Kathirkaman Posted 15 years ago
Grammar
Usage of "as"
I had the following sentence in a manuscript:
"Fluctuations in the employment rate are about as important in the United Kingdom and continental Europe, with labour force participation providing more of a margin of adjustment in France and Germany"
In the above example, I see that the use of "as" is totally unnecessary; I referred the usage dictionary "Oxford Advanced Learner's Dictionary" (OALD) for such usage, but I don't find any there. But I have seen many authors using "as" like this unnecessarily. Probably, if the author intended to compare the fluctuations in UK with continental Europe, as defined in OALD, the sentence would read thus:
"Fluctuations in the employment rate are as important in the United Kingdom as in continental Europe, with labour force participation providing more of a margin of adjustment in France and Germany"
Waiting for thoughts on the above....
"Fluctuations in the employment rate are about as important in the United Kingdom and continental Europe, with labour force participation providing more of a margin of adjustment in France and Germany"
In the above example, I see that the use of "as" is totally unnecessary; I referred the usage dictionary "Oxford Advanced Learner's Dictionary" (OALD) for such usage, but I don't find any there. But I have seen many authors using "as" like this unnecessarily. Probably, if the author intended to compare the fluctuations in UK with continental Europe, as defined in OALD, the sentence would read thus:
"Fluctuations in the employment rate are as important in the United Kingdom as in continental Europe, with labour force participation providing more of a margin of adjustment in France and Germany"
Waiting for thoughts on the above....
Top answer
1. Maybe fluctuations in the employment rate in some other place were mentioned in the preceding text. In that case the pattern goes like this: Fluctuations ...
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1. Maybe fluctuations in the employment rate in some other place were mentioned in the preceding text. In that case the pattern goes like this:
Fluctuations ... in the U.S. are important.
Fluctuations ... are as important in the UK and in Europe. (as in the U.S. omitted and left implicit.)
2. Maybe the intention was as you say: as important i
Fluctuations ... in the U.S. are important.
Fluctuations ... are as important in the UK and in Europe. (as in the U.S. omitted and left implicit.)
2. Maybe the intention was as you say: as important i
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