The phrase "assume the answer" is correct and usable in written English.
It can be used when suggesting that one should take a particular answer as a given or starting point for further discussion or analysis.
Example: "For the sake of this argument, let's assume the answer is yes, and explore the implications of that decision."
Alternatives: "take for granted the answer" or "presume the answer".
I assume the answer is covering it all up.
In particular, the Oliver Wyman approach appears to assume the answer – which is not an appealing way to conduct research.
He had to assume the answer lay in the new Great Explanation, the politics of "identity liberalism".
Ask for your surgeon's complication rate before your procedure, Dr. Ruggieri suggests — you will have to assume the answer is truthful.
To debate and define absorption capacity is, strictly, to beg the question: ie, to assume the answer that you are pretending to look for.
While many people may assume the answer to that provocative and unsettling question is zero, the creators of a new Web site want to demonstrate how forced labor, especially overseas, is tantamount to slavery.
If you just assume the answers to these questions and don't agree, don't be surprised if people aren't happy with the outcome.
Such has been Mr Uribe's sway over his country's institutions that many pundits assumed the answer was yes.
When scientists set out to study whether this could be countered by chewing gum, they assumed the answer would be no.
In contrast, the Oxford Economics report assumes the answer that the Clearing House has long offered — that funding costs for banks would increase and by a significant amount (see the equation Oxford Economics uses on Page 8).
The problem is that while the debate proceeds, the bill assumes the answer: it would hold employers liable for the "lingering effects of past discrimination" — "pay disparities" that have been "spread and perpetuated through commerce".
