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Conditional Verb - E-gmat

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by sparkles3144 » Tue Feb 24, 2015 5:06 pm
Question: If insurance companies had accurate information, obtainable from genetic tests of the future, then someone who was likely to get ill would pay hundreds of thousands of dollars in premium.

I thought since if clause is in past perfect tense (had), then clause should be would have paid

But the answer is correct as is.

Why is it correct as is?

Please explain.

Thanks!
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Source: — Sentence Correction |

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by [email protected] » Tue Feb 24, 2015 6:49 pm
Hi sparkles3144,

If this is the original sentence that you were given to practice with, then you should know that it's a bit "clunky" and the style does not quite match what you'll see on the Official GMAT.

The sentence describes a 'hypothetical' - IF something occurred (right now), THEN something else WOULD also occur. In this sentence, the verb "had" means "possesses"; it's not a usage of the past-perfect tense.

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by bonetlobo » Wed Feb 25, 2015 4:24 am
Hello Rich, how about this sentence:

If he had gone to New York for higher studies, he would have done well.

Here, is "had gone" past perfect? If yes, then can we say that whether the "if" portion is simple past or past perfect, the second part should have a "would" structure?
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by vina » Thu Feb 26, 2015 5:00 am
It depends on what you want to convey.Look at the following-
1.If I knew the answer, I would reply.-The conditional indicates that I don't know the answer.
2.If I had known the answer,I would have replied.-The conditional indicates that I didn't know the answer.
The above are conditionals.

Now read this-
If I sang,she listened.
The above is a narration of what used to happen along with another happening.
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by Brent@GMATPrepNow » Thu Feb 26, 2015 10:49 am
In general, you need only match up tenses with conditional sentences.

1st conditional:
If (simple present) then simple future
If something happens then something else will happen
EXAMPLES:
If Barb sells her car, then she will buy a scooter.
If you touch Neil's feet, he will cry.

2nd conditional:
If (simple past) then (clause beginning with would)
If something happened then something would happen
EXAMPLES:
If Barb sold her car, then she would buy a scooter.
If you touched Neil's feet, he would cry.

3rd conditional:
If (past perfect) then (clause beginning with would have)
If something had happened then something would have happened
EXAMPLES:
If Barb had sold her car, then she would have bought a scooter.
If you had touched Neil's feet, he would have cried.

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by Brent@GMATPrepNow » Thu Feb 26, 2015 10:53 am
sparkles3144 wrote:Question: If insurance companies had accurate information, obtainable from genetic tests of the future, then someone who was likely to get ill would pay hundreds of thousands of dollars in premium.
In this instance had = possessed

Reworded sentence:
If insurance companies possessed accurate information, obtainable from genetic tests of the future, then someone who was likely to get ill would pay hundreds of thousands of dollars in premium.
possessed is simple past [had is simple past too]
This means we have a 2nd conditional (see my post above for the 3 kinds of conditionals)
So, we need would pay

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by Brent@GMATPrepNow » Thu Feb 26, 2015 11:02 am
bonetlobo wrote:
If he had gone to New York for higher studies, he would have done well.
PERFECT!

had gone is past perfect, which means we have a 3rd conditional.
So, the second half (the "then" part) requires would have

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by bonetlobo » Fri Feb 27, 2015 4:37 am
Thanks Brent. This is very helpful.
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