prakhar992 wrote:
dcummins wrote:
The consistent rising revenues of the shipping company has convinced analysts that the company is a good one for their clients to invest in.
(A) The consistent rising revenues of the shipping company has convinced analysts that the company is
(B) The consistently rising revenues of the shipping company has convinced analysts that the company is
(C) The consistent rise in the revenues of the shipping company has convinced analysts that the company is
(D) The consistently rising revenues of the shipping company have convinced analysts that the company was
(E) The consistent rise in the revenues of the shipping company have convinced analysts that the company is
Hello
VeritasPrepHailey Can you explain this question?
Is not the phrase “The consistent rising revenues” a complete subject in the sentence?
Hi there,
prakhar992, happy to help!
So, to directly answer your question, if we identify and remove descriptive words to get at the root of the subject/verb agreement (eliminating adjectives, adverbs, and modifiers), we end up with
The
consistent rising revenues
of the shipping company - so, we need "revenues" -> "have" with this construction. (Though we'll want to keep in mind that some of our answers change the construction entirely!)
Let's take a look!
(A) The consistent rising
revenues of the shipping company
has convinced analysts that the company is <- Lack of agreement (for the above mentioned reasons). This one's out!
(B) The consistently rising
revenues of the shipping company
has convinced analysts that the company is <- Again, we lack agreement here.
(C) The consistent
rise in the revenues of the shipping company
has convinced analysts that the company is <- Now the core of the agreement has been restructured to singular "rise" -> "has," so we're in good shape. In this case, if we eliminate all descriptive language to get at the core of the subject, we end up with: The
consistent rise
in the revenues of the shipping company, leaving us with proper singular agreement!
(D) The consistently rising revenues of the shipping company have convinced analysts that the company
was <- Here, our tense sequence is illogical.
(E) The consistent
rise in the revenues of the shipping company
have convinced analysts that the company is <- Again, once we get down to the root of the subject, we lack agreement.
So, anytime we have a larger noun phrase in an agreement question, we want to think about whittling away the excess descriptive language to get at the root of the subject, and thus, the root of the agreement. In general, learning to "read past" adjectives, adverbs, and modifiers when looking to the agreement in questions tends to be a value-add skill that drastically simplifies the agreement at hand.
I hope this helps!
_________________
Hailey Cusimano
GMAT Tutor and Instructor