Official Guide Explanation:
Data Sufficiency #49

Background

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Solution and Metadata

Question: 49
Page: 277
Difficulty: 4 (Moderately Easy)
Category 1: Algebra > Inequalities > other

Explanation: To answer the question, we'll need some point of comparison among the variables a, b, c, and d to tell us more about x and y.

Statement (1) is insufficient. If, for instance, a = 1 and c = 2, x could still be bigger than y--we don't know anything about the upper limits of those numbers.

Statement (2) is sufficient. If b is less than c we can link to the two sets of inequalities together:

a < xIf y is greater than c, which is greater than b, which is greater than x, y must be greater than x. Choice (B) is correct.

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