PrepTest 113 · Section 3 · Question 11

Nadia's Bracelet Business

Nadia ran a bracelet table at the school fair. Last spring she switched from wooden beads to plastic ones. Plastic beads were faster to string, and one bag made twice as many bracelets. But soon customers came back with sad faces. The plastic bracelets snapped. Owen frowned. "Wooden beads never broke. Why not switch back?" Nadia kept using plastic anyway. Owen was baffled until Priya peeked at Nadia's workbench. There was a spool of thick thread from Aunt Rosa's sewing box. "After a few weeks I found out," Nadia said, "that if I double-knot the string with this extra thread, the plastic bracelets stop breaking." Owen grinned. "So you keep the speed and fix the snapping. Mystery solved."

Nadia switched from wooden to plastic beads because plastic bracelets are quicker to make and one bag makes more of them. Soon after, her bracelets started snapping. Yet she kept using plastic beads, even though she could have gone back to wood.

Which one of the following, if it were true, would best account for Nadia's decision to keep using plastic beads?

The Case of the Squeaky Wheels

The bus company was sued for keeping cheap plastic wheels on its school buses after they began squeaking loudly. Attorney Grant thundered, "Rubber wheels were available! Why keep the noisy ones?" Mr. Whitfield called the head mechanic. "Tell us what happened after the squeaking began." The mechanic smiled. "We learned that a few drops of a common oil, which we already keep in the garage, stop the squeak completely." Mr. Whitfield turned to the jury. "The plastic wheels last longer and cost less. The squeak was real, but fixable. Keeping the wheels was not foolish. It was smart." The judge marked the puzzle solved.