It is widely believed in the papermaking industry that unless mills ru

It is widely believed in the papermaking industry that unless mills run continuously, a firm cannot make money and waste, estimated at 30% of overall mill cost, resulting from changing products "on the run" is inevitable while the machine is achieving "on grade" performance.

Glad to see a tough question - almost lost the plot... hopefully it was a happy ending with D look forward to the OA


A) a firm cannot make money and waste, estimated at 30% of overall mill cost, resulting from changing products "on the run"

Initially, I assumed this would be wrong - but its among the best 2 options - so lets keep it for now.


B) a firm cannot make money and waste resulting from changing products "on the run," estimated at 30% of overall mill cost

Meaning error - seems to suggest that money and waste both are being made


C) a firm cannot make money and that waste, estimated to be 30% of overall mill cost and resulting from changing products "on the run,"

Seems good - lets keep it


D) money cannot be made by a firm and waste, estimated to be 30% of overall mill cost, resulting from changing products "on the run"

Sounds awkward - but in the absence of a strong reason - lets keep it too


E) that a firm cannot make money and that waste, estimated to be 30% of overall mill cost, resulting from changing products "on the run,"

Thankfully a weak choice - too many that's (that spoil the broth) - reject


Between D, C & A
A loses out due to the wrong idiom 'estimated at'
D & C use the correct idiom and the grammar too doesn't have any glaring faults, so we need to look for meaning variations.

C is the winner. I was stumped on this one
C gets the parallelism right with 'that' repetition.

My answer is (C). It took me 1 minute and 2 seconds.

(A) I really could not understand what this option tries to convey. It is badly written sentence.
(B) See (A)
(C) Finally, I understand what the sentence means. "that waste ..." parallels with "that unless.." Both "that ..." clauses combine to serve as object of "believe in".
(D) Passive voice is not as strong as active voice. Also, a comma is needed before "and waste" to form Comma+FANBOYS coordinate sentence.
(E) Within "Unless mills run continuously, Here we need a main clause" the main clause cannot start with "that a firm...".

A) a firm cannot make money and waste, estimated at 30% of overall mill cost, resulting from changing products "on the run"
Seems to imply a firm cannot make "waste". Incorrect.

B) a firm cannot make money and waste resulting from changing products "on the run," estimated at 30% of overall mill cost
Seems to imply a firm cannot make "waste". Incorrect.

C) a firm cannot make money and that waste, estimated to be 30% of overall mill cost and resulting from changing products "on the run,"
Correct.

D) money cannot be made by a firm and waste, estimated to be 30% of overall mill cost, resulting from changing products "on the run"
Usage of "and" is incorrect.

E) that a firm cannot make money and that waste, estimated to be 30% of overall mill cost, resulting from changing products "on the run,"
"that" is redundant.

It is widely believed in the papermaking industry that unless mills run continuously, a firm cannot make money and waste, estimated at 30% of overall mill cost, resulting from changing products "on the run" is inevitable while the machine is achieving "on grade" performance.

firm doesnt make money and waste together.
waste results from changing products "on the run," and this wastage amounts to 30% of overall cost

A) a firm cannot make money and waste, estimated at 30% of overall mill cost, resulting from changing products "on the run"........waste and resulting are separated thus changing overall meaning

B) a firm cannot make money and waste resulting from changing products "on the run," estimated at 30% of overall mill cost.........this makes a proper sentence

C) a firm cannot make money and that waste, estimated to be 30% of overall mill cost and resulting from changing products "on the run,"............that before waste doesn't make sense

D) money cannot be made by a firm and waste, estimated to be 30% of overall mill cost, resulting from changing products "on the run"............half the sentence is in direct and other half indirect speech.

E) that a firm cannot make money and that waste, estimated to be 30% of overall mill cost, resulting from changing products "on the run,"...........that in beginning ruins the whole meaning

IMO. B.
It took me a while to figure the verb is in the un-underlined part.

It is widely believed in the papermaking industry that unless mills run continuously, a firm cannot make money and waste, estimated at 30% of overall mill cost, resulting from changing products "on the run" is inevitable while the machine is achieving "on grade" performance.

A) a firm cannot make money and waste, estimated at 30% of overall mill cost, resulting from changing products "on the run" // a comma is required before "and waste bla bla"

B) a firm cannot make money and waste resulting from changing products "on the run," estimated at 30% of overall mill cost // a comma is required before "and waste bla bla" a comma is required after "mill cost" otherwise, the meaning is distorted.

C) a firm cannot make money and that waste, estimated to be 30% of overall mill cost and resulting from changing products "on the run," // fine

D) money cannot be made by a firm and waste, estimated to be 30% of overall mill cost, resulting from changing products "on the run" // a comma is required before "and waste bla bla"

E) that a firm cannot make money and that waste, estimated to be 30% of overall mill cost, resulting from changing products "on the run", // seems like two nonessential modifiers in between commas modify "waste". So, they should be conjoined by "and". If only there would not be a comma after "on the run", this sentence could have been considered correct.

A tough question. Only careful readers can dissect the sentence.

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GMATNinja can you please explain me this ques

GMATNinja

Can you pls explain me this question?

Hi,
Let me try this.
First understand the meaning of the sentence.
here parallelism marker is shifted between many things so let's see what is the intended meaning.
in the original sentence we can see that a firm cannot make money and waste is inevitable while the machine is achieving "on grade" performance.
So form this we can understand that firm cannot be the subject of both money and waste { firm cannot make waste is inevitable?? what??? ]
So original sentence has meaning issues.

lets go with options now:
A) a firm cannot make money and waste, estimated at 30% of overall mill cost, resulting from changing products "on the run"

1. The parallelism marker has changed the meaning as explained above.
2. resulting is the comma ing verb which should modify the preceding clause. the preceding clause - "a firm cannot make money and waste."
but this doesn't make sense.
" resulting from changing products "on the run" "- has to modify the waste.
Lets remove option A


B) a firm cannot make money and waste resulting from changing products "on the run," estimated at 30% of overall mill cost

1. same parallelism marker mistake.
2. resulting is now modifying waste here- better.
3. Estimated - modifying waste - better

but for the parallelism marker mistake, which caused meaning issues. Eliminate this.


C) a firm cannot make money and that waste, estimated to be 30% of overall mill cost and resulting from changing products "on the run,"
1. here we have that waste after "and"- look for what is it parallel to.

It is widely believed in the papermaking industry
that unless mills run continuously, [u]a firm cannot make money
AND
that waste is inevitable. sounds good.
2. estimated and resulting
both are participle phrases trying to modify waste and are marked with parallel marker and
waste estimated to be 30% of overall mill cost is inevitable.
waste resulting from changing products "on the run," is inevitable.

this makes sense.

Lets keep C.

D) money cannot be made by a firm and waste, estimated to be 30% of overall mill cost, resulting from changing products "on the run"

what are making parallel?
Money and waste?

unless mills run continuously
money cannot be made by a firm
AND
waste is inevitable.

Unless mill run continuously waste is inevitable ? wrong.
2. resulting is modifying money cannot by a firm - wrong.

Eliminate D

E) that a firm cannot make money and that waste, estimated to be 30% of overall mill cost, resulting from changing products "on the run,"

1. Parallelism.
unless mills run continuously
that a firm cannot make money
AND
that waste is inevitable.
2. now we have that waste, resulting.... , is inevitable. no clause for comma- ing "resulting from changing products "on the run " to modify waste.

Eliminate E

Correct Answer - C

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