The European Economic Community exported just under $400 billion in

Question

The European Economic Community exported just under $400 billion in goods in 1988, sixty percent more than  the United States did and nearly twice as much as Japan's exports .

(A) the United States did and nearly twice as much as Japan's exports 
(B) the United States and nearly double what the Japanese exports were 
(C) the United States exported and nearly twice as much as the Japanese did 
(D) what the United States did and nearly twice as much as Japan's exports 
(E) what the United States exported and nearly double the Japanese exports

https://www.nytimes.com/1988/10/23/business/the-growing-fear-of-fortress-europe.html

The European Community exported just under $400 billion in goods last year, 60 percent more than  what the United States exported and nearly double Japan's exports . The community's imports are also huge, totaling just under $400 billion as well, roughly equal to the American import volume and more than three times Japan's volume. One goal of the 1992 program is to expand Europe's exports by reducing the costs of European companies - a goal that increased protectionism could well undermine.

egmat · Accepted Answer

Hi,
The European Economic Community exported just under $400 billion in goods in 1988, sixty percent more than the United States did and nearly twice as much as Japan's exports.

https://e-gmat.com/blogs/wp-content/uploads/2012/01/Grammar.png

It is very important to  identify the parallel list  in the sentence (if it has any) and then to  ascertain the nature if the entities  in the parallel list. In this sentence, parallelism has been introduced as a way of comparison. The entities compared here are the  “verb”  entities EEC “exported”… more than the US “did”. Till here the parallelism is fine because these two entities are parallel. But, the third entity “Japan’s exports” violates this rule because this entity is a noun phrase. 
Since the first entity is that is in “verb” lies in the non-underlined portion of the sentence, we need all the three entities in the “verb” form.

With this understanding, when we perform the PoE, choices A, D, and E are eliminated. In choice B, the second and the third entities are now the noun phrases and hence choice B is incorrect. This leaves us with choice C which is the correct answer because it maintains the parallelism as all the three entities in the list are verb now.

Hope this helps.
Shraddha

venksune · Answer

quick notes..

1. We are talking European Economic community, United States and yes it should be Japan or Japanese. NOT Japan's - the possesive form. With this we have b, c and e in our first pass

2. do we need 'what' - I dont think so. 'what' is intrusive and does not add value. We now have b and c in our second pass

3. look at C. 'as much as' - right idiom, OK. Next 'DID'. Yes we need 'DID' - its a keyword, when comparing actions. Does b have it. NO. Also, b sounds very awkward - read it..'....sixty percent more than the United States...'. The sentence is dying for a logical completion 60% more than US - US What. Is it US imports or exports or what is it? Thus, "DID" becomes a keyword.

Hence C.

ExpertsGlobal5 · Answer

Dear Friends,

Here is a detailed explanation to this question-

Concepts tested here: Comparisons

• A comparison can only be made between similar things.

A:  This answer choice incorrectly compares the verb phrase "The European Economic Community exported" to the noun phrase "Japan's exports"; remember, a comparison can only be made between similar things.

B:  This answer choice incorrectly compares the verb phrase "The European Economic Community exported" to the noun phrase "the United States" and the pronoun phrase "what the Japanese exports were"; remember, a comparison can only be made between similar things.

C:   Correct.  This answer choice correctly compares the verb phrase "The European Economic Community exported" with the verb phrases "the United States exported" and "the Japanese did".

D:  This answer choice incorrectly compares the verb phrase "The European Economic Community exported" to the pronoun phrase "what the United States did" and the noun phrase "Japan's exports"; remember, a comparison can only be made between similar things.

E:  This answer choice incorrectly compares the verb phrase "The European Economic Community exported" to the pronoun phrase "what the United States exported" and the noun phrase "the Japanese exports"; remember, a comparison can only be made between similar things.

Hence, C is the best answer choice.

All the best!
Experts' Global Team

praveen_rao7 · Answer

C it is

tests parallelism of the phrases
in c we have 
 The European Economic Community  exported just under $400 billion in goods in 1988, sixty percent more than  the United States  exported and nearly twice as much as the Japanese did 


E comes close by phrase after and is wrong

banerjeea_98 · Answer

This is a clear "C"....we r comparing action of european community with US and Japan....only "C" keeps it all in ||.


the United States  exported  and nearly twice as much as the Japanese  did

x2suresh · Answer

good one.

Will go with C for parallelsim.

X exported..,  60% more than  Y exported  and nearlytwice as much as the  Z did <exported>

Technext · Answer

The European Economic Community exported just under $400 billion in goods in 1988, sixty percent more than the United States did and nearly twice as much as Japan's exports.

Explanation: 
When we say that, 
 Japan's exports saw a record plunge in February  OR 
 Japanese exports saw a record plunge in February 
we are referring to the   goods   and  not to the  amount  (in figures) .

The original sentence tries to compare the amount of total exports , which is correctly stated in option C.
-------------------------------
( A ) the United States did and nearly twice as much as Japan's exports ---> Usage of the words  Japan's exports  is wrong. Changes the original meaning of the sentence.

( B ) the United States' and nearly double what the Japanese exports were ---> Usage of the words  Japanese exports  is wrong. Changes the original meaning of the sentence.

( C ) the United States exported and nearly twice as much as the Japanese did ---> Correct

( D ) what the United States did and nearly twice as much as Japan's exports ---> Same explanation as that stated in option A.

( E ) what the United States exported and nearly double the Japanese exports ---> Same explanation as that stated in option B. 
-------------------------------

Hope that helps.

Regards,
Technext

metallicafan · Answer

+1 C

Logical comparison:
EU  exported  vs. US  exported  vs. Japan  did

In E, you are comparing countries vs. Japan's exports; it is not parallel.

daagh · Answer

There are three countries, EEC, the US and Japan whose exports are being compared. So we need three verbs overall and two in the underlined portion to keep their actions parallel. You will notice only choice C exhibits three verbs(they must be equal in form and function)

doe007 · Answer

Rule tested here is parallelism on export done by 3 countries/communities. Non-underlined part "European Economic Community exported" need to be parallel to those in the underlined part.

A) "European Economic Community exported", "United States did", and " Japan's exports " are not parallel.
B) "European Economic Community exported", " United States ", and " Japanese exports were " are not parallel. Export of EEC is compared with US and not export of US.
C)  "European Economic Community exported", "United States exported", and "Japanese did" are parallel.  Correct . 
D) "European Economic Community exported", "United States did", and " Japan's exports " are not parallel.
E) "European Economic Community exported", "United States exported", and " Japanese exports " are not parallel.

Correct answer is C.

egmat · Answer

Hi ishaniscrazee,
This is in response to your PM.

The European Economic Community exported just under $400 billion in goods in 1988, sixty percent more than the United States did and nearly twice as much as Japan's exports.

Meaning Analysis:

The ECC exported goods in 1988. So did the US and Japan. But the ECC’s exports were 60% more than those of the US and twice as much as those of Japan.

Error Analysis:

So here action of exporting of three political entities has been compared. The action of ECC and US export has been correctly compared. But this is not the case with the action of Japan because there is no action mentioned here. This is not a parallel comparison.

PoE:

A) the United States did and nearly twice as much as Japan's exports: Incorrect for the reason stated above.

B) the United States and nearly double what the Japanese exports were: Incorrect.
i. Action of export of the ECC has been compared to the US. This is illogical.
ii. Use of “double” is not idiomatic here.

C) the United States exported and nearly twice as much as the Japanese did: Correct. All the actions are correctly compared.

D) what the United States did and nearly twice as much as Japan's exports: Incorrect. Repeats the same error as in choice A.

E) what the United States exported and nearly double the Japanese exports: Incorrect. Repeats the comparison error of choice A and the “double” idiom error of choice B.

Hope this helps. :-)

Thanks.
Shraddha

Thanks. Shraddha

sairam595 · Answer

Can someone explain why option E is wrong

sayantanc2k · Answer

Lack of parallelism.

Structure X AND Y
X = 60% more than  what the US exports 
Y = double  the Japaneses exports

The blue highlighted parts are not parallel.

X should have been  60% more than the  US exports   in order to maintain parallelism with  double the  Japanese exports  .

sriamlan · Answer

Can any expert reply on this ? Not sure how C is the right answer

sayantanc2k · Answer

The European Economic Community exported just under $400 billion in goods in 1988, sixty percent more than the United States did and nearly twice as much as Japan's exports.

A) the United States did and nearly twice as much as Japan's exports 
B) the United States and nearly double what the Japanese exports were 
C) the United States exported and nearly twice as much as the Japanese did 
D) what the United States did and nearly twice as much as Japan's exports 
E) what the United States exported and nearly double the Japanese exports

The comparison structure here is "X  60%more than /  twice as much as  Y " - Y in turn is comprised of a parrallel structure "P and Q"

Hence the overall structure is " X 60% more than P and twice as much as Q"

X = European Economy exported
P = United States exported
Q = the Japaneses did (exported).

Moreover,
The comparison between X and P is: 60% more than
The comparison between X and Q is:nearly twice as much as (= 200% of = 100% more than)

In the correct option C, the above parallelism is maintained properly:

The European Economic Community exported  just under $400 billion in goods in 1988,  sixty percent more than   the United States exported  and  nearly twice as much as   the Japanese did .

Option A: The element Q (Japan's exports) is not parallel to X and P.
Option B: P (United States) is not parallel to X. Q is also wrong since it uses "were" rather than "exported" or "did".
Option D: The element Q (Japan's exports) is not parallel to X and P.
Option E: The element Q (Japanese exports) is not parallel to X and P.

warriorguy · Answer

By virtue of omission, in C --> nearly twice as much as the Japanese did {exported}?

Doesn't this sound incorrect? Shouldn't it be did export and since export is not present anywhere in the sentence, shouldn't we ideally repeat it?

sayantanc2k · Answer

It is not omission; it is replacement - "exported" is replaced by "did". It is a common practice to REPLACE the verb in the second element of a parallelism structure with the verb "to do" .

warriorguy · Answer

I understand that part. But if I remember (correctly), one of your post, you mentioned that the verb should be present in the earlier part of the sentence in the same form as intended in the second part else repeat?

sayantanc2k · Answer

Yes, you are absolutely right. In this example, if the second verb were "has"/"have" ("...as the Japanese have"), then the point you have mentioned would be applicable (this would then be a case of omission) - since there is no past participle ("exported") form in the first part of the sentence, using "have" would be wrong.

However the simple past "exported" can be replaced with "did". (This is not a case of omission.)

The European Economic Community exported just under $400 billion in

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