argument117 【OB小组】第8次作业

phillipsareaUID: 2318537

题目：ARGUMENT117 - The following is a memo from the business manager of Valu-Mart stores.
"Over 70 percent of the respondents to a recent survey reported that they are required to take more work home with them from the workplace than they were in the past. Since Valu-Mart has not seen impressive sales in its office-supply departments in the past, we should take advantage of this work-at-home trend by increasing at all Valu-Mart stores the stock of home office machines such as printers, small copy machines, paper shredders, and fax machines. We will also increase stock of office supplies such as paper, pens, and staplers. With these changes, our office-supply departments will become the most profitable component of our stores."
字数：390          用时：00:33:09          日期：2007-7-21 上午 12:10:46
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In this argument, the author concludes that the Valu-Mart stores should increase the stock of home office machines such as printers, small copy machines, paper shredders as well as papers, pens and staplers since a recent report shows a trend to take more work home among people. The author's reasoning seems appealing, while clearly examine the author's reasoning, we may find that there're several facets that are questionable.

Firstly, the author doesn't provide us with enough details of the recent survey. We need to know the range of age among respondents, how many people are involved the survey as well as the jobs of the respondents. Besides, it's possible that not all the respondents are taking this survey seriously, perhaps some of them are meeting trouble at work and directly do the survey with anger, which results in the conclusion of the survey that there's a work-at-home trend among them. Without the support of the above information, the survey becomes a pale one.

Secondly, if the survey shows exactly the fact among people, is there a certain evidence shows that people are taking more work home is related to the increasing need in home office machines. Nowadays, nearly every American family has a computer, which shows that people do have the basic office machines at home. For the above-mentioned copy machines, paper shredders and printers, it's not really necessary for every work-at-home people to have. They can simply edit their documents at home and take them to the office and print them out the next morning.

Thirdly, to stock more home office machines doesn't necessarily mean that the company can get more profits. On one hand, to stock more doesn't mean to sell more, on the other hand, to sell more doesn't mean to profit more. The sales of products are not only related to the amount of stocking ones, but also related to the qualities and types of products. So, simply making a decision to stock more home office machines may not necessarily lead to a increasing sales among them.

In sum, the conclusion lacks of credibility. Regardless of who the author is, he or she has overlooked or chosen to ignore several aspects of his or her conclusion. Thus, the argument fails to convince me. To support the argument, the author should give more evidences about the above-mentioned possibilities.