Research Paper
With so much talk of the economy these days in the media, there are questions about what types of things actually affect the economy. Start by looking at one topic, coffee, and look at whether or not coffee is an asset to the economy. While one side does not believe coffee is an asset to the economy, the other side does believe that coffee is an asset to the economy. In order for this argument to be successful and reliable—research, analysis, assessment, and judgment must take place. Explore both sides of the argument; yes, coffee is an asset to the economy, and no, coffee is not an asset to the economy, for this debate.
According to The Oxford American College Dictionary, asset means “a useful or valuable thing, quality, or person” (72).
Side A believes that the individual consumer alone, by buying and staying true to this coffee trend, are in their own right helping the economy. It is no doubt with the many large coffee chains that millions of people visit every day, such as, The Coffee Bean and Tea Leaf, Caribou Coffee, and Starbucks( just to name a few), that this group of consumers is a force to be reckoned with. Whatever the appeal or reason may be behind someone spending $3.50 every morning for a grande mocha, or $10.95 a pound for gourmet coffee beans, the fact of the matter is that people are willing to spend that money. As the author of Starbucked, Taylor Clark put it quite well:
Ours is a caffeinated nation. We buy more coffee that of any other country in the world—almost a third of the planet’s supply—and consume somewhere around 110 billion cups of it per year. There’s no shortage of impressive-sounding statistics that demonstrate the little brown bean’s dominance over our lives: coffee is the second most traded physical commodity in the world, after petroleum; four out of every five American adults drink the beverage regularly. (Clark 7)
Side B believes, though the consumer is buying and keeping this coffee trend going,...