TPO 53 Writing Integrated
Many countries require cigarette smokers to pay particularly high taxes on their purchases of cigarettes; similar taxes are being considered for unhealthy foods. The policy of imposing high taxes on cigarettes and other unhealthy products has a number of social benefits.
First of all, the taxes discourage people from indulging in unhealthy behaviors. Raising taxes on cigarettes, for instance, leads people to buy fewer of them. Smoking has declined as taxes on tobacco have risen, showing that these taxes do work to make society healthier. It can be expected that imposing similar taxes on unhealthy food and beverages would help reduce obesity rates.
Second, taxes of this kind are financially fair. When people get sick as a result of their smoking or eating unhealthy foods, they create medical costs. It is unfair that everyone in the society, including nonsmokers and people who follow a healthy diet, should contribute equally to covering these costs. Taxing people who engage in unhealthy behaviors creates extra income that can be used to cover the medical costs. In this way, some of the financial burden is shifted from all of society to just those who choose to participate in the unhealthy activities.
Finally, the high rate of taxation on cigarettes significantly increases revenue for the government. In addition to using this tax revenue on medical assistance, governments often use the revenue for other projects that benefit public welfare, such as building stadiums or creating public parks. Even basic government-supported services like public education benefit from these taxes. Thus, the taxes on cigarettes, and the proposed taxes on unhealthy foods, benefit everyone.
The reading passage argues that imposing high taxes on cigarettes and unhealthy foods will have a number of social benefits. However, the lecturer challenges the points made in the article. She contends that the measures proposed in the reading will be ineffective and could be even detrimental.
First of all, the author assumes that raising taxes on unhealthy food would discourage people to buy it and hence decrease the obesity rate in the society. Nevertheless, the lecturer refutes this claim. She mentions that when governments started to impose higher taxes on cigarettes, smokers began to buy low quality cheaper brands, which often contain even more toxic chemicals. Thus, authorizing high taxes on unhealthy food and beverages could lead individuals to spend more money on buying those unhealthy items leaving them with less money to purchase healthy food. As a result, this plan could make the problem even worse.
Secondly, the excerpt postulates that these taxes would be financially fair as it would shift the financial burden resulting from the medical costs due to smoking or eating fast foods just to those who engage in unhealthy activities. In contrast, the lecturer indicates that these taxes could be unfair in a way. For example, they do not take into account people's income. According to the lecture, a high-income person would find these taxes affordable. On the other hand, this tax could represent a burden on lower income citizens.
Lastly, the article posits that taxing cigarettes and unhealthy foods would generate revenue for the government that could be used to fund other public services. The lecturer points out a downside in this argument. She explains that the government might become dependent on the millions of dollars collected through taxation. Consequently, there would be less motivation to enact policies to eliminate the unhealthy behaviors altogether such as banning smoking in public and private outdoor areas.
Grammar and spelling errors:
Line 9, column 534, Rule ID: WHITESPACE_RULE
Message: Possible typo: you repeated a whitespace
Suggestion:
...sent a burden on lower income citizens. Lastly, the article posits that taxing c...
^^^^^^^
Line 13, column 499, Rule ID: WHITESPACE_RULE
Message: Possible typo: you repeated a whitespace
Suggestion:
...ng in public and private outdoor areas.
^^^^^^^
Transition Words or Phrases used:
consequently, first, hence, however, if, lastly, nevertheless, second, secondly, so, thus, for example, in contrast, such as, as a result, first of all, on the other hand
Attributes: Values AverageValues Percentages(Values/AverageValues)% => Comments
Performance on Part of Speech:
To be verbs : 6.0 10.4613686534 57% => More to be verbs wanted.
Auxiliary verbs: 15.0 5.04856512141 297% => Less auxiliary verb wanted.
Conjunction : 7.0 7.30242825607 96% => OK
Relative clauses : 12.0 12.0772626932 99% => OK
Pronoun: 25.0 22.412803532 112% => OK
Preposition: 35.0 30.3222958057 115% => OK
Nominalization: 5.0 5.01324503311 100% => OK
Performance on vocabulary words:
No of characters: 1666.0 1373.03311258 121% => OK
No of words: 311.0 270.72406181 115% => OK
Chars per words: 5.35691318328 5.08290768461 105% => OK
Fourth root words length: 4.19942759058 4.04702891845 104% => OK
Word Length SD: 2.62926577841 2.5805825403 102% => OK
Unique words: 184.0 145.348785872 127% => OK
Unique words percentage: 0.591639871383 0.540411800872 109% => OK
syllable_count: 508.5 419.366225166 121% => OK
avg_syllables_per_word: 1.6 1.55342163355 103% => OK
A sentence (or a clause, phrase) starts by:
Pronoun: 6.0 3.25607064018 184% => OK
Article: 9.0 8.23620309051 109% => OK
Subordination: 1.0 1.25165562914 80% => OK
Conjunction: 0.0 1.51434878587 0% => OK
Preposition: 3.0 2.5761589404 116% => OK
Performance on sentences:
How many sentences: 17.0 13.0662251656 130% => OK
Sentence length: 18.0 21.2450331126 85% => The Avg. Sentence Length is relatively short.
Sentence length SD: 55.386843403 49.2860985944 112% => OK
Chars per sentence: 98.0 110.228320801 89% => OK
Words per sentence: 18.2941176471 21.698381199 84% => OK
Discourse Markers: 10.0 7.06452816374 142% => OK
Paragraphs: 4.0 4.09492273731 98% => OK
Language errors: 2.0 4.19205298013 48% => OK
Sentences with positive sentiment : 1.0 4.33554083885 23% => More positive sentences wanted.
Sentences with negative sentiment : 12.0 4.45695364238 269% => Less negative sentences wanted.
Sentences with neutral sentiment: 4.0 4.27373068433 94% => OK
What are sentences with positive/Negative/neutral sentiment?
Coherence and Cohesion:
Essay topic to essay body coherence: 0.304278796479 0.272083759551 112% => OK
Sentence topic coherence: 0.0888663513864 0.0996497079465 89% => OK
Sentence topic coherence SD: 0.0802573265267 0.0662205650399 121% => OK
Paragraph topic coherence: 0.186066867157 0.162205337803 115% => OK
Paragraph topic coherence SD: 0.010089392377 0.0443174109184 23% => Paragraphs are similar to each other. Some content may get duplicated or it is not exactly right on the topic.
Essay readability:
automated_readability_index: 13.0 13.3589403974 97% => OK
flesch_reading_ease: 53.21 53.8541721854 99% => OK
smog_index: 8.8 5.55761589404 158% => OK
flesch_kincaid_grade: 10.3 11.0289183223 93% => OK
coleman_liau_index: 13.81 12.2367328918 113% => OK
dale_chall_readability_score: 9.3 8.42419426049 110% => OK
difficult_words: 94.0 63.6247240618 148% => OK
linsear_write_formula: 8.5 10.7273730684 79% => OK
gunning_fog: 9.2 10.498013245 88% => OK
text_standard: 9.0 11.2008830022 80% => OK
What are above readability scores?
---------------------
Rates: 76.6666666667 out of 100
Scores by essay e-grader: 23.0 Out of 30
---------------------
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.