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505-555 Level|   Grammatical/Rhetorical Construction|   Pronouns|   Verb Tense/Form|                        
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The personal income tax did not become permanent in the United States 10 Apr 2022, 08:13
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Struggled with this question. My last two options were B and D. I ended up choosing D.

I thought B would be wrong because of redundancy of the use of "before" and " had depended".

I thought D would be okay because we are not supposed to guess the original meaning? Is there something dramatically wrong with D?

Please let me know how to go about making decisions between these two type of last options.

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The personal income tax did not become permanent in the United States 10 Apr 2022, 10:23
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GSBHopeful98
Struggled with this question. My last two options were B and D. I ended up choosing D.

I thought B would be wrong because of redundancy of the use of "before" and " had depended".

I thought D would be okay because we are not supposed to guess the original meaning? Is there something dramatically wrong with D?

Please let me know how to go about making decisions between these two type of last options.

Best
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In (B), the use of "before" and "had depended" is redundant, but this particular type of redundancy is widely accepted. So, unless we see no other way of deciding between two choices, we should not eliminate a choice because of such redundancy.

Regarding (D) there is an issue, though not a very clear one, with the meaning. (D) conveys that the federal government's main source of revenue was dependent on tariffs. While I guess there may be some way which that meaning makes sense, the truth is that tariffs would themselves be a source of revenue rather than something a source of revenue depended on.

We may have to consider what the question writer probably meant in order to eliminate (D), but that the question writer thought the meaning conveyed by (B) to be illogical is more a logical deduction than a wild guess.
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The personal income tax did not become permanent in the United States 11 Apr 2022, 06:01
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GSBHopeful98
Struggled with this question. My last two options were B and D. I ended up choosing D.

I thought B would be wrong because of redundancy of the use of "before" and " had depended".

I thought D would be okay because we are not supposed to guess the original meaning? Is there something dramatically wrong with D?

Please let me know how to go about making decisions between these two type of last options.

Best
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Hello GSBHopeful98,

We hope this finds you well.

To answer your query, Option D commits a blatant meaning-related error through the construction "the main source of revenue...was dependant on tariffs"; the construction of this clause incorrectly implies that the government's main source of revenue existed independently of tariffs but was dependent on them; the intended meaning is that the federal government dependent on tariffs to serve as its main source of revenue.

Further, it is important to keep in mind that redundancy is the least important factor in GMAT SC; when eliminating answer choices, we must take matters of conciseness into consideration only if there are multiple error-free answer choices.

We hope this helps.
All the best!
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The personal income tax did not become permanent in the United States 12 Apr 2022, 15:30
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Is there any grammatical reason to eliminate OC
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The personal income tax did not become permanent in the United States 01 Jun 2022, 13:55
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Can somebody please explain if C is grammatically incorrect or just too wordy?
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The personal income tax did not become permanent in the United States 01 Jun 2022, 16:35
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Rasalghul853
Can somebody please explain if C is grammatically incorrect or just too wordy?
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Choice (C) does not convey a meaning that makes sense, for the following reasons.

The first is the use of the wording "dependent on." "Dependent on" means "relying on for support," and it has to be followed by what is relied on, in other words, by a noun.

For instance, we could say, "The city is dependent on tourism." Notice that "tourism" is a noun.

However, in (C) we have "tariffs were what the federal government was dependent on to be its main source of revenue."

Notice that (C) doesn't simply say that the federal government was "dependent on tariffs." Rather, it conveys that the government was "dependent on" tariffs "to be its main source of revenue. So, since "dependent on" means "relying on for support, the meaning conveyed is essentially the following: tariffs were what the federal government was relying on for support to be its main source of revenue.

We can see that "relying on for support to be its main source of revenue" is not logical.

What we need there instead is the wording "DEPENDED on," as in "tariffs were what the federal government depended on to be its main source of revenue."

Unlike "dependent on," "depended on" works because its correct to say, "dependent on x to be y."

OK, but even if the sentence used "depended on" rather than "dependent on," it would still be a little off because "depended on to be its main source of revenue" suggests the nonsensical idea that the government depend on tariffs to actively be a source of revenue, as if tariffs could choose to be or not to be a source of revenue.

So, we can see that (C) is not just wordy but rather clearly illogical.
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The personal income tax did not become permanent in the United States 02 Jun 2022, 07:13
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Rasalghul853
Can somebody please explain if C is grammatically incorrect or just too wordy?
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I think my real issue with C is that its meaning is muddy.

Let's plug C in and read the sentence:

Quote:
The personal income tax did not become permanent in the United States until the First World War; before that time tariffs were what the federal government was dependent on to be its main source of revenue.
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And let's look at a sentence similar in structure to that second clause:

Tariffs were what the government was dependent on to be its main source of income.

[Subject] were [something] to be [something].

'infinitive' modifiers ('to verb') like this one tend to describe *why* an action was done. "He went to the store *to buy a loaf of bread*." "The company raised prices *to increase marginal profits*."

So in this sentence, 'to be its main source of income' is why 'tariffs were what the government was dependent on.'

That... doesn't make sense. I know what it's trying to say--the government depended on tariffs to be its main source of income.'

(This uses an idiomatic structure: "X depends on Y to [be/do] Z").

But the reverse structure of answer C ruins that idiom and creates a nonsensical meaning.
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The personal income tax did not become permanent in the United States 29 Jan 2023, 14:30
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ReedArnoldMPREP @everyone else
I am a student in the live course a while ago.

I struggle with the concept of using "what" in an appropriate way. in some examples, the "what" stands for something that is implied, but here, does what refer to tariffs? I am using the question in the below to guide me. "what" seems to be very flexible in terms of its antecedent... sometimes you use logic as in answer C and B in the below question to eliminate.
https://gmatclub.com/forum/residents-of ... 00580.html
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The personal income tax did not become permanent in the United States 29 Jan 2023, 14:50
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M838TE
ReedArnoldMPREP @everyone else
I am a student in the live course a while ago.

I struggle with the concept of using "what" in an appropriate way. in some examples, the "what" stands for something that is implied, but here, does what refer to tariffs? I am using the question in the below to guide me. "what" seems to be very flexible in terms of its antecedent... sometimes you use logic as in answer C and B in the below question to eliminate.
https://gmatclub.com/forum/residents-of ... 00580.html
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I'm answering this pretty quickly and without much thought, but 'what' is usually something like "the thing that" or "the amount that."

So "tariffs were what the government relied on to blah blah..." = "tariffs were [the thing that] the government relied on..."

"They pay three times what we pay" = "They pay three times [the amount that] we pay."
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The personal income tax did not become permanent in the United States 29 Jan 2023, 15:29
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ReedArnoldMPREP thank you very much for answering on a weekend! I try looking for other ways to eliminate first because subtle meaning differences are hard to spot... when you referred to tariffs were "the thing that" ... does it adds a level of redundancy? Colloquially, it sounds fine but I wonder if a sentence structure that uses "what" would often be considered not a preference in gmat land.
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The personal income tax did not become permanent in the United States 31 May 2023, 08:13
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Gnpth
The personal income tax did not become permanent in the United States until the First World War; before that time the federal government was dependent on tariffs to be their main source of revenue.


(A) the federal government was dependent on tariffs to be their main source of revenue

(B) the federal government had depended on tariffs as its main source of revenue

(C) tariffs were what the federal government was dependent on to be its main source of revenue

(D) the main source of revenue for the federal government was dependent on tariffs

(E) for their main source of revenue, tariffs were depended on by the federal government
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Sounds a dumb question after reading through all the forum discussion but why can't C be the correct answer?? It sounds awkward but I do not see any glaring error...can anyone please explain.

KarishmaB GMATNinja MartyTargetTestPrep
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The personal income tax did not become permanent in the United States 31 May 2023, 11:07
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@MATking94

No need to apologize; it's a tricky issue to pin down.

I think the biggest problem with C is one of meaning. If I say "I depend on X to be Y," that second part should apply to me. For instance, if I depend on chocolate to be happy, I'm saying that for ME to be happy, I need chocolate. So if I say the government "depends on tariffs to be its main source of revenue," I'm saying that the government needs tariffs so that THE GOVERNMENT can be its main source of revenue. This makes no sense!

B fixes this by using an "as modifier." The government depended on tariffs. In what way? As its main source of revenue.

Aside from this meaning, the structure of C is rather more complicated than necessary. It's simple to say "the government depended on tariffs," so why say "tariffs were what the government depended on"?
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The personal income tax did not become permanent in the United States 31 May 2023, 13:06
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DmitryFarber

I think the biggest problem with C is one of meaning. If I say "I depend on X to be Y," that second part should apply to me. For instance, if I depend on chocolate to be happy, I'm saying that for ME to be happy, I need chocolate.
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I was just thinking about this now, and I think the problem is slightly different. As you point out, if someone says "I depend on chocolate to be happy", the intended meaning is "I need chocolate". But if instead someone says "I'm depending on Avery to be at the meeting", being at the meeting now describes something Avery needs to do. And if I say "I'm depending on Avery to be happy", it's unclear if I need Avery for my own happiness, or if Avery's happiness is something I rely on for some reason. So the "X depends on Y to be Z" is a construction that can convey an ambiguous meaning, since it's unclear what Z goes with, and we usually try to avoid constructions like that in SC if an alternative is available.
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The personal income tax did not become permanent in the United States 01 Jun 2023, 04:29
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Gnpth
The personal income tax did not become permanent in the United States until the First World War; before that time the federal government was dependent on tariffs to be their main source of revenue.


(A) the federal government was dependent on tariffs to be their main source of revenue

(B) the federal government had depended on tariffs as its main source of revenue

(C) tariffs were what the federal government was dependent on to be its main source of revenue

(D) the main source of revenue for the federal government was dependent on tariffs

(E) for their main source of revenue, tariffs were depended on by the federal government

Sounds a dumb question after reading through all the forum discussion but why can't C be the correct answer?? It sounds awkward but I do not see any glaring error...can anyone please explain.

KarishmaB GMATNinja MartyTargetTestPrep
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Multiple problems with (C) -
'tariffs were what the federal government was dependent on' is a round about way of saying 'the federal government was dependent on tariffs' (not that it is wrong though)

Let's rephrase then:
The federal government was dependent on tariffs to be its main source of revenue.

The use of 'to be' is questionable. We know that 'as' means in the role/function and hence it fits well.

As Ian pointed out, 'I want you to be happy' has two meanings:
- To be happy, I want you.
- What I want is that you are happy.

Though in this context it seems that tariffs are to be 'its main source of revenue' since tarrifs are plural while 'its' is singular and stands for the govt. so the govt cannot be the govt's main source of revenue.
In any case, I would prefer 'as' over 'to be' and hence (B) would be better than (C).
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