That's not entirely true. If the behavior is both predatory AND adjustable on the whims of one party, then it may not be enforceable. [msjlaw.org/what_we_do/predatory_mortgage.html] is one advocacy group fighting, and winning some cases, in that vein. A guest on the Colbert Report also pointed out that this might be a way to protect some people targeted by predatory loans. That's why I noted this as an argument for SUB-PRIME, not just ARMs. I've done plenty of reading on the topic: Contract law is evolving.

I'd argue that so many elements of AR/EW's contracts are legally questionable that the whole contract is likely unenforceable.

Except even lines being perfectly straight is somehow measurable. Quality of papers is not, unless you use the final grade which means that you know that the student is engaging in fraud. After all, many people are arguing that the subprime mortgages were unenforceable too, even though those were all about quantifiable fact, because it is absurd to sign onto a contract whose terms can change!

Nice out of context quoting. With friends like you indeed.


Actually, my experience has been the same. I ask for half up front to secure trust and negotiate each contract individually.

According to contract law. You can't meaningfully agree to contracts where the underlying arrangement can change. If they can decide, subjectively, to cut what they pay me based on their interpretation of the quality of the work, they can pay me nothing for my work. That's not an enforceable contract. An honest company would just not work with that freelancer anymore.

Big: It's not really the right kind of business.

You can't consent to something illegal. If my employer takes $20 from my wallet and I don't press charges because I don't want to go to court, that does not empower him to take $20. Their fining system is almost undoubtedly illegal and unenforceable. I agree that this doesn't help.


Exactly. I think that, say, if a writer turns in a half-completed paper, it could be justifiable to pay them only half the promised amount, which is a "fine" in a sense. The problem is the slippery slope: There is no bright line between that and a poor quality paper, or "improper" citation.

Rupysk: Give them a week, if you haven't already. After that, notify them that you are going to inform cyber-crimes and seek legal recourse. Stop work on all assignments and, if you can, message every customer on their list that they are frauds (what do you have to lose, they're going to not pay you). That's what's worked in the past for companies like AR. And, of course, follow up on the threat. These dishonest companies try to register in the US/UK/etc. or otherwise misrepresent themselves. Unfortunately for them, that means they have opened themselves legally.

Most people would suck at being doctors. If a hospital said that, they wouldn't be insulting their own "employee base". One of the industry's problems is that there are far too many unqualified writers. Imagine if a bunch of undergraduates were running around offering unlicensed surgery. This would be exceptionally bad, right? One thing unions have always done is try to stop semi-skilled competition. You're trying to protect people who are harming you and are likely to be your eventual scabs.


So we're on the same page. The beauty of this approach is that non-represented writers can be terrible.


Sure, but

a) Many of their practices are either dishonestly disclosed, hidden in legalese, or simply not in the contract
b) Many of their practices are illegal, and it's likely that the whole contract is unenforceable given that they don't do their due diligence to make sure that they're not committing illegal academic fraud

c) Not all of these freelancers are even aware of this site; I doubt that even the majority are (I wasn't until I Googled to see which services were fraudulent)

I agree the CPP is undoubtedly legal. But under present international law, people in Haiti dipping baseballs into toxic chemicals by hand is legal too; doesn't make it any less exploitative, as we agree. That having been said, yes, workers do need to take responsibility for their own exploitation.


Again: Editor is on record saying it won't be a registered union, not in any legal sense. I think the more accurate conception would be a professional organization.

It's really tragic that they won't pay even when they're charging the standard rates they are and getting something like 70-90% of the profit.

Not the right context. What made him CERTAIN you don't have much work is that you don't appreciate administration.

I agree with you that it doesn't take much time to post here, and I view it as being worth it for the industry, for customers, for my clients. I love to actually be able to point clients away from illegitimate scammers if I can't or won't handle their assignment.


Yes, I agree. I think many people here are taking the stand that either you are successful and well-established or you're a dope and a fool who doesn't belong in the industry. There is a gradation, a continuum, and I agree that many people on it are fully competent but don't know the industry too well and will get fleeced. This site exists in part to protect them.


But they're not just handling that. They're also handling

*Subsidizing clients who don't pay or pay incompletely (which I have had to deal with and simply can't enforce because I don't have the time)

*Promoting and advertising
*Getting to the top of search engines
*Running different kinds of transactions (credit card, debit card, etc., sometimes across international borders) and eating those costs

Etc.

Let's not bring messy politics into an already too-long thread. Socialism's merits, debits and definition versus capitalism's merits, debits and definition are moot. If his proposal would improve the lot of writers, I'd be for it. It just doesn't seem like it would.

#1 seems like a good idea. #2 makes sense too: The AMA doesn't defend or represent whackjobs who use holistic energy fields or something with no university degree. Editor, would you agree that one of the union's requirements would need to be an independent writing test?

#3 is silly: People make all sorts of decisions for all sorts of reasons and companies defend themselves with all sorts of legalese, but those decisions are not necessarily thereby legitimate or true. People choose to hand their money to a mugger too, but that's not a decision based in justice. AR and EW do viciously exploit their writers, not just with really low CPPs but also likely illegal fining structures and policies.

That having been said, yes, writers should have known what they were getting into to some extent. Further, ESL writers shouldn't be in the industry. Editor: For someone who cannot write good English copy to present themselves as an English essay writer is ITSELF fraudulent. I'm not going to be too hard on someone seeking to make $2/3 a page off of writing which is an excellent wage in their countries, and as many people have noted here apparently some people are willing to turn that in (plus some people need someone who can mimic an ESL style anyways since they themselves are ESL), but nonetheless, if you can't put together coherent, grammatical, syntactical sentences, you shouldn't be writing in English. I don't sell French essays to French university students with my limited French skills, even though I know a French translator so what I put out would actually be perfectly legible.


But, again, not every burger flipper is made equal yet they are all paid the same, and someone working at a hardware store may have a lot more skill but the minimum wage at the fast food location is still mandated by law. Professional organizations for freelancers and businesses try to similarly control prices insofar as they can without becoming a monopoly. An organization of freelancers mandating a minimum CPP would be a GOOD thing for th industry, even for people who don't like the ESL writers. If companies like AR and EW couldn't pay their ESL writers $2/3 per page, they would have to either reduce their take or raise their prices. Either way, the incentive to actually HIRE bad ESL writers would go away, EVEN IF THE UNION didn't actually do any quality control itself!

Sure, but when you move beyond an ad hoc system like that, it becomes exponentially mroe complex.


No. His claim is that someone who doesn't say that management is difficult must not be doing much of it. He says management is difficult; ipso facto, his claim doesn't apply to him.

That's a little hyperbolic. Professional associations do not Stalinism make. But Major is right in general that there has to be trust, discussion about mutual agreements and preferences, etc.

That's a fair point, except that it's also good to trust peoples' reputations, and if someone seems that they're backing up what they're saying, you can trust that they're backing it up in general.


Agreed. I'm far from inundated and even I dread having to deal with bank statements and making sure I got paid the correct amount from each of my clients.

Actually, my family member in the translation industry finds her ATA membership to be very useful. She wouldn't have gotten on the Trados bandwagon as early as she did without it, for example.

Also, I think Editor is describing an organization with no fees. If he does ask for fees, I would balk even more at unrealistic demands that would waste the time of the members.

Really: Post your needs to EssayChat.

I have been defending you from what I view as misrepresentations. You have done nothing but alienate one of your allies. Good work.

Beatrice: I don't think Editor was ever proposing a literal, legal union, but more like a professional association.

First: The essay mill industry does most of its business online and tries to accommodate poor students. That sometimes means subsidizing a lower CPP, accounting for credit card/debit card transaction costs, etc.

Second: YOU CAN'T QUANTIFY THE PRODUCTIVITY OF A WRITER, YOU IDIOT. This industry charges by the page, but even if it charged by the word, not all jobs are made equal. "Watch an episode of House and comment on it critically" is not "An analysis of genetic drift in giraffes from 1950-1960".

Third: Most writers work from home. That means you have to pay by productivity, not time.

Again, someone in my family is a translator. This is a perfectly legitimate business. She DOESN'T GET BENEFITS. SHE IS A FREELANCER. She is NOT being exploited, the translation industry is NOT a scam, GO AWAY.

And I'm telling you that claim requires EVIDENCE. Evidence which you have spent four pages of thread refusing to provide.

You have to prove, on the one hand, that what administrators and companies do doesn't require 50% off the top for overhead. You haven't bothered, so you're done, go away.

You have to prove, on the other, that writers are actually exploited and actually don't have power. You haven't bothered, writers here tell you otherwise, go away.

Yeah, that was my point. I think it's a demonstrably false assertion that everyone who is a worthwhile writer is currently represented.

WHY? You don't ever bother making the argument! For the record: Is $3 CPP different from $6 different from $12? You've conceded that someone making $100 CPP is not exploited. What CPP or income is high enough for you to not think there's exploitation? And do you think that freelancers in other fields are exploited just because they don't have health insurance? And what about people working in countries where health insurance is provided? For God's sakes, your ideas are so mind-numbingly simplistic...

As regards capitalism and socialism: Capitalism is also a desperately failed economic system, responsible for ecological destruction, imperialism, war and omnicidal threats. I think it's transparently obvious that we need to seek out new forms, neither Stalinist/Leninist forms nor capitalist forms. Doesn't seem terribly relevant, though...

Questioning is not rude. I asked for more info.

$36 per page, by my calculations (assuming 300 word pages) is not terribly unreasonable, ESPECIALLY for master's papers.

Meaningless semantics.

You continue to lump together, despite the difference experience of WRITERS here telling you otherwise, blatantly exploitative companies and companies that have minimum CPPs, don't charge fines, and have a very fair split.

No, I agree, but there are plenty of people, ESL and otherwise, just entering the industry who could be taken advantage of who have plenty of wonderful potential.

No, but no one "forces" someone to work in a coal mine for ten cents a day either, yet that's also exploitative. Many of these ESL writers do not have options that are high paying. Protecting them would be a wonderful way to helping them support their families.

Some don't belong in the industry, but some do, IMHO.


Let's say that there was a minimum split and a minimum CPP of, say, $7. EW/AR would then have no incentive to hire people who are undereducated or bad writers. EW/AR get an advantage because they can hire garbage writers who are unprotected from their exploitation then rip them off. A good union could also have standards for membership.


I agree, but without the existence of some kind of professional organization to protect writers, it's difficult to anticipate how many would scab.

No, my point was that, while in all jobs there are negotiations, there are some legal limitations. A union could easily push for a bare minimum CPP and also push for higher CPPs in general. What is impossible is trying to push for benefits.

That having been said, there is a minimum wage. Many writers in this industry could use representation protecting them from exploitation.

I neglected to mention that the idea of one uniform set of standards is INSANE.

I'm a writer with about ten years of experience and an undergraduate degree from a prestigious university. I expect to get a certain amount of pay/benefits, say we call it X. A high school or college dropout with five years of writing experience should get, say, .6-.8X. A Ph. D should get 1.7-2X. I'm not going to be paid the same and accept the same benefits as someone with half of my experience, and I wouldn't ask to be paid the same as someone with double my experience.

I know, and you said as much. So what you should have done is BACKED OFF, not accused everyone else of being parasites feeding off of the working man because they wouldn't adopt proposals you couldn't defend.

"Little stuff" like bonuses and paid vacations IS NOT LITTLE STUFF. Even those things LEGALLY require different ways of treating and classifying your employees and are highly unlikely. The only thing that makes sense is a bonus, maybe a flat bonus or maybe a percentile one or maybe a sweepsstake or something, for getting a positive feedback off an essay, or some other bonus program.

What's WRONG with it is that you're making a proposal that you have no idea if it's even possible. For the fourth time: Do a feasibility report. Look at the industry a little, send WRT, WB, Freelance Writer, any other trustworthy people an e-mail and ask them what they'd be willing to share about their sharing ratios, average CPPs, average workflow, etc. Take that into account and make a feasibility report. If you find a way that it's possible for a company to provide their employees a reasonable CPP (anything above $8 a page minimum, $15 average, say) and still offer benefits, then you'll know that having a potential union demand that isn't a bad idea, and you can forward the info to WRT and others who I am sure would LOVE to adopt it as a practice if it were really legally and economically viable.

You have given us "perspectives" on possible cuts and numbers, Editor. NOT an actual report. You can't demand that writers get X% and management get Y% without actually DOING THE WORK to show how much money would be coming in, how much work management would be doing for how much pay, if that's remotely like the pay that management could get working somewhere else, if you're assuming that management still writes papers and only does a few extra management tasks, etc. You'd need to show that the issues that everyone here cites about overhead costs, both scale-invariant and scale-variant, are not a problem. You've said NOTHING that's actually helpful or concrete.

People who want to form a union typically know something about their industry...

I was on board with the idea until you got insane. To reiterate for the nth time: If you could find a way to secure benefits for writers, that'd be awesome. But you're not going to. Even if you would, giving paid vacations to writers paid $3 per page doesn't make them less exploited. Focus on raising CPPs for writers and eliminating things like fines first.

I have seen no independent evidence that they offer a bad or fraudulent product?

From what I've seen thus far, Editor is stupidly and stubbornly insisting on the impossible, but plenty of smart and capable people have done that.

An item number you could have made up. "Abviously". Post all your information in such a way that it's independently verifiable. WRT made clear he wasn't defending MasterPapers, but just because a company's bad doesn't mean every claim against them is valid. You posted multiple identical threads - it's a good way of looking like a spambot. I assumed you weren't and just told you that it was suspicious. Stop being so defensive, it makes you look like you have something to hide...

Wrong part of the dishonest statement.

Ummmmm, yes, that IS dishonest. I said specifically that it only applies to a full Ph. D dissertation, which, by the way, is the same policy WRT has for his companies. I will write every paper for an entire class, hell, for an entire undergraduate career, for someone. I just won't do an entire dissertation. Simple.

Wow, what an insipid, dishonest jack.

I didn't say "Read a thesaurus" in response to your RIGHTS, but in response to you offering a meaningless semantic distinction.

Hey, writers! This is what your union leader does: Dishonestly take people out of context even when they were on his side and ask for impossible demands that no company will ever offer.


More ESL garbage. I was interested in your idea and had e-mailed you except that both times the e-mail bounced, the height of unprofessionalism. I only started insulting you after you effectively called me a parasite, with no idea about how my business works or who I deal with. In your world, if businesses don't voluntarily destroy themselves and run themselves into the red to offer impossible and illegal benefits, they are EXACTLY THE SAME as those who pay their workers poverty wages.

Want to be positive? Give us a feasibility report, like I've asked for three times, you dishonest character assassin. Give us the average cost per page, number of writers, average number of completed contracts, etc. it would take to give workers a reasonable CPP and the benefits you're listing. Until you can do that, I'm done with you.

This is a paper-thin legal defense, and in any respect does not disprove the statement I made.


Still inaccurate, abusive and unprofessional. Dishonesty appears to be your MO.

Actually, no, that's not really that good of evidence. It doesn't indicate that it was a refund, or that the refund was late, and you could easily have fabricated it.

Nice inaccurate implication. I'm not hurt. It's just not appropriate etiquette. Either YOU were hurt and are lashing out, in which case my emotional response was fine, or you were responding out of professional pride, in which case I am responding in the same way. Trying to belittle me when YOU were the one who escalated to unprofessional heights is a GREAT argument.


Half your "arguments" are "Riiiiight... dream on", with no evidence, when you have just been proven utterly, totally wrong. Bodes well for your clients.

I will not write model dissertations. I will write model essays on any topic, including, if the customer requested it, how to be anything they wish to be. I will indulge any client unlimited amounts of papers, unless I feel that this is a ploy to get a Ph. D paper published. That is it, that is all. My concern is EXCLUSIVELY suborning Ph. D fraud, and possibly other types of fraud (e.g. basically purchasing an entire degree).

But even if your assessment was spot on and not abusively inaccurate, it would STILL be mocking and insulting in tone and entirely unprofessional, exposing you as a J-A.

Meanwhile, what is wrong about the following statement:

EW_Writer has no ethical or legal problem with suborning fraud. He doesn't care if his client is prosecuted and is unconcerned with legal risks. He also has no concern for the ongoing viability of human knowledge. He is irresponsible.

You brought my business and writing into it, several times, NOT just the above statement. Back off. Last chance.

I don't take home a couple of hundred grand. I take home thirty or forty.

Have any specific, non-scam companies where this is the case? Any actual financials? Or is this just a made up statistic?

Even if you did, that STILL wouldn't be the sign of a scam. How many of those writers are working full time? Almost none. How much more money would you need to provide those writers to come into the office? Moms, for example, might be willing to make $30,000 less a year to be able to actually raise their kids. Did the people at the top start there, or did they work their way up by working for years? How much money could those people at the top make if they were in a comparable job within their professional echelon? Etc. But from what I've seen talking to WRT, this assessment is WRONG, WRONG, WRONG. You're describing frauds, not actual companies.

Of course, this failure to put your money where your mouth is proves my point. You have NO IDEA whether or not benefits could be feasible. You seem to understand, implicitly, that they're NOT. You're a spoiled kid sitting outside the window asking for a hundred pounds of candy.

Read a friggin theasaurus. And no, they have NOT been telling you they're content. The ones HERE have been telling you they are HAPPY. Ecstatic. I am making great money and working for myself. I am my own boss.