Federal incentives now encourage investing capital in commercial offic

Question

Federal incentives now encourage  investing capital in commercial office buildings despite vacancy rates in existing structures that are exceptionally high and  no demand for new construction.

(A) investing capital in commercial office buildings despite vacancy rates in existing structures that are exceptionally high and

(B) capital investment in commercial office buildings, even though vacancy rates in existing structures are exceptionally high and there is

(C) capital to be invested in commercial office buildings even though there are exceptionally high vacancy rates in existing structures with

(D) investing capital in commercial office buildings even though the vacancy rates are exceptionally high in existing structures with

(E) capital investment in commercial office buildings despite vacancy rates in existing structures that are exceptionally high, and although there is

why is the the OA correct? It seems to me to be a run-on sentence ( Don't you need , before the conj. "and")? I find D quite attractive ... can someone explains?? Really confused now..

daagh · Accepted Answer

How do you go about in a complex situation such as this. Forget for while the investing capital or the capital investment part of it and let us try out other means.

It may be seen that logically vacancy rates in - existing structures - can not lie side by side  with  new constructions. Such expressions are oxymorons, which are incongruous in nature. May be this is not pure grammar but logic. So C and D are out.

Among the rest of A and B and E, to make life simple, A and E have modification problems. In A and E, the phrase -  that are exceptionally high  – seems to modify existing structures rather than vacancy rates. B is the only one with proper modifictaion and logic.

Now on to whether capital investment or investing capital: Normally  encourage  entails a noun such as person or action or an animal or even a gerund. By that score, we may prefer - encourage capital investment to investing capital, unless one seeks to argue that investing also is a kind of gerund. Investing being a transitive verb will need - investing of – to be a gerund

varun4s · Answer

Federal incentives now encourage investing capital in commercial office buildings despite vacancy rates in existing structures that are exceptionally high and no demand for new construction.
(A) investing capital in commercial office buildings despite vacancy rates in  existing structures that are exceptionally high  and  (Vacancy rates are exceptionally high not existing structure) 
(B) capital investment in commercial office buildings, even though vacancy rates in existing structures are exceptionally high and there is  (Correct) 
(C) capital to be invested in commercial office buildings even though there are exceptionally high vacancy rates in existing structures with  (It seems that existing structures having no demand for new construction. It changes the meaning) 
(D) investing capital in commercial office buildings even though the vacancy rates are exceptionally high in  existing structures with   (Same as C) 
(E) capital investment in commercial office buildings despite vacancy rates in  existing structures that are exceptionally high , and although there is  (Same as A)

Kudos please if you like my explanation

Shelen · Answer

Using POE, the answer is B. ‘capital investment’ is preferable than ‘investing capital’ , so A, D out. Also in (D): originally there are two reasons: 1 – high vacancy rates and 2 – no demand, and in this answer choice these two reasons become one “high vacancy rates in existing structures with no demand ” and moreover, it is not very clear for me what "no demand" refers to: "vacancy rate" or "existing structures" (C) – ‘encourage capital to be invested”, well, I can understand when we encourage students to study or children to be obedient, but I can’t imagine how can we encourage capital?

C – out. (E) - too wordy. “ despite vacancy rates in existing structures that are exceptionally high, and although there is no demand”

BKimball · Answer

ajit257,

I don't want to give away the reasoning here because I think it's more valuable if you give it a try on your own and then ask others to help you check your thinking. That said, I'll point you in the right direction:

When I look at SC, I immediately scan vertically to see what I'll have to decide. Here, some of those splits include:

-investing capital vs. capital investing
-despite vs. even though
-there is vs. with

If I'm considering these splits, I know that the most black and white grammatical rule relates to the use of "there is" or "with."

I'll be notified as soon as you reply to this. Let me know where you take this problem and then I'll be back to help out as necessary.

Good luck!

Brett

aragonn · Answer

Official Explanation: 
In choices A, C, and D, investing capital and capital-to be invested are awkward and imprecise; the verb encourage more appropriately takes a noun such as investment for its object. Moreover, these choices and choice E contain ambiguous wording: that are exceptionally high in A and E, and with (no demand) in C and D, illogically seem to modify existing structures. In A and E, despite vacancy rates does not allow for a grammatically complete sentence with parallel construction. Choice B is best: capital investment is the proper object for encourage, modifying phrases are placed so as to avoid ambiguity, and the construction even though vacancy rates ... are ... high and there is (no demand) is grammatically parallel.

angarg · Answer

But in answer option B, what is the antecedent of there?
As I could not find any antecedent for there, I prefered D to B.

AjiteshArun · Answer

But why? I'm sure that you're comfortable using there is/are/was... to discuss something about something. Okay, that was not a very precise way to put it

. But that's what sentences like the ones below do. 1. There is no train at that time. 2. There are two students in the classroom. This is common usage. Option D on the other hand, has errors that are "worse" than any possible ambiguity introduced by the there .

krishnabalu · Answer

Hi,

Can anyone explain how parallelism is maintained in B? Even though vacancy rates in existing structures are exceptionally high vs Even though no demand for new construction.
Also why C and D are wrong? I don't see any meaning errors in these two options.

AjiteshArun · Answer

This is the sentence that option B leads to:

Federal incentives now encourage capital investment in commercial office buildings ,  even though   vacancy rates in existing structures are exceptionally high  and  there is no demand for new construction .

(1) Federal incentives now encourage capital investment in commercial office buildings
 even though 
(2a) vacancy rates in existing structures are exceptionally high
 and 
(2b) there is no demand for new construction.

As for options C and D, we can't really say  encourage money to be invested  and  encourage investing money . Also,  existing structures with no demand  makes it sound as if the  existing structures  don't have any  demand .

krishnabalu · Answer

Can you help me in identifying how parallelism is maintained between 2a and 2b.

I know capital to be invested and investing capital in C and D aare awkward, but I am still unable to interpret why the last part
" with no demand for new construction" is wrong

AjiteshArun · Answer

The  and  joins two  clauses . Let's look at them separately:

2a.  Federal incentives now encourage capital investment in commercial office buildings  even though   vacancy rates in existing structures are exceptionally high  
 and 
2b.  Federal incentives now encourage capital investment in commercial office buildings  even though   there is no demand for new construction .

mSKR · Answer

Hi  AndrewN  sir

Could you please share your thoughts on this question. I find hard to eliminate more options in this question.
On reading the posts above, I would like to know your approach on making decisions related with these three below points:
1. investment vs investing - you decide based on by meaning or suggest some rule?
2.  There  doesn't refer to any definite place( vacancy rates are not at some place ). Its better not to reject  there  immediately? Your advise.
3. high vacancy rates  with  no demand.  with  here just give extra information about demand . it should not be a main reason to reject. What's your take on this ?

Thanks in anticipation  AndrewN  sir

AndrewN · Answer

Hello,  mSKR . I will respond to your queries below, but how about we take a look at the sentence and answer choices first (for reference)?

The only option I would eliminate based on the head of each answer choice is (C):  encourage capital to be invested  is passive and generally harder to follow than either of the other iterations.  Encourage investing capital  may be less preferred than  encourage capital investment , since the -ing form of a verb after the verb  encourage  takes a moment to sort out (i.e. the -ing phrase would be considered a noun, answering the question,  Encourage  ? ) However, both options use two words, the former focusing on  capital , the latter on  investment , so I would keep everything but (C) in the running to play it safe, even if (B) and (E) were the forerunners on this basis alone.

No,  there  does not refer to a place, but you have to be careful not to consider a word in isolation, as  there is/there are  is a common construct, and that is just what we see in answer choices (B), (C), and (E). Because I would have eliminated (C) already, a quick check at the tail-end of (B) or (E) would suffice:

there is no demand for new construction

This makes perfect sense. I suppose the sentence could dodge hiding behind a  there is  by opting for a more active verb, as in,  no demand  exists  for new construction , but that is not an option anyway. Leave (B) and (E) alone on this consideration.

The transition from discussing  vacancy rates in existing structures  to a completely separate topic in  demand for new construction  is not clear when  with  is used right after  existing structures . A reader is led to believe that  existing structures with , or even  existing structures with no demand for   , will provide further information on  these structures  after the preposition, so it is jarring to encounter information on new construction instead. If there were any lingering questions about (C), I would hope that this third reason to eliminate it would suffice. (D) also looks poor compared to other options.

So, in light of these three considerations, I would  disfavor  (C) and (D). With the remaining answer choices, I would test the  and  at the end to see whether the part that followed was logical, grammatically sound, and, as a final consideration, parallel. Between (B) and (E), the two answers that start with  capital investment , (E) is the poorer choice. Do we need both  despite  and  although , for instance? It really comes down to (A) or (B) for me as the best of their kind. Using the  and  test, (A) pairs a phrase that is modified by a clause with a phrase:

despite vacancy rates in existing structures that are exceptionally high  AND

no demand for new construction.

Meanwhile, (B) looks a little more promising, pairing a clause with another clause:

even though vacancy rates in existing structures are exceptionally high  AND

there is no demand for new construction.

(B) is the better option, which is why we should choose it.

You are welcome,  mSKR . I hope my response helps you.

- Andrew

Mck2023 · Answer

Hi, 
I eliminated B for not using 'comma' before 'and'. I read in a book that to connect two independent clause we need comma plus one of the FANBOYS. 
Please shed some lights; where am I wrong?

AjiteshArun · Answer

Hi  Mck2023 ,

The clause you're looking at is part of a dependent clause ( even though... ), but, generally speaking, it's not a good idea to take options out on the basis of comma usage (except for a few issues related to commas that the GMAT does test, like comma splices).

adityaganjoo · Answer

Splits that helped me:

This literally means that something happened despite the existence of  vacancy rates  (which are exceptionally high). But actually, this something happened despite high vacancy rates. These two phrases have different meaning. Mere existence of vacancy rates cannot trigger anything
(A) and (E) are out

Split number 2: "with" or no with
Logically "with" makes no sense here, as existing structures can never have demand for new construction

(C) and (D) are out

(B) makes perfect sense. Therefore, (B)

Mavisdu1017 · Answer

Hello expert,
I ruled out B for this reason: we know “AND” is a parallelism trigger, but I can not see any structure that can parallel to “there is no demand for new construction”.
I picked D, although I know it might be kind of ambiguous. According to RON, “with” can modify either preceding noun or preceding sentence, so I think “with” can modify the preceding sentence “vacancy rates in existing structures that are exceptionally high”.
Any expert can help? Thanks in advance.

ExpertsGlobal5 · Answer

Hello  richardkliao ,

We hope this finds you well.

To answer your query, the clauses "vacancy rates in existing structures are exceptionally high" and "there is no demand for new construction" form the parallelism pair in Option B.

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

GMATNinja · Answer

"There is no demand" is an independent clause. All we need is an independent clause earlier in the sentence that can be parallel to this one. "Federal incentives now encourage investing capital in commercial office buildings," is also an independent clause, so the parallelism is fine.

Part of the problem with (D) is that "with" could function in multiple ways and none of them make much sense. Take another look:

One interpretation is that "with no demand" is modifying the noun "structures." What kind of structures have high vacancy rates? The kind of structures  with  no demand for new construction. This interpretation seems debatable, at best -- if the structures already exist, you can't really say they're  with   low demand for new construction, can you? What would that even mean? That the few people who live in the existing low-vacancy buildings don't want new buildings? Nah.

But if we interpret the "with" modifier to describe the clause, "vacancy rates are exceptionally high" it's still off. How can the lack of demand for  new  construction describe the vacancy rates of  current  buildings?

So now in (D) we've got multiple meanings that aren't great. Contrast that with (B), which introduces a new clause altogether. This seems way more logical. One clause talks about what's happening in existing buildings -- they have low vacancy. And the other talks about demand for new construction -- it's low.

If (B) is clearer and more logical, it's better.

I hope that clears things up!

Federal incentives now encourage investing capital in commercial offic

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Federal incentives now encourage investing capital in commercial offic

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