With Proposition 13, if you bought your house 11 years ago for $75,000, your property tax would be approximately $914 a year (1 percent of $75,000 increased by 2 percent each year for 11 years); and if your neighbor bought an identical house next door to you for $200,000 this year, his tax would be $2,000 (1 percent of $200,000). Without Proposition 13, both you and your neighbor would pay $6,000 a year in property taxes (3 percent of $200,000). Which of the following is the conclusion for which the author most likely is arguing in the passage above?
(A) Proposition 13 is unconstitutional because it imposes an unequal tax on properties of equal value.
(B) If Proposition 13 is repealed, every homeowner is likely to experience a substantial increase in property taxes.
(C) By preventing inflation from driving up property values, Proposition 13 has saved homeowners thousands of dollars in property taxes.
(D) If Proposition 13 is not repealed, identical properties will continue to be taxed at different rates.
(E) Proposition 13 has benefited some homeowners more than others.
answer is B
B
B
B
B
B
B
B
Can anyone explain why?
Why not D or E? or even C??
B
A : unconstitutional, too much out of scope
B: Can be inferred but put on hold.
C: Inflation , out of scope. Too less information to infer any such thing
D: Sounds good, as lack of 13 would tax different property at different rate, but lack data to support this.
E: Vague : Some owner than others.
Hence should be B: because can be inferred that if introduced 13 every owner would pay a large amount of tax.
C
Guys, but there is no mentioned or any suggestion made about repealing the Proposition 13 in the argument.
Hence, I think choice B and D can be eliminated.
I go for choice E as argument provides example of “you” and “your neighbor” case.
Plz share your thoughts and not just your choice…
B
E
I am caught up between B and D
B- Direct Conclusion.Nothing out of scope.
D- Looks to me dat I can infer from the passage.
E definately is vague.
B
I go for choice E
under 13, A pay app 9000 while B pay 2000. Without 13, A pay and B pay the same 6000. Therefore, 13 benefit A while take money from B
I will go with B. Raghu, prop 13 advocates equal tax rates.
I think its Option B bcoz thru the POE method:
Option A : the diff is due to the inflation factor & not due to the Prop 13(see the rate is same for both homeowners)
Option C : this is in complete contrast to Option A(in fact the rate is applied on the present purchase value to its homeowner) so inflation is taken into account.
Option D : Identical properties will be taxed at diff rates if time of purchase is diff(assuming inflation is at work) also the option says different rates will be charged which is cotradictory since rate is same i.e 1 percent irrespective of the value/time of purchase
Option E : statement is limited in scope since it refers to SOME homeowners
The answer is B
who has the final authority ? Can the authors post the answer. This way we will hardly know what the answer is
(B) If Proposition 13 is repealed, every homeowner is likely to experience a substantial increase in property taxes
how is this the correct answer ? how can it be inferred that Prop 13 has saved taxes ? on the contrary the tax is being increased by 2% every year. What if there was another prop that did not intend to increase tax ?
The answer is B.
A,C and E are out of scope.
between B and D, note that B is the answer as D states “identical properties taxed at different rates”, while in the example, both the Identical properties ARE taxed at the same rate(1% of the price).
confused between C & D
printing mistake ——confused between B & C
The answer is definitely E. As you guys have pointed out, A and C are out of scope, because the passage says nothing about whether Proposition 13 is constitutional or whether Proposition 13 is preventing inflation. D is only partially correct. With Proposition 13 in place, identical properties – i.e., properties that cost the same – can be taxed differently, but only if they were bought at different years. Since D doesn’t make the distinction between identical properties bought in the same year vs. bought in different years, D cannot be the right answer. That leaves us with B and E.
There is a reason why B isn’t the right answer. The tax rates under Proposition 13 are calculated using the same formula as that of compound interest; the formula is (1 + r)^kt where r is the percent increase in taxes every year, k is the number of times per year the rate is compounded, and t is the number of years the rate is compounded over. From the question, we know that r is 2% and k is 1. In order to prove that choice B isn’t the answer, we need to find a minimum value for t that would cause the current tax rate to be greater than 3%, the current property tax rate without Proposition 13. After all, finding such a value for t would prove that not every homeowner would benefit from the repealing of Proposition 13 since a homeowner who bought a home >t years ago would be paying a higher property taxes with Proposition 13. It turns out that a t of 56 would cause the current property tax rate to be greater than 3%. As a result, B is wrong.
It’s impossible to solve for t without the use of at least a scientific calculator. But even without a calculator, there is good reason not to pick B. B says that “every homeowner is likely to experience a substantial increase in property taxes”. Every is, what I like to call, a blanket word. Everybody, nobody, all, and none also fall into this category. Choices that contain blanket words are usually not the answer. I believe the reason why is that most actions or policies are unlikely to affect everyone or not affect anyone. Unless it’s spelled out in the critical reading mini-passage that a blanket word applies, one should generally assume that it doesn’t. Since choice B comments on every homeowner, it is most likely not the right answer.
Answer is definitely C.
First of all, Inflation is not out of scope to what is referred.
Reason :Inflation also means progressive increase in prices.
With Proposition 13, if you had bought your house 11 years ago for $75,000, your property tax would be approximately $914 a year increased by 2 percent each year for 11 years), rather than paying $6,000 a year without Proposition 13 .
So buyer who bought before 11 years is benefited and saved thousands of dollars with Proposition 13.
Hence the option C.