CAT Critical Reasoning Practice question with Solution 92

The auto industry opposes a requirement to make cars that are more fuel-efficient. How come? Because previous attempts at better fuel efficiency led to smaller—but less safe—cars. The exec’s implication is that, once again, the search for better fuel efficiency will lead to small, dangerous cars, but (C) rebuts that by asserting that large cars can be made more fuel-efficient. More efficient cars needn’t be smaller, so it’s not true that they will have to be more dangerous.

(A)’s point that large cars were frequently involved in serious accidents doesn’t refute the statistics that smaller cars were even more dangerous.

(B) Au Contraire. This strengthens the automaker’s argument by confirming that small cars are very unsafe, since the odds of surviving an accident in one have become worse.

(D) doesn’t even address the automaker’s argument that progress in fuel efficiency requires dangerously small cars.

(E) suggests that the fuel-efficient cars on the market today are still those dangerous small cars. (E) might be stretched to imply that cars can be made more fuel-efficient and remain large, but it’s too vague; we don’t know why fuel efficiency rose and later fell, nor do we know if large cars could meet the proposed new standards.