Argument 17

题目：ARGUMENT17 – The following appeared in a letter to the editor of the Walnut Grove town newspaper.

“Walnut Grove’s town council has advocated switching from EZ Disposal (which has had the contract for trash collection services in Walnut Grove for the past ten years) to ABC Waste, because EZ recently raised its monthly fee from $2,000 to $2,500 a month, whereas ABC’s fee is still $2,000. But the town council is mistaken; we should continue using EZ. EZ collects trash twice a week, while ABC collects only once. Moreover, EZ-which, like ABC, currently has a fleet of 20 trucks-has ordered additional trucks. Finally, EZ provides exceptional service: 80 percent of respondents to last year’s town survey agreed that they were ‘satisfied’ with EZ’s performance.”
字数：288 用时：上午 12:30:00 日期：2006-7-15

The arguer quotes three evidence to support his viewpoint that Walnut Grove should continue using EZ for trash collection services rather than ABC, although the fee of latter is lower. But these evidences provide no sufficient advantages beyond ABC’s lower fee, which do not support this argument well.

One of the main reason the arguer insists is that EZ collects once more than ABC every week, by which the arguer seems to suggest that EZ collect trash in a lower average price for every collection. However, price is not of such a definition on the viewpointer of dwellers. Dwellers do not care how many times EZ collects every week, but how clean it makes the streets and how it disturb their daily life. It is entirely possible that the total amount of trash in this town is so small that it is not worthy two collections a week. Also, since the big noise trash-collectin truck makes, dwellers may do not like too many collections. In short, more trash collections is not an advantage, even worse.

Did ABC put a similar plan on agenda that ordering new trucks? The arguer informs that EZ has such a plan while providing no coresponding information about ABC in order to suggest that EZ will have better equipnment condition based on a mere unfair compare between EZ and ABC, which is misleading. Why did EZ order additional trucks? As known, trucks have their own service period, it should be updated when out of service period. This can, to some extend, explan why EZ ordered new trucks. What is more, this may be why the fee of EZ raised. If true, it is unfair to make Walnut Grove’s dwellers afford the cost of EZ.

As far as the survey is concerned, it does not have any significance too. 80 percent of respondent in this survey claimed they were satisfied with EZ’s performance, but what ratio do all the respondents account for? All local dwellers? It is not mentioned. How about the survey result if the object is ABC? Have these respondent ever have chance to experience ABC’s performance? Will the response be better? Without this analysis, the survey can be a meaningless one, which ironically undermine the argument.

In summary, a full, comprehensive, fair compare and more specific evidence are required for the arguer to convince people that EZ does be worth its higher fee than ABC.