A recent court decision has qualified a 1998 ruling that workers canno

Question

A recent court decision has qualified a 1998 ruling that workers cannot be laid off  if they have been given reason to believe that their jobs will  be safe, provided that their performance remains satisfactory.

(A) if they have been given reason to believe that their jobs will

(B) if they are given reason for believing that their jobs would still

(C) having been given reason for believing that their jobs would

(D) having been given reason to believe their jobs to

(E) given reason to believe that their jobs will still

ratsvijay · Answer

GMATNinja  A lot has been said about conditionals here, and i got all the rules.
 What i am not able to do that is identify XXX and YYY in the structure If XXX, then YYY

GMATNinja · Answer

This is a good reminder that language is fluid - you don't want to be so rigid in your expectations that a simple structural change ruins your ability to tackle a question.

Typically, the If/then structure will contain the "if" clause first. For example, "If I forget to wear pants to the opera, my wife will pretend she does not know me." But it's perfectly legitimate to flip the order and write, "My wife will pretend she does not know me if I forget to wear pants to the opera."

The same is true in the OA for this question. The "then" clause comes first: "Workers cannot be laid off if they have been given reason to believe that their jobs will be safe." This is, for all intents and purposes, the same as "If they have been given reason to believe that their jobs will be safe, workers cannot be laid off."

The takeaway: do not try to memorize dozens and dozens of structures and then expect to see those structures in a form that resembles what you memorized! Yes, some rules are worth internalizing, but ultimately, you need to use context and logic, while remaining flexible enough to adapt to a variety of scenarios. Some related ideas can be found in  this article .

I hope that helps!

Dvaishnav · Answer

This is a conditional statement. The intended meaning is to say that IF workers have been assured that their job is safe, THEN they can not be fired. Hence, we need IF statement. Hence, C, D, and E are out.

I also noticed a split: "for believing" or "to believe". The correct idiom is to use an indicative form of the verb when the intention is to show a purpose or reasoning. Hence, "reason to believe" is correct. Hence, B is also out.

(Most of the posts here have correctly pointed out invalid use of "would" in B. However, even if this rule is unclear to you, noticing the split for/to believing/believe will lead you to the correct answer - A).

mk96 · Answer

Hi,
very helpful explanation. Just one follow up:

In the part "If they have been given reason to believe that their jobs will be safe, workers cannot be laid off" can you point me to what the "then clause" is ?

Appreciaite the help. Many thanks.

GMATNinja · Answer

The first part of the sentence gives you a condition: " If  they have been given reason to believe that their jobs will be safe..."

The second part gives an outcome if that condition is met: "workers cannot be laid off."

The second part is the "then" clause, because it tells us what would happen if the condition is met. Note: a "then clause" doesn't need the word "then" as long as the meaning of the sentence is clear without it.

I hope that helps!

Soham68 · Answer

I need little clarification on Conditional vs Hypothetical situation, and how can I identify those?

For example, If I were you, I would have completed the test. (It seems that this sentence is a conditional as well as a hypothetical).

So, how can I determine when to use Conditional or Hypothetical (Subjunctive mood)? Explanation with examples would be helpful.

EducationAisle · Answer

Oh no @Soham68; it is generally not an  or  relationship between Conditional or Hypothetical; as your example shows,  Hypothetical  can be (and in fact, in most cases  are )  conditionals .

On the other hand, not all conditionals are hypothetical. For example:

The Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) had long been expected to announce a reduction in output to bolster sagging oil prices, but officials of the organization just recently announced that the group will pare daily production by 1.5 million barrels by the beginning of next year only if non-OPEC nations, including Norway, Mexico, and Russia, trim output by a total of 500,000 barrels a day.

The above sentence is just a simple (non-hypothetical) conditional:  If X happens, Y will happen .

p.s. Our book    EducationAisle Sentence Correction Nirvana    discusses  Subjunctive , its application and examples in significant detail. If you or someone is interested, PM me your email-id; I can mail the corresponding section.

AnirudhaS · Answer

OE:
 Verb form; Idiom 
This sentence asserts that a court decision has qualified a 1998 ruling. It
then goes on to explain the series of conditions stipulated by that ruling:
workers cannot be laid off if they have been given (prior) reason to
believe that continued satisfactory job performance will (always) ensure
that their jobs are safe. To express these complicated temporal
relationships, the present tense passive verb cannot be laid off describes
the assurance provided by the ruling; the present-perfect, passive verb
describes the prior condition have been given . . ., and the future tense
verb will be describes the outcome the workers can expect. The idiom
reason to believe succinctly describes the assurance given to workers.
A.  Correct.  The sequence of conditions makes sense, and the idiom is
correct.
B. The present tense are given fails to clarify that the assurance of job
security must precede the workers’ confidence that they cannot be
laid off. The phrase reason for believing (singular, with no article) is
unidiomatic and in this context is inappropriate.
C. This version appears to be presenting having been given reason . . .
as a restrictive modifier of laid off. This makes the sentence very
awkward and hard to make sense of, and it obscures the requisite
nature of the condition (that workers had been given prior reason to
think their jobs were safe). Reason for believing is unidiomatic.
D. Without a comma after off, it is unclear what having been given
reason . . . modifies; the string of infinitive phrases is awkward and
confusing.
E. As in (D), it is unclear what the participial phrase (in this case, given
reason to believe) is supposed to modify.
 The correct answer is A.

thangvietnam · Answer

"provided that performance remain satisfactory" is if-clause of the clause, "there jobs will be safe". this is why "would" in choice B is wrong.

gmatwarriorju20 · Answer

Hey  GMATNinja ! could you please help me solve this question.

100mitra · Answer

Correct option : A

A recent court decision has qualified a 1998 ruling that  workers  cannot be laid off 
 if  they  have been given reason to believe  that their  jobs will  
be safe, provided  that their  performance remains satisfactory.

Correct idiom :  beleive that 
Correct usage of "That" with Pronoun "Their" to  Workers

(A) if  they  (have been given reason   to believe that    their  jobs will
(B) if they are given reason    for believing that    their jobs would still
(C) having been given reason    for believing that    their jobs would
(D) having been given reason     to believe their    jobs to
(E) given reason     to believe that    their jobs will still

aksh123456123456 · Answer

CrackVerbal  Kindly post your answer explanation of the above question.

woohoo921 · Answer

DmitryFarber 
For "I would go to the party if there were a good band playing", in Word "were" comes up as incorrect/underlined.

woohoo921 · Answer

Hi experts,

I am struggling with @dmitryfarber's response below/the additional explanations on this thread. Can an expert kindly provide more examples? Subjunctive/would are tricky! Thank you for your help in advance.

Careful, vp101. The problem with B can't be "given reason," since that is used in A, too!

The issue is with "would," but this is a little tricky. For simpler clauses, it's easy: we don't use both "if" and "would" to mark the same hypothetical event. Rather, when using "if," we follow up with "would" to show the consequence:

If my car were stolen, I would be upset.

However, if our hypothetical/conditional has more than one action in it (as in the original Q), "would" may be appropriate:

If I thought that you would believe me, I'd tell you the whole story.

So what's the difference between this and the original? You might notice that here we're using what looks like past tense ("thought"), while in A and B we're using present perfect and present, respectively. Why the difference? My example is a hypothetical (subjunctive), while the original is a simple conditional. With conditionals, we don't even use "would" for the consequence:

If Karen's sandwich falls on the floor, she will still eat it. (It's a really good sandwich.)

Since the choices here are conditional and not subjunctive, we need to leave "would" out of the sentence entirely.

ExpertsGlobal5 · Answer

Hello  woohoo921 ,

We hope this finds you well.

To answer your query, another way to look at Option B is that it redundantly uses the helping verb "would" alongside the verb "believe"; remember, “will” is preferred for referring to events that are certain to happen, and “would” is preferred for referring to events that are hypothetical, meaning the use of “would” alongside verbs that express uncertainty (predict, assume, guess, etc.) is redundant.

We hope this helps.
All the best!
Experts' Global Team

CrackverbalGMAT · Answer

Let’s look at the logic of the sentence.

A recent court decision has qualified a 1998 ruling that workers cannot be laid off  if they have been given reason to believe that their jobs will  be safe, provided that their performance remains satisfactory.
 
The sentence says that if the workers have been given reason to believe that they will still have their jobs, they cannot be laid off. Here, very clearly, a condition and its consequences have been mentioned.

Let’s look at each option.

(A) if they have been given reason to believe that their jobs will
 
“have been given” is in the present perfect tense. This tense is used to say that something was done in the past, and this stands true even now. “they have been given reason to believe that their jobs will be safe” implies that this assurance was given in the past and still holds true today. The tense used accurately represents the situation.

(B) if they are given reason for believing that their jobs would still

The verb “are” implies that something is true right now. This usage implies that if the workers are given the assurance right now, then they cannot be laid off. This does not make any sense. Further, idiomatically, one would say that one is “given reason to believe.”

(C) having been given reason for believing that their jobs would

Logical analysis of the original sentence tells us that a condition has been presented. In this option, the conditional clause has been removed, and this changes the meaning of the sentence.

(D) having been given reason to believe their jobs to

Same as in Option C.
 
(E) given reason to believe that their jobs will still

Same as in Option C.

I hope this is clear.

TBT · Answer

Can someone explain usage of:
If....will
If....would
If...were

TBT · Answer

Can someone explain usage of:
If....will
If....would
If...were

VerbalBot · Answer

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A recent court decision has qualified a 1998 ruling that workers canno

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A recent court decision has qualified a 1998 ruling that workers canno

Prep Toolkit

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