Because an oversupply of computer chips has sent prices plunging

Hi,

Because an oversupply of computer chips has sent prices plunging, the manufacturer has announced that it will cut production by closing its factories for two days a month.



I believe most of the people are confused because there has been some gap in understanding the meaning of the sentence. The sentence presents cause and effect. Cause: An oversupply of computer chips has sent prices plunging. Effect: The manufacturer has announced that it will cut production by closing its factories for two days a month.



1) Use of “because” in the beginning of the sentence is correct to show the causal relationship of the first clause with the second.

2) Singular subject “oversupply” agrees in number with singular verb “has sent”. Note, that plural “computer chips” cannot be the subject as it lies in a prepositional phrase “oversupply of computer chips”. Since “oversupply” is the head of this prepositional phrase, it is the subject of the sentence.

3) The present perfect verb “has sent” in the first clause clearly indicates that the cause has already taken place. The present perfect verb “has announced” in the second clause also clearly states that the announcement has been made because of the plunging prices. Thus, there is no error in the sentence.

POE:

A) Because an oversupply of computer chips has sent prices plunging,: Correct. This choice is correct as is as pointed out in sentence analysis.

B) Because of plunging prices for computer chips, which is due to an oversupply: 1) Relative pronoun “which” refers to plural subject “prices”. But the following verb “is” is singular that does not agree in the number with its noun antecedent.
2) This choice is wordy.

C) Because computer chip prices have been sent plunging, which resulted from an oversupply: 1) Reference to “which” is vague. It is not clear whether it refers to the price that was there before plunging or to plunging price.
2) Passive voice unnecessarily makes the choice wordy.

D) Due to plunging computer chip prices from an oversupply: 1) The events here are not presented in the chronological order. The order of the events is: oversupply of chips, plunging prices and announcement by the manufacturer. But this choice states the order as: plunging prices, (due to) oversupply and announcement by the manufacturer. This change in order creates a bit confusion as to what happened first: plunging in prices or oversupply?

E) Due to an oversupply, with the result that computer chip prices have been sent plunging: 1) It is better to say, due to x, y happened rather than due to x what resulted in is y. This expression makes “with the result” redundant.
2) This choice is too wordy.



1. Understand the logical intended meaning of the sentence.
2. Subject and verb must always agree in number.
3. Be vary of choices that are wordy and confusing.
4. Pronouns must have a clear referent.

Hope this helps.
Shraddha

A very very important point to note in the usage of Because of and Due to
Because of - used when the EFFECT is a VERB
eg) The match was postponed because of the rain
Here, in this sentence the effect is a Verb . Hence Eliminate D and E

Due to - when the EFFECT is a Noun
eg) The Postponement of the match was due to the rain

Using POE , u can arrive at A

Hope this helps

Its Ok to use "because" at the beginning of the sentence.

https://www.bartleby.com/64/C001/015.html

because beginning a sentence. “Because I could not stop for Death—/He kindly stopped for me”. So begins one of Emily Dickinson’s most well-known poems, and so falls another of the more arbitrary rules of usage, which states that you should not begin a sentence with because. As Dickinson’s poem attests, there are occasions when because is perfectly appropriate as the opening word of a sentence. In fact, sentences beginning with because are quite common in written English

My 2 cents

GMAT test because of and due to

NOT

Because and Due to

That said, I looked at what made the manufacture cut down on production

OS or Price Plunge. Its the PP

This is clearly a modifier Q and if you ask the Q what is because an oversupply of computer chips has sent prices plunging, the answer is manufacturer cut production. Sentence not only misses of but also sounds as if OS made the manufacturer to cut down production

In D there is no such ambiguity. What is due to the Plunging computer chip prices?

Manufacturer decided to cut down production.

A manufacturer does not have to refer to a person. It will very often refer to a company, and a company is always gender-neutral. So it is the automatic choice of pronoun.

Tata Motor is a company and a manufacturer. But can we call it he or she? Nay.

Secondly, why is the worry about something which is not underlined? Take it as it is and get along. That is the wy to practice GMAT prep.

SnehaC,

The correct pronoun to refer to manufacturers and other inanimate entities (company, book, telephone, government) is "it."

You would only use "he" or "she" with living beings. If the statement said: "The manager told us to fix the problem today or he would fire us" then you would need to use "he."

Regarding your other point: On the GMAT, the antecedent is not optional; the antecedent must be present and unambiguous.

Feel free to write back with other questions!

Brett

"Due to" is correct if it can be replaced by "caused by" and the resulting sentence stil makes sense.

Caused by plunging computer chip prices from an oversupply, the manufacturer has announced that it will cut production by closing its factories for two days a month => does not make sense. we have a dangling modifier.

Crick

Can someone explain something to me?
In answer choice B, why does 'which' modify prices and not computer chips?
I was under the impression that which modifies the word immediately preceding it.

Structure: "Because X did Y, A did B."

Here: "Because [this thing has sent prices plunging], [this other thing has announced blah blah blah]."

It is a well known trivia on GMAT (though this fact is not just limited to GMAT alone:)) that the usage of due to is appropriate when you can substitute due to (literally substitute in the sentence) with caused by.

Just to point out that GMAT usually does not like 'due to'

GMAT Black List

Due to
Like
Being
if (vs. whether)
actually
... etc..

Hope it helps
Cheers!
J

Actually which always modifies the nearest grammatically eligible word preceding it.

B says: which is due to an oversupply...

Because of the presence of is (a singular verb), only singular nouns will be grammatically eligible to be modified by which. But here, there is no singular noun present (plunging prices and computer chips are both plural); hence which actually does not have any noun to modify here.

p.s. Our book SC Nirvana discusses the which and that pronouns, and what they modify, in significant detail. If you can PM you email, I can send you the corresponding section.

Hi warriorsquared,
I don’t know whether you are looking for the reply or not, but here it is anyways.

You are correct in saying that the “which” modifier modifies the preceding noun, but it can also modify a slightly far away noun, depending on the context of the sentence. Let’s see how:

• The sword of the great Tipu Sultan, which was used in the famous battle of Pollilur, resides in the Local Arts Museum.

In the above sentence, the modifier ‘which’ jumps over the prepositional phrase “of the great Tipu Sultan” to modify slightly far away noun ‘the sword’ since the prepositional phrase is modifying the noun “the sword” and hence it cannot be placed anywhere else in the sentence.

Let’s take two more examples:
• The Hindi translation of this book, which was done by a prominent Hindi author, is one of the best Hindi translations till today. (‘which’ modifies ‘The Hindi translation’)


• The English translation of the book, which was originally written in Hindi, was done in 1998. (‘which’ modifies ‘the book’)

To learn more about how a noun modifier can modify a slightly far away noun, please refer to the following link:
noun-modifiers-can-modify-slightly-far-away-noun-135868.html#p1105003

Note that, when there are more than one possible antecedents for a pronoun, then we replace the pronoun by the possible antecedents one by one and check which one of the antecedents makes sense in the sentence.

Now, coming to your question, let’s replace “which” by “plunging prices” and “computer chips”:

• Because of plunging prices for computer chips, which is due to an oversupply, the manufacturer has announced that it will cut production by closing its factories for two days a month.

As we can see, it does not make sense to say “computer chips is due to an oversupply”. So, “which” cannot refer to “computer chips”.
Now, it makes sense to say “plunging prices is due to an oversupply”, but the subject verb pair does not agree in number. So, this is also incorrect. However, now we know that logically “which” can refer to plunging prices.



Hope this helps!
Deepak

Yes, would agree. "caused by" is correct if we can substitute it with "attributable to".

So, D is:

Attributable to plunging computer chip prices from an oversupply, the manufacturer has announced that it will cut production by closing its factories for two days a month.

But manufacturer was not attributable to plunging computer chip prices. That is the reason for D not being correct.

Also, I feel that D is not depicting the meaning properly, because it says "plunging computer chip prices from an oversupply"; oversupply of what? It should be clear "oversupply of computer chips".

I'd request for an experts response on this. I am slightly confused about the tense used in the correct option A.

We have used present perfect in both the clauses to highlight that there is a continued effect. But is it grammatically correct to frame a sentence in the form:
Because present perfect, present perfect?

Posted from my mobile device

Yes, there is nothing wrong is using the sentences like this.

It is trying to convey the meaning that both the plunging of price and the announcement happened at the same time and are still continuing/their effect is still continuing.

So, we should never reject any answer based on the decision point you made above.

what is wrong with D?
in option A,shouldn't "because" be followed by an "of"