A question about two texts tests how one author would respond to another’s proposal. Start with the question to identify who answers whom, then put each author’s claim and reason in a few words. To qualify a proposal means to accept it only in part or under certain conditions. Ask what limit the responding author would add, using that author’s own reasons. An answer can sound cautious and still fail if its reason isn’t in the text.
Hints
- Hint 1
Start with Ortiz’s last sentence and identify what she wants larger pilots to show.
- Hint 2
In Text 2, look for the caution after the reported results. What does Deshpande think those results might leave out?
- Hint 3
Apply Deshpande’s caution to Ortiz’s proposal. What would an expanded pilot need to test for his concern to be addressed?
Step-by-step
Apply Deshpande’s caution
Step 1Pin down Ortiz’s proposal
Start with how would Deshpande (Text 2) most likely qualify: we’re using Deshpande’s views to judge Ortiz’s plan. What is that plan meant to show? Since earlier participants kept working and paid for training, Ortiz wants longer, broader pilots to convince skeptics that UBI will not undermine labor participation. Her proposal aims to settle doubts about work.
- Step 2
Find the missing effect
What could larger pilots still leave untested? Deshpande says every program so far has been externally funded, while a national UBI would need higher taxes. Those taxes could change people’s willingness to work or start businesses, so the pilots leave out a possible effect of the national policy. The cash payments and the taxes could both change work decisions. More years or a larger region wouldn’t, by itself, test the tax effect.
- Step 3
Name the stance
Deshpande says pilot results may not reliably forecast the outcomes of a tax-funded nationwide policy. Does that make further research pointless? No: he would qualify the proposal by adding a condition, not argue that additional pilots are unnecessary. Neither smaller studies nor the claim about vocational training addresses his reason for doubting the pilots’ results.
- Step 4
Test the proposed fix
An expanded pilot would need to test the payments together with the taxes that fund them to answer Deshpande’s concern. The choice requiring specific tax mechanisms adds that missing part, so researchers can measure work and business decisions under conditions closer to those of a national UBI. Choice C.