Twice as fast as

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Twice as fast as

by neeti2711 » Sat Dec 08, 2012 2:13 am
In the 1980's the rate of increase of the minority population of the United States was nearly twice as fast as the 1970's.

(A) twice as fast as

(B) twice as fast as it was in

(C) twice what it was in

(D) two times faster than that of

(E) two times greater than

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by rami26 » Sat Dec 08, 2012 2:20 am
IMO B

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by Jim@StratusPrep » Sun Feb 17, 2013 8:45 am
The answer is actually C. The rate cannot be fast.
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by aditya8062 » Tue Feb 19, 2013 11:51 pm
though i picked C and i have read that "rate" cannot be "fast" but i want to understand what is the logic behind this .i have read that "height" cannot be "high" and similarly "rate" cannot be "fast"
i want to understand the logic so that all this comes naturally to me
thanks and regards

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by wondering_too » Wed Feb 20, 2013 12:15 am
It was tricky - I have chosen "E" for the first time.

A, B, D are eliminated by obvious reasons.
We are left with C and E.

I remember the very similar question from MGMAT, where "double the figure" was preferred over "double what it was". https://www.beatthegmat.com/twice-as-man ... 64683.html

So I remembered that "what it was" is worse, and voted for E.

Looking more closely at the options, now I see the difference:

C: twice what it was in the 1970's.
(which is parallel to the In the 1980's in the very beginning of the phrase).

E: two times greater than the 1970's.
Here we mean that the 1970's = the 1970's rate, i.e. the rate of the year 1970.
This is not parallel, changes the meaning (single year 1970 instead of 1970's) and contains another error - the year can not be in a posessive form.

Sigh. Spent twenty seconds and got it wrong. Need to be more careful...

Can I ask, what is the source of the question?