The previous director has had a very difficult time during

Question

The previous director has had a very difficult time during his term , from  having his perks reduced ,which was never accounted for  ,to his post retirement privileges getting cancelled .

A)having his perks reduced ,which was never accounted for
B)having his perks reduced ,which has never been accounted for 
C)reduction of his perks,which was never accounted for 
D)reduction of his perks, which has never been accounted for 
E)having his perks reduced,or which there has never been accountability

Pjp · Answer

Options A,B,E are clearly incorrect.-Parallelism Error.
But how do we choose between C and D?
Please explain.

applebus · Answer

I think the word "Never" suits with Present Perfect. So D is correct.

Pags · Answer

Why b) is wrong? It looks perfectly parallel:
from having his perks reduced...to getting his post retirement privileges cancelled
vs.
from reduction of his perks...to getting...

iPen · Answer

B is wrong because "which" needs to refer to "perks" directly (i.e. be adjacent to one another).

D maintains parallelism of tense (stays in present). C goes from present to past to present.

chetan2u · Answer

Hi  iPen  &  Pags ,
which does not refer to perks but to  "reduction of perks" ..
there is nothing wrong on that front..
B is wrong for reasons of parallelism...
the nonunderlined portion is  "to his post retirement privileges getting cancelled "  
and it is parallel to  reduction of his perks,  and not to  having his perks reduced ..
Hope it was helpful.

vijayshree · Answer

The previous director has had a very difficult time during his term , from  having his perks reduced ,which was never accounted for , to his post retirement privileges getting cancelled .

A)having his perks reduced ,which was never accounted for
B)having his perks reduced ,which has never been accounted for
C)reduction of his perks,which was never accounted for
D)reduction of his perks, which has never been accounted for
E)having his perks reduced,or which there has never been accountability

The director faces 2 difficulties

1. having his perks reduced
2.retirement privileges getting cancelled .

A)having his perks reduced  ,which  was never accounted for

"which "---is a relative pronoun that refers to preceding noun , here " reduced " is a verb not noun therefore " which " refers for--- perks ( noun ).

now always check the verb after "which " -----the verb here is ---was ( singular ) while ---perks ( plural ) hence it is Subject verb mismatch .

B)having his perks reduced ,which has never been accounted for

"which "---is a relative pronoun that refers to preceding noun , here " reduced " is a verb not noun therefore " which " refers for--- perks ( noun ).

now always check the verb after "which " -----the verb here is ---has ( singular ) while ---perks ( plural ) hence it is Subject verb mismatch .

C)reduction of his perks,which  was  never accounted for

The sentence starts with -------The previous director  has  ----present tense ------use of ---"was " changes the sentence from present to past .

D)reduction of his perks, which  has  never been accounted for

sentence maintain the tense consistently .

E)having his perks reduced,or which  there has never been  accountability

Use of "Which "" is wrong , before " which " there must be " comma " but exception is only when before it there is preposition . here is conjunction " or " not preposition .

there has never been-----this makes sentence wordy

correct Answer ----D

chetan2u · Answer

Hi,
you are wrong when you say that 'which ' refers to perks..
Replace "which" with perks and see if it makes sense..
 reduction of his perks, his perks has never been accounted for ..
it is not "his perks " but "the reduction of the perks" that has not been accounted for..
and so the usage of 'which' is correct even in A and B

vijayshree · Answer

In option C and D , I agree to you that "Which " stands for reduction of his perks and not perks .

there are 2 reason for that

1. Reduction of his perks ( is Noun ) and " which " is pronoun refers to noun .
2. "Which " can not refers to --his perks because before --his perks ---preposition ( of ) is there that makes it prepositional phrase rather than Noun ,therefore "which " refers for --- Reduction of his perks ( noun ) .

also check verb after "which " in option C and D ----Was / Has ( which is singular ) and as per concept verb after "which " must satisfy the noun ( reduction of his perks ----- singular ).

rishabchoraria · Answer

Is "never" the only reason that mandates present perfect in the non-essential modifier in the options?

Can someone add on this?

iPen · Answer

How about parallel structure with respect to present perfect before the non essential modifier?

The previous director  has had  a very difficult time during his term....

rishabchoraria · Answer

I did not consider it because there is no parallel marker such as "and" that would mandate paralellism between the parts under consideration.

Is a parallel marker not necessary for patallelism?

iPen · Answer

The present perfect is used to refer to unspecified past times that have never occurred before.

e.g. I have never been that late to a meeting before.

The first present perfect refers to an unspecified range of time, too, so there's no specific marking point for which the simple past "had never been..." can be said to occur after from. But, I'd say that logically, the reduction of perks (X)  has never been  taken account before, since (X) + (Y) eventually caused the previous director to have difficult times. So, X must be at least at the same time as or prior to when the previous director began to experience difficult times (the effect). With that causal time frame, and since the simple past tense must occur after the perfect tense, we should maintain parallel structure or else we break the time order of events.

daagh · Answer

First the underlined portion and especially the use of ‘which’: A pronoun should stand for another noun that it should be able to meaningfully replace. In addition it should also agree with the number and gender of the antecedent. Now let’s see choice by choice.

A) having his perks reduced ,which was never accounted for –  What is the noun that the pronoun ‘which’ stands for, perhaps, the plural perks? Then the singular verb ‘which was’ is wrong  
B) having his perks reduced, which has never been accounted for ---  The same error as in A.  
C) reduction of his perks, which was never accounted for ---  this is the right one.  
D) reduction of his perks, which has never been accounted for --  use of present perfect is wrong; why I will explain below.  
E) having his perks reduced, or which there has never been accountability –  ‘or which’ should be either ‘ of which’ or ‘for which’ I believe. Is it a typo? The sentence doesn’t gel at all, with the awkward intrusion of ‘or’. Assuming that it is any one of them, then the pronoun stands the reduction of the perks, and the clause misses the exact referent ‘reduction”. So let us drop this

On the non-underlined portion, I would stress that the use of the present perfect tense is certainly wrong here. Note the words ‘during his term’. It denotes a specific time - line that started from the day he was appointed as a direct and to the date he ended as director. So this is a specific time, definable with a beginning and an end. Secondly the tenure of directorship is a closed chapter and there is no continuity of it today. How can we use a present perfect then? I did not mention it because it was not underlined.

iPen · Answer

I believe "has had..." in the non-underlined portion can be used as if one is talking about a scenario or to retell a story as if it is happening now. So, if I recount a past event, I'll use the present perfect, yet I'll refer to the person as, say, the previous director, which refers to the present reality's timeline. So, for example:

An eyewitness' biographical account with respect to what happened many years ago, as if it is happening now: "While the former President Clinton has had too much to deal with during the final weeks of his first term, the rebels have been raiding the villages."

"Former" may be thought as necessary by the author so as not to confuse the reader. For instance, if the author quickly snaps back to the present reality, then readers may confuse the president (without "former") to refer to the current sitting president Obama. Or, the author may be talking about the past and current president in close proximity, either beforehand or later on, perhaps as a comparison of the differences or similarities between the two presidents' terms, each as it is happening in the present.

daagh · Answer

An eyewitness' biographical account with respect to what happened many years ago, as if it is happening now: "While the former President Clinton has had too much to deal with during the final weeks of his first term, the rebels have been raiding the villages."
I have my doubts about the correctness of this clause. Unless he is having too much to deal with even today, we can’t use the present perfect. Closed matters and finished issues do not entail a present perfect. The correct sentence should be 
While the former President Clinton had too much to deal with during the final weeks of his first term, the rebels were raiding the villages.
Let me also ask whether we can extend the same logic to Roosevelt, who was also a former President? Can we say that

Roosevelt has had a handful of problems to deal with as the slide in economy and the recession have been taking a heavy toll of the people.

Perhaps as you say, it may be correct in story telling which is done in direct speech but not in formal indirect speech; in indirect speeches, all present tenses have to be converted to their relevant past tenses.

This is my humble opinion, if you may wish.

cledgard · Answer

“The previous director  has had  a very difficult time during his term”

If the term is over, why the present perfect is used here?

Other users have pointed out this error, and the sentence is still popping out.

Shef08 · Answer

Hi,

I have a huge doubt on this solution provided. Why is D correct here? As pointed out by  daagh  the statement talks about a term which is completed (the usage of has had points out the same) so the why is idiom that follows "from X (reduction of his perks)" cannot be written in simple past. Why is C not correct

AnirudhaS · Answer

Completely agree with you.

Sir  generis  can you look into this one please. I strongly feel that this should be edited.

The previous director has had a very difficult time during

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The previous director has had a very difficult time during

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