The Quiot Manufacturing suggests that it should decrease the time of work shift in

order to decrease the on-the-job accidents. However, this claim rests on several
unsubstantiated assumptions.
First of all, the article cited the fact that Quiot Manufacturing had 30 percent more
on-the-job accidents than Panoply industries, contributing this difference to time of
work shift. However, we must ask, are these two companies comparable? It is likely
that these two company have very different working content and product, which
potentially affect their possibility of on-the-job accidents. Also, another question we
have to ask is, what is the report system of the accidents? It is possible that Quiot
Manufacturing has a more comprehensive report system with compensation and sick
leave, while Panoply industries’ employee will probably get fired when they report
accidents and thus is not motivated to do so.
The article further stated that according to experts, the decisive factor of on-the-job
accidents are fatigue. The assumption here is doubtful, since the correlation between
on-the-job accidents and fatigue doesn’t necessarily have a cause and effect relation.
For instance, we don’t even have the information about the kind of accidents, it is
likely that those accidents are due to the unfamiliarity with the machine or the
hazardous operation environment, which totally unrelated to over-working.
Finally, the article assumes that reducing work shift can increase productivity.
However, there’s no any evidence suggests that the productivity is affected by the
work shift. Further analysis about how much the product amount can be increase by
the decrease of the time of work shift, holding other factors constant, is wanted.