110 Million cats & Dogs

[Gaurav]

There are over 110 Million dogs & cats in the United States, which is more tha the population of any western European country

A) SAME
B) which are more than the population of any western Eurpoean country
C) being more than the population of any Western European country
D) more than any Western European country in population
E) more than in any Western European country by population

SOURCE : ARCO's GMAT guide
Their Answer : A

I'm not convinced with the usage of 'which' in A .....

I feel the construction should be something like D or E ('more than ..) though I also feel that 'population' is wrongly place in
each.

Can any of the tutors please throw some light on this ...

THanks

[RonPurewal]

um, yeah, ok. if your area experiences a sudden cold snap, you now have a nice thick book that you can burn for fuel.

this is a flagrant violation of the gmat's rules for the relative pronoun 'which'; the gmat ONLY uses that pronoun to refer to the noun immediately preceding the comma. in this case, that would be 'the United States', a reference that makes no sense.

the other thing that just stinks about this sentence is the abject lack of subject-verb agreement - there's an orphaned singular verb: which is more than...
the only possible singular referent is, again, 'the United States', a referent that makes no sense.

suggestions:
1) double-check to make sure they're really positing (a) as the correct answer.
2) if this is truly the case, do not ever open this book again.

--

here is the way in which you'd be most likely to see this sentence on an official test:
there are over 110m dogs and cats in the united states, a figure greater than the human population of any western european country.

[Gaurav]

Thanks a lot for the clarification ROn ..

I have checked again. They Do infact posit A as the right choice ....