In the United States, employees typically work five days a week for eight hours each day. However, many employees want to work a four-day week and are willing to accept less pay in order to do so. A mandatory policy requiring companies to offer their employees the option of working a four-day workweek for four-fifths (80 percent) of their normal pay would benefit the economy as a whole as well as the individual companies and the employees who decided to take the option.
The shortened workweek would increase company profits because employees would feel more rested and alert, and as a result, they would make fewer costly errors in their work. Hiring more staff to ensure that the same amount of work would be accomplished would not result in additional payroll costs because four-day employees would only be paid 80 percent of the normal rate. In the end, companies would have fewer overworked and error-prone employees for the same money, which would increase company profits.
For the country as a whole, one of the primary benefits of offering this option to employees is that it would reduce unemployment rates. If many full-time employees started working fewer hours, some of their workload would have to be shifted to others. Thus, for every four employees who went on an 80 percent week, a new employee could be hired at the 80 percent rate.
Finally, the option of a four-day workweek would be better for individual employees. Employees who could afford a lower salary in exchange for more free time could improve the quality of their lives by spending the extra time with their families, pursuing private interests, or enjoying leisure activities.
The reading and the lecture are both about the impact of a four-day workweek. The article states that a policy that provides employees the option to choose a four-day workweek would be beneficial and provides three reasons of support. However, the professor explains that the impact of such option would be negative and refutes each of the author´s reasons.
First, the reading claims that a shortened workweek would increase company profits. This argument is challenged by the lecturer by suggesting that a four-day workweek would decrease companies´profits since hiring more workers leads to more training and health care costs that have to be covered. Furthermore, he argues that more people working would require more investment on infrastructure as more space and computers would be needed.
Secondly, the writer contends that the policy would benefit the country as well by reducing unemployment rates. The lecturer, however, rebuts this by asserting that companies would not prefer hiring new workers as it would increase their costs. Therefore, companies would rather their current employees to either work overtime or raise expectations on them. If that happens, then there will not be additional jobs and would make the current job more unpleasant for workers.
Finally, it is stated in the article that the shortened workweek would be better for individuals as it would improve the quality of their lives. The professor opposes this point by explaining that instead, such option would be risky for employees as it would decrease their chance of job stability since these four-day work week employees would be regarded as less desirable by companies. In addition, the lecturer argues that it would limit the opportunity of career advancement because management positions require continuos supervision, which cannot be achieved by a short workweek. Therefore, the less job stability and poor prospect of career advance would decrease employees´s quality of living.
Transition Words or Phrases used:
but, finally, first, furthermore, however, if, second, secondly, so, then, therefore, well, in addition
Attributes: Values AverageValues Percentages(Values/AverageValues)% => Comments
Performance on Part of Speech:
To be verbs : 12.0 10.4613686534 115% => OK
Auxiliary verbs: 20.0 5.04856512141 396% => Less auxiliary verb wanted.
Conjunction : 8.0 7.30242825607 110% => OK
Relative clauses : 14.0 12.0772626932 116% => OK
Pronoun: 28.0 22.412803532 125% => Less pronouns wanted
Preposition: 27.0 30.3222958057 89% => OK
Nominalization: 7.0 5.01324503311 140% => OK
Performance on vocabulary words:
No of characters: 1692.0 1373.03311258 123% => OK
No of words: 308.0 270.72406181 114% => OK
Chars per words: 5.49350649351 5.08290768461 108% => OK
Fourth root words length: 4.18926351222 4.04702891845 104% => OK
Word Length SD: 2.91668333208 2.5805825403 113% => OK
Unique words: 157.0 145.348785872 108% => OK
Unique words percentage: 0.50974025974 0.540411800872 94% => More unique words wanted or less content wanted.
syllable_count: 503.1 419.366225166 120% => OK
avg_syllables_per_word: 1.6 1.55342163355 103% => OK
A sentence (or a clause, phrase) starts by:
Pronoun: 3.0 3.25607064018 92% => OK
Article: 9.0 8.23620309051 109% => OK
Subordination: 1.0 1.25165562914 80% => OK
Conjunction: 0.0 1.51434878587 0% => OK
Preposition: 1.0 2.5761589404 39% => More preposition wanted as sentence beginning.
Performance on sentences:
How many sentences: 14.0 13.0662251656 107% => OK
Sentence length: 22.0 21.2450331126 104% => OK
Sentence length SD: 46.2012015039 49.2860985944 94% => OK
Chars per sentence: 120.857142857 110.228320801 110% => OK
Words per sentence: 22.0 21.698381199 101% => OK
Discourse Markers: 7.35714285714 7.06452816374 104% => OK
Paragraphs: 4.0 4.09492273731 98% => OK
Language errors: 0.0 4.19205298013 0% => OK
Sentences with positive sentiment : 8.0 4.33554083885 185% => OK
Sentences with negative sentiment : 4.0 4.45695364238 90% => OK
Sentences with neutral sentiment: 2.0 4.27373068433 47% => OK
What are sentences with positive/Negative/neutral sentiment?
Coherence and Cohesion:
Essay topic to essay body coherence: 0.17814346778 0.272083759551 65% => OK
Sentence topic coherence: 0.0738597397573 0.0996497079465 74% => OK
Sentence topic coherence SD: 0.0552983832771 0.0662205650399 84% => OK
Paragraph topic coherence: 0.122661927468 0.162205337803 76% => OK
Paragraph topic coherence SD: 0.0300082785601 0.0443174109184 68% => OK
Essay readability:
automated_readability_index: 15.4 13.3589403974 115% => OK
flesch_reading_ease: 49.15 53.8541721854 91% => OK
smog_index: 8.8 5.55761589404 158% => OK
flesch_kincaid_grade: 11.9 11.0289183223 108% => OK
coleman_liau_index: 14.56 12.2367328918 119% => OK
dale_chall_readability_score: 9.29 8.42419426049 110% => OK
difficult_words: 89.0 63.6247240618 140% => OK
linsear_write_formula: 10.5 10.7273730684 98% => OK
gunning_fog: 10.8 10.498013245 103% => OK
text_standard: 11.0 11.2008830022 98% => OK
What are above readability scores?
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Rates: 80.0 out of 100
Scores by essay e-grader: 24.0 Out of 30
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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.