#22 - At the end of the year, Wilson's Department Store

[jeremiah230!!]

this question stem is very confusing to me. I am usually able to tell whether a given question is a Justify question or a Necessary Assumption question, but I couldn't do so by this one. I thought it was a Justify question. I get that Justify question stems generally contain language of sufficiency, and that this does not, but I still can't see a way to be able to tell off the bat that this question is a Necessary Assumption.

[gingerale]

I was also confused whether this was a justify or assumption question. What are the main indicators that will help me differentiate between the two?

[Dave Killoran]

Hi Ginger,

Rachael's explanation further up in this chain contains an excellent explanation: this isn't a Justify question because there's no language of sufficiency in the stem. Justify questions require some indication that we on the sufficient side, and this does not have it.

This with the mention of asking for an assumption and no sufficiency present, this is rightly classified as an Assumption question

Thanks!

[mab9178]

Point of clarification:

Is answer-choice C, incidently, both a necessary and a sufficient assumption, meaning that it does answer the question whether it was asking for a necessary assumption (in which case the negation techniques applies) or the sufficient assumption (the answer-choice that guarantees the conclusion)?

I know that this was addressed, but I am having hard time accepting it: the phrase "to be properly drawn" classifies the question as one that does NOT ask for a necessary assumption, but a sufficient one; correct?

Thank you
Mazen

[Luke Haqq]

Hi Mazen!

Answer choice (C) is necessary for the conclusion to follow. Since that answer choice does indeed permit the conclusion, it is also sufficient for the conclusion to follow.

This is an assumption question so the answer choice is going to be a necessary assumption. The question stem does look close to a justify stem, but as Dave and Rachael note above, the stem is missing words about sufficiency, such as "Which of the following assumptions would be sufficient to allow..."

We can test (C) using the Assumption Negation technique. Negated, that answer choice would be: "The criterion used by Wilson's for selecting its award recipients has [not] remained the same for the past fifteen years." If the criteria had not remained the same, this would weaken/make the argument fall apart. The company states, "our award criterion at present is membership in the top third of our sales force"--this might come across as an unchanging criteria, but the italicized language highlights that it is only about the present criteria. If the criteria had been varying over the past 15 years, the company wouldn't be able to make the conclusion it does about the number of people being passed over for the award.