where is the mistake in this question

Question

who earn more money, you or your husband?

CalifJim · Accepted Answer

Two mistakes.

who should be Who.
earn should be earns.

CJ

RandomGuy · Answer

To make it a completely grammatical sentence, you would have to rewrite it: Between you and your husband, who earns/makes more money?

Fivejedjon · Answer

Aspara GusTo make it a completely grammatical sentence, you would have to rewrite it: Between you and your husband, who earns/makes more money?

I see nothing wrong with "Who earns more money, you or your husband?"

RandomGuy · Answer

fivejedjonI see nothing wrong with "Who earns more money, you or your husband?"

It’s perfectly natural and would be just fine in spoken English, but I’ve recently been convinced that there is no truly grammatical way of writing it. I would avoid it in writing altogether. If I’m not mistaken, CJ would agree. (Correct me if I’m wrong!)

Fivejedjon · Answer

Aspara Gus I’ve recently been convinced that there is no truly grammatical way of writing it.

What convinced you that there is anything ungrammatical about the sentence?

RandomGuy · Answer

fivejedjonWhat convinced you that there is anything ungrammatical about the sentence?

This thread, although it took about a week for it to sink in and change my mind.

CalifJim · Answer

Aspara GusI’ve recently been convinced that there is no truly grammatical way of writing it.

I don't know what the punctuation experts would say, but I would use a dash. I think that's the proper way to do an "alternate answers" phrase.

Who earns more money — you or your husband?

Nevertheless, using a sentence fragment for the alternate answers (or, indeed, the comma), is also possible.

Who earns more money? You or your husband?

I'm a little at a loss regarding the phrase "grammatical way of writing it". Since it's focused on writing, it seems to be a question of punctuation rather than of grammar, strictly speaking. Sentences are grammatical or ungrammatical regardless of how they are written. Well, I think so, anyway.

Aspara GusIf I’m not mistaken, CJ would agree.

As informal conversation, I think we have to say it's grammatical, even though it's elliptical.

Who earns more money? Do you earn more money, or does your husband earn more money?

If something more formal is required, then we'll have to go with the solution you've already proposed or something very much like it. (Possibly Is it you or your husband who earns more money?) As for the thread you referenced, I'm afraid that the sentence of interest in this thread is not really a blended interrogative, which was the topic I wrote about there. The blended interrogative that I'm familiar with has to be divisible into two real grammatical questions by using overlapping parts of an ungrammatical question. For example,

Who are you going to ask Jill for help on that? is a combination of these:

Who are you going to ask for help on that?
Are you going to ask Jill for help on that?

I don't know of a way of making one of these bizarre blended interrogatives when questioning the subject, which is what the sentence in this thread does. Neither "you" nor "your husband" can occur naturally at the end of a string of words from the original sentence because they are subjects, e.g., "Earns more money you?" isn't grammatical. You'd have to move words around, and you never have to do that in a blended interrogative.

CJ

RandomGuy · Answer

Thanks for your reply.

I must say that this is not at all as simple as I thought it was! I’ll have to mull it over for a while.

By the way, who are these "punctuation experts" you speak of? This wouldn’t be the first time you’ve mentioned them. Are they style manual authors? If so, do you have any recommendations?

CalifJim · Answer

Aspara GusBy the way, who are these "punctuation experts" you speak of?

Anyone more familiar than I am with the rules of punctuation. My punctuation is terrible, especially if it involves quotation marks or dashes. Besides that, style manuals don't always agree on what is correct. I have no recommendations.

CJ

where is the mistake in this question

Top answer

Get the Weekly English Kit 📬

Related Questions