#14 - Thirty years ago, the percentage of the British people

[reop6780]

The correct answer is D while I chose E.

I kept both of them as contenders and could not tell which one was the correct answer.

Stimuli states that more percentage of British people travel now than before. Based upon this fact, it is concluded that people now make more money than before.

Hence, the stimuli assumes that increased money is key to drive British people to travel now.

Thus, answer D is correct that more money could make the British 30 years ago travel.

At the same time, answer E seems to be a "defender" for this assumption question.

It seemed to me that E defends stimuli from a scenario that British people spend money on other activities other than traveling.

Once negated, answer E looked damaging for the conclusion since it does not matter whether British people now make more money as the money does not necessarily go to traveling.

Could anyone tell me why E is absolutely out?

Thank you, always !

[Emily Haney-Caron]

Hi reop,

Be careful with how you frame the conclusion; it is not that British people make more money than before, but that they have more money to spend on vacations than they did before. E, therefore, is irrelevant - it doesn't matter whether they are wealthier, it only matters that they have more money to spend on vacations; we don't know whether they are wealthier now!

Hope that helps.

[lina2020]

Hello,

I had a lot of trouble deciding between three of the answer choices: A, B and D. They all seem like they are identical in meaning. I eliminated E because of "wealthier now" and eliminated C because of the word "domestic".Would you please write out in detail why each answer choice is wrong and/or right?

I pasted the question below for quick reference since it usually take a few days for someone to respond and I can no longer locate the question at that point.

Stimulus:
Thirty years ago, the percentage of the British people who vacationed in foreign countries was very small compared with the large percentage of the British population who travel abroad for vacations now. Foreign travel is, and always has been, expensive from Britain. Therefore, British people must have, on average, more money to spend on vacations now than they did 30 years ago.

A. If foreign travel had been less expensive 30 years ago, British people would still not have had enough money to take vacations abroad.
B. If travel to Britain were less expensive, more people of other countries would travel to Britain for their vacations.
C. If the percentage of British people vacationing abroad was lower 30 years ago, then the British people of 30 years ago must have spent more money on domestic vacations.
D. If more of the British people of 30 years ago had had enough money to vacation abroad, more would have done so.
E. If British people are now wealthier than they were 30 years ago, then they must have more money to spend on vacations now than they did 30 years ago.

[Paul Marsh]

Hi Lina! Let's take a look at this problem.

This is an Assumption question. For Assumption questions, we're trying to find an Assumption that the argument in the stimulus makes that needs to be true in order for the conclusion to make sense.

The first step for Assumption questions is to analyze the stimulus. I identify the conclusion, which here is the last sentence of the stimulus. I then take note of the premises: "A larger percentage of the British population vacations abroad today than they did 30 years ago", and "Foreign travel is and always has been expensive for the British". I then look to identify any potential Gaps between conclusion and premises. That is, does everything about the conclusion 100% logically follow from the premises? Or is there something (in addition to the premises) that the argument is Assuming in order to reach the conclusion?

Here, there is indeed a Gap between our conclusion and our premises. The conclusion comes up with an explanation for the increase in foreign travel, seemingly out of nowhere. It makes a causal argument, claiming that "having more $$$" is the Cause and "vacationing abroad more" is the Effect. Causal arguments often present a serious Gap between conclusion and premises on the LSAT, because they are ignoring all other potential causes of an effect. For example in this case, maybe transportation is much safer than it was 30 years ago and so people are much more willing to travel abroad. Thus by claiming to know the Cause, the conclusion is assuming that there are no other possible Causes for the Effect of "vacationing abroad more".

Now that I've identified this Gap, I want to find the answer choice that addresses it. Since this a (Necessary) Assumption question, my correct answer will be something that absolutely needs to be true in order for the conclusion to make sense. I Pre-Phrase that my right answer will face the Gap - it will do something to confirm the Cause and Effect relationship between "more $$$ to spend on vacation" and "more foreign vacations". When in doubt, I can test an answer choice with the Negation Test. With that, I come down to my answers.

Answer Choice (A). Does this have to be true in order for the conclusion to make sense? No. Our premises already tell us that only a small percentage of British people travelled abroad back then. Saying that "they still wouldn't be able to travel abroad even with cheaper travel" just sort of strengthens that premise, it doesn't address the necessary Assumption that the argument makes.

Answer Choice (B). Our conclusion is only discussing British people traveling abroad. The argument does not assume anything about people from other countries. So it doesn't matter what they "would do", it has no effect on the argument.

Answer Choice (C). You're right on the money for why this is wrong; we're only concerned about foreign travel, not domestic.

Answer Choice (D). This is our correct answer. It confirms the Causal relationship between "more $$$ to spend on vacations" and "more foreign travel" that constitutes the underlying assumption of the argument. Let's check the Negation Test: "if more British people had $$$ 30 years ago to travel abroad, more would NOT have travelled abroad." That destroys the Causal relationship underlying the argument, and so the conclusion of the argument wouldn't make any sense. So (D) passes the Negation Test as well. (If you have any questions about the Negation Test, be sure to refer back to the portion of the Bibles/Course Books that discuss Assumption questions!).

Answer Choice (E). This answer choice is focused on overall wealth, but our conclusion is purely interested in the amount of money available to travel abroad. It's not a necessary assumption of the argument that overall wealthier people necessarily spend more money on travel.

Hope that helps! Please follow up below if you have any more specific questions.

[sunshine123]

Hello,

I found the previous discussion very illuminating but I still have a lingering problem with this question. With regard to answer choice E -- since it's a possible necessary assumption presented as a conditional statement, I thought the implication was that in reading it we had to ask the following: assuming the author granted the sufficient condition of this conditional statement, would they necessarily have to agree with the necessary condition of this necessary statement? Guided by that understanding, it never occurred to me to mark off the answer choice as out of scope since I was treating the sufficient condition as given, as it were. And if it were true that British people now make more money than they used to, and the author was aware of this fact, and was considering this fact, and was granting this fact, then it would follow that they WOULD have to agree that that implies that the British people now have more more money to spend on vacation. BUT, that is NOT how I was supposed to treat an answer choice of conditional nature on a necessary assumption question! Right? Do yall see why I was tempted to do so though? Or am I tjust otally off the rails on this one? Thanks in advance,

Sunshine

[Robert Carroll]

Sunshine,

Your way of evaluating answer choice (E) is correct to a point. I think it's perfectly appropriate to assume that the sufficient condition of the conditional is true, and ask "Does the author have to think that the necessary condition is true as well?" But the answer to that question is "no" - the author could easily think that Britons are wealthier overall but do NOT have more money to spend on vacations. To think otherwise is a whole-to-part flaw. More money doesn't mean more money for a specific expense - Britons could be wealthier, but spend proportionally more on non-vacation expenses, leaving less money than before for vacations.

Robert Carroll

[Roadto170]

Hey Powerscore, I totally understand why D is correct. However, I want to make sure that my process is sound as I consistently miss an assumption question on most LR sections.

In the stimulus, the author notes that foreign travel from Britian is higher now than it was 30 years ago, percentage wise. The author then says foreign travel is expensive. Finally, the author concludes that British people must have more money to spend now than they did 30 years ago.

Ultimately, what I see here is a casual relationship between the amount of money that a British person possesses and how much they travel. The more money they have, the more they will travel.

So looking at answer choices, we should be looking for either a Supporter or Defender assumption choice. I feel like D is a defender choice because it keeps an additional variable (alternate cause) constant which allows the conclusion to remain true. If people 30 years ago had more money, than they would have travelled more. Consequently, when utilizing the assumption negation technique, we see that if people 30 years ago had more money and did not travel, the casual relationship that I outlined above would be destroyed complete.

Is this the correct way to think about this problem and assumption problems more broadly? Although I missed the question initially (I selected E- which still is a bit confusing), I feel like at least I really understand why D is correct!

Thanks

[Adam Tyson]

Your reasoning looks correct to me, Roadto170! Answer D does defend against a possible problem with the argument, that maybe there were other reasons besides money 30 years ago that kept people from traveling. Well done!