Writing from Prompts: Minimum Age and Minimum Wage. By Tanzim Ahmed

What are the arguments for minimum wage? Which do you find most persuasive?

     Work. Something we all think that is for grown-ups only. But since the 1800's, kids have been working in large factories under dangerous conditions. Minimum Age and Minimum Wage is an article that describes the history of children working. The author, Joseph Berger, starts his article by going through time. He starts in the early 1900's and then moves on to modern day Labor Laws. In the article, there is a section which is labeled "Minimum Wage, Pros & Cons". This section is dedicated to some of the reasons why raising the minimum wage is good and why its bad. The section also includes information on child labor outside the United States. This helped me pick a side on the minimum wage issue. Before, I couldn't decide whether I wanted higher wages but now I know what I want. The article is not against higher minimum wage, Berger does a fantastic job giving reasons why the minimum wage should be raised. That is why I want higher minimum wages.

     The author first starts reinforces his claim by saying, "Advocates of a higher minimum say it's too low to live on, especially if you're trying to support a family." The way the author described how minimum wage is too low for a family reminded me of how many people are without jobs, and how many people can't support their families. http://www.tradingeconomics.com/united-states/unemployment-rate (See this link to see current unemployment rate). The author also uses facts from Sally Greenberg, who is the executive director of the National Consumer League, to show the amount of children working across the globe. The author wrote that, "...there are 250 million children under age 16 working around the world... In Bangladesh, 17% of the children between the ages of 5 and 14 work for at least part of the day for the minimum wage of $37 a month." This quote makes me feel horrible. How can these kids work so hard but be paid so little? That is one of the reasons why the author's argument of raising minimum wage is stronger than the opponents argument of lowering minimum wage.

     In the article Berger said," Opponents say a higher minimum causes companies, especially small businesses, to hire fewer people, making it harder for teens and others trying to get a start in the work world." This quote made me think about made me think about how much selfish people were. If the minimum is increased then companies will hire less. This shows how greedy business owners are. They don’t want to pay their hard working employees what they deserve. They want more money for themselves. This personally connects to me because when my family first came to America, my dad would get paid very little and work for long hours. This story connects with a previous quote that I mentioned earlier. "Advocates of a higher minimum say it's too low to live on, especially if you're trying to support a family." Throughout this article, I thought the author’s claim for higher minimum wage was stronger than his counter argument. The author uses quotes and statistics to support his claim. He also gave great reasons why the minimum wage should be hired. Because of how well he supported his claim, I was persuaded to believe in what the author believed. So the next time you complain about how low your salary is, remember that there are kids working in other countries for less than half of what you make.

A Reading Response on Inquiry Question #2 By Tanzim Ahmed

Inquiry Question #2: How are issues treated in your young adult fiction book?

     The book that I recently finished is called "Trafficked" by Kim Purcell. In this book, sixteen year old Hannah has a job offer from Los Angeles. A family wants to bring her over and want to make her a nanny for their family. The people promise her $400 a week and her own room inside the big house. She was blown away by the offer and decided to go. But the company that was smuggling her had to make her fake documents. On her way to the airport with Volva, one of the agents, who was supposed to give her her fake papers, she asked for her forged documents. Unexpectedly, Volva demanded a bribe before he would hand over her passport. After receiving only forty dollars, Volva assured her that there were other ways to pay. But now he didn't want her money, he wanted her body.
     This brings us to our answer. Hannah has to deal with many situations in this book. Unfortunately, she can't get out of all of them scratch-less. Twice in this book Hannah has to use her body to crawl out of tight situations. One of them, which I already mentioned, was on her way to the airport. Another one occurred after her grandma died. While Hannah became highly depressed over the death of her grandma, Sergey, her employer, took advantage of this situation to have sex with her. This goes to show how some men have no respect for a women's body. Hannah pleads him to get off of her and Sergey reluctantly does, but he wasn't finished. He touched her inappropriately and left her after he was done. But he also left $300 for her. Hannah felt like a prostitute but she desperately needed money so she hesitantly took it. 
     This story was focused on the side effects of human trafficking, but it held little messages inside them. One of which showed how women have to sell themselves for what they need. This answers my inquiry question. Certain issues are treated in this book with sex. Men take advantage of a desperate women and force them to something that they don't want to do.   

Reading Response: "Faithful Elephants" By Yukio Tsuchiya

     The short story, "Faithful Elephants, illustrates a very important lesson. The book teaches the reader that war affects everyone and everything negatively. During WW2, Japan was being heavily bombed and the government feared that the cages at the Ueno Zoo would break. They also feared that if the cages broke all the animals would run loose onto the streets and hurt ordinary civilians. In order to prevent such catastrophe, the Japanese army ordered that all big animals be poisoned at once. So one-by-one all the animals at the zoo were being put down. After the animals were killed. It was time to kill the beloved elephants John, Tonky, and Wonly. With the death of the three animals, Yukio Tsuchiyo implants an image of how a war can ruin the lives of innocent people and their loved ones,

     The first example where we see the lesson being taught is when the elephants die. The author describes how the elephants were getting skinnier and skinnier by day. She explains that they where being starved to death because they couldn't be killed any other way. The elephants are begging for food but the zookeepers, who were supposed to be their friends, could only watch with sorrow. At a last attempt to survive, Tonky and Wanly raised their bodies and did the Banzai trick in hope of receiving something to eat and drink. At that moment the one of the zookeepers couldn't take it anymore, he dashed for some food and water and then begged the elephants to eat. But at that time the damage was already done. As the elephants ended died, they died in pain and hunger instead of a quite and peaceful death. This scene shows that a war can effect everything on and off the bloody battlefields.

     Later on in the book, after the elephants die, the zookeepers are in distraught. "' The elephants are dead! They're dead!' screamed the elephant trainer as he ran into the office. He buried his head in his arms and cried, beating the desk top with his head in his arms and cried, beating the desk top with his fist.'" This quote shows that even though the trainers weren't physically effected by the war, a part of them also died with the elephants. These zookeepers trained and raised the elephants like their own children. So it was like having to kill your own kids. This just goes to show the devastating side effects that a war can bring.

     The main idea in this book is that war effects everyone and everything negatively. The author portrays this by showing the pain of the elephants and the grief of the  zookeepers. This short story reminds the reader of what happens when we fail to control our anger.

    

Alex Rider Series: Snakehead By: Anthony Horowitz

                               NOTICE

                       The URL of this blog will change to:                                               tanzimsreadingsummaries.blogspot.com

     The book Alex Rider: Snakehead is my favorite book from the Alex Rider Series. Anthony Horowitz, the author, does an excellent job filling in the gaps that many authors fail to do. He fills the gaps with action. The little details that we take for granted turn out to be huge factors later on in the book. These are some of the things that Anthony Horowitz include in his books.
     Snakehead is a very interesting book. The tides turn very quickly and you never know when they will turn on you. One example of this is when Alex meets his godfather, Ash. Alex is very eager to meet him because Ash is the one who knows who killed Alex's parents. In the book, Alex is told that he will go into a secret mission with Ash. While acting as a victim of human trafficking, Alex loses touch with Ash. Snakehead is the organization that smuggles humans into Australia from all around the world. While on the mission, Ash gets caught and held prisoner. When Alex finds out that Ash was caught, he tells MI6 (the British version of the CIA) about the situation. MI6 comes and picks him up and then they decide to launch a mission to recover Ash. But what no one knows is that Ash, who is thought to be a retired MI6 agent, is actually working with Snakehead. When Alex meets Ash, he is in bad shape. He is coughing blood and covered in bruises. That's when the Snakehead commander tells Ash to tell Alex the truth. So Ash tells Alex everything about his parents and how they died. But the most startling fact about the explanation was that fact that Ash was the one to kill his parents. When Ash wanted to join Snakehead, he had to prove his loyalty. So Ash decided to kill Alex's parents. The news that Alex received knocked the wind out of him. He felt a sudden mix of anger and sadness. The book is so well described that the reader can feel the same emotions as Alex. With that the book ends and Alex continues on with his life. 
     These are some examples of the sudden change in events in the Alex Rider Series. Of course there are so much more but this book is where I felt the most emotion so I decided to do a summary about it. Anthony Horowitz is a great author. He is one of only the handful of people who really understand how to describe scenes and characters in a book. His books entertain the reader and I hope he writes more novels to read.