“from one year to another” vs. “from a year to another”

Question

Which one (#1, #2 or #3) is grammatical?

This is calculated as...

1) ...the price difference from one year to another.

2) ...the price difference from a year to another.

3) ...the price difference from one year to other.

I was about to write #1 in a document, when I thought that maybe I should not mix a numeral (one) with an article (an in another).

UPDATE: In his answer below, FX_ says that he would say #1 and that thinks that #2 is also correct. I'm starting a bounty to check if there any different answers.

Answer 1

"From one year to another" is definitely the correct choice among those three.

I would be more inclined to say it "from one year to the next", though.

You could also say "the price change from year to year" or "the year-over-year price change" or even "the annual price differential."

(edit: I should also say that while "from a year to another" may well be grammatically correct, it is absolutely not idiomatic and will sound bad to most if not all native speakers.)

Answer 2

The issue here is that "the price difference" is from one particular year to another. Therefore it is erroneous to be vague about "the price difference" being from a (general) year to another year. Because this construction is usually made with particular years in mind, the idiom has become "from particular" to "another" (meaning next).

Answer 3

The third sentence is definitely not correct: you already have mentioned one thing, so you have to use another and not other.

The first one is correct, and is the way I'd say it. The second does not sound as good to me, but I think it is also correct.

Answer 4

The first one is definitely correct. The second one, while not technically wrong, sounds somewhat unidiomatic in my opinion.

Here's a little trick to check the contemporary usage of an expression or a phrase: just Google the two phrases and compare the usage contexts. Also, try to figure out which form is preferred by native English speakers.

For instance:

1 "from one year to another"

2,210,000 results (with links to Britannica, etc., which gives us a clue that this usage is acceptable to certain authoritative users of the language)

http://www.google.com/search?sourceid=chrome&ie=UTF-8&q=%22from+one+year+to+another%22

2 "from a year to another"

177,000 results, and it occurs more often in the writings of non-native speakers of English.

http://www.google.com/search?sourceid=chrome&ie=UTF-8&q=%22from+a+year+to+another%22

At any rate, in your context, I think you'd be safer with #1 than #2.

Answer 5

In English, 'a' can be interpreted as meaning, literally, 'one', but it can just as easily be interpreted to mean 'any'. In sentence #2, 'a year' will be viewed as 'any year' by many, if not most, native English speakers. It is, of course, a very subtle distinction, because the same argument might be made that 'one' can be taken as meaning 'any' within the right context.

English can be a very imprecise language.