Would have vs Would have been
Would have and Would have been are two kinds of usages in the English language that have to be understood with precision. The use of ‘would have’ suggests possibility as in the sentence ‘He would have bought it if he had 40 dollars’. In this sentence the use of ‘would have’ suggests the possibility of a thing being purchased if the buyer had 40 dollars.
On the other hand ‘would have been’ suggests ‘possibility’ too but in a continuous sense as in the sentence ‘He would have been rich by now’. In this sentence the use of ‘would have been’ suggests a continuous sense.
The use of ‘would have’ indicates ‘likelihood’ sometimes as in the sentence ‘I would have made it possible’. In this sentence the use of the expression ‘would have’ suggests ‘likelihood’. The use of ‘would have been’ is sometimes accompanied by the use of the word ‘otherwise’ as in the sentence ‘Otherwise it would have been fine’.
On the other hand the expression ‘would have’ is sometimes accompanied by the use of a clause beginning with ‘if’ as in the sentence ‘You would have done if you had concentrated better’. Sometimes we find that ‘would have’ is accompanied by a clause beginning with the past perfect verb ‘had’ as in the sentence ‘The team would have won the match had its players performed better’.
On the other hand the expression ‘would have been’ is not too often accompanied by the clauses beginning with ‘if’ or the past perfect verb ‘had’. It is interesting to note that ‘would have’ is often followed by a verb in the present tense form as in the sentence ‘He would have become rich for sure’.
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