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2. Neither a rising standard of living nor balanced trade, by itself, establishes a country’s ability to compete in the international marketplace. Both are required simultaneously since standards of living can rise because of growing trade deficits and trade can be balanced by means of a decline in a country’s standard of living.

If the facts stated in the passage above are true, a proper test of a country’s ability to be competitive is its ability to
(A) balance its trade while its standard of living rises
(B) balance its trade while its standard of living falls
(C) increase trade deficits while its standard of living rises
(D) decrease trade deficits while its standard of living falls
(E) keep its standard of living constant while trade deficits rise.

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3. Which of the following best completes the passage below?

The more worried investors are about losing their money, the more they will demand a high potential return on their investment; great risks must be offset by the chance of great rewards. This principle is the fundamental one in determining interest rates, and it is illustrated by the fact that______.

(A) successful investors are distinguished by an ability to make very risky investments without worrying about their money
(B) lenders receive higher interest rates on unsecured loans than on loans backed by collateral
(C) in times of high inflation, the interest paid to depositors by banks can actually be below the rate of inflation
(D) at any one time, a commercial bank will have a single rate of interest that it will expect all of its individual borrowers to pay
(E) the potential return on investment in a new company is typically lower than the potential return on investment in a well-established company

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4(Z). Which of the following most logically completes the passage?

Concerned about financial well-being of its elderly citizens, the government of Runagia decided two years ago to increase by 20 percent the government-provided pension paid to all Runagians over 65.  Inflation in the intervening period has been negligible, and the increase has been duly received by all eligible Runagians.  Nevertheless, many of them are no better off financially than they were before the increase, in large part because ________.

A. They rely entirely on the government pension for their income
B. Runagian banks are so inefficient that it can take up to three weeks to cash a pension check
C. They buy goods whose prices tend to rise especially fast in times of inflation
D. The pension was increased when the number of elderly Runagians below the poverty level reached an all-time high
E. In Runagia children typically supplement the income of elderly parents, but only by enough to provide them with a comfortable living

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5.(Z) Which of the following most logically completes the argument?

Yorco and Zortech are two corporations that employ large numbers of full-time workers who are paid by the hour.  Publicly available records indicate that Yorco employs roughly the same number of such hourly wage workers as Zortech does but spends a far higher total sum per year on wages for such workers.  Therefore, hourly wages must be higher, on average, at Yorco than at Zortech, since _____.

A. Zortech spends a higher total sum per year than Yorco does to provide its hourly wage workers with benefits other than wages
B. The work performed by hourly wage workers at Zortech does not require a significantly higher level of skill than the work performed by hourly wage workers at Yorco does
C. The proportion of all company employees who are hourly wage workers is significantly greater at Yorco than it is at Zortech
D. Overtime work, which is paid at a substantially higher rate than work done during the regular work week, is rare at both Yorco and Zortech
E. The highest hourly wages paid at Yorco are higher than the highest hourly wages paid at Zortech

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6.(Z)Which of the following most logically completes the reasoning?

Either food scarcity or excessive hunting can threaten a population of animals. If the group faces food scarcity, individuals in the group will reach reproductive maturity later than otherwise. If the group faces excessive hunting, individuals that reach reproductive maturity earlier will come to predominate. Therefore, it should be possible to determine whether prehistoric mastodons became extinct because of food scarcity or human hunting, since there are fossilized mastodon remains from both before and after mastodon populations declined, and ______.

A.        there are more fossilized mastodon remains from the period before mastodon populations began to decline than from after that period
B.        the average age at which mastodons from a given period reached reproductive maturity can be established from their fossilized remains
C.        it can be accurately estimated from fossilized remains when mastodons became extinct
D.        it is not known when humans first began hunting mastodons
E.        climate changes may have gradually reduced the food available to mastodons

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7(Z). Which of the following most logically completes the argument below?

Although the number of large artificial satellites orbiting the Earth is small compared to the number of small pieces of debris in orbit, the large satellites interfere more seriously with telescope observations because of the strong reflections they produce. Because many of those large satellites have ceased to function, the proposal recently been made to eliminate interference from nonfunctioning satellites by exploding them in space. This proposal, however, is ill conceived, since     .

A.        many nonfunctioning satellites remain in orbit for years
B.        for satellites that have ceased to function, repairing them while they are in orbit would be prohibitively expensive
C.        there are no known previous instances of satellites’ having been exploded on purpose
D.        the only way to make telescope observations without any interference from debris in orbit is to use telescopes launched into extremely high orbits around the Earth
E.        a greatly increased number of small particles in Earth’s orbit would result in a blanket of reflections that would make certain valuable telescope observations impossible

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8.(Z)Which of the following most logically completes the passage?

A certain tropical island received food donations in the form of powdered milk for distribution to its poorest residents, who were thought to be malnourished. Subsequently, the rate of liver cancers among those islanders increased sharply. The donated milk was probably to blame: recent laboratory research on rats has shown that rats briefly exposed to the substances aflatoxin tend to develop liver cancer when fed casein, a milk protein. This result is relevant because       .

A.        in the tropics, peanuts, a staple of these island residents, support a mold growth that produces aflatoxin.
B.        the liver is more sensitive to carcinogens, of which aflatoxin may be one, than most other bodily organs.
C.        casein is not the only protein contained in milk.
D.        powdered milk is the most appropriate form in which to send milk to a tropical destination.
E.        the people who were given the donated milk had been screened for their ability to digest milk.

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9.(Z)Which if the following, if true, most logically completes the argument?

Aroca County’s public schools are supported primarily by taxes on property.  The county plans to eliminate the property tax and support schools with a new three percent sales tax on all retail items sold in the county.  Three percent of current retail sales is less than the amount collected through property taxes, but implementation of the plan would not necessarily reduce the amount of money going to Aroca County public schools, because ______.

A.        many Aroca County residents have already left the county because of its high property taxes
B.        a shopping mall likely to draw shoppers from neighboring counties is about to open in Aroca County
C.        at least some Aroca County parents are likely to use the money they will save on property taxes to send their children to private schools not funded by the county
D.        a significant proportion of parents of Aroca County public school students do not own their homes and consequently do not pay property taxes
E.        retailers in Aroca County are not likely to absorb the sales tax by reducing the pretax price of their goods

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10.(Z)Which of the following most logically completes the argument?

Researchers recently asked dozens of shoppers, chosen at random coming out of a FoodBasket supermarket, what they had purchased.  The prices of the very same items at the nearest ShopperKing supermarket were totaled and compared with the FoodBasket total.  The ShopperKing totals averaged five percent higher than the FoodBasket totals.  Nevertheless, this result does not necessarily show that shoppers at ShopperKing would save money overall by shopping at FoodBasket instead, since ______.

A.        shoppers who shop regularly at a given supermarket generally choose that store for the low prices offered on the items that they purchase most often
B.        for shoppers with more than 20 items, the ShopperKing totals averaged more than five percent higher than the FoodBasket totals
C.        many shoppers consider factors other than price in choosing the supermarket at which they shop most regularly
D.        there is little variation from month to month in the overall quantity of purchases made at supermarkets by a given shopper
E.        none of the people who conducted the research were employees of the FoodBasket supermarket

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11.(Z) Which of the following, if true , most logically completes the passage?

A recent poll found that over 80 percent of the residents of Nalmed Province favored a massive expansion of the commuter rail system as a means of significantly easing congestion on the province’s highways and were willing to help pay for the expansion through an increase in their taxes. Nevertheless, the poll results indicate that expansion of the rail system, if successfully completed, would be unlikely to achieve its goal of easing congestion, because        .

A.        most of people in favor of expanding the rail system reported less congestion during their highway commute as the primary benefit they would experience.
B.        of the less than 20 percent of residents not counted as favoring the expansion, about half claimed to have no opinion one way or the other.
C.        the twice-daily periods of peak congestion caused by people commuting in cars have grown from about an hour each to almost two and a half hours each in the past 20 years.
D.        expanding the commuter rail system will require the construction of dozens of miles of new railroads.
E.        the proposed expansion to the commuter rail system will make it possible for some people who both live and work at suburban locations to commute by rail.