The following appeared in the opinion column of a financial magazine:
“On average, middle-aged consumers devote 39 percent of their retail expenditure to department store products and
services, while for younger consumers the average is only 25 percent. Since the number of middle-aged people will
increase dramatically within the next decade, department stores can expect retail sales to increase significantly
during that period. Furthermore, to take advantage of the trend, these stores should begin to replace some of those
products intended to attract the younger consumer with products intended to attract the middle-aged consumer.”
Discuss how well reasoned . . . etc.
The argument claims that the department stores can expect retail sales to increase significantly in the coming decade and that the stores should begin to replace some of the products meant for younger customers with products for middle aged customers. The conclusion is backed by the premises that middle-aged consumers spend a bigger portion of their expenditure at department stores and that such consumers are expected to dramatically increase in number over the next decade. Stated this way, the argument manipulates facts and presents a distorted view of the situation. It fails to mention several important aspects necessary to sufficiently evaluate the argument.
First, the argument assumes that 25% of younger consumers spending is less than 39% of middle-aged consumers spending. This statement is a stretch as there is no reason to believe the said assumption. For example, Younger consumers may be sufficiently large in number than the middle-aged consumer or the total spending of an average young consumer is far more than the total spending of the middle-aged consumer. The argument could have been more convincing if it mentioned something about the percentage contribution of the young consumers and middle-aged consumers in the overall market.
Second, the argument claims that dramatic increase in number of middle-aged population implies that the said cohort will be growing at a faster pace than the other cohorts. It maybe a case that the overall population is increasing at a similar pace and relative proportion of middle-aged consumers will remain constant instead of growing disproportionately. For this reason, It again is an example of poor reasoning. For example, the geography is facing mass migration of population and families, lead by middle aged people, are shifting together with their young ones. In order to make the claim more believable, the author could have mentioned about relative proportion of the middle-aged population expected at the beginning and the end of the said decade.
Finally, the argument fails to answer many relevant questions such as why is it necessary to replace the young consumer focused products with products focused at middle-aged consumers rather than just adding more SKU and whether or not ignoring young consumers. who shall later grow into the middle-aged population, today will mean that they will switch loyalty at a later stage in their life? Maybe, the consumers shift loyalty only at a young age and do not change it later on. Without convincing answers to these questions, one is left with an impression that the claim is more of a wishful thinking than a substantive evidence
In conclusion, the argument is flawed and therefore un-convincing. It could have been further strengthened if it were to mention few census stats such as relative contribution of young consumers and middle-aged consumers both in terms of population and overall expenditure while highlighting the relative change expected in the metrics over the coming decade. In order to analyze the merits of a situation, it is important that the all the relevant facts necessary for the evaluation are presented clearly. Without this, the argument is unsubstantiated and open to debate.
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Comments
Essay evaluation 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: 20 15
No. of Words: 512 350
No. of Characters: 2675 1500
No. of Different Words: 222 200
Fourth Root of Number of Words: 4.757 4.7
Average Word Length: 5.225 4.6
Word Length SD: 2.904 2.4
No. of Words greater than 5 chars: 207 100
No. of Words greater than 6 chars: 165 80
No. of Words greater than 7 chars: 125 40
No. of Words greater than 8 chars: 81 20
Use of Passive Voice (%): 0 0
Avg. Sentence Length: 25.6 21.0
Sentence Length SD: 13.238 7.5
Use of Discourse Markers (%): 0.4 0.12
Sentence-Text Coherence: 0.333 0.35
Sentence-Para Coherence: 0.535 0.50
Sentence-Sentence Coherence: 0.071 0.07
Number of Paragraphs: 5 5
Grammar and spelling errors:
Line 1, column 163, Rule ID: SOME_OF_THE[1]
Message: Simply use 'some'.
Suggestion: some
...that the stores should begin to replace some of the products meant for younger customers wi...
^^^^^^^^^^^
Line 5, column 253, Rule ID: ADJECTIVE_IN_ATTRIBUTE[1]
Message: A more concise phrase may lose no meaning and sound more powerful.
Suggestion: large
..., Younger consumers may be sufficiently large in number than the middle-aged consumer or the to...
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
Line 13, column 222, Rule ID: WHETHER[7]
Message: Perhaps you can shorten this phrase to just 'whether'. It is correct though if you mean 'regardless of whether'.
Suggestion: whether
...rs rather than just adding more SKU and whether or not ignoring young consumers. who shall lat...
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
Line 13, column 263, Rule ID: UPPERCASE_SENTENCE_START
Message: This sentence does not start with an uppercase letter
Suggestion: Who
...hether or not ignoring young consumers. who shall later grow into the middle-aged p...
^^^
Transition Words or Phrases used:
but, finally, first, if, may, second, so, then, therefore, while, for example, in conclusion, such as
Attributes: Values AverageValues Percentages(Values/AverageValues)% => Comments
Performance on Part of Speech:
To be verbs : 22.0 19.6327345309 112% => OK
Auxiliary verbs: 11.0 12.9520958084 85% => OK
Conjunction : 15.0 11.1786427146 134% => OK
Relative clauses : 12.0 13.6137724551 88% => OK
Pronoun: 29.0 28.8173652695 101% => OK
Preposition: 65.0 55.5748502994 117% => OK
Nominalization: 31.0 16.3942115768 189% => OK
Performance on vocabulary words:
No of characters: 2737.0 2260.96107784 121% => OK
No of words: 512.0 441.139720559 116% => OK
Chars per words: 5.345703125 5.12650576532 104% => OK
Fourth root words length: 4.75682846001 4.56307096286 104% => OK
Word Length SD: 2.96373896062 2.78398813304 106% => OK
Unique words: 229.0 204.123752495 112% => OK
Unique words percentage: 0.447265625 0.468620217663 95% => OK
syllable_count: 843.3 705.55239521 120% => OK
avg_syllables_per_word: 1.6 1.59920159681 100% => OK
A sentence (or a clause, phrase) starts by:
Pronoun: 6.0 4.96107784431 121% => OK
Article: 12.0 8.76447105788 137% => OK
Subordination: 0.0 2.70958083832 0% => More adverbial clause wanted.
Conjunction: 0.0 1.67365269461 0% => OK
Preposition: 5.0 4.22255489022 118% => OK
Performance on sentences:
How many sentences: 20.0 19.7664670659 101% => OK
Sentence length: 25.0 22.8473053892 109% => OK
Sentence length SD: 67.5880906669 57.8364921388 117% => OK
Chars per sentence: 136.85 119.503703932 115% => OK
Words per sentence: 25.6 23.324526521 110% => OK
Discourse Markers: 5.05 5.70786347227 88% => OK
Paragraphs: 5.0 5.15768463074 97% => OK
Language errors: 4.0 5.25449101796 76% => OK
Sentences with positive sentiment : 11.0 8.20758483034 134% => OK
Sentences with negative sentiment : 7.0 6.88822355289 102% => OK
Sentences with neutral sentiment: 2.0 4.67664670659 43% => OK
What are sentences with positive/Negative/neutral sentiment?
Coherence and Cohesion:
Essay topic to essay body coherence: 0.270824283115 0.218282227539 124% => OK
Sentence topic coherence: 0.0883025693104 0.0743258471296 119% => OK
Sentence topic coherence SD: 0.0798305298364 0.0701772020484 114% => OK
Paragraph topic coherence: 0.16725070418 0.128457276422 130% => OK
Paragraph topic coherence SD: 0.0611815643608 0.0628817314937 97% => OK
Essay readability:
automated_readability_index: 16.6 14.3799401198 115% => OK
flesch_reading_ease: 46.1 48.3550499002 95% => OK
smog_index: 8.8 7.1628742515 123% => OK
flesch_kincaid_grade: 13.0 12.197005988 107% => OK
coleman_liau_index: 14.05 12.5979740519 112% => OK
dale_chall_readability_score: 8.24 8.32208582834 99% => OK
difficult_words: 109.0 98.500998004 111% => OK
linsear_write_formula: 14.0 12.3882235529 113% => OK
gunning_fog: 12.0 11.1389221557 108% => OK
text_standard: 14.0 11.9071856287 118% => OK
What are above readability scores?
---------------------
Rates: 66.67 out of 100
Scores by essay e-grader: 4.0 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.