GMAT Critical Reasoning questions, with every answer explained

Some Linwood board members propose that the district stop buying printed textbooks and give each student a tablet loaded with digital editions, citing the lower price of digital editions. That price comparison omits two costs. Tablets need replacing every three or four years, while printed textbooks last about eight, and digital editions are licensed for a fixed term rather than owned. Counting both costs, the proposal would not save the district money over any period beyond a few years.

In the argument above, the two portions in boldface play which of the following roles?

1. A. The first is the argument's main conclusion; the second is evidence offered in its support.
2. B. The first is evidence the argument presents against a proposal; the second is the proposal that the argument opposes.
3. C. The first is a proposal that the argument opposes; the second is a premise offered in support of a further conclusion.
4. D. The first is a proposal that the argument opposes; the second is the main conclusion of the argument.
5. E. The first is a proposal that the argument opposes; the second is a consideration that the argument concedes weighs in favor of that proposal.

Archivists report that letters written in the colony of Aldern before 1750 mention smallpox far more often than later letters do. Some historians conclude that the disease struck Aldern less often after 1750. Yet nearly all surviving letters from before 1750 were written in port towns, where outbreaks usually began, whereas most surviving later letters were written by settlers in the interior. The decline in mentions may therefore reflect a change in who was writing rather than in how often the disease struck.

In the argument above, the two portions in boldface play which of the following roles?

1. A. The first is evidence for a conclusion the argument challenges; the second is that conclusion.
2. B. The first is a finding whose accuracy the argument disputes; the second is evidence offered to show that the finding is mistaken.
3. C. The first is a finding that the argument accepts while disputing some historians' reading of it; the second supports the argument's own explanation.
4. D. The first is a finding that the argument accepts; the second is the main conclusion of the argument.
5. E. The first is a conclusion that some historians have drawn; the second is evidence that the argument offers against that conclusion.

During last year's drought in the state of Carver, hay became scarce and its price nearly doubled. Economists in the state had predicted that the drought would also push up the prices paid for cattle at Carver's livestock auctions, because ranchers would be able to raise fewer calves. Instead, auction prices for cattle fell sharply while the drought lasted, even though national demand for beef held steady throughout that period.

Which of the following, if true, most helps to explain why cattle prices at Carver's auctions fell?

1. A. Many Carver ranchers who could not afford hay at its new price sold large parts of their herds at the auctions.
2. B. Retail prices for beef in grocery stores across the country rose slightly during the months the drought lasted.
3. C. Ranchers in Carver expect the drought to end within two years, after which hay prices should soon return to their normal levels.
4. D. Hay is only one of several kinds of feed that ranchers in Carver give their cattle at different times over the course of a year.
5. E. The drought also cut yields of the corn that local farmers sell to ranchers as feed.

Seeds generally remain able to sprout for longer when they are stored at lower temperatures. The Halden Seed Bank dries every seed to a moisture level safe for storage at 0 degrees Fahrenheit and then stores it in one of two vaults, one kept at 0 degrees Fahrenheit and the other at 40 degrees. Yet when the bank tested seeds that had spent ten years in storage, a smaller proportion of the seeds from the colder vault sprouted.

Which of the following, if true, most helps to resolve the apparent discrepancy described above?

1. A. Seeds stored at very low temperatures must be thoroughly dried first, or ice crystals forming inside them can destroy them.
2. B. Keeping the warmer vault at its set temperature costs the bank much less each year than keeping the colder vault at its set temperature does.
3. C. Seed banks in several other countries have found that seeds kept at 0 degrees Fahrenheit can still sprout after many decades.
4. D. The seeds tested from each vault were drawn at random from all the seeds that had been stored there for ten years.
5. E. The bank reserves the colder vault for species whose seeds lose the ability to sprout most quickly.

Crestmoor University publishes the average starting salary of its graduates each year, both for the university as a whole and separately for each of its five colleges. For last year's graduating class, the average starting salary rose, compared with the year before, in every one of the five colleges. Nevertheless, the average starting salary for the university's graduates as a whole was lower last year than it had been the year before.

Which of the following, if true, most helps to explain how both of these results could have occurred?

1. A. Average starting salaries for new college graduates across the country as a whole rose by more last year than those of Crestmoor's graduates did.
2. B. A larger share of last year's graduates than of the previous year's came from the colleges whose graduates earn the lowest salaries.
3. C. The college whose graduates earn the highest starting salaries recorded the largest increase in its average last year.
4. D. Fewer of last year's graduates than of the previous year's reported their starting salaries to the university.
5. E. Several of Crestmoor's colleges have recently raised admission standards, attracting stronger students.

Reelhouse, a video streaming service, recently surveyed 4,000 of its subscribers, choosing them at random from among those who had watched at least one episode of one of its documentary series during the past year. Of those surveyed, 85 percent said they would like Reelhouse to offer more documentaries. On the strength of this survey, the service's executives concluded that most Reelhouse subscribers would like the service to offer more documentaries.

The executives' reasoning is most vulnerable to criticism on the grounds that it

1. A. fails to consider whether documentaries cost more to produce than the other kinds of programs Reelhouse offers
2. B. assumes without justification that subscribers who ask for more documentaries would actually spend time watching them if Reelhouse were to offer them
3. C. takes for granted that the preferences subscribers expressed in the survey will not change over the coming years
4. D. relies on too small a survey to support a reliable conclusion about the service's subscribers
5. E. generalizes about subscribers as a whole from a group especially likely to favor documentaries

In 2012, coal-fired power plants generated 60 percent of the electricity produced in Marston County. By 2022 their share had fallen to 35 percent, while wind farms built during the decade had come to supply a further 25 percent. The county's two coal-fired plants remained in operation throughout the entire period. A local environmental group has cited these figures as showing that Marston's coal-fired plants generated less electricity in 2022 than they did in 2012.

The group's argument is most vulnerable to criticism on the grounds that it

1. A. fails to establish that wind farms generate electricity at a lower cost than coal-fired plants do
2. B. overlooks the possibility that total electricity production in the county rose substantially between 2012 and 2022
3. C. presumes that the wind farms built during the decade will go on expanding
4. D. ignores the fact that some of the county's electricity comes from sources other than coal and wind
5. E. overlooks the possibility that coal-fired plants in the counties bordering Marston greatly increased the amount of electricity they generated over the same decade

Greenfield Publishing sells its cookery titles mainly through independent bookshops. Last year it began offering those shops a deeper trade discount, and its cookery sales rose sharply. The company now plans to extend the same discount to its gardening titles, which it also sells mainly through independent shops, and expects gardening sales to rise by a comparable amount. Greenfield's gardening list is roughly the same size as its cookery list, and both are priced similarly.

Which of the following is an assumption on which the argument depends?

1. A. Greenfield will be able to maintain its current profit margin on gardening titles even after the deeper trade discount has been applied to them.
2. B. Last year's rise in cookery sales was not produced chiefly by factors largely absent from the gardening market.
3. C. Most independent bookshops currently stock a considerably wider range of cookery titles than of gardening titles.
4. D. Greenfield Publishing has sold gardening titles through independent shops for far longer than it has sold any of its cookery titles there.
5. E. The readers who buy gardening books are generally drawn to the same authors as the readers who buy Greenfield's cookery books.

Most of the litter collected on the public beach in the town of Hollis consists of food wrappers and drink containers. To reduce this litter, the town council has decided to prohibit the beachfront kiosks from selling any packaged food or bottled drinks, and it expects the amount of litter on the beach to fall substantially as a result. The kiosks will still be allowed to rent umbrellas and beach chairs.

Which of the following is an assumption on which the council's expectation depends?

1. A. The kiosks earn more from food and drink sales than from chair rentals.
2. B. No other town along the coast has tried to reduce beach litter by limiting what beachfront businesses may sell.
3. C. Food wrappers and drink containers do more harm to shore birds and marine animals than most other kinds of litter found on the beach do.
4. D. Visitors unable to buy packaged food and drinks at the kiosks will not bring comparable amounts from elsewhere.
5. E. All of the wrappers and containers now found on the beach come from food and drinks bought at the kiosks.

A vineyard in a cold valley loses part of its crop in most years to spring frost. The owner is considering installing large fans that draw warmer air down from above the frost layer on still nights. Fans of this kind have protected orchards in the same valley, and the owner calculates that the fruit saved in an average year would exceed the annual cost of running and maintaining the fans.

Which of the following is an assumption on which the argument depends?

1. A. The fans will protect the whole of the vineyard's crop in every year they are switched on in time.
2. B. The orchards in the valley that installed fans grow fruit that ripens at about the same time as grapes do.
3. C. Capital to install the fans can be borrowed by the vineyard at a reasonable rate.
4. D. The frosts damaging the vineyard's crop occur chiefly on nights still enough for a layer of warmer air to lie above the vines.
5. E. Grapes are more vulnerable to a late spring frost than the fruit grown in the valley's orchards.

A mining company reports that the average grade of the ore it raised last year was higher than in the year before, and that its cost of producing a tonne of refined metal fell over the same period. The company's chief executive attributes the lower cost to the richer ore and predicts a further fall next year, since the section of the deposit now being worked is richer still.

Which of the following is an assumption on which the argument depends?

1. A. The richer section of the deposit now being worked will yield ore of a higher grade than any that the company has ever raised before.
2. B. The price that the company receives for a tonne of refined metal will not fall during the coming year.
3. C. Ore grades at the deposits worked by the company's competitors are falling.
4. D. No factor that helped lower the cost of production last year will reverse enough next year to offset the richer ore.
5. E. Last year's fall in the cost of producing refined metal was caused by the richer ore.

Two years ago Brennan Logistics began paying its delivery drivers a bonus for each month in which they report no damage to their vehicles. Since then, the number of damage reports per vehicle has fallen by half, but the company's spending per vehicle on body repairs has not declined. The fleet manager concludes that the bonus has led drivers to leave damage unreported, so that it is repaired only when mechanics find it during routine inspections.

Which of the following is an assumption on which the fleet manager's argument depends?

1. A. Routine inspections of Brennan's vehicles detect every instance of damage that drivers fail to report.
2. B. The bonuses Brennan pays each year cost less than the company would save if damage to its vehicles genuinely fell by half.
3. C. The average cost of each body repair has not risen enough over the two years to offset a genuine halving in the amount of damage.
4. D. Delivery companies that pay drivers similar bonuses have also seen the number of damage reports fall.
5. E. Damage that is left unreported until an inspection costs more to repair than damage that drivers report promptly.

The council of Deepford proposes to build protected bicycle lanes along four arterial roads. Officials expect the lanes to cut the number of car journeys made within the city, on the ground that many such journeys are short enough to be made by bicycle instead. Critics reply that the lanes will take road space from cars and so worsen congestion for those who continue to drive into the centre.

Which of the following, if true, would most strongly support the officials' expectation?

1. A. The council of Deepford has secured a grant from the regional transport authority that will meet most of the construction cost.
2. B. In cities that have built protected bicycle lanes, the number of short car journeys fell sharply within a year.
3. C. Every resident of Deepford who now makes a short journey by car would switch to a bicycle if a protected lane were available along the route.
4. D. Protected lanes reduce the number of collisions between cars and cyclists on roads where they are built.
5. E. The four arterial roads chosen for the new lanes carry more traffic during the morning peak hours than any other roads in Deepford do.

Borrowing at the Kessler County Library has declined among working adults, many of whom commute by train to jobs in a neighboring city. To reverse this decline, the library plans to install lockers at the county's commuter rail stations, where patrons can pick up books they have reserved online and return books they have finished, at any hour. Library staff will restock the lockers each evening.

Which of the following, if true, most strongly supports the plan described above?

1. A. Several libraries in other states have begun lending tools and musical instruments as well as books.
2. B. Reserved books that go uncollected for a week are returned to the shelves so that other patrons can borrow them.
3. C. Most working adults in the county who have stopped borrowing say the branches are never open at times when these adults are free to visit.
4. D. Most patrons who still visit the library's branches prefer to browse the shelves in person rather than reserve books online.
5. E. Ridership on the county's commuter trains has fallen by a quarter since many employers began letting staff work from home.

Stride, an online shoe retailer, pays the shipping on every item a customer returns, and most shoes sent back to Stride are returned because they do not fit. Because sizing varies from one brand to another, Stride plans to cut its return costs by adding a feature that recommends a size in each brand based on the sizes of shoes the customer has previously bought from Stride and kept.

Which of the following, if true, most strongly suggests that the plan will not achieve its goal?

1. A. Customers who receive shoes that fit well are more likely to buy from Stride again.
2. B. Several rival retailers already offer size recommendations based on purchase histories.
3. C. Some shoes are returned not because they fit poorly but because customers dislike their color once they see them in person.
4. D. Nearly all of the shoes returned to Stride for poor fit were bought by customers placing their first order.
5. E. The cost of shipping returned shoes to Stride's warehouse has risen faster over the past two years than the company's revenue has.

A regional hospital has been offered scheduling software that its supplier says will cut the time operating theatres stand idle between procedures. The hospital's finance officer notes that theatres currently stand idle for about a fifth of the working day, and argues that even a modest reduction would let the hospital perform enough additional procedures each year to repay the annual licence fee several times over.

Which of the following would be most useful to establish in evaluating the argument?

1. A. How many other hospitals of broadly comparable size in the region have already bought the same scheduling software from this supplier.
2. B. Whether the licence fee for the new software is charged every year or as a single payment at installation.
3. C. Whether the hospital has enough surgeons, anaesthetists and recovery beds available to staff the additional procedures that the freed theatre time would make possible.
4. D. Whether lengthy retraining would be needed before the hospital's clerks could operate the new software.
5. E. Whether the hospital's theatres stand idle for the same reasons on every day.

The city of Ardwick introduced a deposit on beverage containers two years ago: shoppers pay a small surcharge at purchase and recover it by returning the empty container to any retailer. The volume of containers collected for recycling in Ardwick has since risen by a third. The council's environment committee has proposed extending the deposit to food packaging, arguing that the same mechanism will produce a comparable rise in the recycling of that material.

Which of the following would be most useful to establish in evaluating the argument?

1. A. Whether the surcharge collected on beverage containers has covered the full administrative cost of running the deposit scheme.
2. B. Where the beverage containers collected under the scheme are processed, whether inside Ardwick itself or at a recycling facility some considerable distance away.
3. C. Whether the councils of other cities in the region are considering similar deposit schemes of their own for beverage containers.
4. D. Whether used food packaging can be returned to retailers as readily as empty beverage containers now are.
5. E. Whether the rise in containers collected merely reflects a rise in the quantity of beverages that Ardwick shoppers buy each year.

Northmoor Air has flown a daily service between two provincial cities at a loss for six years, in the sense that the fares collected on the route fall short of what the route costs to operate. The airline nevertheless retains the service. Most passengers who board at the smaller city connect at Northmoor's hub onto longer flights, and the airline books the whole of each such fare to the connecting flight rather than to the provincial service.

Which of the following can most properly be inferred from the statements above?

1. A. Northmoor Air would earn a larger profit overall by withdrawing every route that fails to cover its own costs.
2. B. Northmoor charges lower fares on the provincial route than its competitors do.
3. C. The accounting figures for the provincial route may well understate the revenue the airline would lose if it withdrew the service altogether.
4. D. The provincial service would cover its operating costs if the fares charged on it were raised enough.
5. E. Passengers boarding at the smaller city pay more for their connecting flights than those joining at the hub.

At Corvid Software, every engineer promoted to senior engineer last year had led at least one product launch at Corvid before being promoted. The company has never allowed an engineer to lead a product launch without first completing the company's systems architecture course, and that course has always been open only to engineers who have worked at Corvid for at least three years. Several engineers who completed the course last year have not yet led a launch.

Which of the following can most properly be inferred from the statements above?

1. A. Every engineer promoted to senior engineer at Corvid last year had worked at the company for at least three years.
2. B. Every Corvid engineer who has led a product launch was promoted to senior engineer last year.
3. C. Most engineers who have worked at Corvid for at least three years have completed the systems architecture course.
4. D. None of the engineers who completed the course last year was promoted to senior engineer last year.
5. E. The engineers who completed the course last year will be promoted to senior engineer once each has led a launch and been at Corvid for three years.

Marlow Coffee introduced a mobile loyalty application at its two hundred outlets last year. Customers who registered for the application spent, on average, forty percent more at Marlow outlets over the following six months than customers who did not register. The chain's marketing director has concluded that the application causes customers to spend more, and proposes to increase spending on the application at the expense of the advertising budget.

Which of the following, if true, most seriously weakens the argument above?

1. A. Marlow Coffee spent considerably less on developing the loyalty application than it spends on newspaper advertising in a typical quarter.
2. B. Several chains competing with Marlow introduced loyalty applications that same year.
3. C. Customers who already visited Marlow outlets several times a week were far likelier to register for the application than occasional customers.
4. D. The application allows Marlow to send registered customers a discount voucher on those days when trade is usually slow.
5. E. Customers who registered spent more at Marlow outlets in the months afterwards than they had immediately before.

Last spring the city of Dunmore transplanted mature shade trees along forty residential blocks. Over the following summer, household electricity use on those blocks fell by eight percent compared with the summer before, while household use in the rest of the city was essentially unchanged. City officials concluded that shade from the new trees had reduced residents' need for air conditioning, and they have proposed planting mature trees along every residential block in Dunmore.

Which of the following, if true, most seriously weakens the officials' conclusion?

1. A. Transplanting a mature tree costs the city several times as much as planting a sapling.
2. B. The forty blocks were chosen because a utility program had, that spring, replaced most of their residents' old air conditioners with efficient models.
3. C. Studies in other cities have found that street trees also reduce storm water runoff and improve air quality.
4. D. The summer after the planting was, on average, slightly hotter in Dunmore than the summer before it.
5. E. Homes on the planted blocks that stand closest to the new trees used less electricity than homes on those blocks set farther back.

Excavations at the ancient harbor town of Pelmos have recovered fragments of clay storage jars from many centuries of occupation. In layers dated before 300 BCE, jars made on the island of Karsa account for about one fragment in twenty; in layers dated after 300 BCE, they account for nearly one fragment in four. Historians have concluded that Pelmos imported a substantially greater volume of goods from Karsa after 300 BCE than it had before.

Which of the following, if true, most seriously weakens the historians' conclusion?

1. A. Storage jars made on Karsa were larger, on average, than those made in Pelmos or elsewhere, and so tended to break into more fragments when they were discarded.
2. B. Pelmos came under the rule of a mainland kingdom shortly after 300 BCE and remained under its control for two centuries.
3. C. The total quantity of goods that Karsa produced for export did not increase at all in the century after 300 BCE.
4. D. The layers dated after 300 BCE contain far more jar fragments in total than the layers dated before 300 BCE do.
5. E. After 300 BCE, Pelmos stored its own goods in woven baskets, which rarely survive burial, instead of local clay jars.

A salmon farm added a seaweed extract to the feed given to one of its pens and found that the fish in that pen grew nine percent faster than fish of the same age in the farm's other pens. The extract costs little, and the manager has concluded that adding it to the feed in every pen would raise the farm's total output by enough to justify the modest expense.

Which of the following, if true, most strengthens the argument above?

1. A. The seaweed used to make the extract is harvested from beds near the farm.
2. B. Salmon raised on feed containing the extract command a slightly higher price at market than salmon raised on the farm's ordinary feed do.
3. C. No salmon farm that has adopted the extract has reported a decline in the growth of its fish.
4. D. The farm's other pens were given feed of exactly the same composition that the farm had used in each of the three seasons immediately preceding the trial.
5. E. The farm's pens match in water temperature, stocking density and hatchery.

A manufacturer of solar panels has developed an anti-reflective coating that, in laboratory tests, raises the electricity a panel generates by about six percent. The coating adds roughly two percent to the cost of a finished panel. Because installers judge panels almost entirely on the price of each unit of output they deliver, the manufacturer's engineers predict that panels carrying the coating will displace uncoated panels across the whole market within three years.

Which of the following, if true, most strengthens the argument above?

1. A. The manufacturer's patents on the coating do not expire soon.
2. B. Rival manufacturers are developing coatings of their own but have published no commercial results.
3. C. Panels coated with the new material retain their entire output advantage after a full decade of outdoor exposure.
4. D. Installers will refuse to buy uncoated panels once coated panels reach the market, whatever they cost.
5. E. Applying the coating requires equipment that the manufacturer's existing factories can install without halting current production.

Biologists surveying ponds in the Tamsin River basin found that ponds where a nonnative crayfish has become established contain, on average, less than a third as many dragonfly larvae as ponds the crayfish has not reached. The crayfish is known to feed on a wide range of small aquatic animals. The biologists concluded that predation by the crayfish has reduced the number of dragonfly larvae in the ponds it has invaded.

Which of the following, if true, most strengthens the biologists' conclusion?

1. A. Before the crayfish arrived, the ponds it later invaded held about as many dragonfly larvae as ponds it never reached.
2. B. The crayfish uproots much of the vegetation in the ponds it invades, and dragonfly larvae depend on such plants for shelter.
3. C. Dragonfly larvae are an important food for fish and wading birds in the basin.
4. D. The nonnative crayfish has spread to more ponds in the basin in each of the past five years.
5. E. Dragonfly larvae are known to prey on the young of several kinds of crayfish, including the nonnative crayfish now found in the basin.