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 work for 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 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 the statement that earning a high salary was less important to
them than job satisfaction. This finding suggests that the large, corporate
firms of Megalopolis will need to offer graduates more benefits and
incentives and reduce the number of hours they must work."
In this article, the author talks about how the graduates of Metropolis are
preferring small law firms over large, corporate firms causing a 15% decline
in the number of graduates going to these firms. This argument rests on a
series of unsubstantiated assumptions and is therefore unpersuasive as it
stands.
To start with, graduates preferring small firms over large firms might not be
the primary reason for the 15% decline, many factors might have come into
play leading to the decline. It is entirely possible that job openings for the
past three years would have been minimal and an economy fall would have
resulted in this drop. Since the article, fails to account for this alternative
explanation for the 15% decline, the author cannot make any sound
recommendations to law firms based on this decline.
Furthermore, to consider the survey of first-year students at a leading law
school, the vocational goals of a first-year student doesn't reflect what the
student chooses after three years. In today's world, the changes taking
place are so rapid that no one can even predict what is going to happen at
the very next minute. Moreover, the survey was taken at a leading school,
a lone school does not account for the overall pool of students in the city,
so this again undermines the survey's relevance in prescribing any course
of action for Megalopolis' law firms.
Finally, the author mentions greater job satisfaction for students working at
small firms. Job satisfaction cannot be compared to how small or big a firm
is, both are independent entities. If a student is wholeheartedly enjoying
what he does, than if the student works in a small firm or a large firm
doesn't matter at all. Moreover, enhanced job benefits can be tantamount
to an 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 provide better evidence that new law school graduates seeking
jobs in Megalopolis would feel the proposed incentives enticing.
Comments
e-rater score report
Attribute Value Ideal
Final score: 4.0 out of 6
Category: Good Excellent
No. of Grammatical Errors: 0 2
No. of Spelling Errors: 0 2
No. of Sentences: 15 15
No. of Words: 400 350
No. of Characters: 1955 1500
No. of Different Words: 196 200
Fourth Root of Number of Words: 4.472 4.7
Average Word Length: 4.888 4.6
Word Length SD: 2.773 2.4
No. of Words greater than 5 chars: 141 100
No. of Words greater than 6 chars: 107 80
No. of Words greater than 7 chars: 69 40
No. of Words greater than 8 chars: 43 20
Use of Passive Voice (%): 0 0
Avg. Sentence Length: 26.667 21.0
Sentence Length SD: 8.942 7.5
Use of Discourse Markers (%): 0.667 0.12
Sentence-Text Coherence: 0.332 0.35
Sentence-Para Coherence: 0.601 0.50
Sentence-Sentence Coherence: 0.058 0.07
Number of Paragraphs: 5 5
Grammar and spelling errors:
Line 1, column 73, Rule ID: PROGRESSIVE_VERBS[1]
Message: This verb is normally not used in the progressive form. Try a simple form instead.
...s about how the graduates of Metropolis are preferring small law firms over large, corporate f...
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
Line 27, column 15, Rule ID: COMMA_THAN[1]
Message: Did you mean 'then'?
Suggestion: then
... wholeheartedly enjoying what he does, than if the student works in a small firm or...
^^^^
Line 30, column 14, Rule ID: SENT_START_CONJUNCTIVE_LINKING_ADVERB_COMMA[1]
Message: Did you forget a comma after a conjunctive/linking adverb?
Suggestion: Thus,
... hours amount to a higher hourly wage. Thus if new law-school graduates seeking job...
^^^^
Transition Words or Phrases used:
finally, first, furthermore, if, moreover, so, then, therefore, thus, to start with
Attributes: Values AverageValues Percentages(Values/AverageValues)% => Comments
Performance on Part of Speech:
To be verbs : 16.0 19.6327345309 81% => OK
Auxiliary verbs: 10.0 12.9520958084 77% => OK
Conjunction : 7.0 11.1786427146 63% => OK
Relative clauses : 3.0 13.6137724551 22% => More relative clauses wanted.
Pronoun: 17.0 28.8173652695 59% => OK
Preposition: 48.0 55.5748502994 86% => OK
Nominalization: 9.0 16.3942115768 55% => More nominalizations (nouns with a suffix like: tion ment ence ance) wanted.
Performance on vocabulary words:
No of characters: 2082.0 2260.96107784 92% => OK
No of words: 391.0 441.139720559 89% => More content wanted.
Chars per words: 5.32480818414 5.12650576532 104% => OK
Fourth root words length: 4.44676510885 4.56307096286 97% => OK
Word Length SD: 2.90682935906 2.78398813304 104% => OK
Unique words: 200.0 204.123752495 98% => OK
Unique words percentage: 0.511508951407 0.468620217663 109% => OK
syllable_count: 612.9 705.55239521 87% => OK
avg_syllables_per_word: 1.6 1.59920159681 100% => OK
A sentence (or a clause, phrase) starts by:
Pronoun: 2.0 4.96107784431 40% => OK
Article: 10.0 8.76447105788 114% => OK
Subordination: 3.0 2.70958083832 111% => OK
Conjunction: 2.0 1.67365269461 119% => OK
Preposition: 11.0 4.22255489022 261% => Less preposition wanted as sentence beginnings.
Performance on sentences:
How many sentences: 15.0 19.7664670659 76% => Need more sentences. Double check the format of sentences, make sure there is a space between two sentences, or have enough periods. And also check the lengths of sentences, maybe they are too long.
Sentence length: 26.0 22.8473053892 114% => OK
Sentence length SD: 54.9507254021 57.8364921388 95% => OK
Chars per sentence: 138.8 119.503703932 116% => OK
Words per sentence: 26.0666666667 23.324526521 112% => OK
Discourse Markers: 5.53333333333 5.70786347227 97% => OK
Paragraphs: 33.0 5.15768463074 640% => Less paragraphs wanted.
Language errors: 3.0 5.25449101796 57% => OK
Sentences with positive sentiment : 8.0 8.20758483034 97% => OK
Sentences with negative sentiment : 6.0 6.88822355289 87% => OK
Sentences with neutral sentiment: 1.0 4.67664670659 21% => More facts, knowledge or examples wanted.
What are sentences with positive/Negative/neutral sentiment?
Coherence and Cohesion:
Essay topic to essay body coherence: 0.281825537613 0.218282227539 129% => OK
Sentence topic coherence: 0.0883272122941 0.0743258471296 119% => OK
Sentence topic coherence SD: 0.0710184547849 0.0701772020484 101% => OK
Paragraph topic coherence: 0.0681697548821 0.128457276422 53% => OK
Paragraph topic coherence SD: 0.073247348815 0.0628817314937 116% => OK
Essay readability:
automated_readability_index: 16.7 14.3799401198 116% => OK
flesch_reading_ease: 45.09 48.3550499002 93% => OK
smog_index: 8.8 7.1628742515 123% => OK
flesch_kincaid_grade: 13.4 12.197005988 110% => OK
coleman_liau_index: 13.87 12.5979740519 110% => OK
dale_chall_readability_score: 8.44 8.32208582834 101% => OK
difficult_words: 87.0 98.500998004 88% => OK
linsear_write_formula: 14.0 12.3882235529 113% => OK
gunning_fog: 12.4 11.1389221557 111% => OK
text_standard: 14.0 11.9071856287 118% => OK
What are above readability scores?
---------------------
Maximum six paragraphs wanted.
Rates: 50.0 out of 100
Scores by essay e-grader: 3.0 Out of 6
---------------------
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.