The Calex Telecommunications Company is planning to introduc

[catennacio]

Maybe this is too easy for you guys so no one has posted this before.

The Calex Telecommunications Company is planning to introduce cellular telephone service into isolated coastal areas of Caladia, a move which will require considerable investment. However, the only significant economic activity in these areas is small-scale coffee farming, and none of the coffee farmers make enough money to afford the monthly service fees that Calex would have to charge to make a profit. Nevertheless, Calex contends that making the service available to these farmers will be profitable.

Which of the following, if true, provides the strongest support for Calex's contention?

(A) Currently, Caladian coffee farmers are forced to sell their coffee to local buyers at whatever price those buyers choose to pay because the farmers are unable to remain in contact with outside buyers who generally offer higher prices.

(B) In the coastal areas of Caladia where Calex proposes to introduce cellular telephone service, there is currently no fixed-line telephone service because fixed-line companies do not believe that they could recoup their investment.

(C) A cellular telephone company can break even with a considerably smaller number of subscribers than a fixed-line company can, even in areas such as the Caladian coast, where there is no difficult terrain to drive up the costs of installing fixed lines.

(D) Calex bases its monthly fees for cellular telephone service in a given region partly on the cost of installing the necessary equipment to provide the service there.

(E) Calex has for years made a profit on cellular telephone service in Caladia's capital city, which is not far from the coastal region

Source GMATPrep test 2
OA is A





I'm not questioning the validity of OA. I think about OA differently. When reading OA, I marked it as a weakening answer because if the farmers are ripped off by local buyers, how can they have money to subscribe and then afford the service fee.

I know that if we continue to read more, we will see that the phone service will enable the farmers to contact outsiders, hence make more profit, but at the moment, they still cannot afford the service fee, so how can they subscribe to any cellphone plan to make the profit to pay for that plan? Sounds like one needs to happens before another and in this case, I lean toward the fact that the farmers currently don't have enough money. This fact takes the priority.

Can anyone shed some light please? Thanks.

[catennacio]

Hey,

Your reasoning is sound except the part where you think that Choice A is weakening the claim. Choice A is giving you the current situation of the farmers. Calex think that their service can help farmers change that current situation. If you think of it from Calex's point of view, it represents an opportunity on which they have based their claim.

I agree that it isn't the greatest possible answer and I too had skipped it after the initial read. But going through the other choices, it is the best available answer even though you have to make several assumptions to make it fit.

Remember, you don't have to like the answers. Sometimes, it is the case of picking the best out of the worse. In this case, if you look at the other answers, they are simply irrelevant.

Regards

Sunil

Hey, thanks for your comment. The fact whether it is the best answer choice depends on how you reason. As I said, with my current reasoning, A can turn out to be the worst too. It would be the best if we assume that the farmers have, initially, enough money to sustain until their profits take off from dealing with outsiders.

The bigger question: how do we judge these situations? Where is the line to distinguish between a good and bad reasoning. I think it's up to our life experience though. Certainly one having never subscribed to any cell phone plan will think A is best, but one having in deep sh$t of paying too much for cell phone bills will think A worst.

[messi10]

Hey,

Your reasoning is sound except the part where you think that Choice A is weakening the claim. Choice A is giving you the current situation of the farmers. Calex think that their service can help farmers change that current situation. If you think of it from Calex's point of view, it represents an opportunity on which they have based their claim.

I agree that it isn't the greatest possible answer and I too had skipped it after the initial read. But going through the other choices, it is the best available answer even though you have to make several assumptions to make it fit.

Remember, you don't have to like the answers. Sometimes, it is the case of picking the best out of the worse. In this case, if you look at the other answers, they are simply irrelevant.

Regards

Sunil

[messi10]

Hey, thanks for your comment. The fact whether it is the best answer choice depends on how you reason. As I said, with my current reasoning, A can turn out to be the worst too. It would be the best if we assume that the farmers have, initially, enough money to sustain until their profits take off from dealing with outsiders.

The bigger question: how do we judge these situations? Where is the line to distinguish between a good and bad reasoning. I think it's up to our life experience though. Certainly one having never subscribed to any cell phone plan will think A is best, but one having in deep sh$t of paying too much for cell phone bills will think A worst.

Hey,

Your point is taken but GMAT questions are not open to interpretation. This is not a public debate question. GMAT Critical Reasoning questions have certain rules associated with them. Ron has done some very good videos on this. Some of these require very bland thinking that we are not used to when we are dealing with day to day problems.

So to answer your question about how to think about these problems, I suggest you go back to the basics if you have not already done so. Each CR question can be classified into a certain type (which I am sure you know already) and to solve the different types, you also need to set your thinking according to the type. On some of them, you have to go outside the scope to get the answer, on others you cannot think beyond what is given in the problem.

If you practice enough, you will start to see patterns. But I suggest you check out some of Rons videos before you work on any more official questions. There is only a limited number of official questions available and I suggest that you save it until after you are satisfied with the theoretical side of things.

Also, remember that if the answers were open to interpretation based on life experiences, GMAT would have failed as a test a long time ago. They classify questions according to how many people get the question right and how many get them wrong. So if a question is classified as a 700 level question, it means fewer people got it right. Therefore, going with the majority would mean GMAT is wrong.

Regards

Sunil

[RonPurewal]

Maybe this is too easy for you guys so no one has posted this before.

this is not an appropriate tone in which to post on the forum. please stay professional, thanks. we understand that the problems may frustrate you at times, but this is not a constructive way to express that frustration.

if this problem happens to be from the new edition of gmat prep, don't forget that the new edition has only been out for a few weeks. (also, the new edition has answer explanations, thereby lowering the probability that people will post the problems here.)

--

note the words i've put in boldface here.

none of the coffee farmers make enough money to afford the monthly service fees that Calex would have to charge to make a profit. Nevertheless, Calex contends that making the service available to these farmers will be profitable.

taken together, these words should tell you that calex plans to enter the market at a loss, by pricing the service at a rate that the farmers will be able to afford initially.

after all, the word "available" is not going to be used in a vacuous sense -- i.e., if some product is technically on the market but nobody can afford it at all, then it would be disingenuous to describe that product as "available" (it's not available, because no one can avail themselves of it).

there is no formula for this sort of thing -- in fact, the whole point of these problems is that there won't ever be such a formula -- but i think you'll see what i mean by way of analogy.
if i tell you this:
i want to start a new discount clothing store in order to make designer brands available to people who couldn't previously afford them.
--> in this example, it should be clear that "available" means that i'm going to price the clothing so that these people can actually afford to buy it.

[catennacio]

Maybe this is too easy for you guys so no one has posted this before.

this is not an appropriate tone in which to post on the forum. please stay professional, thanks. we understand that the problems may frustrate you at times, but this is not a constructive way to express that frustration.

if this problem happens to be from the new edition of gmat prep, don't forget that the new edition has only been out for a few weeks. (also, the new edition has answer explanations, thereby lowering the probability that people will post the problems here.)

--

note the words i've put in boldface here.

none of the coffee farmers make enough money to afford the monthly service fees that Calex would have to charge to make a profit. Nevertheless, Calex contends that making the service available to these farmers will be profitable.

taken together, these words should tell you that calex plans to enter the market at a loss, by pricing the service at a rate that the farmers will be able to afford initially.

after all, the word "available" is not going to be used in a vacuous sense -- i.e., if some product is technically on the market but nobody can afford it at all, then it would be disingenuous to describe that product as "available" (it's not available, because no one can avail themselves of it).

there is no formula for this sort of thing -- in fact, the whole point of these problems is that there won't ever be such a formula -- but i think you'll see what i mean by way of analogy.
if i tell you this:
i want to start a new discount clothing store in order to make designer brands available to people who couldn't previously afford them.
--> in this example, it should be clear that "available" means that i'm going to price the clothing so that these people can actually afford to buy it.

Hi Ron and thanks for your reply. Did you have a bad day :D

I absolutely didn't mean to be cynical. The reason I thought it was too easy to be posted was that almost, if not all, the questions from GMATPrep are posted in this forum. I couldn't find the post so I assumed this is not worth of a question. Anyway, apologize to have have made you think what you thought.

Now back to the question. I had done it before I watched your video talking about the Most Probable Interpretation and after that I got it. It's the main flaw in my reasoning. If only I had watched the video. Now I understand this question thoroughly. My hit rate for CR increased greatly after diving in the videos. This is worth to post, so I found my flaw.

Again, sorry for the inconvenience. Thanks.

-C

[tim]

glad to hear that the video helped, and no hard feelings.. :)