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Free GMAT Graphics Interpretation Practice Question

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Tonnage by facility, split across landfill, recycling, compost, thousand tonnesThree stacked bars, one per facility; each bar has three segments: landfill, recycling, compost.0551101652202752103010Facility 1144214Facility 21245026Facility 3Tonnage (thousand tonnes)LandfillRecyclingCompost

The stacked bar chart below shows, for three waste-processing facilities (Facility 1, Facility 2, and Facility 3), last month's tonnage handled split across three streams: landfill, recycling, and compost, in thousands of tonnes. Each bar is divided into three stacked segments, one per stream. Select from each drop-down menu to complete the statement so that it is most accurate according to the data shown.

The facility for which recycling made up the largest share of its own total tonnage was , and for that facility recycling made up about of its tonnage.

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Answer & Explanation

Correct answer

1: Facility 2 · 2: 60 percent

Each facility's bar stacks three streams, and the question asks for the facility where recycling is the largest share of that facility's own tonnage. The word that does the work is share: it is not the biggest recycling band, and it is not the tallest bar, but recycling divided by that facility's own total.

Take each facility's recycling segment over its own stack. Facility 1 has 30 recycling out of a total of 250, only 12 percent. Facility 2 has 42 recycling out of a total of just 70, which is 60 percent, well over half its tonnage. Facility 3 has the biggest recycling band of all, 50, but its bar is large, 200 total, so recycling is only 25 percent of it. So recycling is the largest share for Facility 2, at 60 percent.

The trap comes in two flavors. Facility 1 has the tallest bar, so the eye reads it as the biggest in everything. Facility 3 has the single tallest recycling band, so it looks like the recycling leader. But a tall recycling band inside an even taller bar is a small share, while Facility 2's shorter recycling band fills most of its small bar. A share compares a part to its own whole, so divide each recycling segment by its own facility's total before deciding, and the small facility with the recycling-heavy mix, Facility 2, wins.