XYmelody - A12

XYmelodyUID: 2337706

A12

The arguer recommends that Alta Manufacturing (AM) should shorten each of the three work shifts by one hour in order to reduce the on-the-job accident occurrence, therefore increase productivity. The arguer also claims that reducing the work duration will ensure the employees adequate amounts of sleep, which can contribute to reduce the number of on-the-job accidents. However, the argument relies on a series of unsubstantiated assumptions, which render it unconvincing as it stands.

First of all, the arguer assumes that Panoply Industries (PI) have less occurrence of on-the-job accidents given the evidence that AM had thirty percent more on-the-job accidents than PI during last year. However, the arguer provides no evidence that this is the case. To the extent that AM has much more employees than PI, the arguer's argument that the situation of AM's on-the-job accidents is more serious than PI's would be undermined.

In the second place, even if the occurrence of on-the-job accidents in AM is higher, in claiming that PI has shorter duration of work, the arguer assumes that shortening the time of work should do contribution to the reducing of accidents-occurrence. Although I believe in the conclusion that a significant contributing factor in many on-the-job accidents is fatigue and sleep deprivation among workers, the author doesn't provide enough evidence to substantiate this assumption. Perhaps, PI has more efficient administration on the security of work, which ensures the employees away from accidents. Moreover, perhaps the work in PI is safer than that in AM. In either event, the author could not justifiably rely on the mere fact to support the claim that shorter duration of work results in lower occurrence of accidents.
  
Finally, Even if the reducing of work time is reasonable, the arguer's recommendation that AM should shorten each work shift by one hour is unwarranted. It is entirely possible that reducing half an hour, or another amount, will achieve the benefit similarly, or even more efficiently. Besides, the arguer provides no evidence to convince us that the reducing of occurrence of on-the-job accidents can increase the productivity.

In conclusion, the recommendation for shorten work shifts by one hour to reduce the number of accidents and increase the productivity is not well supported. To convince me that the duration of work in AM is actually too long to render high occurrence of accidents, the arguer must provide clear statistical evidence that the duration in AM is excessive than the standard level, which can ensure the security of the employees in the same career. To better evaluate the recommendation, I would need more information about the relationship between the occurrence of on-the-job accidents and productivity.