On what basis can you cross-reference the charts in this way? The pie chart is not broken out by age; it is only showing the percentage breakdown by practice areas for *all* members in 2015.

So that 7% of members in Intellectual Property (IP) could be spread out across the age groups in any number of ways...

If in reality only 6.3% of the Under 30 group are in IP (and maybe ~8% in the Over 70 group), then there are about 10,395 members Under 30 in IP. Multiplied by 0.74 is 7,692 in Copyright, 4,250 of which are female, leaving about 3,442 Males Under 30 in Copyright in 2015, making the 'correct' answer A...

The slightly lower percentage of those in IP in the Under 30 group is offset by slightly more people in the Over 70 group, such that it would still be true that 7% of all members in 2015 are in IP (and we can easily imagine that slightly more than 6% of the Under 30 would be in, say, Family law, offset by slightly fewer in Over 70). I believe it is true to say that this would not change the charts or any of the numbers in the question...

So too with the next question: "Approximately how many lawyers aged 51-60 specialized in tax law in 2015?"
How can this be answered if we can't cross-reference the charts?

What am I missing? Can I somehow assume that the pie chart applies simultaneously to the 2015 membership as a whole, as well as each age bracket individually...as well as for each gender of each age group? Seems like quite a leap...

Sorry if I'm just being derpy. Thanks for any guidance!

Intellectual property law can be subdivided into two categories: industrial property law and copyright law.
industrial property: 0.07*0.26*(175000)=3185
copyright law: 0.07*175000-3185=9065

So, 9065-4,250 (female intellectual property lawyers)=4815≈5000

Thank you, but you're still making an unjustifiable assumption... How are you concluding that 7% of those Under 30 are in IP?

You might be tempted to say ~"well, duh, just look at the pie chart". But what you're doing there is taking the 7% of *all members* shown in the pie chart and applying that to *just those Under 30*. What if those 7% are almost all in the 51-60 age bracket?

To illustrate, the following numbers are consistent with the question and charts:
- There are 5,743 people Under 30 who are in IP (and there are disproportionately more in other age groups, meaning 7% of *all members* are still in IP...)
- *All* of them are female.
- 1,493 of Under 30s in IP specialize in industrial property law (this is the 26% referenced by the question).
- 4,250 of Under 30s in IP specialize in copyright (consistent with question; this is the other 74%).
- This would make the 'correct answer': 0. There are 0 males Under 30 who are in copyright law (because all of the males Under 30 are in other practice areas, like Tax).
- Or if you like, we could come up with very different numbers that would also be consistent; the question cannot be answered...

Not to beat a dead horse, but please don't make the mistake of saying, "no, you're wrong, there are 12,250 people Under 30 who are in IP, because 175,000 * 0.07 = 12,250...; and we can see that some of them are male because the line chart indicates that..."

Not necessarily; and no you can't. Unless there is something I'm missing (entirely possible!), the pie chart simply cannot be assumed to apply to every age group individually.

I fully understood what you said and meant.

However, I took a quick search and the graph is literally taken from a US official Gov Department or Minister.

I think we should only try to solve the question we have in front of us. ETS does in most charts the same, maybe variate them a bit.

We do have a certain number on M+F <30 and this category is the 7% of the total employees.

That's is enough for me.

I must solve a question to have a good score during a timed exam. I go on an automatic pilot, sort of.

Probably your assumption is correct. However, it is out of my radar

Regards

Thank you for your thoughts Carcass. I appreciate the point you're making. I still think it's a terrible question, but you're certainly right that what ultimately matters is getting the questions correct.

Best,
Chris

Usually if you don't have a clarification or a question answer that says (cannot be determined), it's fair to average it out across the total. You'd do the same with any data distribution. You'd often be asked to draw assumptions based on incomplete data and averaging is always fair game. So if there are 7% in IP and you don't have any further breakdown data (or clarifications) other than age groups, distribute it evenly. Hope that helps.