LR Question 20 Explanation
QUESTION TEXT: Advertisement: In a recent survey, a sample…
QUESTION TYPE: Flawed Reasoning
CONCLUSION: Most people could save hundreds of dollars by switching to Popeka.
REASONING: People who have switched to Popeka saved hundreds of dollars on average.
ANALYSIS: The LSAT expects you to understand the scientific method. One key to science is that samples should be random.
The sample here is not random. The people who saved hundreds of dollars chose to switch to Popeka. Maybe they switched because they knew they would saved hundreds. Maybe the people who haven’t switched to Popeka would not save hundreds, and that’s why they don’t switch.
To put it another way, imagine I run a program called “Auto insurance for Bob”. Anyone named Bob can save $1,000 with my program. So the average savings is $1,000, because only Bobs enroll in my program. But this Bob-related evidence doesn’t prove that Jim will save money if he switches.
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- ‘Some’ is a useless word. Drill this into your head. ‘Some’ can refer to 1-2 people. Who cares if 1-2 people didn’t save money. Thousands of others might have saved money!
- The first test of whether an answer is the flaw is: did this even happen? This answers says “if you’re new, you pay as much as older customers”. The argument didn’t say or assume that! So this can’t be the flaw.
- Who cares? This isn’t a flaw. The conclusion is “Popeka will save you money”. The argument didn’t claim that “Popeka will save you more money than any other company will”.
- If policyholders underreported their savings, then the argument is stronger. The actual savings would be higher, which supports the conclusion. This is not a flaw!
- CORRECT. This means “People switched to Popeka because they could save money”. Maybe others don’t switch because they know they can’t save money. See the explanation above.
More Resources for Flaw Questions
- Flaw drills: Use these to practice making examples of abstract flaws.
- Intro Course lesson: This intro course lesson covers Flaw questions.
- Mastery Seminar lesson: This LR Mastery seminar lesson covers flaw questions.
Another clear flaw in this passage was that people could on average save, but still most people don’t save.
For example, %99 of people who switched to this car insurance could be losing $100 and %1 is saving a trillion dollars and on average everyone is saving millions of dollars.
Averages are tricky like that.
Good point. There are often multiple flaws.
I agree. Isn’t that what answer (A) suggests? I think that’s a fairly strong argument as to why the analysis is flawed. I was between (A) and (E). I can’t see how there is a clear correct answer between the 2
This isn’t quite the same point. Mr Brown was saying it is possible most people fail to save. That would hurt the argument, as the advertisement claims most people could save.
But the ad isn’t claiming that ALL people could save. So A isn’t strong enough to hurt the argument. If 99% of people saved and 1% of people didn’t, that would be consistent with A but also very positive for the ad! Most people did save, so it’s likely a lot of people switching could save too.
But there’s another problem with A: the argument is about whether people who haven’t switched could save. Whereas A only addresses the people who did switch. E correctly addresses this gap. Even if 100% of people who switched saved, it doesn’t mean the people who haven’t switched could save. Perhaps they didn’t switch precisely because they couldn’t save!
Note: This is an old comment but I wanted to clarify the point.