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100 points for $49 worth of Veritas practice GMATs FREE VERITAS PRACTICE GMAT EXAMS Earn 10 Points Per Post Earn 10 Points Per Thanks Earn 10 Points Per Upvote ## Twice as fast as ##### This topic has 1 expert reply and 3 member replies ## Twice as fast as 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 Junior | Next Rank: 30 Posts Joined 29 Jul 2011 Posted: 14 messages Followed by: 1 members IMO B ### GMAT/MBA Expert MBA Admissions Consultant Joined 11 Nov 2011 Posted: 2278 messages Followed by: 266 members Upvotes: 660 GMAT Score: 770 The answer is actually C. The rate cannot be fast. _________________ GMAT Answers provides a world class adaptive learning platform. -- Push button course navigation to simplify planning -- Daily assignments to fit your exam timeline -- Organized review that is tailored based on your abiility -- 1,000s of unique GMAT questions -- 100s of handwritten 'digital flip books' for OG questions -- 100% Free Trial and less than$20 per month after.
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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

Junior | Next Rank: 30 Posts
Joined
03 Jan 2013
Posted:
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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". http://www.beatthegmat.com/twice-as-many-vs-double-the-figure-t64683.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?

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