[a习作temp] Argument237 [复制链接]

thzx0483
UID??179333

高级会员

Rank: 5 Rank: 5

声望: 0
寄托币: 2503
注册时间: 2004-9-19
精华: 0
帖子: 9

电梯直达

楼主

发表于 2005-7-22 16:03:24 |只看该作者 |倒序浏览

Argument237: 485 words 30 minutes
The following appeared as part of an article in a local Beauville newspaper.
'According to a government report, last year the city of Dillton reduced its corporate tax rate by 15 percent; at the same time, it began offering relocation grants and favorable rates on city utilities to any company that would relocate to Dillton. Within 18 months, two manufacturing companies moved to Dillton, where they employ a total of 300 people. Therefore, the fastest way for Beauville to stimulate economic development and hence reduce unemployment is to provide tax incentives and other financial inducements that encourage private companies to relocate here.'

In this argument, the arguer claims that the fastest way for Beauville to develop and reduce unemployment is to provide tax incentives and other financial inducements. To bolster this claim, the arguer provided the evidence that Dillton attracted two manufacturing companies eighteen months after implementing these policies .A meticulous examination would reveal how untenable this argument is.

A threshold problem with this argument is that the fact that two manufacturing companies moved to Dillton lends no support to what the arguer maintains. First, the number two is meaningless in that we have no information suggesting that two is relatively a big number. It is possible that the fact that only two companies moved to Dillton only proves the uselessness of the policies. In addition, we have no reason to believe eighteen months is a short time .As a matter of fact, one year and half is a relatively long period for business. Last, we have no reason to believe that three hundred is able to prove that the unemployment problem is addressed. It is quite possible that three hundred just occupies a small ratio of the whole employees. In short, there is no strong evidence to indicate that the policies applied in Dillton are indeed successful.

Another problem with this argument is that even if we admit that the fact that two companies moved to Dillton means the economy gets development and unemployment problem is settled, we still lack evidence to believe that the success is indeed brought about by the policies. In fact, many other factors have to be considered for any company to choose a city to do business, such as the situation of the market, people's economy conditions, citizens' perspectives and so forth, not just the grants offered by government .If the arguer is not able to preclude these possibilities, the claim is still open to question.

Last but not least, another defect that saps the logic of this argument is that the arguer makes a hasty conclusion. Even if we make a concession that the policies are indeed useful in Dillton that does not necessarily mean it will work out in Beauville. The situations between the two cities are distinct. It is possible that the corporate tax in Beauville is low enough and the government have offered a prodigious amount of grants and favorable rates to companies that would relocate to Beauville which means that these polices are no longer attractive to companies. Besides, the arguer provides no evidence to prove that no other better approaches are available to solve these problems.

To sum up, this argument lacks credibility in that the arguer is incapable of providing enough evidences to buttress what he/she suggests .To make it more convincing, the arguer would have to prove that the policies in Dillton indeed bring benefits. Furthermore, to better access this argument, we have to know more information about the situations in Beauville.