PrepTest 154, Section 4, Question 18
Economist: Machinery firms in this country argue that(81 more words not shown)
The economist's statements, if true,(8 more words not shown)
- AProtection from foreign(15 more words not shown)
- BTen years is(12 more words not shown)
- CNone of the(14 more words not shown)
- DMost of the(18 more words not shown)
- EProtection from foreign(19 more words not shown)
Reading the argument
How much more time do these firms need? They've already had ten years of protection.
At first, the request could sound reasonable: give a domestic industry room to grow before it has to face foreign rivals. But could the protection make customers pay more or let firms avoid improving? On the other hand, perhaps keeping machinery production at home has value for the country. Those are competing possibilities to consider, not facts this passage establishes.
But the economist is addressing one particular promise—that protection will let these firms become big enough to compete successfully.
The final sentence puts a limit on that promise. If protection could produce that result, ten years would be enough. The firms have already received ten years, yet their request for more protection rests on still needing to reach the competitive size.
What we’re looking for
Put those pieces together for the inference question. More of this protection isn't going to deliver the claimed result. That's narrower than saying the firms can never improve by any means or that there could be no other reason to protect them. Keep the conclusion about this policy, these firms, and this proposed benefit.
Working the answers
- A
The economist addresses machinery firms in this country. That doesn't establish what protection usually does for firms in every industry or country. It might help a different industry under different circumstances. A turns a conclusion about this case into a broad judgment about protection generally.
- B
The ten-year limit concerns whether this protection can make these machinery firms large enough to compete. It isn't a universal deadline for judging every economic policy. Policies can have different goals, and the passage supplies no rule covering all of them.
- C
They could have grown significantly without becoming big enough to compete successfully. Imagine a firm getting much bigger while its foreign rivals remain far larger. Growth and reaching the particular competitive threshold aren't the same. The economist's criticism doesn't establish that none of the firms grew.
- D
Losing protection might lead a firm to shrink or reorganize without going out of business. We aren't told which firms would close or how many. The failure of protection to produce the promised growth doesn't establish the claimed consequence of removing it.
- ECorrect
If protection could make these firms big enough to take on foreign rivals, the ten years already provided would have sufficed. The firms are still asking for protection to reach that point. The supported conclusion is that extending protection won't enable the promised competitive growth. E stays within the mechanism and group the economist actually discusses.
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