問：貴欄曾有以下兩句：（1）Wages in Thailand are higher than in Hong Kong（泰國的工資比香港高）。（2）Our output this year is as much again as last year's（我們今年的產量比去年多一倍）。第一句than之後可不可加those一字？第二句last year's可不可改為last year？
答：讀者所說拙欄第一句是縮畧寫法，全寫是Wages in Thailand are higher than they are (high) in Hong Kong。至於讀者提議的寫法，即Wages in Thailand are higher than those in Hong Kong，沒有縮畧，逕以wages in Thailand和those (＝wages) in Hong Kong相比，文法也正確。
讀者所說拙欄第二句也用了縮畧法，last year's等於last year's output。至於讀者提議的寫法，即Our output this year is as much again as (our output) last year，縮畧方式和拙欄稍有不同，文法則當然也沒有問題。
問：網上詞典 The Longman Dictionary of Contemporary English Online 有以下一句，其中we did兩字可以畧去嗎？──We're now doing twice as much business as we did last year（我們現在的生意，比去年多一倍）。
答：We're now doing用了現在式動詞，we did則用了過去式；雖然如此， (are) doing和did屬同一動詞，為免重複，we did可以畧去。韋氏詞典 Merriam-Webster's Advanced Learner's English Dictionary twice條有以下一句，現在式動詞is之後，畧去了過去式的 (our old one) was：The new house is twice as large as our old one（新房子比我們那棟舊房子大一倍）。