Self-study
Support The shoe factory in Centerville is the town’s largest firm, and Support it employs more unskilled workers on a full-time basis than all of the other businesses in town combined. ██████████ ██ ███ ████ ███████ ██████ ████ ███ ██████ ███ ███████████ ████ ████ ████ ██ ███████████████ █████████ ███ ███ █████████ ███████ ████ █████████ ████ ██ ███████████ ████ ████ █████ █████
The Hidden Gap
The premise tells us that the shoe factory employs more unskilled full-time workers than all of the other businesses in Centerville combined. The conclusion then says that if the factory closes, more than half of Centerville's residents who are unskilled workers with full-time jobs in Centerville will lose their jobs.
At first glance, the conclusion seems to follow straightforwardly from the premise. If the factory has more unskilled full-time workers than every other business in town combined, wouldn't closing it necessarily leave more than half of those workers jobless?
But look more carefully at the conclusion. It doesn't say "more than half of the unskilled full-time workers in Centerville." It says more than half of Centerville's
If you want an example to understand this better, imagine the factory employs 100 unskilled full-time workers, and all other Centerville businesses combined employ 80. The premise is satisfied. But now suppose 60 of those 100 factory workers live outside Centerville. Only 40 factory workers are Centerville residents. Among the 80 workers at other businesses, suppose all 80 are residents. In that case, the relevant population of resident unskilled full-time workers is 120 (40 + 80), and the factory closing would only cost 40 of them their jobs, which is well under half. The conclusion would be false even though the premise is true.
So the argument needs to rule out this kind of scenario.
What To Look For
This doesn't feel like a typical Sufficient Assumption question where you're building a bridge between two concepts in a conditional chain. Instead, the gap is more subtle: it's about whether having more unskilled full-time workers than all other businesses combined implies having more unskilled residents who are full-time workers than all other businesses combined.
The cleanest way to guarantee the conclusion is to ensure that every unskilled full-time worker at the shoe factory is a Centerville resident.
24.
The conclusion above logically follows ████ ███ ████████ ██ █████ ███ ██ ███ █████████ ██ ████████
a
More people who ███ ███ █████████ ██ ███████████ ███ ████████ ████ ███ ███████████
Whether more Centerville residents are currently employed than unemployed has no bearing on the argument. The conclusion is specifically about what proportion of Centerville's unskilled full-time workers would lose their jobs if the factory closes. The overall employment rate of the town is a separate issue. Another way to think about (A) is that it still leaves open the possibility that the factory's unskilled full-time workers are mostly non-residents of Centerville. So the factory's closing might not impact more than half of Centerville's residents who are unskilled full-time workers.
b
Centerville has more █████████ ███████ █████ ███ ██████████ ████ ██ ███ ███████ ████████
The problem in the argument doesn't relate to the ratio of unskilled to skilled workers among Centerville residents. The problem is that we don't know whether the factory's workers are residents of Centerville. Even if 90% of Centerville's population consists of unskilled workers, the conclusion still doesn't have to be true if most of the factory's unskilled workers commute in from other towns.
c
The shoe factory ██ ███████████ ███████ ████ █████████ ███████ ████ ███████ ████████
The problem in the argument doesn't relate to the ratio of unskilled to skilled workers at the factory. It's about whether the factory's workers are Centerville residents. Even if, say, 80% of the factory's workers are skilled rather than unskilled, we still don't know whether the unskilled workers are residents of Centerville.
d
The shoe factory ██ ███████████ ███████ ██ ███ ███ ██ ███ █ ████████ ██ ████████████
If every person employed by the shoe factory is a Centerville resident, then all of the factory's unskilled full-time workers are Centerville residents. We already know from the premise that the factory employs more unskilled full-time workers than all other Centerville businesses combined. Since every one of those factory workers is a resident, the factory accounts for more than half of the resident unskilled full-time workers in Centerville. Therefore, if the factory closes, more than half of Centerville's residents who are unskilled full-time workers would lose their jobs.
e
There are no █████████ ██ ███████████ █████ ████ ███ ████ ████████
We already know from the premise that the shoe factory employs more unskilled full-time workers than all other businesses in Centerville combined. Whether those other businesses are factories or some other type of business is irrelevant to the argument. Whether there are no other factories or a bunch of other factories in Centerville doesn't bear on the issue, which is whether the unskilled full-time workers at the shoe factory are residents of Centerville.