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In the five most important battleground states –

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In the five most important battleground states –

by aditya8062 » Sun Aug 31, 2014 11:08 pm
In the five most important battleground states - New York, California, Illinois, Ohio, and Massachusetts - Democrats reported $48.7 million in cash on hand, compared to the Republicans, who reported $35 million.

A)compared to the Republicans, who reported $35 million

B)in comparison to the Republicans, with $35 million

C)compared with $35 million for the Republicans

D)compared with the reporting of the Republicans of $35 million

E)in comparison to the Republicans' report of having $35 million

my doubt: what makes A wrong ?
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by [email protected] » Mon Sep 01, 2014 12:17 pm
Hi aditya8062,

This SC is based on Comparison rules (the word "compared" in the prompt is a rather big clue). The style is a bit "quirky" though and I bet that many Test Takers would choose Answer A.

To present a proper comparison, you MUST compare LIKE things. In this SC, we're ultimately comparing CASH held by Democrats to CASH held by Republicans (we're NOT comparing Democrats to Republicans).

Answer A compares CASH to REPUBLICANS, which is not a valid comparison.

Only the correct answer compares cash to cash.

Final Answer: C

This is a relatively rare issue on the GMAT. Usually, when a comparison is presented, it's almost always presented in strict Parallel format. In rare cases though, it's not.

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by Uva@90 » Mon Sep 01, 2014 7:56 pm
[email protected] wrote:Hi aditya8062,

This SC is based on Comparison rules (the word "compared" in the prompt is a rather big clue). The style is a bit "quirky" though and I bet that many Test Takers would choose Answer A.

To present a proper comparison, you MUST compare LIKE things. In this SC, we're ultimately comparing CASH held by Democrats to CASH held by Republicans (we're NOT comparing Democrats to Republicans).

Answer A compares CASH to REPUBLICANS, which is not a valid comparison.

Only the correct answer compares cash to cash.

Final Answer: C

This is a relatively rare issue on the GMAT. Usually, when a comparison is presented, it's almost always presented in strict Parallel format. In rare cases though, it's not.

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Rich
Hi Rich,

Initially after seeing the question I understood that it test the comparison rule.
I understood that "Democrats report of cash" is compared with "Republican's report of cash".
So I went for Option E.

Rich, Why I can't take the above comparison instead of what you mentioned(comparing cash) ? Can you explain me this ?

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Uva.
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by [email protected] » Mon Sep 01, 2014 8:31 pm
Hi Uva,

Answer E has an immediate problem: the phrase "the Republican's report" is a noun which does not properly parallel anything in the first part of the sentence:

It doesn't parallel Democrats (you can't compare a report to a group of people)
It doesn't parallel the the verb "reported" (you can't compare a report to a verb)
It doesn't parallel the money (you can't compare a report to money)

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by Uva@90 » Mon Sep 01, 2014 8:43 pm
[email protected] wrote:Hi Uva,

Answer E has an immediate problem: the phrase "the Republican's report" is a noun which does not properly parallel anything in the first part of the sentence:

It doesn't parallel Democrats (you can't compare a report to a group of people)
It doesn't parallel the the verb "reported" (you can't compare a report to a verb)
It doesn't parallel the money (you can't compare a report to money)

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Thanks Rich,

I got it now. You made it easy for me :)

Regards,
Uva.
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by conquistador » Tue Nov 10, 2015 4:29 am
Hello Rich,

In the five most important battleground states - New York, California, Illinois, Ohio, and Massachusetts - Democrats reported $48.7 million in cash on hand, compared to the Republicans, who reported $35 million.

In the OA
C)compared with $35 million for the Republicans

Is the usage for the republicans correct?
I feel this deviated the intended meaning and chose E.
Please explain?
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by Jim@StratusPrep » Tue Nov 10, 2015 7:51 am
Comparison all the way. You need to compare what the Democrats reported to what the Republicans reported.


Whenever you see words that are comparison related make sure that you compare nouns to nouns and verbs to verbs. This is an easy way to eliminate answers right away.
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by manihar.sidharth » Wed Feb 17, 2016 1:39 pm
I am still not clear why is the cash being compared here.
I guess the thing that should be compared should be democrats reported X to republicans reported Y
Clause <comparision> Clause.

Can anybody shed more light on this one.
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by thang » Tue Mar 15, 2016 7:39 am
sc tests logic/meaning
in this question, sc test our ability to realize which can campare with which.
in our real world , which thing can compare with which thing depends on our sense of this real world.

depending on context of the sentence we can realize the 2 "like " things which can be compared.
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by jain2016 » Wed Mar 16, 2016 9:40 am
Hi Experts ,

Can you please explain the use of COMMA + WHO is right in option or not?

Please explain.

Many thanks in advance.

SJ
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by DavidG@VeritasPrep » Sat Mar 19, 2016 4:45 am
jain2016 wrote:Hi Experts ,

Can you please explain the use of COMMA + WHO is right in option or not?

Please explain.

Many thanks in advance.

SJ
Who is a relative pronoun, and it functions in a similar manner to that/which. Typically, when "who" follows a comma, it will be nonrestrictive, and so is not essential to the meaning of whatever it modifies.

The Republicans, who received large campaign contributions, won many Senate seats. Here, I'm writing about Republicans in general. The gist of the sentence can be conveyed without the modifier: The Republicans won many Senate seats.

Now look at that same sentence without the comma: The Republicans who received large campaign contributions won many Senate seats. Now I'm talking about a particular subset of Republicans - those who received large campaign contributions, implying that there are other Republicans who did not receive large campaign contributions. In this case, "who received large campaign contributions" is a restrictive modifier, and is essential to describe which Republicans I'm referring to.
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