ARGU 38 求批改

zhanghaolin

38. The following appeared in a memo from the new vice president of Sartorian, a company that manufactures men's clothing.
(相似题目：95、96)
"Five years ago, at a time when we had difficulties in obtaining reliable supplies of high quality wool fabric, we discontinued production of our alpaca overcoat. Now that we have a new fabric supplier, we should resume production. This coat should sell very well: since we have not offered an alpaca overcoat for five years and since our major competitor no longer makes an alpaca overcoat, there will be pent-up customer demand. Also, since the price of most types of clothing has increased in each of the past five years, customers should be willing to pay significantly higher prices for alpaca overcoats than they did five years ago, and our company profits will increase."

Write a response in which you discuss what specific evidence is needed to evaluate the argument and explain how the evidence would weaken or strengthen the argument.

In the memo, the vice president recommends that Sartorian should resume production of alpaca overcoat since the company has a new fabric supplier. Furthermore, because that price of most types of clothing has increased in the past five years, he believes the profits of company will increase. However, I am afraid the recommendation can hardly bear further consideration because the author does not provide sufficient evidence. In addition, the facts cited by the vice president might have multiple explanations.

First and foremost, the vice president only cites the fact that both Sartorian and its major competitor do not produce alpaca overcoat but does not mention a word about the specific reason of why its competitor does not produce it. We know from the argument that Sartorian do not produce alpaca overcoat because there is difficulties to obtain high quality wool fabric. But did its major competitor do not produce alpaca overcoat for the same reason? It is possible that competitor choose not to produce alpaca overcoat just because that it did not sell well. Maybe alpaca overcoat is out of style or the price is so high that seldom customers choose to buy it. So, before reaching a final conclusion, the vice president should investigate the real situation of the market of alpaca overcoat in order to support the argument.

Furthermore, the author makes a precipitous assumption that the profits of the company by alpaca overcoat will increase if Sartorian reproduce it. Only by citing the fact that the price of most types of clothing has increased in the past cannot support the estimation. As we know, there are many other possible factors in existence which can influence the cost of production, for example: economical development and wage level (maybe the price of clothing increased because the development of economy leads the increase of price level and wage level). Another factor is that the vice president does not mention about the spending of reopen the production line, which increase the cost of clothing vastly because it will spend a lot of time and money for train workers about the new technique. Before making the recommendation, the vice president should not ignore these factors. He should provide more information about these in order to make sufficient evidence.

To sum up, after pointing out so many obvious flaws in the argument, we can say that the evidence cited by the vice president can hardly be sufficient and persuasive. Before reaching a final conclusion and make the recommendation, the vice president should conduct comprehensive investigation of the specific situation of market of alpaca overcoat and estimate its potential customers.

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