Logical reasoning PrepTest 133 · Section 2 · Question 15

Correct. Argument or Facts:
Argument

Valid or Flawed:
Flawed

Question Type:
Strengthen with Necessary Premise

Stimulus Summary:
High income inequality makes hiring easier, so it should make society stronger. Social friction is caused by static/slow-changing wages. Therefore, high income inequality doesn't cause social friction.

Answer Anticipation:
This is a complicated argument, so it's important to understand the pieces to it.

It starts with an opposing point that suggests a causal relationship—high income inequality causes social friction. The Sociologist claims that this is unfounded—in other words, there's absolutely no support for the conclusion, or high income inequality almost certainly doesn't cause social friction.

Why does the Sociologist believe that? Well, let's start with what she says about social friction—it's caused by a lack of quick improvements in wages. In other words, it's not inequality, it's when people don't feel like their wages are improving fast enough that causes social friction.

So to show that high income inequality doesn't cause social friction, it would need to be shown that high income inequality doesn't cause stagnant wages. The Sociologist doesn't do that, however—it shows that high income inequality makes hiring freely easier. So in order to connect the pieces of the argument here, we need to know that being able to hire freely doesn't result in stagnant wages. If it does, then high income inequality, in allowing for free hiring, would cause stagnant wages and thus social friction.

Let's find an answer connecting those ideas—free hiring not leading to stagnant wages.

Answer Explanation:
Right off the bat, we get the connection we're looking for. High income inequality lets companies hire freely. If that leads to wage levels that aren't stagnant, then income inequality doesn't result in something that leads to social friction. Note that this doesn't establish that high income inequality doesn't lead to social friction, but an argument that concludes A doesn't cause B has to show that A doesn't cause anything that leads to B—each and every thing that can lead to B. If hiring freely does lead to stagnant wages, then it would cause social friction, killing the argument.

Key Takeaway:
Track connections in arguments! When ideas are mentioned multiple times, these ideas have connections that aren't explicitly stated—similar to how conditional arguments build off of each other. Seeing these connections can help you find a missing connection that needs to be established in the argument for it to work.

Incorrect. The stimulus doesn't require a specific set of people reacting to stagnant wages to cause social friction—as long as it doesn't cause that friction through some mechanism, the argument works. If everyone reacts the same way to obvious disparities in income, regardless of their expectations for their own wages, there could still be friction.

Incorrect. Expanding operations isn't mentioned by the argument, nor is it directly related to income disparities, hiring, or the growth of wages, so this answer is out of scope.

Incorrect. Responding quickly to changing conditions in hiring is noted in the stimulus, and the result is a lack of social friction. That doesn't require that an ability to respond to any changing condition with any response benefits employees.

Incorrect. The argument requires only that social friction develops due to stagnant wages, not that any specific group drives that friction. Even if only low-income individuals are involved in creating social friction due to stagnant wages, that friction would still exist.