#24 - Tariffs on particular products tend to protect the

[Claire Horan]

Hi Alex,

Using hypotheticals can be really helpful, but it's important to pick your numbers conservatively. In other words, you don't want to exaggerate, or overstate, a premise. Because the premise is that MOST people are anti-tariff, you should make this group 51 people out of 100. The pro-tariff people are, then, 49 out of 100.

Now use the assumption negation technique. If you negate A, you get that the pro-tariff people are significantly more likely than the anti-tariff people to vote based on a candidate's stance on this issue. If that were the case, most people would vote against the anti-tariff politician, which would attack the conclusion that voting anti-tariff would help politicians get re-elected. Since answer choice A, when negated, attacks the conclusion, it must be an assumption upon which the argument relies.

I hope this explanation helps!

[DumbBrian]

Hi Alex,

Using hypotheticals can be really helpful, but it's important to pick your numbers conservatively. In other words, you don't want to exaggerate, or overstate, a premise. Because the premise is that MOST people are anti-tariff, you should make this group 51 people out of 100. The pro-tariff people are, then, 49 out of 100.

Now use the assumption negation technique. If you negate A, you get that the pro-tariff people are significantly more likely than the anti-tariff people to vote based on a candidate's stance on this issue. If that were the case, most people would vote against the anti-tariff politician, which would attack the conclusion that voting anti-tariff would help politicians get re-elected. Since answer choice A, when negated, attacks the conclusion, it must be an assumption upon which the argument relies.

I hope this explanation helps!

The bolded part of your response does not make sense to me. Let's return to Alex's hypothetical. If MOST people oppose tariffs then it's 51-99% (and I guess 100% would still be accurate), to your point, but yeah, let's assume 51% of the people oppose the tariffs. You state that this would mean that the remainder, or 49%, would support the tariffs, but that's not necessarily true. It's not a binary (a mistake made in the original explanation to this question as well, re: 4 vs. 6), as you can be either FOR the tariffs or NEUTRAL to them. It could be the case that only 2% of people are actually pro-tariff. There's nothing in the stimulus stating that if you are not in opposition to the tariffs then you are in support of them. If we assume 100 people total and 2 people who support tariffs (2%), 100% of 2 of people is still only 2 people, and 20% of 51 people is a about 10 people. 100% is significantly more than 20% so we clear that hurdle.

So in my hypothetical above it IS TRUE that pro-tariff folks are substantially more likely to vote on the issue of tariffs than the anti-tariff folks, but the argument is not destroyed. It still could be the case that the anti-tariff folks get more votes even with much fewer people voting on the basis of that issue. So the answer choice A does not make sense, basically because it's a numbers game. The stimulus doesn't do enough to limit the breaks between people who support/oppose, so saying "more or less likely", even substantially so, doesn't give anything definitive. It's kind of evident in the second paragraph in your post, where you abandon the numbers completely. You can't just say that just because one is more likely than the other, when the numbers themselves aren't equal, that one will garner more votes than the other.

I have been searching the internet for a satisfying answer to this question and still haven't found it. Can someone please explain this to me?

[Brook Miscoski]

Brian,

It is true that there could be neutral voters, but that doesn't defeat answer choice A.

The numbers Claire picked were arbitrary for the purpose of making an illustration. But we can consider your suggested numbers and still see why A is correct.

Let's say that 2% of voters support the tariffs, and each are 100% likely to base their votes on that issue. Let's say 51% oppose the tariffs, but are 0% likely to base their votes on that issue because it's just not important to them. The other 47% just don't care. That's 2% supporters of tariffs who will vote on that issue, and no one else.

The critical issue here is whether supporters are substantially more likely to base their vote on the tariff issue. The reason we know that is that changing that likelihood changes how believable we find the argument to be.

I approached the problem somewhat differently. When i read the stimulus, my reaction was that opposition to the tariffs only matters if it's something people will change their votes for. Looking at the choices, A is the only one that addresses that critical issue. It's a similar analysis, but not based in hypothetical numbers. Also, B/C/D/E are all way off base. Even if A isn't perfect, it's the only choice that is even relevant.

[DumbBrian]

Brian,

It is true that there could be neutral voters, but that doesn't defeat answer choice A.

The numbers Claire picked were arbitrary for the purpose of making an illustration. But we can consider your suggested numbers and still see why A is correct.

Let's say that 2% of voters support the tariffs, and each are 100% likely to base their votes on that issue. Let's say 51% oppose the tariffs, but are 0% likely to base their votes on that issue because it's just not important to them. The other 47% just don't care. That's 2% supporters of tariffs who will vote on that issue, and no one else.

The critical issue here is whether supporters are substantially more likely to base their vote on the tariff issue. The reason we know that is that changing that likelihood changes how believable we find the argument to be.

I approached the problem somewhat differently. When i read the stimulus, my reaction was that opposition to the tariffs only matters if it's something people will change their votes for. Looking at the choices, A is the only one that addresses that critical issue. It's a similar analysis, but not based in hypothetical numbers. Also, B/C/D/E are all way off base. Even if A isn't perfect, it's the only choice that is even relevant.

Hi Brook, thanks for responding.

To be honest, I'm still not satisfied. You're right in that assuming 0% of the 51 people is less than the 100% of the 2 people. But my hypothetical above shows that it IS possible to still have a substantially lower share of people voting on the basis of tariffs and still have more people vote. Assuming 0% like you did above would work, yes, but we aren't beholden to that. 40% can still be significantly less than 100%, right? And all we have to do is show one possible world where it isn't destroyed to say that it doesn't have to necessarily be the case that answer choice A must be true. Therefore, A can't be necessary to the argument.

I guess what I'm saying is that I still don't see how negating A doesn't destroy the argument. I know that, at the end of the day, the answer is what the LSAC says it is and that's the only one we will get credit for, but I just don't get it. And to your point about it being the "best" answer - I'm not necessarily satisfied with that perspective given that this is a NA question. The right answer, if negated, should destroy the answer completely, not just be the best.

Maybe I'm missing something completely obvious but I've yet to find an explanation that is satisfactory or makes sense...

[Robert Carroll]

Brian,

The key here is to interpret "significantly more likely" correctly in the context. Is 100% significantly more than 40%? You're viewing this as a question with a fixed answer. In other words, in your interpretation, "Is 100% significantly more than 40%?" can be answered affirmatively or negatively without a context. You think it's clear that 100% is significantly more than 40%. It's not. Let me explain by returning to the rather extreme situation you discussed earlier, where the disparity in percentages was even worse.

So, in that extreme situation, 2 people are pro-tariff and each of those 2 people bases his/her vote on tariffs. 51 people are anti-tariff, and 10 of those people (roughly 20%, as you point out) base their votes on tariffs. In this case, it is possible for 100% of the pro-tariff people to base their votes on tariffs and only 20% of the anti-tariff people to base their votes on tariffs, yet a politician would not have to worry about this - ignoring the pro-tariff minority would be perfectly acceptable, from a vote-getting perspective. This hypothetical is supposed to be a situation in which the supporters of tariffs are significantly more likely to vote based on tariffs than opponents of tariffs. Thus, this is supposed to be a situation that matches the negation of answer choice (A). According to the Assumption Negation technique, this situation should destroy the argument, yet it doesn't.

The flaw in the reasoning above is as follows. For this situation to be an example of the negation of answer choice (A), it would have to be a situation where significantly more of the pro-tariff people base their votes on tariffs than the anti-tariff people base THEIR votes on tariffs. The question then is "Is 100% significantly more than 20%?" The correct answer is not "Yes, of course 100% is significantly more than 20%" but instead "It depends." Look at the case here - 100% of 2 people is not more than 20% of 51 people. So, in this very case, 100% is not significantly more than 20%, because 100% of 2 people is not more people than 20% of 51 people. Comparing percentages is senseless here - we need to compare numbers. For the likelihood to be significant, it would have to be a percentage so much higher that the resulting part of the pro-tariff population is higher than the resulting part of the anti-tariff population. The key is what "significant" means. If pro-tariff people are sufficiently few in number, even a portion of that population as high as 100% fails to be significant. Thus, the "2 pro vs 51 anti" hypothetical is inapt. Any other such hypothetical that does not result in more votes on the pro side than the anti side will have a similar defect, so the flaw extends to all such examples.

This means the negation of answer choice (A) does destroy the argument, proving it was an assumption necessary for the argument.

Robert Carroll

[DumbBrian]

Brian,

The key here is to interpret "significantly more likely" correctly in the context. Is 100% significantly more than 40%? You're viewing this as a question with a fixed answer. In other words, in your interpretation, "Is 100% significantly more than 40%?" can be answered affirmatively or negatively without a context. You think it's clear that 100% is significantly more than 40%. It's not. Let me explain by returning to the rather extreme situation you discussed earlier, where the disparity in percentages was even worse.

So, in that extreme situation, 2 people are pro-tariff and each of those 2 people bases his/her vote on tariffs. 51 people are anti-tariff, and 10 of those people (roughly 20%, as you point out) base their votes on tariffs. In this case, it is possible for 100% of the pro-tariff people to base their votes on tariffs and only 20% of the anti-tariff people to base their votes on tariffs, yet a politician would not have to worry about this - ignoring the pro-tariff minority would be perfectly acceptable, from a vote-getting perspective. This hypothetical is supposed to be a situation in which the supporters of tariffs are significantly more likely to vote based on tariffs than opponents of tariffs. Thus, this is supposed to be a situation that matches the negation of answer choice (A). According to the Assumption Negation technique, this situation should destroy the argument, yet it doesn't.

The flaw in the reasoning above is as follows. For this situation to be an example of the negation of answer choice (A), it would have to be a situation where significantly more of the pro-tariff people base their votes on tariffs than the anti-tariff people base THEIR votes on tariffs. The question then is "Is 100% significantly more than 20%?" The correct answer is not "Yes, of course 100% is significantly more than 20%" but instead "It depends." Look at the case here - 100% of 2 people is not more than 20% of 51 people. So, in this very case, 100% is not significantly more than 20%, because 100% of 2 people is not more people than 20% of 51 people. Comparing percentages is senseless here - we need to compare numbers. For the likelihood to be significant, it would have to be a percentage so much higher that the resulting part of the pro-tariff population is higher than the resulting part of the anti-tariff population. The key is what "significant" means. If pro-tariff people are sufficiently few in number, even a portion of that population as high as 100% fails to be significant. Thus, the "2 pro vs 51 anti" hypothetical is inapt. Any other such hypothetical that does not result in more votes on the pro side than the anti side will have a similar defect, so the flaw extends to all such examples.

This means the negation of answer choice (A) does destroy the argument, proving it was an assumption necessary for the argument.

Robert Carroll

Robert, thank you for responding.

So from all that you've said above the big thing I'm getting is the meaning of the word "significant". Basically, you're saying that the use of the word "significant" FORCES the absolute number of pro-tariff people likely to base their vote on the politician's stance on tariffs to be higher than the number of anti-tariff people likely to base their vote on that same issue. Is this an accurate summary of your explanation?

If so, and if the key to getting this answer right is an understanding of the word "significant" that allows you to make a determination out of thin air to make a statement about any type of absolute numbers, then I again have to say this this explanation is unsatisfactory.

Essentially, if we interpret "significant" like you're saying we can/should, then a negated answer choice A will read something like "the absolute number of pro-tariff people voting on the basis of tariffs is higher than the absolutely number of anti-tariff people voting on the basis of tariffs". That, to me, seems like an astronomical jump from what it actually says. Your definition of the word seems arbitrarily established to eliminate any possible world where the letter of the question would allow for A to be negated and the argument still stand (like the middle paragraph in your post). It seems to go against the conventional understanding of what "significantly more likely" means.

But, to be fair, I highly doubt that I have studied the LSAT as long as you have or have seen anywhere near as many questions as you have. So if you, or anyone else at Powerscore, could show me some examples of where the test forces you to interpret "significantly more likely" in the way you do above, I would really appreciate it. Otherwise, at this point, if I miss a question like this that I believe is fundamentally flawed, then I guess I'll just have to live with it.

Thank you all for your help and patience.

[T.B.Justin]

Hey,

I had this down to B and C, selected B, complete misunderstanding is going on here.

Because tariffs on particular products more often protect the small percentage of people that work in the industries that make those products and hurt everyone that does not work in those industries by way of higher costs, and since polls show most people oppose these tariffs, it follows that if politicians voted against these tariffs, they would be more likely to be reelected.

PP: I find this assumes that most of the people that oppose tariffs will vote for this politician solely on the grounds of his support for this one issue.

I have the conclusion diagrammed as:

PVT: Politician votes tariffs
RE: Reelected

Not PVT RE

[lsatshalin77]

I struggled with this because of the words "small percentage" which I took to mean 5, maybe 10% of the population. If the question had said "a minority," then i would be thinking more along the lines of 40% (like the example situation presented earlier in this thread with 4 supporters and 6 opposers).

If the supporters truly made up a small percentage, then it wouldn't matter if they are significantly more likely than opponents to base their vote for a politician on this issue.

For example, with 20% of the population and 100% of them voting for the politician based on the issue:
If the 80% majority that opposes is significantly less likely (i.e. only 75% base their vote on this issue), then the politician is not going to be re-elected, despite the supporters' best rallying efforts.

If the percentage of the population that is protected by this tariff is anything lower than this example, the politician is probably going to be re-elected regardless of how many of them vote for him.

I'm getting two possible take aways from this problem that would lead me to Answer A -- which one makes more sense?

1) "small percentage" = anything up to 50%, like a simple minority? Then it becomes more likely that supporters can overcome a smaller majority of opposition if supporters have a higher voting rate based on the issue.

2) "significantly more likely than opponents to..." -- a significant difference implies extremes: i.e. one group votes 100% based on this issue, and the other votes 10% based on this issue. With this extreme discrepancy, choice A becomes a valid assumption.

[James Finch]

Hi Shalin,

The actual percentages aren't important to the stimulus's argument, which is why they're so vague; all we need to know is that the people who are hurt by tariffs outnumber those who benefit from them. Instead, the big key to this Supporter Assumption question is the new element introduced in the conclusion: likelihood of reelection. We're expected to understand that politicians typically must campaign on multiple issues, because voters generally care about multiple issues. So in order to evaluate whether the conclusion is true or not, we would have to know the relative importance of this single tariff issue to voters. And for the conclusion to be true, tariffs would have to be important enough for voters that a large amount of them base their voting on it. Again, we don't need a specific percentage, but just to know that this issue is important to all voters, both those who would benefit and those who would be hurt by the tariffs.

(A) is an immediate contender because it ties the premises to the conclusion by tying a position on tariffs to likelihood to vote for a politician, based on one's self-interest. And once tested via the Assumption Negation technique, we can see that it is necessary to the argument, by eliminating the possibility that people who benefit from tariffs base their votes on this issue, while those who are hurt by them do not.

Hope this clears things up!

[queenbee]

Hi
I am missing something very fundamental. The question asks what is an assumption on which the argument relies. The argument is saying that the politicians should for against the tariff so they can get re-electeed.

in order for this to the true, I thought the assumption required would be something that would provide the missing link about why voting against the tariff would get them re-elected. It seems like answer choice (A) doesnt do that, but E does.

Any chance you can help?