#5 - Television executives recently announced that

[deck1134]

The answer (E) mathematically works out to 12% more viewership per year. How does that explain a 10-15% increase? If it is 15%, then that is 3% higher than the previous cycle, and we cannot guarantee that they can sell it.

What am I missing here?

[chian9010]

Hi,

Could anyone explain why E is the correct answer? I don't think it is a vert strong statement to support the argument because although the average number of hours people watch TV is increasing, they might just watch shows or drama series, not watching the ads.

[Malila Robinson]

Hi Deck1134 & Chian9010,
Since this is a Strengthen question, the answer choice just has to make the argument better than it was. It doesn't have to make the argument 100% true (like a Justify question). The obvious weakness in the argument is that if ads cost 10%-15% more it is unclear why the tv executives are so sure that it won't be harder to sell ads. As Deck1134 mentioned, Answer E uses the increased percentages in television viewing time to offset the increased costs of advertising. Offsetting this increase in advertising costs doesn't require that the percentages match and cancel each other out, for a Strengthen question like this you just need to address the weakness in the argument. The underlying argument here is that ad space on tv is bought because advertisers believe that viewers will be swayed to buy what they are advertising when they see the commercial. The more tv people watch the more likely it is that their ads will be seen. To strengthen the argument it is not necessary that we definitely know people will be watching the ads, we just need for it to be a possibility, so that that possibility could be the basis for the executives claim that it will not be harder to sell the more expensive ads.
Hope that helps!
-Malila

[kevin.hussain24]

Hello,

I need help understanding why D is wrong? wouldn't they continue to profit if providers purchasing services is increasing?
or maybe i reading it wrong. I understand why E is right, i was between E and D. E just threw me off because of 2 percent and i was debating if increasing television viewers had anything to do with them them increasing profits from advertising

[Adam Tyson]

Answer E is the best answer here because increased viewership, no matter how small or large the increase is, gives advertisers a motive to keep buying ad time to reach that growing audience. Thus, the argument that it won't be harder to sell ad time is improved.

The problem with D is that it tells us nothing about how hard or easy it will be to sell ad time. One group is buying more time while another group is buying less. Are they changing at the same rate, or at a different rate? Are those who buy time to advertise services willing to pay the higher rates, or are they more price-sensitive than the folks selling products? Nothing about the answer tells us that selling time won't get harder with the new rates in effect.

[ericj_williams]

Hello,

I need help understanding why D is wrong? wouldn't they continue to profit if providers purchasing services is increasing?
or maybe i reading it wrong. I understand why E is right, i was between E and D. E just threw me off because of 2 percent and i was debating if increasing television viewers had anything to do with them them increasing profits from advertising

I think the issue with D is how vague it is. It presents a comparison but I don't really know what the net effect is.

I need more concrete facts, basically that would lead to a net positive effect.

Maybe if it had said the amount purchased was increasing on BOTH ends, I can see the ability to sell at a higher price improved simply because I have more buyers. Alternatively, if it had said one was buying so much despite the other falling, to the extent the net BENEFIT would actually be offset by the price increase, I can see that being a strengthener. But again, I don't really know the net effect. I would have to add a lot to get the answer I want, and there is already an answer better without having to do that.

[BMM2020]

While I understand that the answer choice we're looking for is simply the "most" supportive, I feel like E requires the same level of assumption that other wrong answers do. For example, if only 5 people watch television in total, the fact that those 5 people will be watching 12% more television next year doesn't clearly affect advertisers' bottom line, given the information in the stimulus. Perhaps those 5 people never buy anything they see advertised, regardless of how often they see the advertisement. To choose E, we have to assume that more television watching results in more sales for advertisers - which may be true for some goods/services, but I wouldn't automatically assume that is the case for most goods/services. Maybe my understanding of television advertising strategy is weak.

Regardless, I feel like assuming that truth about TV advertising and sales is a similarly-sized logical jump as one assumption we could make for answer A, that the expected increased cost of production may encourage advertisers to bite the bullet on higher-cost TV advertising in order to increase sales to cover costs. Clearly a shaky assumption, but I don't see how it's a bigger assumption than assuming more hours watched per viewer will result in more sales for advertisers. Again, I may just lack the real world knowledge required for this question.

Thanks for any insight.

[Robert Carroll]

BMM,

I think you're neglecting another aspect of the "most supportive" language in the question - that means this is a Strengthen question, so the answer does not have to prove anything. The answer simply has to make it more likely that the conclusion is true. So objections that an increase in average viewing time won't ensure more revenue for advertisers aren't relevant - we're not trying to prove anything, but merely make it more likely that advertisers will profit.

With that in mind, it seems plausible to me that the more people watch TV, the more valuable advertising becomes. If no one watches television, we'd have minimal value for TV advertising. It seems a reasonable commonsense assumption that, overall, more time is better. That doesn't have to be true - there could be such a thing as too much TV time, where people get sick of ads and actually buy the advertised products less because they see the ads too often. But we're not trying to establish a specific curve for the relationship between viewing time and advertising profits - all we need is the looser "generally, the more time people view TV, the more bang a TV advertiser gets for their buck".

I don't see how answer choice (A) helps the argument. Note that if the increased advertising was always good for advertisers, why not do it even if production and distribution costs are rising? In other words, you claim that, with increased costs, advertisers would want to spend more on advertising to cover those costs. But if the advertising is profitable anyway (so that, by doing more, you can cover costs), what do increased costs have to do with that? If the costs didn't increase, advertisers would still want to do something beneficial for profits. And if advertising is beneficial, then they'd do it regardless, and the production costs have nothing to do with that.

Robert Carroll

[BMM2020]

Thanks Robert. I think, to your point, that even though arguments can be made for and against the answer choices, E is only a benefit for advertisers in the aggregate, while A could (and most likely does) weaken the argument’s claim. Ultimately, the per person metric of E made me think it was a trick answer.

[JulesJewels]

Hello,
Would someone be able to explain why answer choice (C) is wrong? I understand why (E) is right since more eyes on the ads means higher likelihood for more patrons to the advertising business. However, my brain tells me C functions similarly in that people will be able to see the ad for longer. They both seem to strengthen in my eyes, though E admittedly better (but only *one* should be able to get the job done at all) .
Thanks for your help!
-Jules