Lots of “that” going on this week. Check out our
Topic of the Week, or our
YouTube live webinar on the GMAT’s many uses of “that”.
In this question, we have two different uses of “that” going on. Fun.
Quote:
A. that personal spending in the July-September quarter more than doubled that of
The first "that" is pretty harmless, and just modifies “expectations.” The second that is trying to function as a pronoun – and “that” is always singular when it’s being used as a pronoun, so let’s look for a singular noun it could refer back to. “Personal spending” is singular. So let’s replace “that” with “personal spending”:
Retail sales rose 8/10 of 1% in August, intensifying expectations that personal spending in the July-September quarter more than doubled the personal spending of the 1.4 percent growth rate in personal spending…
Whoa, that’s a steaming pile of nonsense. Eliminate (A).
Quote:
B. that personal spending in the July-September quarter would more than double
Hm, this looks good. “Intensifying expectations that personal spending… would more than double” is perfectly clear, and we don’t have any pronoun issues. Keep (B).
Quote:
C. of personal spending in the July-September quarter, that it more than doubled
I don’t like the “intensifying expectations
of personal spending, but the pronouns are a much bigger issue. “That” looks like a noun modifier – modifying “personal spending in the July-September quarter”, I guess? But then what does “it” refer to? “Personal spending”, I guess? Then we have “intensifying expectations of personal spending, that personal spending more than doubled the 1.4 percent growth rate in personal spending…”
Wow, that’s another pronoun mess. I think we can safely get rid of (C).
Quote:
D. of personal spending in the July-September quarter, more than doubling that of
Same pronoun error as in (A), so (D) is gone.
Quote:
E. of personal spending in the July-September quarter, that it would more than double that of
Same pronoun error as in (A) and (D), so (E) is gone, too.
We’re left with (B). Yay pronouns.
I have a question with C. How did you determine that 'that' in C is being used as a noun modifier ? Could it not have been an article ? If I determine that it's an article, where am I wrong?