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TOPIC: 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."
WORDS: 430 TIME: 上午 12:30:00 DATE: 2008-1-25
In this argument, the arguer recommends that Valu-Mart should increase all Valu-Mart stores the stock of home office machines and office supplies. By doing this, the office-supply will become the most profitable component of the store. To support the recommendation, the arguer cites the result of a recent survey that over 70 percent of the respondents to a survey reported that they are required to take more work home with them. However, this argument suffers from several critical flaws.
In the first place, the arguer fails to provide evidence to prove the assumption that the requirement of home office machines is actually increasing. Depending on the survey that over 70% of respondents said that they were required to take more work home with them, it is unfairly to draw the conclusion that most of the workers are required to take work home with them. For one thing, it is entirely possible that this result of survey is not representative of the whole market. For another, even granted that most of the workers are required to take more work home with them, the arguer must provide evidence to prove that more home office machines are required to be installed. Without ruling out these possibilities, the arguer can not safely claim that the store should increase the stock of home office machines and office supplies.
In the second place, the assumption that the office-supply departments will become the most profitable component of the stores is totally unfounded. The arguer must take into account other factors that might affect the profits of the store. Increasing the stock of office supplies does not necessarily mean that the store will make profits. To a further step, other factors, such as the shares of the market, the sales of the products, the competition from other stores which sell the similar or the same products, etc, would affect the condition of selling the office machines, thus affecting the profits of the company. What is more, in the same company, other departments are also struggling to earn as much money as possible. If so, then the arguer's recommendation would amount to poor conclusion that the office-supply departments would be the most profitable in the store.
In sum, the arguer fails to analyze the market requirement for the products of the home office machines. To strengthen the argument, the arguer has to provide more concrete information concerning about the true and accurate need of the market for the home office machines. Moreover, the selling of other departments have to be provided to better evaluate and compare the profits among departments. |
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