Retail sales rose 8/10 of 1 percent in August, intensifying expectatio

Hello Everyone!

Let's take a look at this question, one problem at a time, to narrow it down to the right choice! First, here is the original question, with the major differences between the options highlighted in orange:

Retail sales rose 8/10 of 1 percent in August, intensifying expectations that personal spending in the July-September quarter more than doubled that of the 1.4 percent growth rate in personal spending for the previous quarter.

A. that personal spending in the July-September quarter more than doubled that of
B. that personal spending in the July-September quarter would more than double
C. of personal spending in the July-September quarter, that it more than doubled
D. of personal spending in the July-September quarter more than doubling that of
E. of personal spending in the July-September quarter, that it would more than double that of

After a quick glance over the options, couple key differences stand out:

1. Beginning with "that" vs. "of" (idiom / meaning)
2. How they end (verb tense / logic / punctuation)

While it's tempting to tackle #1 on our list because it seems simple, let's instead focus on #2: how they end. To narrow this down, let's focus on two main components:

1. Do all of the pronouns have clear antecedents?
2. Does it make logical sense in terms of time?

Let's take a closer look at each option, and rule out the ones that don't work. To make this easier to spot problems, I included the end of the sentence that's not underlined.

A. that personal spending in the July-September quarter more than doubled that of the 1.4 percent growth rate in personal spending for the previous quarter.

This is INCORRECT for two reasons. First, it states that personal spending in the July-September time frame already doubled - but we only have information about August so far. Therefore, this doesn't make logical sense in terms of time. Second, it uses the phrase "that of" without anything for it to refer back to. There are already two items being compared, and they both use the phrase "personal spending." This leaves us with a confusing phrase that isn't tied to anything else!

B. that personal spending in the July-September quarter would more than double the 1.4 percent growth rate in personal spending for the previous quarter.

This is OKAY for now! It uses the phrase "would more than double," which is clearly a prediction about what will happen in the rest of the quarter. There also don't seem to be any issues with pronouns here.

C. of personal spending in the July-September quarter, that it more than doubled the 1.4 percent growth rate in personal spending for the previous quarter.

This option is INCORRECT for a couple reasons. First, this option also assumes that the personal spending rate already doubled, instead of predicting the rate for the rest of the quarter. Second, the pronoun "it" doesn't have a clear antecedent to refer back to - WHO doubled the spending rate? The sentence doesn't actually name anyone, so this "it" pronoun doesn't make sense to use here.

D. of personal spending in the July-September quarter more than doubling that of the 1.4 percent growth rate in personal spending for the previous quarter.

This is INCORRECT for two reasons. First, by saying "more than doubling," the writer is now saying the spending rate has already doubled, which we don't know is going to be true or not. Second, the phrase "that of" isn't necessary - it's not referring back to anything. Both items being compared use the phrase "personal spending," so there's no need for any pronouns.

E. of personal spending in the July-September quarter, that it would more than double that of the 1.4 percent growth rate in personal spending for the previous quarter.

While this option uses the correct "would more than double" to show a prediction, it's still INCORRECT. The phrase "that of" has no clear antecedent. The sentence is comparing personal spending in July-September to personal spending in the previous quarter, and both use the phrase "personal spending," so the pronoun isn't necessary.

Well, there you go - option B is our correct choice! It clearly shows the writer making a prediction about future behavior, and doesn't include any unclear or unnecessary pronouns or phrases!


Don't study for the GMAT. Train for it.

Dear Friends,

Here is a detailed explanation to this question-

Concepts tested here: Pronouns + Tenses + Awkwardness/Redundancy

• The simple future tense is used to refer to actions that will take place in the future.
• The simple past tense is used to refer to events that concluded in the past.

A: This answer choice suffers from a pronoun error, as the pronoun "that", in the phrase "that of the 1.4 percent growth rate", has no logical referent. Further, Option A incorrectly uses the simple past tense verb "doubled" to refer to an action that will take place in the future; please remember, the simple future tense is used to refer to actions that will take place in the future, and the simple past tense is used to refer to events that concluded in the past.

B: Correct. This answer choice avoids the pronoun error seen in Options A, D, and E, as it doe not use "that" as a pronoun. Further, Option B correctly uses the simple future tense verb "would...double" to refer to an action that will take place in the future. Additionally, Option B is free of any awkwardness or redundancy.

C: This answer choice incorrectly uses the simple past tense verb "doubled" to refer to an action that will take place in the future; please remember, the simple future tense is used to refer to actions that will take place in the future, and the simple past tense is used to refer to events that concluded in the past. Further, Option C uses the needlessly indirect construction "expectations of personal spending in the July-September quarter" and the appositive modifier "that it more than doubled", leading to awkwardness.

D: This answer choice suffers from a pronoun error, as the pronoun "that", in the phrase "that of the 1.4 percent growth rate", has no logical referent. Further, Option D uses the needlessly indirect construction "expectations of personal spending in the July-September quarter", leading to awkwardness.

E: This answer choice suffers from a pronoun error, as the pronoun "that", in the phrase "that of the 1.4 percent growth rate", has no logical referent. Further, Option E uses the needlessly indirect construction "expectations of personal spending in the July-September quarter" and the appositive modifier "that it would more than double", leading to awkwardness.

Hence, B is the best answer choice.

To understand the concept of "Simple Tenses" on GMAT, you may want to watch the following video (~1 minute):



All the best!
Experts' Global Team

[quote="td"]Retail sales rose 8/10 of 1 percent in August, intensifying expectations that personal spending in the July-September quarter more than doubled that of the 1.4 percent growth rate in personal spending for the previous quarter.


(A) that personal spending in the July-September quarter more than doubled that of

(B) that personal spending in the July-September quarter would more than double

(C) of personal spending in the July-September quarter, that it more than doubled

(D) of personal spending in the July-September quarter more than doubling that of

(E) of personal spending in the July-September quarter, that it would more than double that of

This question tests the concept of Modifiers, Comparisons and Pronouns.
When we do a vertical scan of the options, we see that Options A and B begin with the relative pronoun ‘that’ and Options C, D, and E begin with the preposition ‘of’.

There is also a comparison in the sentence between the growth rate of personal spending in July-September and the growth rate of personal spending for the previous quarter.

Let us examine the options.
In Option A, there is a pronoun that can only refer to ‘personal spending’, implying that the comparison is between the growth rate of personal spending in July-September and the personal spending of the growth rate of personal spending for the previous quarter.
That just makes it an extremely confusing sentence with no logic at all. There is also a tense error in Option A. The sentence mentions expectations, which are conveyed in the underlined portion of the sentence. But the tense used in the underlined portion is the simple past – doubled. The past tense implies that the action is over but the word ‘expectations’ implies an action that is yet to happen. There is a mismatch between the meaning that is conveyed and the intended meaning. So, Option A can be eliminated.

Options C, D, and E begin with the phrase ‘of personal spending’. “Expectations of personal spending” is not graceful usage. There are also more concrete reasons to rule out these options.
The relative pronoun ‘that’ has been used in Option C. As it is not clear what the pronoun is referring to, the pronoun is ambiguous. To make matters worse, the relative pronoun is followed by another pronoun ‘it’. This increases the ambiguity in the sentence. So, Option C can also be eliminated.

Options D and E repeat the error in Option A. With the use of the pronoun ‘that’ in both the options, the comparison is again illogical. So, Options D and E can also be eliminated.

Option B correctly uses a noun modifier beginning with the relative pronoun ‘that’ to state what the expectations are and also makes the accurate comparison.

Therefore, B is the most appropriate option.

Jayanthi Kumar.

Please do not reveal the OA rightaway. Post the question and give it a day or two. When you come back you would see more hot discussions than you expected.

As for the SC, "that of" and "rate" is redundant. You would want to "that of" when the question is
"...intensifying expectations that the rate of personal spending in X quarter more than doubled than that of the personal spending for the previous quarter..."
So, ADE goes off.

Nevertheless, 'expectations that' needs a "would". So, ACD out.
Only B remains.

My approach:
Clear B

Retails sales rose(cause)............,intensifying expectations(effect).....

It cannot be expectations OF thus C,D,E are straight out. Now we have A & B
-ing form shows the present continuous, thus we need show the result in future tense. In A doubled is in past tense where as in B "would" shows the future tense.

Retail sales rose 8/10 of 1 percent in August, intensifying expectations that personal spending in the July-September quarter more than doubled that of the 1.4 percent growth rate in personal spending for the previous quarter.

Retail sales rose 8/10 of 1 percent in August, intensifying expectations that personal
spending in the July-September quarter more than doubled that of the 1.4 percent growth
rate in personal spending for the previous quarter.
A. that personal spending in the July-September quarter more than doubled that of
B. that personal spending in the July-September quarter would more than double
C. of personal spending in the July-September quarter, that it more than doubled
D. of personal spending in the July-September quarter more than doubling that of
E. of personal spending in the July-September quarter, that it would more than
double that of

B wins

I picked answer B:

A. This answer choice states the verb "doubled" in the simple past tense, but this doesn't make any sense. The reason it doesn't make sense is because we are looking at statistics in August and we are predicting the outcome of the future. Therefore, the use of the simple past tense is incorrect here - it should be the conditional word "would."

B. At first I wasn't sure if this was the correct answer because it seemed to compare personal spending to growth rate. However, after further analysis I realized that you could include "in personal spending" as part of the comparison. This makes more sense. It also uses the conditional "would" to agree with the word "expectation."

C. I was quite confused by the use of "it" because I wasn't sure if it correctly refers to personal spending. However, I noticed that this answer choice uses "doubled" which is the simple past tense of the verb and therefore cannot be correct.

D. By using "that of" in this comparison, it is redundant because "that of" is a pronoun used to replace "personal spending of." If you notice later in the sentence, it repeats the words "personal spending," so this answer cannot be correct.

E. Again, I was unsure about the usage of the pronoun "it" and whether it correctly refers to personal spending. Regardless, I found this answer choice wordy and the use of the relative pronoun "that of" is unnecessary.

Retail sales rose 8/10 of 1 percent in August, intensifying expectations that personal spending in the July-September quarter more than doubled that of the 1.4 percent growth rate in personal spending for the previous quarter.

Hi e-gmat,

Although we can't challenge OG questions, here is my query.

personal spending in the July-September quarter more than doubled that of the 1.4 percent growth rate in personal spending for the previous quarter.

In your video explanation the last line mentioned in the "Meaning analysis" is .

The growth rate in personal spending this quarter would more than double that in personal spending for previous quarter.

However, the sentence states "Personal spending this quarter would more than double 1.4 percent growth rate in personal spending for previous quarter.

My Doubt:

In the official question shouldn't the sentence be as below.

The growth rate in personal spending this quarter would more than double that in personal spending for previous quarter.

How can we estimate personal spending this quarter by doubling(growth rate in personal spending)?????

Hi Saurabh,
Thank you for posting your query here.

Our audio visual solution states that “the personal spending for this quarter is expected to more than double the growth rate of the same (the personal spending) in last quarter”.
So, here we are comparing the growth rate in personal spending in two quarters. This is logical comparison. Now, coming to your question:
• The growth rate in personal spending this quarter would more than double that in personal spending for previous quarter.
This is incorrect because when “that” is used as a demonstrative pronoun it should always be followed by the noun that it refers to. From the above sentence it is not clear what “that” refers to.

Now, we are not estimating the growth rate just by doubling something. The estimates or expectations might be made after a lot of data crunching. Here in the sentence we are only told that the value of this growth rate in the July-September quarter is expected to be double the value of the same thing in the previous quarter.

Also, as you said this is an official question. We should try to learn from them whatever they have to offer.


Hope this helps!
Regards,
Deepak

Despite B is the correct answer, it is illogical.

How can "personal spending" more than double "the percent growth rate in personal spending"? It is illogical to say that a magnitude can double a percent growth rate.

A percent growth rate should be compared against another percent growth rate, and a magnitude (in this example, personal spending) against another magnitude.

There is no comparison between " personal spending" and "growth rate". Please refer to my post just above yours:
retail-sales-rose-8-10-of-1-percent-in-august-intensifying-10546-80.html#p1679613

The subject for the verb "double" is " personal spending". The conveyed meaning is that the personal spending in July-September quarter would be so high that growth rate of personal spensing would be more than 2.8% (i.e. July-September quarter's growth rate > previous quarter's growth rate x 2).

Analogically, say my salary in 2015 was 100 and that in 2016 is 110 (increase of 10%). In 2017 I would get a salary of 133.1 (increase of 21%). Thus my salary in 2017 would more than double the 10% growth rate in my salary for the last year.

Thus option B is logical.

The answer is of course option B. But, I have a doubt and need some expert comments on that.

I eliminated options C, D, and E on the following basis:

...expectations of personal spending...

It's like the personal spending has expectations and those expectations have been intensified. This construction seemed to me quite awkward and I thus eliminated the options. But the official explanation -- (D) Although this option is not technically wrong, it is less clear and graceful than (B) -- doesn't find anything wrong with the construction.

I agree with you. I read somewhere that the explanations in OG are not written by the same experts who write the questions. These experts who write the explanations are not as highly talented as the ones who write the questions. However I cannot confirm the authenticity of this information.

Retail sales rose 8/10 of 1 percent in August, intensifying expectations that personal spending in the July-September quarter more than doubled that of the 1.4 percent growth rate in personal spending for the previous quarter.

A. that personal spending in the July-September quarter more than doubled that of ==> second that refers to "personal spending" which makes the sentence illogical
B. that personal spending in the July-September quarter would more than double ==> Correct
C. of personal spending in the July-September quarter, that it more than doubled ==> incorrect usage of "of personal spending"
D. of personal spending in the July-September quarter, more than doubling that of ==> incorrect usage of "of personal spending"
E. of personal spending in the July-September quarter, that it would more than double that of ==> incorrect usage of "of personal spending"

Hence, Answer is B

Here is the OE from OG 2015:



GMATNinja: Why did OG say that option D isn't technically wrong?

Wow, that's a really interesting official explanation. It pains me to say this, but those explanations are often complete garbage. Often, the questions themselves are written years -- or even decades -- before they're ultimately retired and end up in an OG. So whoever writes the explanations likely has no contact with the people who created the question in the first place. I'm not even sure that the explanation-writers are GMAC employees -- it's possible that they're contracted by Wiley, the publisher, not GMAC.

Anyway... in this case, I completely disagree with the explanation for (D). I don't think there's any justification whatsoever for the use of "that of" here, but maybe I'm missing something.

Oh, it's surprising to hear that OG is a commercial product that helps test takers prepare for the exam. Hence, GMAC shouldn't make any those careless things.