请教一道逻辑题

nici37

In 1992, a major newspaper circulated throughout North American paid its reporters an average salary paid by its principle competitors to their reporters. An executive of the newspaper argued that this practice was justified, since any shortfall that might exist in the reporters’ salaries is fully compensated by the valuable training they receive through their assignments.

Which one of the following, if true about the newspaper in 1992, most seriously undermines the justification offered by the executive?

A.    Senior reporters at the newspaper earned as much as reporters of similar stature who worked for the newspaper’s principle competitors.
B.    Most of the newspaper’s reporters had worked there for more than ten years.
C.    The circulation of the newspaper had recently reached a plateau, after it had increased steadily throughout the 1980s.
D.    The union that represented reporters at the newspaper was different from the union that represented reporters at the newspaper’s competitors.
E.    The newspaper was widely read throughout continental Europe and Great Britain as well as North America.

答案是B，但是不明白为什么，题目都有点看不懂是什么意思，请NN解释一下，谢谢！

nici37

还有一题不明：

On a certain day, nine scheduled flights on Swift Airlines were canceled. Ordinarily, a cancellation is due to mechanical problems with the airplane scheduled for a certain flight. However, since it is unlikely that Swift would have the mechanical problems with more than one or two scheduled flights on a single day, some of the nine cancellations were probably due to something else.
The argument depends on which one of the following assumptions?

A.    More than one or two airplanes were scheduled for the nine canceled flights.
B.    Swift Airlines has fewer mechanical problems than do other airlines of the same size.
C.    Each of the canceled flights would have been longer than the average flight on Swift Airlines.
D.    Swift Airlines had never before canceled more than one or two scheduled flights on a single day.
E.    All of the airplanes scheduled for the canceled flights are based at the same airport.