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Shiv2016
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Prices at the producer level are only 1.3 percent higher now than a 26 Apr 2017, 23:05
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Alexey1989x
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Option B contains a comma before "and" that is incorrect, confirmed with OG 2017 SC no 758.
This comma leads to option "B" be deemed as incorrect because preposition "and" doesn't link two independent clauses.
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Hi GMAT Ninja and other experts
It would be great if you could answer this.


Why the correct sentence uses a comma before and? As far as I know, this construction is used to connect two independent clause.

Here they can be:
Prices at the producer level are only 1.3 percent higher now than those of a year ago.

Prices at the producer level are going down.

The subject prices has two verbs are and are going down. And we use just a conjunction 'and' to connect verbs of the same subject. Then why a comma?

Also can this be a correct version of this sentence?

Prices at the producer level are only 1.3 percent higher now than a year ago.


Thanks
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Prices at the producer level are only 1.3 percent higher now than a 27 Apr 2017, 10:27
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I have in my notes that we don't have to use comma to connect two clauses when the subject is the same, although I did not write down the source. Someone should confirm this :)
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Prices at the producer level are only 1.3 percent higher now than a 28 Apr 2017, 17:33
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The simple answer is that the GMAT is not consistent on this. Keep in mind that comma usage is generally not tested directly. The one absolute rule you *can* rely on is that you can't join two independent clauses with *only* a comma, as in "I like pie, it is tasty." You always need a conjunction or a semicolon.
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Prices at the producer level are only 1.3 percent higher now than a 29 Apr 2017, 11:04
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Shiv2016, I think part of the confusion is that there's a typo in the OP: there's no comma before the "and" in the OG version of this question. Here's the corrected version:

Quote:
Prices at the producer level are only 1.3 percent higher now than a year ago and are going down, even though floods in the Midwest and drought in the south are hurting crops and therefore raised corn and soybean prices.

(A) than a year ago and are going down, even though floods in the Midwest and drought in the south are hurting crops and therefore raised
(B) than those of a year ago and are going down, even though floods in the Midwest and drought in the south are hurting crops and therefore raising
(C) than a year ago and are going down, despite floods in the Midwest and drought in the south, and are hurting crops and therefore raising
(D) as those of a year ago and are going down, even though floods in the Midwest and drought in the south hurt crops and therefore raise
(E) as they were a year ago and are going down, despite floods in the Midwest and drought in the south, and are hurting crops and therefore raising
Show more

So (B) is correct, and the comma is a non-issue. :)

Quote:
Also can this be a correct version of this sentence?

Prices at the producer level are only 1.3 percent higher now than a year ago.
Show more

In real life, your sentence would be completely fine, in my opinion. But if we're being really strict and literal with this particular OG question, it's definitely not ideal: it sounds like we're comparing the prices themselves to last year, and that's not logical. More importantly, there's a better alternative available that makes the comparison much clearer: "Prices at the producer level are only 1.3 percent higher now than those of a year ago..." The correct version sharpens the comparison between old prices and new prices.
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Prices at the producer level are only 1.3 percent higher now than a 16 Jul 2018, 17:09
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Arlene0504
Prices at the producer level are only 1.3 percent higher now than a year ago and are going down, even though floods in the Midwest and drought in the south are hurting crops and therefore raised corn and soybean prices.

(A) than a year ago and are going down, even though floods in the Midwest and drought in the south are hurting crops and therefore raised
(B) than those of a year ago, and are going down, even though floods in the Midwest and drought in the south are hurting crops and therefore raising
(C) than a year ago and are going down, despite floods in the Midwest and drought in the south, and are hurting crops and therefore raising
(D) as those of a year ago and are going down, even though floods in the Midwest and drought in the south hurt crops and therefore raise
(E) as they were a year ago and are going down, despite floods in the Midwest and drought in the south, and are hurting crops and therefore raising

OG2017 SC758
Show more

daagh, @Experts,

What does "those of" stand in option B.

Prices at the producer level are only 1.3 percent higher now than a year ago and are going down, even though floods in the Midwest and drought in the south are hurting crops and therefore raised corn and soybean prices.

(A) than a year ago and are going down, even though floods in the Midwest and drought in the south are hurting crops and therefore raised
(B) than those of a year ago, and are going down, even though floods in the Midwest and drought in the south are hurting crops and therefore raising

If it were just "THOSE" i would have understood. But i am not able to understand how "those of" stands for "prices"
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Prices at the producer level are only 1.3 percent higher now than a 25 Jul 2018, 20:44
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ammuseeru
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Prices at the producer level are only 1.3 percent higher now than a year ago and are going down, even though floods in the Midwest and drought in the south are hurting crops and therefore raised corn and soybean prices.

(A) than a year ago and are going down, even though floods in the Midwest and drought in the south are hurting crops and therefore raised
(B) than those of a year ago, and are going down, even though floods in the Midwest and drought in the south are hurting crops and therefore raising
(C) than a year ago and are going down, despite floods in the Midwest and drought in the south, and are hurting crops and therefore raising
(D) as those of a year ago and are going down, even though floods in the Midwest and drought in the south hurt crops and therefore raise
(E) as they were a year ago and are going down, despite floods in the Midwest and drought in the south, and are hurting crops and therefore raising

OG2017 SC758

daagh, @Experts,

What does "those of" stand in option B.

Prices at the producer level are only 1.3 percent higher now than a year ago and are going down, even though floods in the Midwest and drought in the south are hurting crops and therefore raised corn and soybean prices.

(A) than a year ago and are going down, even though floods in the Midwest and drought in the south are hurting crops and therefore raised
(B) than those of a year ago, and are going down, even though floods in the Midwest and drought in the south are hurting crops and therefore raising

If it were just "THOSE" i would have understood. But i am not able to understand how "those of" stands for "prices"
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"Those" is a plural pronoun, so it has to refer to a plural noun, right? Well, the only plural noun that comes before "those" is "prices," so there's nothing else it could possibly refer to! If you're unsure about the logic, simply replace "those" with "prices" and see if the sentence makes sense.

"Prices at the producer level are only 1.3 percent higher now than [prices] of a year ago..."

Sounds okay to me! So we've got confirmation that "those" does indeed refer to "prices."

(It seems as though you were thrown off by the presence of the preposition "of." All it's doing in the above sentence is modifying "prices." Which prices? The ones of a year ago. It plays the exact same role in the construction "those of a year ago.")

I hope that helps!
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Prices at the producer level are only 1.3 percent higher now than a 28 Feb 2019, 00:57
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Can't we say there is an error of comparison in A and C. We can't compare price with an year. To compare similar entities we need those.



daagh
First thing: Please look into transcription; corn and soybean prices should not be underlined.


For those who want to go into the complicated process finding the nuances in meaning created by ellipsis, they can do that; but before that one should ensure that one can eliminate as many choices as possible on grammar alone. IMO, this problem can be easily solved without bothering about the differences in meaning of comparison. We can forthwith dispense with D and E for using the ‘as’ comparator instead of the ‘than’ comparator. Among A, B and C:

A: than a year ago and are going down, even though floods I the Midwest and drought in the south are hurting crops and therefore raised --- are hurting and raised are blatant shift of tense. So gone.
B: than those of a year ago, and are going down, even though floods in the Midwest and drought in the south are hurting crops and therefore raising ---Grammatically good
C: than a year ago and are going down, despite floods in the Midwest and drought in the south, and are hurting crops and therefore raising—This is a fragment; the conjunction ‘and’ creates confusion as to what are hurting crops and raising. They seem to point to the subject the sentence prices at producer level;

As a foot-note, I wish to add a small comment by no less than Ron on this
https://www.manhattanprep.com/gmat/foru ... 32362.html

Quote:
RonPurewal wrote: both versions are fine.
I looked at the problem, and—just as I suspected—the choices with '...than a year ago' can be eliminated for other, quite straightforward, reasons.

Don’t forget—the OG answer keys are usually incomplete, and often incorrect.
The official PROBLEMS are essentially flawless, but the official answer keys are not. (GMAC's all-stars, the people who write the problems, do not write the answer keys; GMAC 'outsources' that work to people of lesser talent, presumably to cut costs.)
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Prices at the producer level are only 1.3 percent higher now than a 28 Feb 2019, 01:31
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Can't we say there is an error of comparison in A and C. We can't compare price with an year.
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Hi Swati, even the official explanation says so!

However, I feel this is not the case, since A and C are correctly comparing two time zones (now and one year ago).

A case in point is the following correct official sentence:

Heating-oil prices are expected to be higher this year than last.

Again, the above sentence is comparing two time zones (this year and last year).
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Prices at the producer level are only 1.3 percent higher now than a 03 May 2019, 08:07
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hello, anyone knows that in option B "are hurting crops and therefore raising" ,what does "raising" mean? If it is a verb form, there should have "are" , so the sentence should be "are hurting crops and therefore are raising.."; or is it a modifier ? but it should modifier the noun right before it. I'm very confused...
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Prices at the producer level are only 1.3 percent higher now than a 03 May 2019, 19:43
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hello, anyone knows that in option B "are hurting crops and therefore raising" ,what does "raising" mean? If it is a verb form, there should have "are" , so the sentence should be "are hurting crops and therefore are raising.."; or is it a modifier ? but it should modifier the noun right before it. I'm very confused...
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Raising is part of the verb are raising, because are is "common" to both hurting and raising. We can read that portion of the sentence like this:

B ... floods in the Midwest and drought in the south are hurting crops and therefore raising corn and soybean prices.

floods and drought
(a) are hurting crops
and
(b) are therefore raising prices.
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Prices at the producer level are only 1.3 percent higher now than a 24 Apr 2020, 22:55
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[quote="Arlene0504"]Prices at the producer level are only 1.3 percent higher now than a year ago and are going down, even though floods in the Midwest and drought in the south are hurting crops and therefore raised corn and soybean prices.


(A) than a year ago and are going down, even though floods in the Midwest and drought in the south are hurting crops and therefore raised

(B) than those of a year ago and are going down, even though floods in the Midwest and drought in the south are hurting crops and therefore raising

(C) than a year ago and are going down, despite floods in the Midwest and drought in the south, and are hurting crops and therefore raising

(D) as those of a year ago and are going down, even though floods in the Midwest and drought in the south hurt crops and therefore raise

(E) as they were a year ago and are going down, despite floods in the Midwest and drought in the south, and are hurting crops and therefore raising


Price can be compared with price not a year so (A) and (C) are wrong
You draw similarity using as eg Krishna is as tall as Dhanush. We do not say Krishna is as taller than those of Dhanush. So (D) & (E) are wrong.
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Prices at the producer level are only 1.3 percent higher now than a 04 Sep 2020, 22:29
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mikemcgarry, GMATNinja

Wanted to check one thing:
- Prices at the producer level are only 1.3 percent higher now than a year ago.
- Prices at the producer level are only 1.3 percent higher now than those of a year ago

Both are fine, right? I didn't find it wrong and thus, did not use this comparison as a split.

I agree that the following sentence will be incorrect:
- Prices at the producer level are only 1.3 percent higher now than last year.

Please guide.
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Prices at the producer level are only 1.3 percent higher now than a 05 Sep 2020, 05:03
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Prices at the producer level are only 1.3 percent higher now than a year ago and are going down, even though floods in the Midwest and drought in the south are hurting crops and therefore raised corn and soybean prices.

Prices at the producer level are only 1.3 percent higher now than a year ago - Just reading this part, there are two interpretations:
Prices at the producer level are only 1.3 percent higher now than (prices were at the producer level) a year ago - Conveys correct meaning
Prices at the producer level are only 1.3 percent higher now than (prices were 1.3 percent higher) a year ago - Conveys incorrect meaning
Any answer choice needs to correct this error first.

(A) than a year ago and are going down, even though floods in the Midwest and drought in the south are hurting crops and therefore raised - For reason above

(B) than those of a year ago and are going down, even though floods in the Midwest and drought in the south are hurting crops and therefore raising - corrects the error in option (A) by suggesting specifically referring to prices at the producer level using pronoun 'those'

(C) than a year ago and are going down, despite floods in the Midwest and drought in the south, and are hurting crops and therefore raising = Same reason as (A)

(D) as those of a year ago and are going down, even though floods in the Midwest and drought in the south hurt crops and therefore raise - unidiomatic use of 'higher as' instead of 'higher than'

(E) as they were a year ago and are going down, despite floods in the Midwest and drought in the south, and are hurting crops and therefore raising - changes the meaning by suggesting that, 'the prices were 1.3% higher as the prices were a year ago'. The original sentence doesn't convey that the prices at the producer level were 1.3% higher a year ago'
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Prices at the producer level are only 1.3 percent higher now than a 04 Nov 2020, 00:12
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DmitryFarber
zoezhuyan, I agree with my colleague Ron Purewal (cited above) that the comparisons in A and C aren't necessarily faulty. There are other reasons to eliminate those choices. However, I want to make a slight correction to your analysis above. Your use of "that of" or "those of" in parentheses makes it appear that the implied comparison is between two nouns. Actually, your choices should read ("they were") or ("it was"). The comparison is actually between two adverbial modifiers. Prices are different now than they were last year. This is important because I can't say something like this:

American crows are larger today than in ancient China.

If we filled in "those," this might make sense: "American crows are larger today than those (crows) in ancient China." However, the actual implied meaning here is a comparison between two modifiers: "today" and "in ancient China." "American crows are larger today than (they were) in ancient China." This would make it seem that American crows existed in ancient China!
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thank you. I think both cases are correct but both cases do not contain any verb in the second clause. so, we can not infer "they were" or "those were" but we must infer "they are" and 'those are'. this form of verb is incorrect.

many official questions test the verb of the second clause. these questions test this point.

so, what is your opinion on "were/are".
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Prices at the producer level are only 1.3 percent higher now than a 14 Nov 2020, 05:13
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Hi! GMATNinja egmat
I have arrived at the correct option B after eliminating other choices for at least 1 error in each of them. However, As per OG's explanation, option D contains a tense mismatch between 'Hurt' (Simple past tense) and 'Raise' (Simple present tense). I don't understand how they interpreted 'Hurt' as simple past tense instead of simple present tense. Can anyone please explain this? Is there any parallelism error in Option D?
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Prices at the producer level are only 1.3 percent higher now than a 14 Nov 2020, 05:31
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(A) than a year ago and are going down, even though floods in the Midwest and drought in the south are hurting crops and therefore raised
Wrong comparison

(B) than those of a year ago and are going down, even though floods in the Midwest and drought in the south are hurting crops and therefore raising

(C) than a year ago and are going down, despite floods in the Midwest and drought in the south, and are hurting crops and therefore raising
Wrong comparison

(D) as those of a year ago and are going down, even though floods in the Midwest and drought in the south hurt crops and therefore raise
Incorrect usage of “as”

(E) as they were a year ago and are going down, despite floods in the Midwest and drought in the south, and are hurting crops and therefore raising
Incorrect usage of “as”

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Prices at the producer level are only 1.3 percent higher now than a 15 Nov 2020, 02:40
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GMATNinja
Shiv2016, I think part of the confusion is that there's a typo in the OP: there's no comma before the "and" in the OG version of this question. Here's the corrected version:

Quote:
Prices at the producer level are only 1.3 percent higher now than a year ago and are going down, even though floods in the Midwest and drought in the south are hurting crops and therefore raised corn and soybean prices.

(A) than a year ago and are going down, even though floods in the Midwest and drought in the south are hurting crops and therefore raised
(B) than those of a year ago and are going down, even though floods in the Midwest and drought in the south are hurting crops and therefore raising
(C) than a year ago and are going down, despite floods in the Midwest and drought in the south, and are hurting crops and therefore raising
(D) as those of a year ago and are going down, even though floods in the Midwest and drought in the south hurt crops and therefore raise
(E) as they were a year ago and are going down, despite floods in the Midwest and drought in the south, and are hurting crops and therefore raising

So (B) is correct, and the comma is a non-issue. :)

Quote:
Also can this be a correct version of this sentence?

Prices at the producer level are only 1.3 percent higher now than a year ago.

In real life, your sentence would be completely fine, in my opinion. But if we're being really strict and literal with this particular OG question, it's definitely not ideal: it sounds like we're comparing the prices themselves to last year, and that's not logical. More importantly, there's a better alternative available that makes the comparison much clearer: "Prices at the producer level are only 1.3 percent higher now than those of a year ago..." The correct version sharpens the comparison between old prices and new prices.
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GMATNinja
So, in the highlighted part, the 'at the producer level' is an 'ellipsis', right?
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Prices at the producer level are only 1.3 percent higher now than a 19 Mar 2021, 09:30
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saichandrateja
Hi! GMATNinja egmat
I have arrived at the correct option B after eliminating other choices for at least 1 error in each of them. However, As per OG's explanation, option D contains a tense mismatch between 'Hurt' (Simple past tense) and 'Raise' (Simple present tense). I don't understand how they interpreted 'Hurt' as simple past tense instead of simple present tense. Can anyone please explain this? Is there any parallelism error in Option D?
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Yet another example of why you should be wary of the explanations in the Official Guides! (For more on that, check out this post.)

"Hurt" could be either simple past ("They hurt their arms playing baseball yesterday.") or simple present ("Insults hurt my feelings."). That said, consider these two examples:

  • "Insults hurt my feelings." - Insults happen, and when they do happen, they hurt my feelings. Are they happening right now? Maybe, maybe not.
  • "Your insults are hurting my feelings." - Now we get the sense that someone is currently insulting me -- the insulting is happening now (as opposed to being a thing that can sometimes happen).

Back to this question. I'd argue that "are hurting" is a bit better than "hurt" in this case. By using the simple present tense ("Floods hurt crops."), it sounds like we are making a general statement without actually indicating whether floods are hurting the crops at the moment. Because we are talking about a current effect of the floods on prices, it makes more sense to use "are hurting" to make it clear that this action is currently happening.

And I think the parallelism is okay in (D) -- it's pretty much the same as the parallelism in (B).

I hope that helps!
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Prices at the producer level are only 1.3 percent higher now than a 20 Mar 2021, 10:05
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TheUltimateWinner
GMATNinja

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In real life, your sentence would be completely fine, in my opinion. But if we're being really strict and literal with this particular OG question, it's definitely not ideal: it sounds like we're comparing the prices themselves to last year, and that's not logical. More importantly, there's a better alternative available that makes the comparison much clearer: "Prices at the producer level are only 1.3 percent higher now than those of a year ago..." The correct version sharpens the comparison between old prices and new prices.
GMATNinja
So, in the highlighted part, the 'at the producer level' is an 'ellipsis', right?
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Yes, given the context, it makes sense for the pronoun "those" to refer to "prices at the producer level" -- we are comparing prices at the producer level now to prices at the producer level a year ago.

Again, context is key, and we could easily have a similar sentence where the "those" should NOT include the prepositional phrase ("at the producer level"). For example:

    "Prices at the producer level are higher than those at the distributor level."

Obviously it wouldn't make any sense to compare "prices at the producer level" to "prices at the producer level at the distributor level," so it's clear that "those" only refers to "prices" in this case.

thecoronafever
mikemcgarry, GMATNinja

Wanted to check one thing:
- Prices at the producer level are only 1.3 percent higher now than a year ago.
- Prices at the producer level are only 1.3 percent higher now than those of a year ago

Both are fine, right? I didn't find it wrong and thus, did not use this comparison as a split.

I agree that the following sentence will be incorrect:
- Prices at the producer level are only 1.3 percent higher now than last year.

Please guide.
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Sorry for the late reply, but hopefully you stumbled across our earlier post addressing this very question!
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Prices at the producer level are only 1.3 percent higher now than a 20 Apr 2021, 03:49
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Arlene0504
Prices at the producer level are only 1.3 percent higher now than a year ago and are going down, even though floods in the Midwest and drought in the south are hurting crops and therefore raised corn and soybean prices.


(A) than a year ago and are going down, even though floods in the Midwest and drought in the south are hurting crops and therefore raised

(B) than those of a year ago and are going down, even though floods in the Midwest and drought in the south are hurting crops and therefore raising

(C) than a year ago and are going down, despite floods in the Midwest and drought in the south, and are hurting crops and therefore raising

(D) as those of a year ago and are going down, even though floods in the Midwest and drought in the south hurt crops and therefore raise

(E) as they were a year ago and are going down, despite floods in the Midwest and drought in the south, and are hurting crops and therefore raising


GMAT® Official Guide 2017

Practice Question
Question No.: SC 758
Page: 700

Show Spoiler
Producer Level

(A) Comparison (X higher than Y); Verb / Meaning (raised)

(B) CORRECT

(C) Comparison (X higher than Y); Structure / Meaning

(D) Comparison (X higher as Y)

(E) Comparison (X higher as Y); Structure / Meaning

First glance

The first word switches between than and as. The sentence will contain a comparison; should the comparison idiom use than or as?

Issues

(1) Comparison: X higher than Y; X higher as Y

The first three answers use than and the final two use as. Which should it be? Also, check that the comparison is an apples-to-apples comparison.

The correct idiom is either higher than or as high as. This sentence uses higher, so the correct pairing must be than. Eliminate answers (D) and (E).

Prices at the producer level are higher now

(A) than a year ago

(B) than those of a year ago

(C) than a year ago

What are the remaining answers comparing? Answers (A) and (C) compare now to a year ago. Answer (B) compares prices now to those (prices) of a year ago. While it can be acceptable to compare timeframes (as in OG 2017 #772 / OG 2016 #104 “this year” and “last [year]”), the more precise comparison in this problem is between the two prices: prices now versus prices of a year ago.

Answer (B) makes the proper comparison. Eliminate (A) and (C).

(2) Verb / Meaning: are hurting and therefore raised

The sentence is trying to convey a certain sequence of events: floods and drought are hurting crops and therefore causing something else to happen. This second event is caused by the first; therefore, this second event should take place at the same time as or later in time than the first event.

If crops are being hurt right now in the present, then it’s illogical to indicate that the consequence (raised prices) took place in the past. Eliminate answer (A).

(3) Structure / Meaning: and are hurting crops

Answers (C) and (E) both insert an and just before are hurting. What consequences does this have for the sentence structure?

Fix: The core sentences read:

(C) Prices are higher now than a year ago and are hurting crops…

(E) Prices are higher now as they were a year ago and are hurting crops…

In both cases, parallelism dictates that the subject prices must pair with the verb are hurting. In other words, the sentence indicates that the current prices are hurting crops. This is illogical. The floods and drought, not the prices, are hurting crops.

Eliminate answers (C) and (E) for faulty meaning.

The Correct Answer

Correct answer (B) makes a valid comparison between prices now and those (prices) of a year ago. It also clearly conveys the sequence of events: floods…and drought are…hurting crops now, and therefore (are) raising prices (also now).

*Note: the official explanation indicates that the word hurt, in answer (D), is in the simple past. The word hurt can also be simple present: floods and drought hurt crops (today or in general in the present) and therefore raise prices (again, today or in general). Answer (D) is still incorrect, but not for this particular reason stated in the official explanation.

Logical predication; Verb form

The sentence as written makes an illogical comparison between prices at the producer level and a time period (a year ago); surely the intended comparison is between such prices now and those of a year ago. The clause at the end of the sentence states that flooding and a drought are hurting crops, and as a result of this, they have raised prices of certain crops. Are hurting is in the present progressive tense, indicating an ongoing process; raised is in the simple past tense, indicating a completed action. It would be more appropriate to use the present progressive tense here as well, [are] raising.

(D) The comparative adjective higher requires the comparative term than instead of as; the tenses of the verbs in the latter half of the sentence, hurt (simple past) and raise (simple present), do not work together logically.
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Though there are errors in other choices.
But in choice B when I fill the pronoun with prices it doesn't make much sense to me-

Prices at the producer level are only 1.3 percent higher now [u]than (were) prices of a year ago and are going down,......

Doesn't the later part read as prices of a year?
Or my understanding is incorrect ?

Please help
VeritasKarishma @e-gmat SaraiGMAT
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