Although people in France consume fatty foods at a rate comparable to

Thanks sayantanc2k for your reply. So, "the rate of the United States" seems unclear to me. I mean, is that valid? Do countries have a "rate" ?

You are correct, we cannot miss out certain words because it makes the sentence illogical in comparison..
the correct sentence could be
Although people in France consume fatty foods at a rate comparable to that (the rate) of the people in the United States, their death rates from heart disease are far lower in France.[/quote]

Your observation is correct. As chetan2u rightly explained, the preposition should be "in" (to be parallel with "in France"), not "of". I missed out on that.

But even with "in", how do we know what "rate" is being talked about?

Hi,
we have just spoken of ONLY one kind of rate in the entire sentence, so the rate would logically refer back to its earlier antecedents and also usage of "comparable to" refers to the previous RATE being talked about..

Responding to a PM here.

"That" as a pronoun can serve as a "new copy" of a previously mentioned noun. In this case, we are trying to compare the separate rates - France's (death) rate and the United States' (death) rate. The rates are separate, but we don't want to repeat the use of rate so we use "that" to represent the US' rate.

Here is another example:
The money spent on food for three days at Disneyland is slightly less than THAT spent for an entire month at home (but only slightly).

Here "that" is referring to a different pile of money spent on food for a month, but it is still money so using "that" is appropriate.

KW
[Yes, I did just make a trip to Disneyland ]

Thanks for responding to the PM Kyle, this might be a typo, because the sentence does not seem to be comparing death rate, but rate at which fatty foods are consumed.

There are actually two sets of rates that are involved. You are correct that ultimately we are comparing the death rates but the rates of consumption are included to compare how those rates impact the death rates. It may be a bit tricky to keep straight, but including two sets of rates in the sentence is totally legimate.
KW

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Thanks Kyle. That's what is confusing me. There is no mention of "rate of consumption" in the sentence and so, the following sentence would be incorrect:

Although people in France consume fatty foods at a rate comparable to that of the United States, their death rates from heart disease are far lower in France.

that is meant to refer to "rate of consumption of fatty foods", but this is not present in the sentence From my class, I was told that the noun must be present in the sentence in the same form (though I might have mis-interpreted or mis-understood the instructor).

The pronoun "that" is more flexible and can be used to represent an idea / phrase. Take for example this other GMAT question: lacking-information-about-energy-use-people-tend-to-81026.html. "That" can be used to represent "the amount of energy used" but "it" cannot because "it" must have a noun it replaces.

KW

Hello Kyle, in the example you have stated, "the amount of energy used" is present in the sentence.

However, in this example, "rate of consumption of fatty foods" is "not" present in the sentence. So, if you can give an example where "that" is referring to something that is not present in the sentence, it would help me clear this doubt.

Could you please elaborate your query? There is no "that"(creating a new copy) in the correct option.

Hi sayantanc2k, thanks for your help. if you scroll few posts up, experts have said that the following "modified" sentence would be correct:

Although people in France consume fatty foods at a rate comparable to that in the United States, their death rates from heart disease are far lower in France.

My question is: In the above sentence, what would "that" refer to? I don't think "that" can just refer to "rate", because then it will not be clear "rate of what?".

Still I am not clear where exactly lies your doubt. Reading the posts it appears that you have already understood that "that" refers to "rate"... that's absolutely correct - but somehow you do not agree that "that" can JUST refer to "rate". Also it is very evident from the first part of the sentence that the "rate" refers to the consumption of fatty foods : "people in France consume fatty foods at a rate". Then why are you still not convinced that "that" is referring to the "rate" at which people consume food?

Hi sayantanc2k, this is exactly my doubt. Ideally, "that" should be referring to "rate of consumption of fatty foods" (and not just to "rate" because then it would not be clear "rate of what??).

However, this noun phrase "rate of consumption of fatty foods" is not present in the sentence. So, how can "that" refer to a Noun phrase that is not even present in the sentence? I remember it was told in the class that the noun must be present in the sentence in the same form. But may be I did not understand the instructor correctly, hence wanted to clarify.

No Sukanya, the pronoun "that" refers to a noun, not a noun phrase as a whole. The pronoun "that" creates a new copy of a previous noun ("rate") in the sentence. Hence presence of "rate" is good enough, as long as it is clear from the context which rate is referred to.

Indeed sykanyar, as sayantanc2k has pointed out, that will clearly an unambiguously refer to rate in this sentence.