Each year Americans buy a record number of new books from retail bookstores and online retailers. Despite these robust book sales, the average American reads fewer books each year than the year before.

Each of the following, if true, could explain the simultaneous increase in book sales and decrease in the number of books Americans read EXCEPT:

Answer Choices

Correct answer marked below

During this year, the number of nonfiction books that Americans read increased faster than the number of novels read decreased.

Correct

The number of books borrowed from public libraries decreased by 30% in the last ten years.

Historically, Americans have read more than two-thirds of the books they purchased, but recently that number has dropped to less than forty percent.

More Americans have their own personal libraries of books today than in the past and therefore choose to purchase a book rather than to borrow it from a friend.

More books are available at a discount today, from bargain booksell ers and online retailers, than at any time in the past

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What this question tests

What it tests

Whether you can explain an apparent contradiction in a way that makes both facts true.

Common trap

Picking an option that explains one side of the paradox while making the other side false.