#3 - Flynn: Allowing people to collect large damage awards

[Administrator]

Complete Question Explanation

Method of Reasoning, Cause and Effect. The correct answer choice is (A).

Flynn's argument is that collecting large damage awards benefits consumers since it incentivizes the corporations to reduce safety risks.

Garcia counters Flynn's argument by pointing out that damage awards can actually harm consumers if the award is high enough to destroy the corporation.

Answer choice (A) This is the correct answer choice. Garcia takes the policy Flynn supports (letting people collect large damage awards in lawsuits) and shows undesirable consequences (corporations could be destroyed, eliminating jobs and harming the economy and consumers).

Answer choice (B) Flynn's argument is based on the premise that corporations are incentivized to reduce safety risks due to the possibility of large damage awards. (B) cannot be right because Garcia does not undermine this premise, instead, they show an alternative outcome of that practice.

Answer choice (C) Garcia does not compare Flynn's argument to a separate flawed argument, so this cannot be the correct answer.

Answer choice (D) Garcia does not show how Flynn's argument (that corporations are incentivized to reduce safety risks because of large damage awards) could be applied to a separate policy.

Answer choice (E) Garcia is not providing another explanation for a situation - Flynn and Garcia discuss the same situation, wherein a company must award a large damage settlement.

[Zierra28]

I understand why A, but can you explain why E is a poor choice?

Thanks!

[Claire Horan]

Hi Zierra28,

With these method of reasoning problems, I try to map the terms in the contenders to the more specific terms in the argument. Let me explain what I mean. For the correct answer, "(A) arguing that the policy supported in Flynn’s argument could have undesirable consequences," maps this way:

policy supported by Flynn's argument: allow people to collect large damage awards
the potential undesirable consequences: harm to economy and customers

Now let's try the same mapping for "(E) providing an alternative explanation for a situation described in Flynn’s argument."

situation described in Flynn's argument: plaintiffs earning high damages and corporations producing safer products
alternative explanation for that situation: no explanation is given to explain why plaintiffs might earn high damages or why corporations might produce safer products.

I recommend this process of trying to map the general onto the specific and checking if it works.

[EmilyC]

Hi there,

I had this question narrowed down to answer A and D, and ended up choosing D. I thought that Flynn's argument, "damage awards clearly benefits consumers" could support the policy Garcia mentions, that "employees lose jobs...harms the economy thus harms consumers" which is inconsistent with what Flynn argues.

I'm missing something here, but I don't know what. Could someone please explain why D is incorrect?

[Zach Foreman]

Emily,
The policy that Garcia mentions is the same policy that Flynn mentions, namely "Allowing people to collect large damage awards when they successfully sue corporations that produce dangerous products". Flynn says that this policy will result in benefit to the consumer because companies will be deterred from making dangerous products. Garcia says the same policy (without limit) could result in a company going bankrupt which would harm employees and ultimately the consumer because they couldn't get that product anymore.
So, clearly Garcia is arguing that the policy that Flynn advocates could actually have a negative effect rather than a positive one, which is what A is saying. Now, Garcia could make an argument like D, but that isn't really what's happening. It would look like this: "You are arguing that laws should be for the protection of the consumer. However, this motive would mean you actually support a policy different than collecting large damages, because those could potentially destroy corporations which benefit consumers."