AppId is over the quota
AppId is over the quota
A: Ah, the old subject-verb agreement problem. Most of us learned in elementary school that a singular subject takes a singular verb and a plural subject takes a plural verb. What could be simpler?
Many things, it turns out. In “The Copyeditor’s Handbook,” Amy Einsohn lists 25 “perplexities and controversies in subject-verb agreement.” As Einsohn notes, the grammatical form of a subject (that is, whether it is singular or plural) sometimes conflicts with our idea of its meaning. So we sometimes treat as singular a subject that looks like a plural–we do this to satisfy a “notional” agreement. We say, for example:
Plain spaghetti and meatballs never satisfies my dad.Your question basically asks, Is “$1,000” singular or plural?
I think 200 square feet gives the dog plenty of room.
Five dollars for a latte is too much!
Like “five dollars,” the sum of $1,000 is a specific amount, constituting a unit. It is thus treated as a singular noun. So we would say, “There was $1,000 in bad debt for the year.” Changing “bad debt” to “bad debts” wouldn’t make any difference; we’d still use a singular verb.
Note: “The Yahoo! Style Guide” discusses other subject-verb agreement problems on pages 332-335.
–Karen Seriguchi
Copy editor
Published on Thursday, December 22, 2011
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