The general availability of high-quality electronic scanners and color printers for computers has made the counterfeiting of checks much easier.In order to deter such counterfeiting, several banks plan to issue to their corporate customers checks that contain dots too small to be accurately duplicated by any electronic scanner currently available; when such checks are scanned and printed, the dots seem to blend together in such a way that the word “VOID” appears on the check.
A questionable assumption of the plan is that
A. in the territory served by the banks the proportion of counterfeit checks that are made using electronic scanners has remained approximately constant over the past few years
B. most counterfeiters who use electronic scanners counterfeit checks only for relatively large amounts of money
C. the smallest dots on the proposed checks cannot be distinguished visually except under strong magnification
D. most corporations served by these banks will not have to pay more for the new checks than for traditional checks
E. the size of the smallest dots that generally available electronic scanners are able to reproduce accurately will not decrease significantly in the near future
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Technological improvements and reduced equipment costs have made converting solar energy directly into electricity far more cost-efficient in the last decade.However, the threshold of economic viability for solar power (that is, the price per barrel to which oil would have to rise in order for new solar power plants to be more economical than new oil-fired power plants) is unchanged at thirty-five dollars.
Which of the following, if true, does most to help explain why the increased cost-efficiency of solar power has not decreased its threshold of economic viability?
A. The cost of oil has fallen dramatically.
B. The reduction in the cost of solar-power equipment has occurred despite increased raw material costs for that equipment.
C. Technological changes have increased the efficiency of oil-fired power plants.
D. Most electricity is generated by coal-fired or nuclear, rather than oil-fired, power plants.
E. When the price of oil increases, reserves of oil not previously worth exploiting become economically viable.
82.(33511-!-item-!-188;#058&007598)
Technological improvements and reduced equipment costs have made converting solar energy directly into electricity far more cost-efficient in the last decade.However, the threshold of economic viability for solar power (that is, the price per barrel to which oil would have to rise in order for new solar power plants to be more economical than new oil-fired power plants) is unchanged at thirty-five dollars.
Which of the following, if true, does most to help explain why the increased cost-efficiency of solar power has not decreased its threshold of economic viability?
A. The cost of oil has fallen dramatically.
B. The reduction in the cost of solar-power equipment has occurred despite increased raw material costs for that equipment.
C. Technological changes have increased the efficiency of oil-fired power plants.
D. Most electricity is generated by coal-fired or nuclear, rather than oil-fired, power plants.
E. When the price of oil increases, reserves of oil not previously worth exploiting become economically viable.