23. A Labor Department study states that the numbers of women employed outside the home grew by more than a thirty-five percent increase in the past decade and accounted for more than sixty-two percent of the total growth in the civilian work force.
(A) numbers of women employed outside the home grew by more than a thirty-five percent increase
(B) numbers of women employed outside the home grew more than thirty-five percent
(C) numbers of women employed outside the home were raised by more than thirty-five percent
(D) number of women employed outside the home increased by more than thirty-five percent（D）
(E) number of women employed outside the home was raised by more than a thirty-five percent increase
Because a count of women employed outside the home at any given time will be expressed by a single number, the use of the plural noun numbers in choices A, B, and C is illogical.
也就是说，表示某个物体在某个状态下的数目，应该用number,而不是numbers.但是请看这一题：
251. The gyrfalcon, an Arctic bird of prey, has survived a close brush with extinction; its numbers are now five times greater than when the use of DDT was sharply restricted in the early 1970’s.
(A) extinction; its numbers are now five times greater than
(B) extinction; its numbers are now five times more than
(C) extinction, their numbers now fivefold what they were
(D) extinction, now with fivefold the numbers they had（A）
(E) extinction, now with numbers five times greater than
gyrfalcon目前（now）的数目应该是number(注意不是numbers)，但是ets自己明确用了numbers.请问为什么？
在gmat中，什么时候用number,什么时候用numbers?ets有没有一个定论？希望nn指点！ | 
