Dealing with the age-old controversy over the usage of “fewer” and “less”

Question by jhinx22, Forum member (May 2, 2014):

People often don’t know when to use “fewer” and when to use “less” in a sentence. “Fewer” is used when referring to people or things in plural as in this sentence: “Fewer students are opting to study science-related subjects. “Less,” on the other hand, is used when referring to something that can’t be counted, as in this example: “People want to spend less time in traffic jams.”

I was confused when I came across this example in your forum: “‘Why are there less women CEOs?’ asks the professor.”

Shouldn’t it be “fewer” instead?

My reply to jhinx22:

You hit the nail right on the head, so to speak, when you say that people often don’t know when to use “fewer” and when to use “less.” The fact is that the choice between these two comparatives has been steeped in controversy for over two centuries now, and it’s a controversy that shows no sign of abating. The general rule is, of course, to use “less” if we are talking comparatively about an amount of something that can’t be counted, as the noun “time” in the example you gave, “People want to spend less time in traffic jams”; and to use “fewer” if we are talking comparatively about a number of people or things that are countable, as the noun “students” in your other example, “Fewer students are opting to study science-related subjects.”

In actual usage, though, we soon discover that this general rule doesn’t always work—or at least not work very nicely—for quite a few things. While “money” is obviously countable, for instance, we don’t say “I have fewer than five-hundred pesos in my savings account” but say “I have less than than five-hundred pesos in my savings account” instead. And while the noun “minute” is evidently countable as a unit of time, I’d say “Less than half of the 180 minutes of that atrocious stage play was worth watching” and definitely not “Fewer than half of the 180 minutes of that atrocious stage play was worth watching.”

There are obviously other grammatical or semantic forces at work when we make the choice between “fewer” and “less” in our written or spoken English. It is therefore perfectly understandable that you got confused when you came across this construction in the Forum: “‘Why are there less women CEOs?’ asks the professor.” Shouldn’t it be “fewer” instead?

That questionable “less”-using sentence was actually a news headline on the web that was brought to my attention by a Forum member, journalism student Jhumur Dasgupta, way back in December 2011. He found that headline odd from a structural standpoint, not because it used “less” instead of “fewer,” and he asked me if there was a better way to construct that headline (“The proper way to construct a question in a news headline”). I suggested some structural variations, but that headline’s usage of “less” not having been questioned, I took its wording at face value when I analyzed it for Jhumur.

Now that you’ve brought up that sentence for discussion, though, I think it’s time to seize the bull by its horns and answer your question: Shouldn’t it use “fewer” instead of “less”? Shouldn’t it be corrected to read as follows?

“‘Why are there fewer women CEOs?’ asks the professor.”

For sure the sentence above is more grammatically airtight than “‘Why are there less women CEOs?’ asks the professor,” but I think only in the context of a comparison against a well-known, numerically established number of women CEOs in, say, a specific industry within a certain geographic location. For instance, assuming that it has been definitely established that there are 8,000 male CEOs in Metro Manila’s telecommunications industry against only 500 women CEOs in that local universe of CEOs, then given that level of certainty, the use of the comparative “fewer” would be unquestionable and that statement should definitely read as follows: “‘Why are there fewer women CEOs?’ asks the professor.”

I would think though that when comparing unknown, not well-established, or merely assumed or conjectural quantities, “less” might just be preferable to “fewer” and better-sounding at that. Take this hypothetical example: “In that progressive island-nation in which you imagine that female executives outnumber male executives by a ratio of 100:15, why would there be less women CEOs?” (I know that grammar prescriptivists would accept that construction only if the phrase “than male CEOs” is added to the tail end of that sentence, but no matter.) I’m not saying, though, that “fewer” is wrong in that sentence, only that “less” becomes an irresistible if not an unquestionably viable usage as well. Indeed, the shade of difference between “fewer” and “less” becomes marginal in such situations, and I personally don’t think I’d be so embarrassed as to lose sleep if somebody caught me instinctively using “less” for that comparative.

MORE READINGS IN THE FORUM ABOUT “FEWER” VS. “LESS”:
Trouble in using “less” or “fewer”
“Ten items or less”

ELSEWHERE ON THE WEB:
OxfordWords Blog on “Less” and “Fewer”
New York Times ”After Deadline” Blog on “Less” and “Fewer”