Petrochemical industry officials have said that the extreme pressure exerted on plant managers during the last five years to improve profits by cutting costs has done nothing to impair the industry’s ability to operate safely. However, environmentalists contend that the recent rash of serious oil spills and accidents at petrochemical plants is traceable to cost-cutting measures.
Which of the following, if true, would provide the strongest support for the position held by industry officials?
(This question is from Official Guide. Therefore, because of copyrights, the complete question cannot be copied here. The question can be accessed at GMAT Club)
Petrochemical industry officials have said that the extreme pressure exerted on plant managers during the last five years to improve profits by cutting costs has done nothing to impair the industry’s ability to operate safely.
According to Petro people, X has had no negative impact on Y
X: the extreme pressure exerted on plant managers during the last five years to improve profits by cutting costs
Y: the industry’s ability to operate safely
In other words, Petro people say that this extreme pressure on plant managers has not decreased the operational safety of the petrochemical industry. (The pressure has been exerted to improve profits by cutting costs.)
However, environmentalists contend that the recent rash of serious oil spills and accidents at petrochemical plants is traceable to cost-cutting measures.
We have a contrast here. Environmentalists don’t agree with Petro people.
Environmentalists say that the recent spate of oil spills and accidents at petrochemical plants is due to cost-cutting measures.
X is a cost-cutting measure.
Z: the recent spate of oil spills and accidents at petrochemical plants
Environmentalists say that X has led to Z. (Z, logically, indicates a negative impact on Y.)
We are looking for support for the position held by industry officials.
What is their position?
X has had no negative impact on Y
X: the extreme pressure exerted on plant managers during the last five years to improve profits by cutting costs
Y: the industry’s ability to operate safely
Thus, we need to support that this extreme pressure on plant managers has not decreased the operational safety of the petrochemical industry.
One way we can support this is by saying that the recent spate of oil spills and accidents at petrochemical plants is due to some external factor and not due to cost-cutting measures.
(A) Incorrect.
Some people find this option correct since, per them, this option goes against environmentalists’ contention. Per them, given option A, the cost-cutting measures cannot lead to a lack of safety since the petrochemical industry benefits from the safety. However, this logic is flawed.
Let’s take an analogy to understand why this logic is flawed.
Suppose I state that your irregular eating habits have caused your bad health.
Can you weaken my statement by saying that you’re benefited if you have good health?
No.
Why?
Even though you benefit from good health, we know that you don’t have good health, and we are now trying to figure out the cause of your bad health.
You cannot rule out a potential cause of bad health (irregular eating habits) by saying that you never wanted bad health.
Does this make sense?
(Even if this doesn’t, I have to move on!! 🙂 )
Similarly, option A doesn’t weaken the environmentalists’ contention and doesn’t support the Petro people’s position.
(B) Incorrect.
This option says that these unions demanded safety and later abandoned demanding it. However, the option doesn’t indicate whether X has had an impact on Y or not.
(X: the extreme pressure exerted on plant managers during the last five years to improve profits by cutting costs
Y: the industry’s ability to operate safely)
Thus, this option has no impact on Petro people’s position.
(C) Correct.
This option indicates that the cost-cutting measures have not decreased spending on environmental and safety measures. Essentially, the cost-cutting happened in other areas of operation but not on safety-related aspects.
In such a case, there is no reason to argue that the industry’s ability to operate safely has decreased because of the cost-cutting measures.
Thus, Petro people’s (industry official’s) position is strengthened.
(Please note that this option directly challenges the statement made by the environmentalists – they were saying that the recent accidents are traceable to the cost-cutting measures; this option says that such a thing is not possible since no cost-cutting happened on the safety-related measures.)
(D) Incorrect.
Do you realize that this option is weakening the Petro people’s position?
I believe people who mark this option don’t realize that it is doing the exact opposite of what we want.
Trust me, doing so (marking an option that is doing exactly the opposite of what the question is asking) is quite common. Thus, before marking an option, I always ensure that the option is NOT doing the opposite of what the question is asking.
(E) Incorrect.
The option says that the petrochemical industry is now devoting more resources to oil-spill prevention because of large fines and adverse publicity
Can this be used to argue that the industry believed that they can do more to increase the safety?
Yes.
Can this be used to argue that the industry’s cost-cutting measures lead to oil spills?
I don’t think so.
Even if the cost-cutting measures did not lead to any oil spills, the large fines and adverse publicity can still very much lead them to spend more resources on oil-spill prevention.
This option, thus, has NO impact the Petro people’s position.
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