PT48, S4, Q16 Economist: A tax is effective if it raises

[bbirdwell]

16. (C)
Question Type: Application: Choose an Example to Illustrate a Principle
This argument can be boiled down to two conditional statements:
1. Raise revenue & burden only and all those targeted ? effective
2. Do not raise revenue & cost significant $ to enforce ? ineffective
Our task is to find an answer choice that matches one of the two statements (or their contrapositives).

Answer choice (C) does this best. The tax on gas costs significant money to enforce _ this is on the left side of statement 2. Therefore, if it does not raise revenue (the other half of the left side of statement 2), then it is ineffective (the right side of statement 2).

(A) is incorrect because it mentions a tax that burdens "most, but not all."
(B) is incorrect because the tax raises a modest amount of revenue, thus it does not qualify as ineffective.
(D) is incorrect because it does not mention revenue.
(E) is incorrect because the tax does not cost significant money to enforce.