Sentence Correction

gracezz wrote:Hi everyone, i don't understand why E is better than B, i think E should be than their parents and grandparents did...rather than use the verb had...
Would anybody pls help me out with this one?
thank you..

Same doubt , tried reasoning it

between the two options B and E the diff is only the use of had at the end.

The comparison is between the work culture of today's youth and the older generation during their work life. If the older generation was still working there will not be a collapse of the work ethic.

akhp77 wrote:Here, you can say, D is better among five.

guess that's the only way to rule out B then...still wondering why "had" is used instead of "did" though..

I wondered the same thing and I originally chose B. However, it should be d. Here is why - "had" means past perfect. It refers to an action that happened further back in the past. In this sentence, young people's commitment is being compared to the previous commitment of their parents and grandparents. We are not comparing the current commitment of parents and grand parents, but the commitment that they once had. The latter part of the sentence talks about the source of the change. This is our hint to pick past tense. Change can only be documented if we are comparing an action in the past with one in the present. What kind of change would there be if both of the actions occurred at the same time? This is why "had" is needed. I hope this helps, even just a little.

lunarpower wrote:the biggest problem with (c) is "that of", which is not actually parallel to anything at all.

if you write "that of their parents and grandparents", then this MUST be parallel to one of the following two types of constructions:
* another OF construction (the commitment of young people)
* a POSSESSIVE construction (young people's commitment)

since neither of these constructions appears in the first part of the sentence, you can't use "that of" in the second part.

I have a doubt applying above rule to below question(OG12, Q-43)

Laos has a land area about the same as Great Britain but only four million in population, where many are members of hill tribes ensconced in the virtually inaccessible mountain valleys of the north.
Correct answer says:
E. comparable to that of Great Britain but a population of only four million people, many of whom

I am not posting all other options as the answer E is quite obvious than rest of the choices. My doubt is on the application of this rule to this new problem.

Here, we don't have either 'another OF construction' or 'a POSSESSIVE construction'. How do we justify "THAT OF" here. I think we need to add some more rules now to this list. Ron - please help.

gracezz wrote:Hi everyone, i don't understand why D is better than B, i think E should be than their parents and grandparents did...rather than use the verb had...

Would anybody pls help me out with this one?

thank you..

I'm just taking a shot at this one, but I think 'D' is preferable because of the parallelism between "young people HAVE..." and "...their parents and grandparents HAD"

Pedros wrote:There is a widespread belief in the United States and Western Europe that young people have a smaller commitment to work and a career than their parents and grandparents and that the source of the change lies in the collapse of the "work ethic."

(A) a smaller commitment to work and a career than their parents and grandparents
(B) less of a commitment to work and a career than their parents and grandparents
(C) a smaller commitment to work and a career than that of their parents and grandparents
(D) less of a commitment to work and a career than their parents and grandparents had
(E) a lessening of the commitment to work and a career that their parents and grandparents had

Regardless to smaller & less of , is the parallelism structure correct in C ?

OA is D

the ST here is to compare young people with their parents or grandparents thus we need "had"
after " than their parents and grandparents" thus elimilate A, B, C
i chose D just because a lessening of the commitment to word is so wordy

C is wrong because of the ||ism. We are comparing goals what young have and goals what elder had. 'Have' is actually non-underlined part of the sentence, but we must have 'had' for the comparison. Here 'had' is used as past tense of 'to have'.

We do not need did. Did and Had two different meanings.

Did means you done something/some action in past.
Had means you possessed something in the past.

In this sentence A, B and C are out because they lack verb 'had'. Out of D and E, in E 'a lessening of' is not correct. Therefore, E is out.

Answer is D.

I narrowed it down to B and D and chose B, because I thought that "had" implies the grandparents no longer have the work ethic. Are we to assume that because it states "young people" and the grandparents are no longer "young" that the committment of the grandparents occurred in the past?

Hi Mitch /Marty:

The discussion here about 'C Vs D' is anything but conclusive. Pls could you throw some light on why D is better?

Thnks!