The following appeared in a letter to the editor of a Batavia newspaper.
The department of agriculture in Batavia reports that the number of dairy farms throughout the country is now 25 percent greater than it was 10 years ago. During this same time period, however, the price of milk at the local Excello Food Market has increased from $1.50 to over $3.00 per gallon. To prevent farmers from continuing to receive excessive profits on an apparently increased supply of milk, the Batavia government should begin to regulate retail milk prices. Such regulation is necessary to ensure fair prices for consumers.
Write a response in which you discuss what questions would need to be answered in order to decide whether the recommendation is likely to have the predicted result. Be sure to explain how the answers to these questions would help to evaluate the recommendation.
The letter states that Batavia government should curtial mil prices in order to protect consumers from excessive milk prices. The recommendation would have some merit but only after answering several overarching questions. Firstly, the information that the number of farmers has increased in 10 years by 25 percent begs the question. How many farmers are now in comparison to ten years ago. It is possible that the number of farmers has increased from 10 to 14 or maybe from 1000 to 1250. The first set of numbers would hardly support the claim of 25 percent increase while the second set could be much more indicative. However, we do not know the actual number to properly validate the recommendation.
Secondly, a letter only mentions a price increase in a single food market "Excello Food Market". What are the prices in other markets? Is "Excello Food Market" a representative of all the markets in Batavia? For that matter we are in the dark to the actual number of Batavia's residents and more importantly how many of those residents regularly frequent the mentioned market? This can be a case of a specialized market which marks up its prices including the milk. In addition, it is a period of ten years in which the price of milk has doubled. Adjusted for the inflation the overall increase in the cost of living it is hardly surprising to see the price of milk increase two fold in such a long time period. It is quite probable that other stores in the city have similar prices. Two time price increase in a ten year period can hardly be the reason for milk price regulation by the local government.
Thirdly, the letter assumes that farmers receive large profits but it does not establish a plausible reason to the claim that supply of milk has increased. How is the supply of milk excessive? How are the profits excessive? What are the profits now in comparison to ten years ago? What about the cost of the milk production now and ten years ago? These are some serious questions that letter does not address and it simply assumes since there are more farmers there is more production and more profit. As mentioned, the letter does not state how many more and how many farmers in total produce milk in Batavia. It is possible that some farmers produce less meaning that the total production has decreased. Again, we do not know. Correct numbers are not provided in the letter.
As a summary, it is clear that letter's recommendation for the Batavia's governemnt to limit milk prices is based on weak claims and many unanswered questions. We do not know how many farmers are now in total, nor how much milk they produce. Also, we do not know what are the prices in other shops. Only by knowing answers to these questions a better judgment can be passed.
Comments
Essay evaluation report
Sentence: The letter states that Batavia government should curtial mil prices in order to protect consumers from excessive milk prices.
Error: mil Suggestion: No alternate word
Error: curtial Suggestion: curtail
Sentence: As a summary, it is clear that letter's recommendation for the Batavia's governemnt to limit milk prices is based on weak claims and many unanswered questions.
Error: governemnt Suggestion: government
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argument 1 -- not OK
argument 2 -- not exactly
argument 3 -- not exactly
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Attribute Value Ideal
Final score: 3.0 out of 6
Category: Satisfactory Excellent
No. of Grammatical Errors: 0 2
No. of Spelling Errors: 3 2
No. of Sentences: 30 15
No. of Words: 485 350
No. of Characters: 2231 1500
No. of Different Words: 198 200
Fourth Root of Number of Words: 4.693 4.7
Average Word Length: 4.6 4.6
Word Length SD: 2.471 2.4
No. of Words greater than 5 chars: 154 100
No. of Words greater than 6 chars: 108 80
No. of Words greater than 7 chars: 63 40
No. of Words greater than 8 chars: 44 20
Use of Passive Voice (%): 0 0
Avg. Sentence Length: 16.167 21.0
Sentence Length SD: 6.837 7.5
Use of Discourse Markers (%): 0.267 0.12
Sentence-Text Coherence: 0.285 0.35
Sentence-Para Coherence: 0.421 0.50
Sentence-Sentence Coherence: 0.13 0.07
Number of Paragraphs: 4 5
Transition Words or Phrases used:
also, but, first, firstly, however, may, second, secondly, so, third, thirdly, while, in addition
Attributes: Values AverageValues Percentages(Values/AverageValues)% => Comments
Performance on Part of Speech:
To be verbs : 24.0 19.6327345309 122% => OK
Auxiliary verbs: 7.0 12.9520958084 54% => OK
Conjunction : 10.0 11.1786427146 89% => OK
Relative clauses : 13.0 13.6137724551 95% => OK
Pronoun: 30.0 28.8173652695 104% => OK
Preposition: 56.0 55.5748502994 101% => OK
Nominalization: 14.0 16.3942115768 85% => OK
Performance on vocabulary words:
No of characters: 2304.0 2260.96107784 102% => OK
No of words: 485.0 441.139720559 110% => OK
Chars per words: 4.75051546392 5.12650576532 93% => OK
Fourth root words length: 4.69283662038 4.56307096286 103% => OK
Word Length SD: 2.64556732366 2.78398813304 95% => OK
Unique words: 205.0 204.123752495 100% => OK
Unique words percentage: 0.422680412371 0.468620217663 90% => More unique words wanted or less content wanted.
syllable_count: 720.0 705.55239521 102% => OK
avg_syllables_per_word: 1.5 1.59920159681 94% => OK
A sentence (or a clause, phrase) starts by:
Pronoun: 11.0 4.96107784431 222% => Less pronouns wanted as sentence beginning.
Article: 8.0 8.76447105788 91% => OK
Subordination: 2.0 2.70958083832 74% => OK
Conjunction: 1.0 1.67365269461 60% => OK
Preposition: 1.0 4.22255489022 24% => More preposition wanted as sentence beginning.
Performance on sentences:
How many sentences: 30.0 19.7664670659 152% => OK
Sentence length: 16.0 22.8473053892 70% => The Avg. Sentence Length is relatively short.
Sentence length SD: 40.7174682688 57.8364921388 70% => OK
Chars per sentence: 76.8 119.503703932 64% => OK
Words per sentence: 16.1666666667 23.324526521 69% => OK
Discourse Markers: 3.23333333333 5.70786347227 57% => More transition words/phrases wanted.
Paragraphs: 4.0 5.15768463074 78% => More paragraphs wanted.
Language errors: 0.0 5.25449101796 0% => OK
Sentences with positive sentiment : 15.0 8.20758483034 183% => OK
Sentences with negative sentiment : 1.0 6.88822355289 15% => More negative sentences wanted.
Sentences with neutral sentiment: 14.0 4.67664670659 299% => Less facts, knowledge or examples wanted.
What are sentences with positive/Negative/neutral sentiment?
Coherence and Cohesion:
Essay topic to essay body coherence: 0.148093500988 0.218282227539 68% => OK
Sentence topic coherence: 0.0451425124676 0.0743258471296 61% => OK
Sentence topic coherence SD: 0.0423537406129 0.0701772020484 60% => OK
Paragraph topic coherence: 0.0969023468059 0.128457276422 75% => OK
Paragraph topic coherence SD: 0.0418951512495 0.0628817314937 67% => OK
Essay readability:
automated_readability_index: 9.0 14.3799401198 63% => Automated_readability_index is low.
flesch_reading_ease: 63.7 48.3550499002 132% => OK
smog_index: 3.1 7.1628742515 43% => Smog_index is low.
flesch_kincaid_grade: 8.4 12.197005988 69% => OK
coleman_liau_index: 9.97 12.5979740519 79% => OK
dale_chall_readability_score: 7.65 8.32208582834 92% => OK
difficult_words: 99.0 98.500998004 101% => OK
linsear_write_formula: 8.0 12.3882235529 65% => OK
gunning_fog: 8.4 11.1389221557 75% => OK
text_standard: 8.0 11.9071856287 67% => The average readability is low. Need to imporve the language.
What are above readability scores?
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Rates: 50.0 out of 100
Scores by essay e-grader: 3.0 Out of 6
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Note: the e-grader does NOT examine the meaning of words and ideas. VIP users will receive further evaluations by advanced module of e-grader and human graders.