- 最后登录
- 2012-7-6
- 在线时间
- 395 小时
- 寄托币
- 1248
- 声望
- 4
- 注册时间
- 2009-7-24
- 阅读权限
- 25
- 帖子
- 1
- 精华
- 0
- 积分
- 1036
- UID
- 2670882
- 声望
- 4
- 寄托币
- 1248
- 注册时间
- 2009-7-24
- 精华
- 0
- 帖子
- 1
|
Agument3
Hiring new school graduates
The following appeared in a newspaper article about law firms in the city of Megalopolis.
In Megalopolis, the number of law school graduates who went to large, corporate firms declined by 15% over the last three years, whereas an increasing number of graduates took jobs at small, general practice firms. Even though the large firms usually offer much higher salaries, law school graduates are choosing to work for the smaller firms most likely because they experience greater job satisfaction at smaller firms. In a survey of first-year students at a leading law school, most agreed with that earning a high salary was less important to them than job satisfaction. This finding suggests that large, corporate firms of Megalopolis will need to offer graduates more benefits and incentives and reduce the number of hours they must work.
This article concludes that despite the relatively high salaries at Megalopolis’ large law firms, these firms must begin offering more benefits and incentives to new law-school graduates, while requiring them to work fewer hours, in order to reverse a three-year 15% decline in the number of graduates going to work for these firms. To justify this conclusion the article’s author notes that during the last three years the number of new law-school graduates going to work for small firms has risen. The author also cites a survey at one leading law school in which most first-year students indicated that job satisfaction was more important than salary. I find this argument logically unconvincing in several respects.
First of all, the 15% decline that author cites is not necessarily due to the vocational preference of new law-school graduates. It is entirely possible that the number of new graduates preferring to work for large firms has not declined, but that during the last three years Megalopolis’ large firms have had fewer had fewer job opening for these graduates. Since the article fails to account for this alternative explanation for the 15% decline, the article’s author cannot make any sound recommendations to law firms based on that decline.
As for the survey that the article cites, the vocational goals of first-year law students do not necessarily reflect those of graduating students; after all, a law student’s vocational goals can change over a three-year period. Moreover, the goals of students at one law school do not necessarily reflect those of overall pool of graduates that might seek employment with Megalopolis law firms. In fact, given that the school whose students participated in the survey was leading school, it is entirely possible that the vast majority of the school’s graduates may choose among offers from many large firms in may large cities. If so, this fact would further undermine the survey’s relevance in prescribing any course of action for Megalopolis’ law firm.
Finally the author falsely equates the proposed tangible incentives with job satisfaction, which is an intangible reward based on the nature of one’s work. Moreover, enhanced job benefits can be tantamount to enhanced salary, and shorter working hours amount to a higher hourly wage. Thus if new law-school graduates seeking jobs in Megalopolis are less interested in monetary rewards than in job satisfaction, then the proposed incentives are not likely to entice these graduates.
In sum, the argument is logically flawed and therefore unconvincing as it stands. To strengthen it the author must either modify the proposal to provide incentives for those seeking job satisfaction over monetary rewards, or to provide better evidence that new law school graduates seeking jobs in Megalopolis would find the proposed incentives enticing. |
|