In many job areas the earnings of women are well below that of men in

Question

Project SC Butler: Day 13: Sentence Correction (SC1) 
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In many job areas, the earnings of women are  well below that of men in spite of educational differences that are diminishing  between the sexes.

A) well below that of men in spite of educational differences that are diminishing

B) much below that of men's despite educational differences diminishing

C) much below men in spite of diminishing educational differences

D) well below those of men in spite of diminishing educational differences

E) below men's despite their educational differences that are diminishing

NOTE  : For this question, BEST or EXCELLENT answers must include the   meaning   of this sentence.

The  best or excellent answers get kudos , which will be  awarded  after   the answer is revealed.

Akash720 · Answer

+1 for D

A) well below that of men in spite of educational differences that are diminishing
- Incorrect. Earnings of women is compared to Earnings of men. Hence, we need 'those' as Earnings is plural.

B) much below that of men's despite educational differences diminishing
- Incorrect. Same as A

C) much below men in spite of diminishing educational differences
- Incorrect. The comparison is flawed here, Earnings are compared to men.

D) well below those of men in spite of diminishing educational differences
- Corrects the error in A.

E) below men's despite their educational differences that are diminishing
- Incorrect. Unnecessary 'their',creating ambiguity, is used.

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viitalik · Answer

I believe, D is the answer.

In many job areas, the earnings of women are well below that of men in spite of educational differences that are diminishing between the sexes.

A) well below that of men in spite of educational differences that are diminishing (that?)

B) much below that of men's despite educational differences diminishing (again, that?)

C) much below men in spite of diminishing educational differences (much?)

D) well below those of men in spite of diminishing educational differences (correct)

E) below men's despite their educational differences that are diminishing (their? not sure what "their" refers to)

Ask yourself this: What does the sentence actually compare? Earnings of women to earnings of men. If that is the case, then A, B use "that," which is not plural. E uses "their" and it is hard to understand what is the reference that the sentence then makes. Therefore, D it is.

Prateekj05 · Answer

The sentence means that there are many fields where both men and women are working, but for the same job, women are paid less than their male counterparts even though the difference in their educational qualifications is diminishing.

We are comparing earnings of women to earnings of men.  "The earnings of women"  is plural. In  A  and  B ,  that  is incorrect for the same reason. Also in  B ,  that of men's  uses double possessive form.

C  and  E  are comparing  earnings of women  with  men  which is illogical comparison.

Option  D  is free of the above errors and logically compares the earnings of women with earnings of men and hence should be the answer.

generis · Answer

A reminder about BEST ANSWER or EXCELLENT ANSWER:
please include the meaning of the sentence in your answer

You may edit responses at any time until the official answer is revealed at 8:59 a.m. Pacific Standard Time on November 20.

Of course, you may decide that you want only to post analysis. Totally fine.

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Arro44 · Answer

The sentence aims to compare the salary of women and men in the first place.
Afterwards, the educational differences are compared.

Neither aspect of the sentences is trying to compare men to women in general, however, this exact wrong comparison (men to women) is the main issue that unites the wrong answer choices.

The only sentence that compares salary to salary and education to education is the one in AC D!

Hope this helps.

Regards,
Chris

Hope this helps. Regards, Chris

daagh · Answer

The passage wants to highlight that thou women are bucking up and fast catching up men in educational standards. Still, women's salaries are not catching u as fast.

The important grammar point is to note is that the earnings are plurals and another plural pronoun must be used to match the plural.

In many job areas, the earnings of women are  well below that of men in spite of educational differences that are diminishing  between the sexes.

A) well below that of men in spite of educational differences that are diminishing --  it should be well below those of men

B) much below that of men's despite educational differences diminishing-- that of men's is redundant

C) much below men in spite of diminishing educational differences ----  comparison of below men is a bad comparison between earnings and men

D) well below those of men in spite of diminishing educational differences --  correct choice.

E) below men's despite their educational differences that are diminishing--  some ambiguity exists about the reference for 'their

MikeScarn · Answer

Not an SC expert, but I'll give this a try. Meaning : Educational differences between men and women are diminishing. So they are getting similar educations. However, men are being paid more than women are being paid. Bummer for the ladies. ( A ) well below that of men in spite of educational differences that are diminishing. "that" is not used correctly. "Those" would be much better. We are comparing " earnings ," so we need the plural version of "that." ( B ) "much below" is immediately incorrect. ( C ) "much below" is immediately incorrect. To make it even worse, we are comparing the "earnings of women" to "men." Comparing money to a gender. That's what I call comparing apples to oranges

( D ) In many job areas, the earnings of women are well below those of men in spite of diminishing educational differences between the sexes. Okay, "those" clearly refers to "earnings." So we are comparing apples to apples. That's good. "diminishing educational differences" sounds much better than "educational differences that are diminishing." This is the clearest and most concise way we have phrased this yet. Adjective, Adjective, Noun. I like that. Keep this option. ( E) In many job areas, the earnings of women are below men's despite their educational differences that are diminishing between the sexes. 1. The earnings of women are below men's . Men's what? Men's earnings? Maybe. 2. Despite "their" educational differences? Who is their? women and men's? That seems strange. 3. Here we go again with "educational differences that are diminishing" adjective, noun, that , verb, adjective. That's not very clean.

generis · Answer

OFFICIAL EXPLANATION

This official explanation contains a lot of descriptors that I did  not  see in posts,
an omission about which I am glad.

I would let these descriptors be your last reasons for eliminating a choice:   wordy, awkward , and  unclear.

If a test taker cannot explain why a sentence is "wordy," the option should not be discarded.
My additions are in blue text.

• In choice A, the pronoun  that  does not agree in number with its noun,  earnings ; 
the pronoun that matches earnings is  those  
-- the phrasing is  wordy  
 -- "wordy" is not an explanation. "wordy" is an assertion. WHY is a sentence wordy?
 MikeScarn  , for example, likes the stacked adjectives in one answer and dislikes the  that  clause in others.
His assessment is correct, a point I explain below.** 
-- the phrasing does not convey the sense that diminishing the educational differences between the sexes
would be expected to narrow the gap in earnings.
 I would be willing to entertain this assertion if we were told what (A)  does  convey.
As that assertion stands, I cannot make use of the argument. 
 
• In choice B,  that  and the possessive  men's  are faulty 
--  that  is faulty  because "earnings" are plural. As is the case in (A), the correct pronoun is  those  
-- possessive  men's   is faulty because it is part of the phrase  OF men's.

The  's  is redundant. To show  whose  earnings, use "those   of men" or "men's earnings." 
 Incorrect : those    of  men 's

-- the phrasing does not convey the sense that diminishing the educational differences between the sexes
would be expected to narrow the gap in earnings.
 I would be willing to entertain this assertion if we were told what (A)  does  convey.
As that assertion stands, I cannot make use of the argument. 
 --  much below  is less idiomatic than  well below 
-- the sentence with (B) is awkward.  Why?

• Choices C illogically compares  the earnings of women  to the word  men  rather than
to the parallel phrase  the earnings of men

• In choice E
--  their  seems to refer to earnings
--  men's  is not parallel with  of women , and 
-- the phrasing is unclear. 
 Which phrasing? What is unclear? Why?

• Choice D is best
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
First, welcome to GMAT Club  viitalik  !
And  MikeScarn  , glad to see you wander this way.

In my first post, partly in red, I wrote that answers must include the meaning of the sentence.

In a separate post, I repeated the instructions.
If you failed to include the meaning of the sentence, you were ineligible for kudos.

daagh  , I've been wanting to highlight a phrase I admire from the very first post of this series.

"I am removing E for its  brazen fragmentation ."
 
I laughed admiringly at your originality. 
My thanks to you for serving up two perfectly pitched words.
(And many more than that in thousands of posts.)

Prateekj05  - the way you explained meaning set a good example. 
You found a way to rearrange the words
and to include the word "job." Both of those choices conveyed the meaning in your own words.
You have one error, however, and the error is an easy one to make.
You mistook "men's" for "men." 
The error in E is not the same as that in C.

MikeScarn , 
Very well done.

Most posts are very good to excellent.
But . . .

Best post goes to  MikeScarn  
Thank you, all!

**Pretend that A has the correct pronoun, those. We'll set it next to correct answer D.

Option A: ... earnings of women are  well below those of men in spite of educational differences  that are diminishing   between the sexes.

Option D: . . .earnings of women are  well below those of men in spite of  diminishing  educational differences  between the sexes.

Is (D) better? Yes. "diminishing" as an adjective that precedes  differences  is more effective than the clause "that are diminishing." 
1) in (D) fewer words have exactly the same meaning
2) (D) avoids two "are" verbs. I do not reject passive voice reflexively (automatically). But one  inert  (non-action) verb—"are"—is enough.
3) back-to-back adjectives leave the emphasis at the end of the sentence. That placement accords with the intention to highlight the gap. 
(Emphasis in most English sentences comes at the end.)

unraveled · Answer

I have a question. Can 'the' be used in such a manner to form a plural subject??
Isn't it that the is used for a specific thing.?

Any comments.. Please enlighten.

Tushrgupta · Answer

The split is between that,those and men's - since earnings+women should be followed by Plural pronoun "those" and non possessive form of men.

CEdward · Answer

Something that I would like to point out here regarding E. Aside from 'their', it's main issue is that it doesn't make a whole lot of sense.
Read literally, the sentence is saying "educational differences that are diminishing BETWEEN THE SEXES. Try reading that out loud. Sounds terrible.

vishalkumar05ster · Answer

In many job areas, the earnings of women are well below that of men in spite of educational differences that are diminishing between the sexes.

A) well below  that  of men in spite of educational differences that are diminishing -wrong pronoun

B) much below  that  of men's despite educational differences diminishing-wrong pronoun

C) much  below men  in spite of diminishing educational differences -improper comparison

D) well below those of men in spite of diminishing educational differences-right pronoun usage those has proper antecedent earnings

E) below men's despite their educational differences that are diminishing-wordy

rocky620 · Answer

Even though it is an official question, should it not use  "than" ?
well below   than   those of men

VerbalBot · Answer

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In many job areas the earnings of women are well below that of men in

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GMAT Sentence Correction (SC - EA only) Questions

In many job areas the earnings of women are well below that of men in

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