How many activities in the social services are there where the expenditure has…
2012
How many activities in the social services are there where the expenditure has been less than 5 percent of the total expenditures incurred on the social services in 2008-09 ?
Answer: D. All nine activities — Concept — When the caption of a data table already fixes the unit of every cell, each entry is read in that unit as it stands, so a "less than X per cent"…
- A.
One
- B.
Three
- C.
Five
- D.
All nine activities
Show answer & explanation
Correct answer: D
Concept — When the caption of a data table already fixes the unit of every cell, each entry is read in that unit as it stands, so a "less than X per cent" test becomes a direct comparison of each entry with the number X on the very same scale, with no conversion in between. Fixing the scale from the caption is therefore the first move in any percentage-share table question, because the same figure means different things on different bases.
Application — The caption of this table reads "Government Expenditures on Social Services (As percent of total expenditure)", so every figure inside the table is already an expenditure written as a percentage of total government expenditure. For 2008-09 the nine social-service activities carry these entries:
Activity | Expenditure in 2008-09 (% of total expenditure) |
|---|---|
(a) Education, sports & youth affairs | 4.04 |
(b) Health & family welfare | 1.91 |
(c) Water supply, housing, etc. | 2.31 |
(d) Information & broadcasting | 0.22 |
(e) Welfare to SC/ST & OBC | 0.35 |
(f) Labour and employment | 0.27 |
(g) Social welfare & nutrition | 0.72 |
(h) North-eastern areas | 1.56 |
(i) Other social services | 1.55 |
The largest of those nine entries is 4.04, for education, sports and youth affairs, and 4.04 is already smaller than 5. Every other activity is smaller still, the smallest being 0.22 for information and broadcasting, so not a single activity reaches the 5 per cent mark on this scale.
Cross-check — Adding the nine components gives 4.04 + 1.91 + 2.31 + 0.22 + 0.35 + 0.27 + 0.72 + 1.56 + 1.55 = 12.93, which matches the "Social Services" line of 12.94 for 2008-09 to within rounding. That confirms the nine rows are the complete break-up of the social-services line and are stated on the same percentage-of-total-expenditure scale, so comparing each of them with 5 is legitimate.
Result — Every one of the nine listed activities lies below 5 per cent of total expenditure in 2008-09, so the count asked for covers all of them.
Note on the wording — If the 5 per cent were instead taken of the social-services total itself, the threshold would be 0.05 x 12.94 = 0.647, and only information and broadcasting (0.22), welfare to SC/ST and OBC (0.35) and labour and employment (0.27) would fall below it. The official UGC NET answer key for this paper follows the first reading, in which the table’s own "percent of total expenditure" figures are compared directly with 5.