#19 - Fares on the city-run public buses in Greenville are

[Jennifer Janowsky]

Hi martinbeslu,

Choice (C) doesn't contradict the facts of what is in the stimulus. It's simply puts "some councillors" in a contradictory position as far as their stated goals and the results of their plan. This hurts the councillor's argument. Hope this helps!

[Tajadas]

I am having trouble understanding why D does not weaken the argument. While I understand why the opinion of the voters is irrelevant, I was put off by this answer because it establishes a link between voters who live in the city and them benefiting from the low fares. I assumed that because they are voters, they probably pay taxes, and so because they benefit from the bus fares, the councilors' argument for hiking bus fares is threatened through their own reasoning by showing city tax payers benefiting from the subsidized fares. Was my mistake in assuming that because they are voters, they pay taxes, or is there something else I should have noticed?

[Adam Tyson]

The conclusion is about raising bus fares, while answer D is about opposition to raising taxes, which is not relevant to the conclusion. Heck, maybe raising bus fares would mean the city could lower taxes, which those voters might like!

[mahsan]

I got this question right but I feel like answer choice E still might not weaken the argument since it says that people who work in the city AND earn wages above the nationally mandated minimum pay taxes. There is no information provided in the stimulus that tells us whether or not these non-resident city workers fall into that second category of earning wages above nationally mandated mins. so how can we be sure that this applies to them?

[Adam Tyson]

We can't be sure of that, mahsan, but to weaken an argument we don't need to prove that it is wrong. All we have to do is raise some doubt about it, and answer E certainly does raise doubt. Sure, it may be the case that those out of town bus riders are all making only the minimum wage, which would then have no impact on the argument. But if answer E is true, doesn't it at least make us stop and say "hmmm, so maybe at least some of those people are taxpayers, and therefore the subsidy is going to at least some people who pay taxes?" That's all it has to do to weaken the argument.

Don't reject a weaken answer just because it doesn't disprove the conclusion. That's putting way too much pressure on the answers to do more than they need! If you have to do that much work to come up with a situation where it would not weaken, then you are probably over-thinking the answer rather than accepting that it does at least raise an important question that might cast doubt on the conclusion.

[mahsan]

We can't be sure of that, mahsan, but to weaken an argument we don't need to prove that it is wrong. All we have to do is raise some doubt about it, and answer E certainly does raise doubt. Sure, it may be the case that those out of town bus riders are all making only the minimum wage, which would then have no impact on the argument. But if answer E is true, doesn't it at least make us stop and say "hmmm, so maybe at least some of those people are taxpayers, and therefore the subsidy is going to at least some people who pay taxes?" That's all it has to do to weaken the argument.

Don't reject a weaken answer just because it doesn't disprove the conclusion. That's putting way too much pressure on the answers to do more than they need! If you have to do that much work to come up with a situation where it would not weaken, then you are probably over-thinking the answer rather than accepting that it does at least raise an important question that might cast doubt on the conclusion.

Gotcha. Thanks Aam!

[crispycrispr]

Answer choice (E): This answer choice weakens the argument because it shows that those "outsiders" who commute into Greenville do pay taxes to cover the services they use, and thus they would qualify as as people who should benefit from them. Note how carefully the stimulus worded the issues: they never used "residents," they simply used "people who pay them (taxes)." This answer then shows that the commuters are actually taxpayers, and consequently the city taxes would be used to benefit those who pay them. As this is the very basis of the councillors' objection to the subsidy, this answer would undermine their objection.

But in (E), wouldn't increase bus fare increase local taxes? Or is this an outside information that I'm not supposed to assume?

[Dave Killoran]

But in (E), wouldn't increase bus fare increase local taxes? Or is this an outside information that I'm not supposed to assume?

I don't think I'm following you here on why this would automatically happen, so can you clarify perhaps? Specifically, why would an increase in city bus fares then increase local taxes when we already know that some councillors have argued that "bus fares should be raised enough to cover the cost of the service," meaning the raise will save money, not cost more.

That may not be on the point you are getting at though, hence my request for clarification

thanks!

[crispycrispr]

Hi, thanks for responding! I was thinking that the sales tax (if any) would increase if the price tag on something increase. But now that I'm thinking about it, I don't actually know if there is any tax related to public transportation.

[Dave Killoran]

That won't happen though, per what the councillors told us. In any event, it's a big stretch here to assume that it's a guarantee that it would occur even without knowing what they said

Thanks!