If the proposed expenditures for gathering information abroad are redu

This Question is part of Question Pack 1

If the proposed expenditures for gathering information abroad are reduced even further, international news reports have been and will continue to diminish in number and quality.

(A) have been and will continue to diminish -> Will continue to diminish provides a sense that they are diminishing already. Have been is not required.
Have been diminishing -> is the correct construction. Diminishing can be ellipsed when "diminishing" is used somewhere else in the sentence

(B) have and will continue to diminish -> Will continue to diminish provides a sense that they are diminishing already. Have been is not required.
have diminished -> "Diminished" can be ellipsed when "diminished" is already used somewhere else in the sentence

(C) will continue to diminish, as they already did, -> Will continue to diminish provides a sense that they are diminishing already. Past tense is not required
(D) will continue to diminish, as they have already, -> Will continue to diminish provides a sense that they are diminishing already. Present perfect tense is not required as continue provides the required context.

(E) will continue to diminish -> Correct.

E keeps it simple. The others are too wordy. Will continue implies they are already diminishing, hence the reasons "have been" and "already have" are not needed.

IMO this question is If then conditional type of question in which few set rules follow

if {present clause}, then {present / future clause} ; no need to add past,and past perfect tenses.

So only option E follows it clearly.

R.

Here's the official explanation provided by the GMAC for this question:

This sentence is based on the conditional construction if x happens, then y will happen. In this case, x is proposed expenditures and the present-tense verb is are reduced; y is news reports, but the verb is incorrect. The construction calls for a verb in the future tense, will continue to diminish.

Option A: Have been is the wrong verb tense; the construction is also not grammatical

Option B: Have is the wrong verb tense; the construction is also not grammatical

Option C: As they already did is awkward and redundant; continue expresses this idea

Option D: As they have already is awkward and redundant; continue expresses this idea

Option E: Correct. Will continue to diminish provides the correct future-tense verb for the conditional construction in this sentence.

The correct answer is E.

Please note that I'm not the author of this explanation. I'm just posting it here since I believe it can help the community.

If the proposed expenditures for gathering information abroad are reduced even further, international news reports have been and will continue to diminish in number and quality.


(A) have been and will continue to diminish
Tense error. For specific truth, the “if” clause uses the verb in the present tense and the effect clause uses the verb in the future tense- “will”. Eliminate.

(B) have and will continue to diminish
Same as A. Eliminate.

(C) will continue to diminish, as they already did,
“They” refers to reports or expenditures. Ambiguous. Eliminate.

(D) will continue to diminish, as they have already,
Same as C. Eliminate

(E) will continue to diminish
Correct.
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AjiteshArun
sir please explain the option C part "as they already did" why this construction is wrong here.
here did is referred to which entity.

Hello saby1410,

We hope this finds you well.

Having gone through the question and your query, we believe we can answer your doubt.

In Option C, the use of "as they already did" alongside "continue" is redundant, as "continue" succinctly conveys that the news reports have been diminishing.

We hope this helps.
All the best!
Experts' Global Team
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Hello GMATNinja, egmat, KarishmaB, AjiteshArun

Could you please help with this question.

Regards,
Niyati

Hi niyatisuri,

It's impossible to finish the verb have been in option A and the verb have in option B. For example, we can't say something like "She has and will continue to take risks" (she has... what?). Options C and D attach unnecessary as-clauses to will continue to diminish.

Another way to solve this question is to focus on finding the most efficient option. Option E uses will continue, and that phrase is enough. For example, "She will continue to take risks" is better than "She has taken risks and will continue to take risks", because the word continue means that the thing we're looking at happened in the past as well (otherwise, how could she keep taking risks?).

Similarly, in this question, there's no need to use either have or did, because will continue means that the diminishing has been going on. That's the only way international news reports can continue to diminish in number and quality.
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The intent of the sentence is to tell us that if the proposed expenditures are reduced even further (which means that they have been reducing in the recent past), international reports will continue to diminish in number and quality (which also means that they have been diminishing in number of quality in the recent past).

So there is no need to mention it explicitly. It will be redundant. Just like the 'if clause' implies it already, such a 'then clause' implies it too.

Since every option other than (E) has "will continue to diminish" and then something, they all have redundancy.

Also, the standard structure for first conditionals is: If A happens, B will happen (predictive conditionals).

This is exactly what is used in (E). Hence (E) is the best.

For structure of various conditionals, check: https://anaprep.com/sentence-correction ... ditionals/
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