying out the timeline of events (here, expected and surprising) can be really useful in identifying the pieces of the puzzle, and how they connect!

Let me know if this helps to clear this up!

[WayneW830]

Well I still don't understand why answer A is wrong.

I agree that the principle is "original method→unexpected effect→eventually meets the goal", however, as answer choice A states,instead of the profit, the company's goal is just to increase its market share. And that goal was met by improving the service warranty. So how can we eliminate answer choice A? Is it because that in answer choice A, the final goal isn't really caused by the unexpected effect, by the original method?

Anyone could explain it? Thx.

[YurikaC738]

Well I still don't understand why answer A is wrong.

I agree that the principle is "original method→unexpected effect→eventually meets the goal", however, as answer choice A states,instead of the profit, the company's goal is just to increase its market share. And that goal was met by improving the service warranty. So how can we eliminate answer choice A? Is it because that in answer choice A, the final goal isn't really caused by the unexpected effect, by the original method?

Anyone could explain it? Thx.

A perspective to eliminate choice A is to see the question stem only involves one final effect (that is to say, the question revolves the maintenance of the park; the intermediate effect is to reach the one effect, maintenance again). However, choice A involves two independent effects, profits and market share. Thus we eliminate it.