Argument Structure Questions - - Question 18

Economist:  To the extent that homelessness arises from a lack of available housing, it should not be assumed that th...

Gabriela_Martinez June 6, 2018

Why (A) and not (B)?

I ultimately chose (A) but I mostly do not understand why (B) would be incorrect. Could you please explain the differences b/t these two?

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Anita June 7, 2018

@Gabriela_Martinez You were right to go with A. B tells us that a lack of housing is the primary cause of homelessness. We don't know from the prompt whether that's true. What we do know is that it is at least some of the cause of housing. It could still be that something else - such as a lack of jobs in a certain location - is the primary cause, but here we're just addressing the extent of it that is due to a lack of housing.

Valentina July 12, 2020

How should we know that B tells us that a lack of housing is the primary cause of homelessness rather than that homelessness as a serious social problem? Even though the argument doesn't resolve the problem of homelessness, it (homelessness) is still the problem that the argument is designed to resolve (regardless if it's actually resolved or not).

Valentina July 12, 2020

Actually nevermind! I confused this question with Q1.