Self-study
The government-owned gas company has begun selling stoves and other gas appliances to create a larger market for its gas. █████████ ███ ████ ████ ████████ ████████ ████ ███ ███████████ ████ ████ █████ ███████████ ████ ███ ████ ███ ████████ ███ ████████████████ ███ ███████ ██ ██████ ███ ███████ █████ ████ ███ █████ ██ █ ███████ ███ ███████ █████ ████ ██████ ██ ████ ████ ██████████ ███ ██████ █████ █████ ██ ███████ █████ ████ █████
Summary
It would be alright if a private gas company started selling stoves and similar gas appliances. It is therefore alright that the government-owned gas company started selling stoves and similar gas appliances.
Notable Assumptions
This argument draws a conclusion about what’s okay for government-owned businesses based on a claim that it would be appropriate for a private business, but doesn’t provide any explicit statement telling us that whatever is okay for a private business is also okay for a government-owned business. There’s instead only an assumption that the government-owned business doesn’t have to meet different standards from a private business. We’re looking for some principle that satisfies this assumption, and provides a connection between what is alright for a private business and what is alright for a government-owned business.
4.
Which one of the following ███████████ ██ ██████ ████ █████ ██ ███████ ███ █████████ ██████
a
Government-owned companies have ███ █████ ██ ██ ████████ ███████ ██████████ ████ ███ █████ ██ ███
This justifies how the argument get to its conclusion - if government-owned businesses can do whatever private businesses can do, and private businesses could sell stoves, then of course government owned businesses could sell stoves.
b
A government should ██████ ████ █████████ ███ ██████████ ██ ██████████
Leads to the wrong conclusion. The argument is suggesting that the government shouldn’t worry about the complaints of merchants, because it’s alright for the government-owned business to be selling stoves.
c
Private businesses have ██ █████ ██ ███████ ████ ██████████ ███████████
Wrong trigger. The argument is suggesting that government monopolies do have a right to compete with private businesses - this answer choice provides the opposite.
d
There is nothing █████ ████ █ ████████████████ ███████ ███████ ████████ ██ ████ ██ ██████ ██ ███████ █████████ ██ ███ █████████
Wrong trigger. In this case, the argument states that the owners of private companies are complaining.
e
There is nothing █████ ████ ███████ █████████ █████████ ███████ ████ ██████
Wrong trigger. This argument is about whether a government-onwed business can compete with private companies, not about competition between private companies.