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Identify the 10 grammatical errors related to verb conjugation in the following excerpt.
The U.S. Congress passes legislation to establish a federally funded health insurance program for aged persons in 1965. Title XVIII of the Social Security Act, also known as Medicare, is being made into law by President Lyndon B. Johnson. The first recipient of Medicare benefits was former President Harry S. Truman, who receives his card at the bill-signing ceremony. Medicare soon becomes the larges single healthcare payer in the United States. Currently, Medicare has provided coverage for more than 40 million Americans. Many expected enrollment in Medicare to almost double by 2031. This increase was partly because of the huge generation of baby boomers, who begins to turn 65 in 2010. But Medicare itself expands as well. Initially, Medicare coverage was only available to American citizens over the age of 65, but recently coverage is extending to many other with long-term conditions.
Quick answer:
This excerpt includes 10 grammatical errors, each having to do with a verb conjugation. The error could be the helping or the main verb in a clause: passed – past tense was – past tense received – past tense is – present tense provides – present tense expected– future tense will occur in the future. "Will" is a present-tense modal and cannot coexist with a future verb form. In addition to being used to describe the agreement of two elements of a sentence, pronouns can also be used as descriptors, giving information about nouns that precede them. For example, "the large elephant," which gives information about what kind of animal is being described.
I have broken the passage down sentence-by-sentence, with an explanation beneath each of the words requiring corrections identified with italics.
The U.S. Congress passes legislation to establish a federally funded health insurance program for aged persons in 1965.
In this sentence, "passes" needs to be changed to past tense,"passed," since the context is historical (in 1965).
Title XVIII of the Social Security Act, also known as Medicare, is being made into law by President Lyndon B. Johnson.
In this sentence, "is" needs to be changed to past tense,"was," since the context is historical (during Johnson's presidency).
The first recipient of Medicare benefits was former President Harry S. Truman, who receives his card at the bill-signing ceremony.
In this sentence, "receives" needs to be changed to past tense,"received," since the context is historical (during Johnson's presidency).
Medicare soon becomes the largest single healthcare payer in the United States.
In this sentence,...
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"becomes" needs to be changed to past tense,"became," since the context is historical.
Currently, Medicare has provided coverage for more than 40 million Americans.
In this sentence, the verb phrase "has provided" needs to be changed to present tense,"provides," since the context is present, denoted by the word "currently."
Many expected enrollment in Medicare to almost double by 2031.
In this sentence, the verb "expected" needs to be changed to future tense,"expect," since the context is the future, denoted by the year "2031."
This increase was partly because of the huge generation of baby boomers, who begins to turn 65 in 2010.
This sentence has two errors. The increase is projected, meaning it will occur in the future, whereas "was" is a past tense verb; "was" needs to be replaced by "is." The second error is the verb tense of "begins," which needs to be changed to "began" since 2010 is in the past.
But Medicare itself expands as well.
In this sentence, the verb "expands" needs to be changed to past tense,"has expanded," since the context is the past.
Initially, Medicare coverage was only available to American citizens over the age of 65, but recently coverage isextending to many other with long-term conditions.
In this sentence, the verb phrase "is extending" needs to be changed to past tense,"has extended," since the context is the past, denoted by the word "recently."