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SC. aimed at decreasing operating costs and improving

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SC. aimed at decreasing operating costs and improving

by johnbelieve » Sun Dec 14, 2008 12:39 am
The Baldrick Manufacturing Company has for several years followed a policy aimed at decreasing operating costs and improving the efficiency of its distribution system.
(A) aimed at decreasing operating costs and improving
(B) aimed at the decreasing of operating costs and to improve
(C) aiming at the decreasing of operating costs and improving
(D) the aim of which is the decreasing of operating costs and improving
(E) with the aim to decrease operating costs and to improve
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by johnbelieve » Sun Dec 14, 2008 12:40 am
Here's the OG explantion to this question:

The best choice, A, offers an adjective phraseunequivocally modifying policy and exhibiting grammatical parallelism (decreasing... and improving). In choice B, the gerund the decreasing is not grammatically parallel with the infinitive to improve. Likewise, in C and D, the decreasing of... costs is not parallel with improving the efficiency. In E, the infinitives to decrease and to improve, while parallel, are less idiomatic than the prepositional phrase of decreasing... and improving in modifying the noun aim. Also, with the aim... improve can easily be construed as referring to the Baldrick Manufacturing Company and so does not refer unequivocally to policy.

I have a question about this explantion. OG says "with the aim... improve can easily be construed as referring to the Baldrick Manufacturing Company and so does not refer unequivocally to policy" but I think it is exactly referring to "the company". The latter part of the sentence is " the efficiency of its distribution system." , if we choose A, then the choice is modifying "policy", but obviously its refers to “the company" rather than "policy". So I think E is the better choice.

Plus, "aim to" and "aim at" are both suitable here. This is the explantion from Longman:
(aim)
*to try or intend to achieve something
1.aim to do sth
　 We aim to finish by Friday.
2.(be) aimed at doing sth
　 an initiative aimed at reducing road accidents
*to choose the place, person etc that you want to hit or reach and point a weapon or another object towards them
　 Denver aimed his gun but did not shoot.
aim at/for
　 The pilot was aiming for the runway but came down in a nearby field.

Can someone please explain why A not E? Thank you.
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by ronniecoleman » Sun Dec 14, 2008 4:34 am
with the aim to is too awkward to be true..
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by logitech » Sun Dec 14, 2008 10:26 am
ronniecoleman wrote:with the aim to is too awkward to be true..
When you read a ton of SC questions, you immediately see that WITH THE AIM TO is way wordy to be a correct answer if there is any better option.
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by iamcste » Sun Dec 14, 2008 10:55 am
johnbelieve wrote:Here's the OG explantion to this question:


Can someone please explain why A not E? Thank you.
In E, second "to" ( To improve) is really optional and go for such options in case you do not have any other grammatically correct answer

Second "To" is assumed

Many a times, you are stuck with 2 close optins and in such cases, conciseness play a pivotal role...
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but my question is..

by johnbelieve » Sun Dec 14, 2008 4:18 pm
my question is if the answer if A, what does the "its" refer to in the latter part of the sentence "the efficiency of its distribution system"? It can't mean the "policy" has a distribution system, I guess.
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