LSAT Question Explanation
PT 106, Section 2, Question 14
Identify the FlawArgument structure
Owning a laptop led to people getting high-paying jobs.
Laptop owners made more on average last year than non laptop owners.
Explanation
Owning a laptop is correlated with higher earnings, based on the study. But the Advertisement concludes that owning a laptop led to the higher earnings. In other words, the advertisement concludes that owning a laptop causes someone to earn more.
We have no idea if this "laptop causes higher earnings" relationship is true based on the evidence. It seems equally (if not more) likely to me that the reverse causal relationship could be true: that having a high paying job could cause people to be more likely to own a laptop. A high paying job would lead to more disposable income to buy a laptop, or maybe fancy high paying jobs give employees company laptops. This demonstrates how weak the advertisement's conclusion is.
We can't make a conclusion about causality based merely on a correlation in the evidence.
Answer choices
We have no reason to believe that the economist's study was based on too small of a sample size.
This answer choice indicates circular reasoning - that the conclusion was referencing itself as evidence. But that didn't happen, the advertisement references the study done by the economist as evidence.
Here we go - this answer choice is correct. It points out that the advertisement didn't account for the fact that a high paying job could lead people to be more likely to buy a laptop.
The evidence definitely doesn't show that the conclusion is false. The conclusion may or may not be true, we just can't say for sure based on the evidence.
The conclusion doesn't make predictions about the future, "led" seems to indicate that the conclusion is about the past. (Last year specifically, given the information about the study.)