Logical reasoning PrepTest 123 · Section 3 · Question 19

Question prompt

Editor:  Many candidates say that Remaining source text redacted.
Why the credited answer is right

Credited answer: A

The notes below walk through why it fits the stem and how to eliminate the rest.

Argument or Facts

Argument

Valid or Flawed

Flawed

Question Type

Strengthen Questions

Stimulus Summary

Voters vote for politicians who promise help, and help costs money, and money comes from taxes, and taxes are a form of governmental intrusion, so governmental intrusion into the lives of voters is unlikely to be reduced.

Answer Anticipation

There's a key word early on in this stimulus—"promise." A promise won't definitely be kept—it's akin to stating that politicians say something is true. On the LSAT, whenever a premise is based on what someone says, there's a good chance that the argument will erroneously rely on that being true. Here, the entire chain of events stems from politicians enacting reforms to help people with their problems. But that's based on promises made by politicians. There's a gap between what someone says and what someone does, so to strengthen this argument, we should look for an answer that connects those ideas.

Answer choices

  1. A
    Politicians who win their Remaining source text redacted.
    Why choice A matches the stem
    Correct. This answer choice connects the promises made by politicians to the reforms they actually enact. If the promises to increase assistance to people to solve their problems are followed, then the chain of events from the premises will likely come to pass and the conclusion is more likely to be true. This answer strengthens the argument.
  2. B
    Politicians never promise what Remaining source text redacted.
    Why choice B is not credited
    Incorrect. If anything, this answer choice undermines the argument by suggesting that the promises will be broken. That said, the politicians could still break their promises in a way that results in taxes going up, so in reality we have no way of knowing what impact this answer has on the conclusion.
  3. C
    The most common problems Remaining source text redacted.
    Why choice C is not credited
    Incorrect. The relevant premise states that government assistance costs money—not just government assistance for financial problems. The specific type of problems faced by voters aren't relevant to the argument, since no matter what they are they'll require money/taxes.
  4. D
    Governmental intrusion into the Remaining source text redacted.
    Why choice D is not credited
    Incorrect. The conclusion here is limited to discussing democracies, not comparing them to other forms of government. This answer choice is out of scope.
  5. E
    Politicians who promise to Remaining source text redacted.
    Why choice E is not credited
    Incorrect. If this answer choice connected believing in promises to actually enacting them, it might be relevant to the logic of the argument. However, since the argument is based on the promises being kept, it doesn't matter whether the politician believes in them or not—just whether the promise ends up turning into legislation.

What this tests

Question analytics

Based on historical answer selection rates for this question.

Answer choice distribution

  1. A Credited 33%
  2. B 17%
  3. C 18%
  4. D 21%
  5. E 12%

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