At the end of the year, Wilson’s Department Store awards free merchandise to its top salespeople. ████ █████████ ████ ███ ████ ████ ███ ██████ ██ ███████████ █████████ █████ ██████ ███ ████████ ████████ ████ ███ ████ ███████ ██████ ███ █████ █████████ █████████ ██ ███ ███████ ██████████ █████ ████ █████ █████ ███ █████ █████████ ██ ███████ ██ ██████████ ██ ███ ███ █████ ██ ███ █████ ██████ ██ ███ ████ ███ ████ ███ ██████ ██ ███████████ ██████ ████ ███ █████ ██████ ███ █████████ █████████
The president sees the number of awarded salespeople declining and does some math. If the top third get awards, the bottom two-thirds get passed over. So for every salesperson awarded, two are passed over. If the number of people awarded shrinks, then the number of people passed-over (which should be twice awarded) shrinks too.
Premise: Fewer salespeople are getting awards now than 15 years ago.
Premise: The current award criterion is membership in the top third.
Conclusion: Fewer salespeople are being passed over now than 15 years ago.
This is a Sufficient Assumption question, so we want to make the argument valid.
The president's logic uses a 2:1 ratio between passed-over and awarded. That ratio comes from the current criterion of top third. To go from "awarded declined" to "passed-over declined" across 15 years, we need to know how awarded and passed-over were related 15 years ago.
If the criterion has been top third throughout, the 2:1 ratio has held the whole time, and a decline in awarded forces a decline in passed-over.
But the criterion 15 years ago might have been different. Imagine it used to be top half:
Criterion: top half
100 salespeople
50 awarded
50 passed over
Criterion: top third
90 salespeople
30 awarded
60 passed over
Awarded went from 50 to 30, a marked decline that matches the premise. But passed-over went from 50 to 60, an increase. The conclusion doesn't have to be true.
We need information that pins down what the criterion was 15 years ago.
Which one of the following ██ ██ ██████████ ████ █████ █████ ███ ███████ █████████████ ██████████ ██ ██ ████████ ██████
Policies at Wilson’s ████ ██████ ██ ██████ ███████████ ████ ███ ██████ ████ ███ ████ ███ ████ ███████ ██████
This is about hiring standards, not the award criterion. Even if hiring has been consistent for 15 years, the conclusion still depends on the award criterion 15 years ago. If 15 years ago the criterion was top half rather than top third, the math falls apart no matter how strict or lax hiring has been.
The number of ███████████ ██ ██████████ ███ █████████ ████ ███ ████ ███████ ██████
The number passed over equals total salespeople minus awarded. If the total has grown and the number awarded has shrunk, then the number passed-over has grown since 15 years ago, which is the opposite of what the president concludes.
The criterion used ██ ██████████ ███ █████████ ███ █████ ██████████ ███ ████████ ███ ████ ███ ███ ████ ███████ ██████
This makes the argument valid. With the criterion locked at top third throughout the 15 years, the number passed over has always been exactly twice the number awarded. So if awarded declined, passed-over (which is just 2 × awarded) declined too. The conclusion now follows.
The average total █████ ███████ ███ ██████████ ███████████ ████ ████ █████████ ███ ███████ ██████
This is about absolute sales numbers, but the award criterion is relative. The criterion is about ranking within the sales force, not about hitting any particular sales target. Whether average sales went up or down over the 15 years doesn't change how the top third is determined. The top third is still 1/3 of whoever's on the sales force, regardless of what their actual sales figures look like. So (D) doesn't speak to the criterion's history, which is the gap in the argument.
Wilson’s calculates its ███████████████ █████ ███████ ██ ███ ████ ███ ██ ██ ███ ███████ █████ ████
This ensures sales figures are calculated consistently year to year, which sounds close to what we want. But measuring sales the same way is a different issue from awarding the same proportion of salespeople. Even with sales calculated identically the whole 15 years, the company could have moved from rewarding the top half to rewarding the top third. The argument's gap is about the cut-off for getting an award and whether it has changed, not about how sales are measured.
Answer five questions and we'll estimate your score.
It takes about five minutes.
Take the free diagnosticWant to know why the right answer is right?
7Sage membership unlocks explanations of every question. Every answer choice. On every official PrepTest. Start with a free account.
By signing up you agree to our
terms of service.
This site is protected by reCAPTCHA and the Google
Privacy Policy
and
Terms of Service
apply.