Here is a video in which the answer is explained.


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Let me take this wonderful opportunity as a best friend of you all and explain the intricacies of what I call - The Subject-verb-modifier/quantifier agreement rule.

verbs and modifiers such as adjectives/adverbs need to take different forms depending on singularity or plurality of the nouns and relative pronouns, especially for count and non-count nouns. for a count noun, the modifier becomes plural and thereby verb needs to be plural, likeways with non-count nouns. sometimes quantifier/modifier is singular such as each, every etc while the noun may be a count noun or plural in nature, verb becomes singular following the quantifier/modifier. Also, a conjunction such as "and" is required between two singular nouns to create a plural verb. sometimes, quantifiers may be used incorrectly. replacing with appropriate quantifier may solve the sentence correction.

In the given sentence, noun is operations (countable) but quantifier is assigned to cost (verb) and that is rising (adverb). Rising is singular so "costs" has to become singular. Also, there is no hard-and-fast rule that nouns alone can be subjects of the sentences. The "of" is connecting the actual intent of the sentence with something related to it - "The rising cost of data-processing operations" thereby, "rising cost" becomes the subject, which is entirely singular and therefore, "has" is used.

The Answer is undoubtedly C.

Costs is plural. So to fit with has only A or C will be right.

A sounds awkward to me. A of B of C.
We have a better option in answer choice . i.e C.
Rising cost is more appropriate than A. ( though A is grammatically correct too)


My answer is C.

Dear goodyear2013,
I'm happy to help.

First, let's get the lay of the land with this sentence:

______________________ of data processing operations at many financial institutions has created a growing opportunity for independent companies to provide these services more efficiently and at lower cost.

First of all, we have a long infinitive phrase at the end. For more on infinitive phrases, see:
http://magoosh.com/gmat/2012/infinitive ... -the-gmat/
I'll mark this in a separate color:
______________________ of data processing operations at many financial institutions has created a growing opportunity for independent companies to provide these services more efficiently and at lower cost.
(The "for" preposition is contains the subject of the infinitive phrase.)

Now, also set the prepositional phrase off in parentheses and mark them in color:
______________________ (of data processing operations) (at many financial institutions) has created a growing opportunity for independent companies to provide these services more efficiently and at lower cost.

We see we have only one main verb, and this main verb needs a subject. The blank at the beginning must be a noun or something that can play the role of a noun. Both (D) & (E) are out.

Choice (A) is super-awkward, so that is out. I'm quite intrigued that official material would leave us with a split that depends only on the presence or absence of the definite article. That's what we have in the split between (B) & (C).

With the definite article, choice (B), "rising costs", would be appropriate if we were speaking in general, if for any reason, we weren't interested in specifying anything about the nature of these "rising costs." For example, "rising costs are a problem for doctors in private practice." This is not an appropriate choice in this sentence.

Here, we know in tremendous detail the nature of the costs. From the sentence, we can answer with tremendous precision the question, "the cost of what?" This means that we need the definite article. That's why (C) is the best answer.

Does all this make sense?
Mike
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Actually rising is used as (what is called) a gerund here, and not a participle. Summarily, participles are adjective forms of the verb, while gerunds are noun forms of the verb.


Indeed, in this case, rising is used as a participle.

p.s. Our book EducationAisle Sentence Correction Nirvana discusses the distinction between Participles and Gerunds. If someone is interested, PM me your email-id, I can mail the corresponding section.
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EducationAisle, my question was a general one. When we need to say costs of operations and when cost of operation?

EducationAisle, thanks for your reply. I encountered one question where gmat tests this concept. That is why it confused me in this question. combining-enormous-physical-strength-with-higher-intelligenc-87777.html

Wait ...

So if the "rising" cannot create something, how about if we replaced "rising" with "rise" ? If "rise" would be acceptable as a subject, what is fundamentally different between "rising" and "rise" that makes one invalid as a subject and the other valid?

Hi HiLine, I don't believe that A is incorrect because rising cannot create something. OE also just terms the rising of costs as wordy and awkward.

Let's take another example; which one of the following would you choose:

(i) The increasing of crimes is a bane on society.

(ii) Increase in crimes is a bane on society.

Hopefully it is evident that increase in crimes is more articulate than the increasing of crimes. In general, if there is a pure-play Noun form available (for example, increase), that structure is more elegant than the corresponding gerund form (the increasing of).
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Well I guess there is some smart work we can do before we get down to answer choices.
Since the non underlined part already contains "has" which is a singular verb, we must eliminate all answer choices which have a plural subject i.e. "rising costs" & above all we need a correct subject for the sentence to make logical sense.
So A, B & E are ruled out. Also in A "rising of costs" is unidiomatic. It should always be rising cost or rising costs.
Between C & D, C wins because using "Because" in choice E changes the intended meaning of the sentence.
Choice C means that the rising cost (i.e. the noun subject, rising modifying the specific feature of cost as a noun) has created opportunities for the companies...blah blah
In choice D Because creates dependent clause which means there is cause - effect relationship. However, in the sentence there is no such thing. The sentence is not trying to say that Because A happens B happens or it leads to B etc.
Hope this helps all those who could not get this question right?