**茶叶蛋炒饭** 第十次作业 ARG186 请组员跟帖

saybia1993UID: 2625112

Due to the survey of the factory workers, the author claims that the older workers were less likely to report the active function of supervisor on their work. Although the argument seems reasonable at first glance, it actually fails to support its conclusion through logical statement and thus have several flaws.

The conclusion of argument based on a known survey of a group of workers among various ages. The survey presents that when workers grow older, they are less likely to report the active function of supervisor in their work. However, there are several flaws in this recommendation which fails to fully convince people when act as proofs. First, the survey was based on the telephone, but it did not present the basic data of the samples. There is no evidence that the percentage of works among 18 to 29, aged 30 or over and aged 50 or over are close to each other. It is possible that one of the three kinds of samples has a less number of works when compared to other two groups during the survey, thus it could not illustrate the major willingness of such group. Second, the survey fails to rule out the difference between automobile factory workers and the printing company workers. There exists the possibility that the automobile factory workers need more supervision according to the nature of the job.

Also, from the survey we cannot conclude that the more older employees the company hires the higher productivity they get. The author did not provide evidences that younger worker has a less productivity than the older worker. Even though the supervisors are more likely to rise the younger workers of their productivity, perhaps the younger workers original have a much higher productivity than the old workers because younger workers always have good health and good spirit. Therefore, although no supervisor exist, the younger workers still have a higher productivity than the old workers.

More important, the reduced need of supervisor will make no sense for the company to save the money. Since no evidence can prove that the older workers expect less salary than younger workers. On the contrary, older workers typically require a higher salary than the younger workers as a universal phenomenon. As a result, the money saved in hiring supervisors was paid for the extra salary required by older workers.

To put all the nuts in a shell, the conclusion is dubious and suspicious at best. In order to persuade us, the author should make his survey more comprehensively and carefully. Unless the author could demonstrate that the older workers’ productivity is higher than the younger workers’, the author’s concern about these issues is unfounded.

口含太阳UID: 2959623

The director of personnel suggests that Professional Printing Company should hire mainly older employees so that they will increase productivity and save money because of the reduced need for supervisors. The director backs his suggestion with the result of a telephone survey of automobile factory workers. The survey shows that the older the employees, the less they need supervisors to generate more productivity. However, this survey does not offer solid grounds for the director’s suggestion.

The survey result of automobile factory workers cannot be extrapolated to that of Professional Printing Company. Since two companies deal in different industries, there could be great difference in personnel structure. The result cannot reflect the productivity of employees in Professional Printing Company. So it does not provide basis for the suggestion.

The survey overlooks some factors that affect productivity. There could be significant difference between young employees and older ones in terms of their capacity of productivity. It is likely that young employees are considerably more productive than the older ones. Though younger employees are less productive than when they have supervisors present, their efficiency may still surpass that of older employees. So mainly hiring older workers may not necessarily increase the overall productivity. Secondly, the differences of productivity of young employees with or without the presence of supervisors may be very significant. With supervisors, the young employees may tremendously increase their productivity. The increase may outstrip the cost of hiring supervisors.


The supervisors may have other responsibilities which influence the operation of the company. Even though mainly hiring older workers may reduce the need of supervision, supervisors may have other job responsibilities to undertake. So the Company still needs to hire supervisors and the cost cannot be avoided.

Last, there may be clear division of job responsibilities between the young and the old. The older workers cannot simply replace them. The younger workers may carry out work requiring more physical strength while the experience of older employees may be conducive to their productivity. As a result, a portion of young employees is essential to make the operation possible.

The personnel policy of a company can be very complex. The director ought to carry out a comprehensive study of their company so that a proper suggestion can be formulated.

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越写越差...

原地兜风UID: 2812262

In this argument, the director claimed that the majority of employees should be hired from older people, by doing so, the productivity will increase and the cost will be saved. From my view, the director was too hasty to give the conclusion as there are some details need to be concerned.

In the first place, the survey form of telephone is not a well-founded method to bring out the results of comparison between young and older employees on their work performance. The verbal allege does not prove the authentic situation, as some older employees may lie and concealed about their performance. There is large possibility for them to doing so say they are tactful since have experienced some ups and downs. As a result, some older one didn't want to admit they could increase their productivity to avoid leaving a slack impression on others as if they didn't do their best. By the contrary, young people just throw out their ideas without a consideration. So the best way to evaluate whether the system of supervising is effective or not should be comparing the workers' products with his in the old times. This is a cogent survey because subject factors are eliminated. Even if the result turned out to be the older were really less need to be supervised, the director's conclusion is not convincing.

The promised increasing productivity is suspicious because the largest portions of young workers' productivity can be increased does not necessary mean their productivity is low. The physical conditions of older people should be considered. Possibility exists that since the youth is more vigorous and flexible than the older, considering attention need to be concentrated in the printing industry, the older are more likely to get tied. When they go to get a cup of tee, the young man can devote themselves in their work. From this view, the more young get fired, the lower productivity will be.

However, the spared need for supervisors does not necessarily lead to the save of cost. If the company hire mainly older employees, the cost of supervising will certainly decrease but this cost is only part of the expense of company. Consider the older tend to be skilled workers and their salary should be appealing enough; therefore, in order to hire older employees, the total cost may be raised instead of saved. Here is also a possibility that when there is no body to scrutinize the workers, the quality of their products may be inferior than before, extra measures should be taken to prevent this and the cost may rise.

From what I have discussed, the judgment of the director is not based on a solid foundation. In order to make his idea more convincing, more details should be presented.

greoge007UID: 2865153

Merely based on unfounded and dubious evidence the author comes to the conclusion that hiring mainly older employees will increase productivity and save money because of the reduced need for supervisors. To substantiate the conclusion the author only cites a recent telephone survey. At first glance the conclusion seems somewhat convincing. But further analysis of this survey will seriously undermine what the author maintains.

In the first place, the argument rests on the gratuitous telephone survey. Firstly, we do not even know who conduct the telephone survey and what exactly the procedure is. It is highly possible that the workers are afraid of saying the truth. What is more, whether the workers participated in the survey are representative enough to reflect the real thoughts of all the workers in the factory is open to doubt. That is to say, the statistical numbers in this argument are not reliable.

In the second place, if it were the case that the telephone survey is plausible in some aspects. Another problem that seriously weakens the logic of this argument comes about. The author unfairly assumes that the older people will perform more stably and efficiently than the younger ones. It is likely that the younger ones are full of enthusiasm and have higher productivities than the older ones. Even if the older people are more experienced, we cannot say they can perform more precisely and have more energy than the younger ones.

Finally, granted that the author justifies all the foregoing evidences, the conclusion remains doubtful since the author fails to consider some other methods that can also improve the productivities and save the spending. We can reduce the working hours and the work load to guarantee more relaxing or resting times. What is more, the appreciation from the supervisors can also increase workers working morale, thus improving the productivities. And another falsely assumption the author makes is that hiring more older workers can save the money it originally spending on the supervisors. In fact, the money is likely to spend on the older workers, for they are weak in bodies and are likely to retire after a few years’ work. And the company has no choices but to offer them the pensions.

In conclusion, the author fails to substantiate its claim that employing mainly older workers can inevitably increase the productivities and save the money it spends on the supervisors, because the evidence cited in the argument is too weak to support what the author maintains. To make the argument more convincing, the author would have to provide more information with regard to how the survey was conducted in details. Additionally, the arguer would have to demonstrate why hiring more older workers can lead to the increase of productivities and decrease the money spends on supervisors. Only with more convincing and persuasive evidences could the argument be more exhaustive and logically acceptable.

澈透水痕rachelUID: 2868066

很久没有写argu，这篇文章写得怪怪的。。先贴着= =

This arguent is logically unconvincing in some aspects. Merely based on a recent telephone survey and without more details about the workers of different ages, it’s too hasty for the director of personnel to make the recommendation that we can increase productivity and save money through hiring mainly older employees. The reasons are stated as follows.

To begin with, since the survey is a telephone survey, the reliability of its result is suspicious at many respects. How many people made a response to this survey? Do they all exactly understand the questions? And were they forthright when answering these questions? These aspects are all not mentioned in the survey so that we have reasons to doubt the dependability of it. If only a few people responded to the telephone call with a halfheartedness attitude, it’s apparently unwarranted to draw such conclusion.

Even if the survey can be proved to be reliable and respective, it’s still unsubstantiated for the director of personnel to make the suggestion. In the argument, he shows us the result of the survey from which we can see that the presence of their immediate supervisor has a greater effect for young workers than the elder ones thus making a conclusion that hiring mainly older employees can increase productivity and save money by less need for supervisors. As I see it, there are two logical limits in this conclusion. Firstly, the director fails to make any comparison between the actual productivity of different groups of employees. As a matter of fact, younger employees may have more energy than the elders. If the workers aged 18 to 29 still have a higher productivity without supervisors than those aged 50 or over, it’s apparent that there’s no need to hire older employees. Secondly, even granted that older employees have higher productivity than youngers when there’s no supervisors, hiring mainly older employees may also bring many negative effects. In our common sense, older people may have higher expectation and request for wages and welfares so that though the company can save money by employing fewer supervisors, the increased wages it must pay for the elder workers can not be avoided. In this way, it’s not sure to save money for the company.

In addition, the director makes an oversimplified analogy between the automobile factory and their own printing company. In most instances, this is an unwarranted assumption for the simple reason that things rarely remain the same in two different places. Many factors should be taken into consideration, such as their own productive model, business model and corporate culture. This is a fallacious analogy unless the director can provide more details about the automobile factory and the printing company and rule out any other possibilities.

To sum up, this recommendation lacks rationality for that it rests on some dubious assumptions which demolish it as it stands. To bolster the argument, the director should consider the given factors discussed above, cite more evidence that is more persuasive and offer more information about the two companies.