Q7 - Economist: ChesChem, a chemical manufacturer

[ohthatpatrick]

Question Type:
Necessary Assumption

Stimulus Breakdown:
Conclusion: If cost of natural gas goes up, CC will move manufacturing to Tilsen.
Evidence: Cost of natural gas in Chester is currently twice that in Tilsen. If cost of natural gas in Chester becomes more than twice that in Tilsen, CC will move to Tilsen.

Answer Anticipation:
What's the wiggle room here? It kinda seems like the Conclusion is properly drawn right?

There must be some difference between the premise trigger
"cost of gas in C becomes more than twice that in T"
and the conclusion trigger
"cost of gas in C increases at all".

In order for this conclusion to be wrong, we'd have to think of a way where "the cost of gas increases somewhat in C, but the cost of gas does NOT become more than twice that in T".

Aha! Isn't it possible that the cost of gas goes up SIMULTANEOUSLY in C and in T? If the cost of gas goes up $1/part in Chester at the same time it goes up $1/part in Tilsen, then the cost of gas will have increased in C, but we will NOT have triggered "cost of gas is twice as much in C as it is in T". Since the argument is vulnerable to this objection, the argument must assume that this objection is NOT possible.

We can prephrase an answer that says something like, "If the cost of gas in C were to increase, it would NOT simultaneously increase in T, such that the price of gas would still be 2 times as expensive or cheaper in C."

Correct Answer:
B

Answer Choice Analysis:
(A) We don't care about OTHER expenses, just whether an increase in Chester guarantees going over the "twice as much" threshold.

(B) YES! This doesn't package in all the safe lawyerly hedging of my prephrase, but it's clearly what LSAT is going for here. If we negate this, and we know that the price of gas WILL increase in T, then an increase in C would not necessarily put us over the "twice as expensive" threshold.

(C) We don't care about PROFIT, just whether an increase in Chester guarantees going over the "twice as much" threshold.

(D) We don't care about OTHER BENEFITS OF MOVING, just whether an increase in Chester guarantees going over the "twice as much" threshold.

(E) Illegal negation. The author thinks "if the price goes up, they'll move". That doesn't commit her to the negation of that: "if the price doesn't go up, they won't move".

Takeaway/Pattern: It's worth marinating on this argument until we solve for the wiggle room, because it's a highly mathematical argument. At the least, focusing on its mathematical "cost of gas" focus should make most of the other answers seem like they're bringing up extraneous factors.

#officialexplanation

[hrgreen]

I don't follow why B is the correct answer. If you negate B, then you are left with the statement that the price of natural gas will rise. If this is the case, then this would require the company to move to Tilsen.

If T increases & C doesn't, then CC doesn't move; if T increases and C does (and more than T), then CC moves-- Doesn't seem that T doesn't require an increase in C

[Yit HanS103]

I got this question right. however, now that I'm going over the explanations of each question. I'm stuck between B and E.
B: if you negate this, all its saying is that T will increase. I can't really tell wether that will destroy the conclusion. since the conclusion is only talking about when C increases.
E: I don't really know how to negate an unless statement. I think I eliminated this one during exam because it assumes that the only way c will move to T is if gas price increases in c. However, it may be too extreme to assume that thats the only way it will move to T. there could still be another factor (not mentioned in stimulus) that can make c move to t.

PLEASE HELP!
THANK YOU