With only 5 percent of the world's population, United States citizens

I think the answer is E.

The subject is "United States citizens". If we flip the sentence around it might help.

United States citizens "with" only 5 percent of the world’s population -> wrong
United States citizens "as" only 5 percent of the world’s population -> seems a bit wrong
United States citizens "being" only 5 percent of the world’s population -> strange sentence construction
United States citizens "despite having" only 5 percent of the world’s population -> this would be correct if it was united states instead of citizens
United States citizens "although accounting for" only 5 percent of the world’s population -> citizens can account for 5% so this seems right to me.

What is the OA?

Dear Friends,

Here is a detailed explanation to this question-

Meaning is crucial to solving this problem:
Understanding the intended meaning is key to solving this question; the intended meaning of this sentence is that United States citizens comprise only 5 percent of the world's population, but they consume 28 percent of its nonrenewable resources, drive more than one-third of its automobiles, and use 21 times more water per capita than Europeans do.

Concepts tested here: Meaning

A: The sentence formed by this answer choice alters the meaning of the sentence through the phrase "With only 5 percent of the world's population"; the use of "With" illogically implies that United States citizens posses only 5 percent of the world's population; the intended meaning is that United States citizens comprise only 5 percent of the world's population.

B: The sentence formed by this answer choice alters the meaning of the sentence through the phrase "As only 5 percent of the world's population"; the use of "As" illogically implies that in their role as only 5 percent of the world's population, United States citizens consume 28 percent of its nonrenewable resources, drive more than one-third of its automobiles, and use 21 times more water per capita than Europeans do; the intended meaning is that United States citizens comprise only 5 percent of the world's population, but they consume 28 percent of its nonrenewable resources, drive more than one-third of its automobiles, and use 21 times more water per capita than Europeans do.

C: The sentence formed by this answer choice alters the meaning of the sentence through the phrase "Being only 5 percent of the world's population"; the construction of this phrase incorrectly implies that United States citizens comprise only 5 percent of the world's population, so they consume 28 percent of its nonrenewable resources, drive more than one-third of its automobiles, and use 21 times more water per capita than Europeans do; the intended meaning is that United States citizens comprise only 5 percent of the world's population, but they consume 28 percent of its nonrenewable resources, drive more than one-third of its automobiles, and use 21 times more water per capita than Europeans do.

D: The sentence formed by this answer choice alters the meaning of the sentence through the phrase "Despite having only 5 percent of the world's population"; the use of "having" illogically implies that United States citizens posses only 5 percent of the world's population; the intended meaning is that United States citizens comprise only 5 percent of the world's population.

E: Correct. The sentence formed by this answer choice uses the phrase "Although accounting for only 5 percent of the world's population", conveying the intended meaning - that United States citizens comprise only 5 percent of the world's population, but they consume 28 percent of its nonrenewable resources, drive more than one-third of its automobiles, and use 21 times more water per capita than Europeans do.

Hence, E is the best answer choice.

All the best!
Experts' Global Team

E

read it as - US citizens "with/as/being/having/accounting for" 5% of the world's population...

In addition, the sentense needs to contrast US citizens with other citizens. Thus "although accounting for" is more logically sound.

I have my doubts about E.

"Although" cannot be followed by a noun phrase; it needs a clause.
Thoughts?

Good point here, I remember reading something like this in the Idioms chapter and it made me scan through the MG SC guide again. What's stated there is 'Although' should 'generally' be followed by a clause. Since this is not out and out a strict rule, in the absence of a better answer choice we could ignore this rule. The following statement has been marked 'suspect' in SC guide and not 'wrong': "Although a frequent napper, I study effectively"

I voted for E because the statement needed a contrast, but I still can't figure out why 'As' is wrong. Just like "As a child, I thought I could fly" is correct, why is "As X, United States citizens...." wrong? Can't we use 'As' as a preposition here and isn't X = "Only 5% of the world's population" a noun phrase? I guess I'm missing something silly here...

.

Maybe. But not in E alone, in all choices. You see, the citizens part is not even underlined. But I think the point of this question is whether the modifiers fit in logically with what they seek to modify.

The best choices are obviously C & E. But Why should I choose E over C. Even C is perfectly alright from grammatical point of view

Dear mikemcgarry sir,
How are you?
Would you please help me with this question?

"although accounting for" is correct answer, Why not "although accounted for"? What's the difference between these two?
I think C (being) is wrong, but i can't understand why...

Thanks in advance...

Dear nahid78,

I'm happy to respond.

My friend, with all due respect, you really need to develop a habit of reading. So many of your questions, such as this one, give evidence of your lack of experience with the subtleties of the English language. They are evidence of a mind that has a large knowledge of abstract rules rather than access to direct experience. Rules simply will not get you to SC mastery. This is very important to appreciate. Again, I will recommend:
How to Improve Your GMAT Verbal Score

The short answer to your question is the substitution that you propose makes absolutely no sense.

What we have here is a structure of [subordinating conjunction] + [participle]. Since subordinating conjunctions have to be followed by a full [noun] + [verb] clause, there always has to be an implied pronoun and auxiliary verb as part of this structure. Thus, if we included the omitted text, the OA would be:
Although [they are] accounting for only 5 percent of the world’s population, United States citizens consume . . .
This makes perfect sense. The present participle (the -ing form) is an active participle. This is appropriate, as the US citizens are the ones who "account" for this percent of the planet.
The past participle (the -ed form) is a passive participle. Right away, that's problematic with this verb. The object of the verb structure "to account for" is always a percent or count or number. In the passive structure, this percent, "5% of the world population" would have to be the subject. Having the same subject when we change the verb from active to passive produces nonsense.

Does all this make sense?
Mike

The US citizens themselves ARE (verb "to be") not 5% of the population - citizens cannot BE population, they CONSTITUTE or ACCOUNT FOR 5% of the population. Hence verb "being" (in option C) is wrong.

In country X, women ARE 50% of the population... wrong.
In country X, women CONSTITUTE / ACCOUNT FOR 50% of the population... correct.

Excessive rules aren't needed for solving this question.

The question clearly intends to state that despite the fact the US only comprises 5% of the world's population it does X, Y, and Z.

We need to show this contrast and the only two answer choices that do this are (D) and (E)

(D) is obviously incorrect because how can citizens have a population? The citizens comprise the population!

Hey daagh Sir, You said this back in 2011, and my apologies for that. But, I want to know more about this rule ! It is used extensively in colloquial language, but is it always incorrect to use 'being' as a modifier? and I need to know if this is one thing I definitely need to keep in mind.

Thank You, Have a good one !

Sharat, Hi,

PFA two files on the issue of 'being' in GMAT, one on the theory and two some practice stuff

Hope they help you.
Regards

daagh

Although confused me



Readhere that above is wrong because Although requires two clauses.

One explanation in this question is

E - the only option that has a modifier modifying the correct entity US citzens

dear GMATNinja sir mikemcgarry sir

is the use of BEING is right here?
can we use it as a Participle?

When you're evaluating "being" don't compare it to a checklist of grammar rules that tell you when "being" is acceptable. Rather, ask yourself first if its use is logical, and if it is, whether the version of the sentence with "being" really is the clearest version of all your options.

So you're right that it's technically possible to begin a sentence with "being" as a modifier. (Full disclosure: in the past, I've written that you're very unlikely to see "being" used as a modifier at the beginning of a correct answer on the GMAT. Technically, it is possible, and I've sounded rigid about it in the past, I was wrong to do so.)

The key, though, is to think about the logic of the sentence. If I write, "Being a jerk, Tim..." I'm suggesting that Tim is a jerk. So, it stands to reason that if we see, "Being only 5 percent of the world's population, United States citizens," the writer is conveying that U.S. citizens are 5 percent of the population. But that isn't quite right. U.S. citizens can account for some fraction of a population or comprise some portion of a population, but they're not the percentage itself.

Better yet, the sentence contains a contrast: U.S. citizens comprise a small proportion of the world's population, but they consume way more than 5% of the world's nonrenewable resources and drive way more than 5% of the world's cars. In (E), "although" captures this contrast. But "being" doesn't suggest a contrast at all.

If you see, "Being a jerk, Tim..." you expect to then see an action in which Tim behaves like a jerk! Similarly, if you saw, "Being only 5 percent of the world's population, US citizens," you'd expect an action that was in line with US citizens comprising a small percentage of the world's population. But instead, we get the opposite in (E). That's a problem.

So we can get rid of (C), not because "being" breaks a strict grammar rule, but because the sentence's meaning is problematic.

I hope that helps!