Some people prefer to work for themselves or own a business. Others prefer to work for an employer. Would you rather be self-employed, work for someone else, or own a business? Use specific reasons to explain your choice.
Sample Response
Several people choose to be self-employed rather than becoming an employeebecoming a professional employee, while others decide to be an employee or an entrepreneura professional or an entrepreneur. Each of the choices has its own advantages and disadvantagespositive and negative things, but in my opinionin my personal opinion, I prefer to be an employee, since it has the lowest risk.
To begin with, some people have decided to be self-employed. They prefer to do that because they do not like to be required to follow any proceduresregulated by any procedures, or being governed by under companies' regulation. Examples of the self-employed jobs are professional actors, athletes, freelancers, or other kinds of performersother kinds of art performers. While others prefer to be an entrepreneur because they feel that by opening a new business, it brings a lot benefits for themselves and societies. Should the new business run smoothlysmooth and in accordance with the business plan, the owner could make substantial profitsthe owner should get a lot of profits. It will also createAnd then, it will create job opportunities for the communitycommunities as well. However, these two choices have their own weaknesses. As a self-employed person, there is no guarantee that they will get a sustainable income, as they are paid according to their performancein accordance with their performances. While as a business owner, it is obvious that there are a lot of risks for them such as the risk of bad debt, foreign exchange fluctuation and bankruptcy.
On the other hand, some people dislike being a professional worker. They feel that they have limited free timelimited and restricted time, and sometimes the workload is also unreasonable. However, many people do not realise that becoming an employee has the least riskthe lowest risk ever. They will have a steady incomehave steady income through their monthly salaries, even if their companiesdespite that their companies might be performing poorly. And then they would have additional benefits from the company such as medical allowance, annual leaveleaves and company cars as well. Lastly, companies also pay into retirement fundscompanies are also paying the retirement fund for their employees as well. Therefore, the advantages of being an employee outweighoutweighed the disadvantages.
In conclusion, it is a fact that people have different options about work. Some people choose to open their own business, while others prefer to be self-employed or work in an organisation. After measuring the benefits and drawbacks, I personally prefer to be a professional employee, since it has the lowest risk.
Why this response received Band 6.5
The response has a clear, consistent preference for employment and supports it with a useful comparison of income stability, benefits, and the risks attached to the alternatives. Its main limitation is uneven language control, with awkward collocations, sentence fragments, and recurring agreement or form errors. The highest-priority improvement is to express the same well-organised ideas through complete sentences and more natural workplace vocabulary.
IELTS Writing Criteria Scores
Task Response
The response answers the choice directly, maintains a clear preference, and supports it with several relevant comparative reasons.
Develop the central risk argument more precisely by explaining how particular employment protections compare with the uncertainties of each alternative.
Coherence and Cohesion
The ideas follow a clear four-paragraph progression, although repetitive linking and several sentence fragments weaken the flow.
Integrate contrast clauses into complete sentences and replace repeated connectors such as "And then" and "While" with more natural transitions.
Lexical Resource
The response uses a sufficient range of work-related vocabulary, but inaccurate collocations and word choices recur.
Prioritise natural combinations such as "advantages and disadvantages," "company regulations," and "stable income" when discussing employment.
Grammatical Range and Accuracy
A mix of simple and complex structures communicates the argument clearly, but fragments, agreement errors, and faulty forms occur regularly.
Check that every contrast clause has a main clause and proofread subject-verb agreement, articles, and singular-plural forms.
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IELTS Writing Task 2
Some people prefer to work for themselves or own a business. Others prefer to work for an employer. Would you rather be self-employed, work for someone else, or own a business? Use specific reasons to explain your choice.
Your response
Write the task yourself, then compare your choices with the annotated response.