Q3 - When compact discs first entered the market

[2946739899]

Can anyone help explain why C is the correct answer and what is wrong with B and E?

[ManhattanPrepLSAT1]

Thanks for bringing this one to the forums!

We're told about the introduction of compact discs into the marketplace. Specifically, that when compact discs were first introduced, their price was much higher than vinyl records, but that over time not only did their price come down, but also the price of vinyl records went up.

The question asks us to help explain why the cost of vinyl records went up.

Let's think about why the price of vinyl records might go up before looking at the answer choices. What would make the price of vinyl records go up as people switch their consumption patterns to compact discs? My first thought is that as vinyl records were replaced, production costs would go up since the technology to produce them would be harder and harder to find. Just imagine trying to find a polaroid camera today. It'd doable, I saw one at Urban Outfitters a few months ago. But it cost $300! I assume that's because they're a speciality item these days and the savings associated with mass production no longer exist to pass on to the consumer. The same would be true of vinyl records. Answer choice (C) provides this exact idea.

INCORRECT ANSWERS
(A) might explain high prices for compact discs, but not the rising cost of vinyl records.
(B) suggest that vinyl records were cheaper than compact discs. But this ignores the issue of why vinyl records became more expensive at some point in the process.
(D) is out of scope. This doesn't discuss the rising cost of vinyl records.
(E) ignores the issue of the rising cost of vinyl records. This suggests that the process of switching over to compact discs either took longer than was necessary, or never fully happened. But why people stayed with compact discs is irrelevant to the issue of the rising cost of vinyl records.