Try Your Hand at the LSAT!

In My Humble Opinion
41

Here’s a fun one, but pretty long. I think Barron’s confused themselves with this question, as will be evident in their stated answer:
Economist: When consumers are in a buying mood, and the cost of money is low, a shrewd retailer with a popular product will reduce prices of items that are selling slowly and make up for any loss by raising prices on the product or products that are popular.

In which one of the following situations are these recommendations observed?

[list=a]
[li]At Easter, John’s Markets offered one dozen eggs at half their usual price, hams and turkeys at a 40 percent discount, but because of heavy rains, raised the price of many green vegetables.[/li][li]This Christmas, Arrow Clothiers is offering six-month interest free charge accounts to any customers who purchase $50 or more of merchandise from their stock of discontinued summer wear and the fashionable new op-art neck wear.[/li][li]Since interest rates have reached a yearly low, the price of tax-free bonds is near an all-time high. Discount Brokerage has launched a campaign to sell off all of its holding in precious metals mutual funds that are now at their lowest price in years.[/li][li]Angus Jewelry is offering special savings for customers who make purchases in May. With graduations ocming soon, they are offering engraved gold Swiss watches, as well as lower-prices on heart-shaped jewelry items that were featured on Valentine’s Day.[/li][li]Travel agents in Orlando are capitalizing on the lowered air-fares to lure tourists by offering special rates on hotel accommodations and discounted admission tickets to two of the large theme parks in the area.[/li][/list]
I’ll preface discussion on this question by saying that I don’t believe that any of the choices are particularly good. However, the logic Barron’s uses to defend its answer is pretty egregious, in my opinion. Those of you who don’t want to make a guess of your own can also try and figure out, given their skewed logic on the other questions, which choice Barron’s made and how they justified it. :slight_smile:

42

as for question two, I have to suspect that they worded the question wrong, and that the heavy rains would have weakened the orchard’s case rather than strengthened it.

I would guess A for question three. I’m not sure exactly how to justify it, just my first best guess (which is always the way to go on multiple choice tests when you’re under time pressure).

43

This is a discount on products expected to be popular, and a price increase on less popular items - the exact opposite of the quote.

This is not a price discount at all, so is not reached by the quote.

This is at least a discount on an unpopular product (although I suppose “campaign” could mean anything in this context). Arguably the high price of tax-free bonds is also a price increase on a popular product, so this looks somewhat promising, even though it’s weird.

Again, only discounts on popular items, not an increase on popular items accompanied by a discount on less-popular items.

All discounts, no price increases.

I go with C, although I agree with you that I don’t like any of the answers.

My only advice to you after my LSATs is not to drink an unusual amount of coffee before they start. I had been tapering off, and then had a big cup that morning because I had to get up earlier than normal. I started shaking in the middle of the logic puzzles, and then I suddenly realized that I was halfway through my time and 20% through the questions, and I had to blaze through the rest of them. (And to reassure you after the horror story, I still got into Harvard).

44

Oh, and my gut feeling is that Barron’s chose A, because it had something to do with cutting some costs and raising others.

45

Good call on that. If the question had asked for something making Jackson Orchards’ claim less convincing rather than more, then heavy rains the year before would be the clearcut answer. I think they probably just screwed-up the question wording.

46

Gotta go with A, even though we know eggs, turkeys and hams are hot sellers during Easter, we are not told if maybe the stores in the area overstocked these items. One one that fits the profile of raising and lowering prices.

47

AAArrrggghhh. New keyboard. Should of type ONLY ONE.

48

for number 3 I’ll go with D.
They are giving a discount on old Valentine Jewelry, so the first part of the recomendation is hit. It never says they are giving discounts for the gold watches, and by the logic these people use I’m guessing that means they are raising the prise just for graduation.

49

Wrong. Specifically opposite; at Easter, the eggs, hams and turkeys should be popular sellers and the prices raised.

Close. Because summer wear isn’t very popular in Christmas, the retailer is lowering the ‘price’ on the product (i.e. free charge accounts rather than normal charge accounts). However, no equal raising of prices on popular goods. In fact, a lowering of prices on a ‘popular’ good in the new op-art neck wear.

Erk. Don’t know mutual funds and bonds well enough. But again, this seems to be a case of dropping prices on a popular good, which is directly contrary to the statement.

Hmm. As good as B- unpopular items being offered at lower prices, but no mention of popular goods at higher prices.

No. Like A and C, the discount is on a popular good, not an unpopular one.
I say it’s D; every other choice has something in it that directly goes against the initial statement.

50

I’m late to class, but I’ve done my homework with no cheating - I promise!

Q1. I chose answer ‘B’, because the question used the logic fallacy that just because “set A” (continents and all geology books) contains some of “set B” (dangerous mountains and geology books in circulation) then all of the characteristics of “set B” can be attributed to “set A”. But I got it right, so screw the logic.

Q2. I chose answer ‘E’. It seems to me that if the other farms paid the about same on a year to year basis then one could reason that ‘A’ was true and ‘D’ was false. ‘C’ is simply specious. ‘B’ is a possibility, but cannot stand on it’s own. For ‘B’ to be and effective arguement for the nursery, one must prove ‘E’ first. Obviously, Barron’s screwed this one. We couldn;t possibly all be wrong!

Q3. The only one that seems possibly fit the reasoning in the question is ‘D’, and only then if: 1) the gold Swiss watches are popular gradulation gifts; and 2) the jeweler is selling the watches (or engraving) at a higher price than normal. Neither condition explicit in the answer.

Mr. Spock would have real trouble with Barron’s logic.

51

Unless I have gone completely isnane, d is the LEAST correct answer. In fact, it’s the one answer that is obviously wrong, since it specifically weakens Jackson’s case.

What the hell’s wrong with these Barron people?

Anyway, on to your third question.

Though it’s economically quirky, the position is that during a buying mood, with a low money cost (low interest rate) a retailer should increase P for products that sell well and reduce P for poor selling products.

Choice A is both wrong - Farmer John is lowering the price of a popular seller at Easter (eggs) - and irrelevant, since the assumption didn’t mention cost or supply.

Choice B is wrong, since Arrow is reducing the cost of both popular AND unpopular items, contradicting the assumption.

Choice C

Choice D is partially correct in that Angus Jewelry is lowering prices on a low-demand item (Velentine’s stuff) but again, they’re offering savings for the high-demand stuff as well.

Choice E, again, it’s price cuts across the board.

Choice C is the obvious correct answer.

The price of money is low (interest rates) so something popular is up in price (tax-free bonds) and something that would be relatively unpopular has gone down in price (precious metals.) Discount Brokerage is doing exactly what the assumption suggested they do.

The key here is that this is the only answer that actually addresses the three key assumptions: low money cost, raised price on a popular item, reduced price on an unpopular item.

52

Out of all the books I got, Barron’s was the worst. I got the most help from the Arco Supercourse book. I remember wanting to throw the Barron’s out the window, though, for their overly-tricky questions. It’s nothing like the real test, so don’t sweat it.

53

I’ll go with D as the correct answer, assuming that “offering engraved gold watches” does not necessarily mean they are offering them at savings. The could be “offering” them at a higher price, which would be exactly the same as the question.

However, since A is clearly wrong (they’re raising the price on exactly the wrong thing) I’ll say that is what Barron’s chose.

Anecdote: Mrs D and I got married after the 2d year of law school (she is also a lawyer.) So we sat right next to each other during the bar exam. I think the afternoon session was something like 150 multiple choice questions. The room was actually quite crowded - you could easily bump elbows with the person next to you. And it was very easy to check out your neighbor’s test and answer sheet. So, of course I did. the questions on Ms. D’s test were the same as mine, but the order of every pair was reversed. So I checked the first few answers, and seing that we had essentially completely different answers figured, “That way lies madness,” and didn’t look at her paper again.

Over the first half of the multiple choice portion I kept track of how many questions I read the question, knew the answer, and looked over the choices and found the correct answer. If I recall correctly, out of the 1st 75 questions, that happened exactly 3 times. So I figured, WTF, and finished the 2d half of the test as quickly as I could, basically scanning the questions and marking the 1st answer that looked okay. What pissed off the missus was, I finished in record time, but they wouldn’t let us leave the room. So I sat there and read the paper. Also, while we were taking the test right outside the window they were ripping up the street with one of those huge machines that strips the asphalt. Great conditions for concentrating.

No idea what I got on the various parts, but I passed (at least that is what I tell my employer!) My theory was, the essay portion you could essentially get passing grades on organization alone. Then just hope to instinctively do good enough on the multiple choice. But I digress…

54

My initial thought was to go with A, you’d have the buying mood, but the rest doesn’t hold true. So I have to go with C Attemted logic follows:

A. Since interest rates have reached a yearly low,
equals low cost of money

B. the price of tax-free bonds is near an all-time high.
equals popular product, which would also presumably sell at a premium

C. Discount Brokerage has launched a campaign to sell off all of its holding in precious metals mutual funds that are now at their lowest price in years

*equals discount on less popular item. *

Now here’s the original:

When consumers are in a buying mood, and the cost of money is low (my condition A), a shrewd retailer with a popular product (the tax free bonds) will reduce prices of items that are selling slowly (metals mutual fund) and make up for any loss by raising prices on the product or products that are popular*(the tax free bonds)**.*

Of course, I was wrong on the first two, so…

55

I knew a man who became a lawyer. He was a fool then and i have no reason to believe the bar raised him up.

I would not trust a lawyer as far as i could throw him:

A) unless it were off a cliff.
B) unless it were under a train.
C) unless it were under a train that ran off a cliff.
D) unless it were off a cliff that was under a train.

I suggest Christopher Jenks’ ‘Cooling Out The Mark’

56

Hmm. I choose A. In the context, it’s not clear whether the train is moving, or how fast. Nor is the relationship between trusting a lawyer and throwing him precisely understood–in fact, I’d say that the syllogism, “I do not trust lawyers as far as I can throw them. If I throw them off a cliff, it increases the distance of my throwing capacity. Therefore, if I throw a lawyer off a cliff, I can trust him.” is fatally flawed. In essence, you’re saying, “If not-A equals B-prime, then C. If C is converted to C++, then D-cup. Otherwise, B and D receive an A-minus in C, where B equals Bill, D equals Dee, and C equals Contracts.” I’m not sure I can go along with that logic.

Even given the premises, however, I’d have to rule out C and D. In C, what utility does throwing a lawyer under a train serve, when the train is running off a cliff? Or has the train already run off the cliff? I feel the choice is poorly worded and dangerously superfluous. And in D, in what way is the cliff “under the train”? The term ‘cliff’ is properly connotative of height–the seeming paradox may undermine the strength of the statement. An alternative explanation is that the lawyer is being thrown off of John Ratzenberger, while Mr. Ratzenberger himself is under a train. For this solution, it is not explained why the latter condition should be the case, unless one assumes a lasting bout of post-Frasier bitterness.

In any case, I’m definitely going to have to go with A.
(grin I’ll vet Question 3 in a bit…)

57

Gad, you’re going to do just fine…

58

I like ‘E’!!!

Somehow, the idea that they lower the air fare but keep and/or raise the prices once they get there reflects the initial question the best, IMHO.

I’m a going one for three!!

POSITIVE.

59

You seem to have independently found one of the big problems with norm referenced tests: they generate bad test questions.

The questions are typically selected by giving sample questions to test populations and seeing how many people get the correct answer. To ensure that the outcome is a normal curve, any question which is answered correctly too often is thrown out (otherwise the top of the bell gets clipped).

Well, there are many reasons a question may not be correctly answered – it may be off-topic, or it may be BADLY WRITTEN, etc. But the test makers assume it must be “harder”; and “harder” is “better”. I know three people who have worked for these companies, and the stories of how these tests are made are frightening. It’s even more frightening that some people and institutions take them seriously.

This is of particular importance to U.S. schools, as there’s currently a wide-spread call for high-stakes “tougher standards”, which largely means basing our educational system on lots of very poorly designed tests.

60

All-righty. ENugent, John Corrado, RickJay, stuffinb, y’all did an admirable job parsing Question Number 3. I concur with your logic, and it seems C and D were the consensus “well, it makes a little bit of sense” choices. Like John, I didn’t know enough about the financial world to fairly evaluate choice C, so I picked D: less-popular items (heart-shaped jewelry) were definitely being marked down, and a popular product (gold watches for graduation) at least put in a cameo appearance. I’m satisfied with the arguments for C, though, too–so again, either choice would have worked logically for me.

And, of course, neither choice was made by Barron’s.

Instead, they went with B. And you’re gonna love their reason why.

Choice B, if you’ll recall, was this:

And here’s what Barron’s has to say about their selection. A-hem–

Well, sure, if “covering all three conditions” simply meant describing some random scenario which contained a low cost of money, a slow-selling product, and a popular product. Then that’d be just fine. Unfortunately, I seem to recall something about “recommendations” in the original question. And I believe that these “recommendations”–pricing popular stuff high and unpopular stuff low–were the most important part of the original question, since it asked us to see which scenario followed them.

And B does not.

There’s no pricing high. There’s no (selective) pricing low. There’s simply an advertisement which states that customers buying $50 of merchandise from either an unpopular stock or a popular stock or some combination thereof will receive future discounts (in the form of interest-free charging).

So once again, Barron’s’s selection (how do you make “Barron’s” a possessive, anyway?) seems to be answering a completely different question. Getting a little tiresome, yeah?

That’s okay; I trust I’ve made my point, and I feel validated by the responses I’ve received. There are a couple more in this vein, and I’ll gladly post them if people want to have some more fun. But otherwise, I think I’ve beaten this into the ground.

…Almost. There’s one more I want to throw out, and it’s a bit of a shift cos it comes from the Analytical portion rather than the Logical portion. It should be quite a change of pace–once again, I just want to confirm my suspicions about something. Next post.