Multiple choice

Directions: The following question presents a sentence, part of which or all of which is underlined. Beneath the sentence you will find five ways of phrasing the underlined part. The first of these repeats the original; the other four are different. If you think the original is best, choose the first answer; otherwise choose one of the others.

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.

  1. the United States did and nearly twice as much as Japan's exports

  2. the United States' and nearly double what the Japanese exports were

  3. the United States exported and nearly twice as much as the Japanese did

  4. what the United States did and nearly twice as much as Japan's exports

  5. what the United States exported and nearly double the Japanese exports

Reveal answer Fill a bubble to check yourself
C Correct answer
Explanation

The sentence compares EEC exports to both US exports and Japanese exports. Option C correctly uses 'the United States exported' and 'the Japanese did' to maintain parallel structure between the two comparisons. Options A, B, D, and E either compare actions to nouns (US did vs Japan's exports), create awkward constructions, or fail to maintain parallel structure between the two comparison elements.

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