Self-study
Support Acme's bank loan must be immediately repaid in full if Acme's earnings fall below $1 million per year. ██ ████ ███ ██ █████ ███ ██████ ████ ████████████ ██ ████ ████ ██ ███████ ███████████ ████ ███ ██████ ████ ████ ███████████ ██████ ████████ ██████ ████████ ██ ████ ████ ██ ███████ ██ ████ ████ ██ ███ ███ ███ ████ █████ ████████ ████ ███ ███ ████████ ███████████ ███ ████████ ███ ████ █████ ██ ██ ████ ████ ██ ███████ ███████████
Summary
Acme will go bankrupt. Why? Because they will go bankrupt if their earnings falls below a certain level, and they have incorrectly reported their earnings.
Notable Assumptions
The author has set up a conditional chain, beginning with “if Acme’s earnings fall below $1 million per year,” and ending in bankruptcy. However, we only know that Acme has falsely reported their earnings—we don’t know that their earning’s have fallen below the threshold that will trigger bankruptcy. The argument has assumed this.
2.
The argument requires the assumption ████
a
Acme's earnings for ████ █████ ████ ██████████ ███████ ███ █████ ██ ███████
This matches our prediction, and it is necessary for the argument. If (A) is negated, then there’s no reason to believe Acme will declare bankruptcy.
b
Acme has other █████ ███████ ███ ████ ████
It’s irrelevant whether Acme has other debts. We are only discussing this particular loan, and how Acme’s earnings might affect that loan.
c
last year is ███ ███ ████ ████ ███ █████ ████ ██████████ ████████
It doesn’t matter whether this is a repeat offense. It only takes one instance of less than $1 million in earnings to trigger the conditional chain that leads to bankruptcy.
Also, like we said in our analysis, we cannot assume that “overstated earnings” = less than $1 million.
d
Acme's earnings for ███ ███████ ████ ████ ████ █████ ██ ███████
The author’s support is about Acme overstating their earnings in a previous year, and how that will lead to bankruptcy. The current year is irrelevant.
This would be sufficient for Acme to declare bankruptcy, but it is not necessary.
e
Acme would be ████ ██ █████ ██████████ ██ ██ ███ ███ ████ ██ █████ ███ ████ ████
We aren’t concerned with what could happen if Acme does not have to repay the loan, or how they might avoid bankruptcy. The conclusion is that Acme will go bankrupt.