With which one of the following statements would the economists discussed in the passage be most likely to agree?

shunhe on August 11, 2020

Hi @fable,

Thanks for the question! So this question’s asking us about a statement with which the economists discussed in the passage would most likely agree. Well, when are the economists brought up, and what do they say? They’re brought up at the very beginning of the passage. Take a look at lines 4-11. We’re told that “some economists argue that the sole basis for determining the penalty [for corporate crimes] should be the reckoning of cost and benefit,” in other words, they think that the only thing you should care about is a cost/benefit analysis. Specifically, you should give bigger penalties than the profits that the corporations make from doing the crimes. So if you make a profit of $6 million, and the fine’s $7 million, the economists are happy. Well, if the ONLY thing you care about is the costs vs. benefits, then you’re not going to care about other things like the possibility of a corporation’s going out of business. And that’s what makes (A) right. The economists would agree with (A). They don’t care if the corporation might go out of business. All they care about is the fact that the penalties are greater than the profits.

Hope this helps! Feel free to ask any other questions that you might have.