Sprint plans to send hundreds of technology jobs overseas

Kansas City Star ^ | 8/7/03 | Suzanne King

[Non-Sequitur]

Hundreds of Sprint Corp. employees may lose their jobs as the Overland Park-based telecommunications giant moves forward with a plan to send certain technology jobs overseas.

Sprint chairman and chief executive Gary Forsee on Wednesday said competitive pressures had forced the company toward "offshoring" -- the growing trend of U.S. companies relying on lower-paid computer programmers as far away as India and China.

Sprint put out a request for proposals from outsourcing companies earlier this year and has since narrowed the list to two offshore vendors. Forsee said Sprint is conducting site surveys and is in "serious discussions" with the two companies.

"At the end of the day, it's several hundred jobs that could be impacted," Forsee said. "But we don't know what the ultimate result is."

A final decision on how to handle sending the jobs overseas is likely within 60 days.

Layoffs would not be immediate, Forsee said, because moving work to the outsourcing companies could take six to 12 months.

Forsee also said the company hopes to ease the impact of sending jobs overseas by moving some displaced workers to other information technology projects within Sprint and replacing existing contractors with Sprint employees.

Sprint already was considering moving jobs overseas when Forsee replaced William T. Esrey as the company's top executive earlier this year. But Forsee said he made the final decision to go ahead with the request for proposals.

Sprint already uses an offshore company for some customer service jobs. The company has outsourced information technology jobs to U.S. firms for years. But it has resisted sending information technology jobs overseas.

That has changed as Sprint, like other telecommunications companies, struggles with weak sales in what continues to be a difficult economy.

For almost two years, Sprint has been on a campaign to lower costs to compensate for soft sales. Since October 2001, more than 18,000 jobs have been eliminated. Hundreds of contractors also have lost work at Sprint.

Computer programmers and other skilled technology workers have been among the hardest hit, and there remains a severe shortage of available technology jobs in Kansas City and elsewhere.

Sprint's move toward sending jobs overseas will make a bad situation worse, said Rick Kumar, a former Sprint contractor who last year founded a support group for laid off information technology workers.

"The market is where it was a year and a half ago," Kumar said.

Many people still are out of work or have abandoned their information technology careers for other work, Kumar said. But unlike many of his information technology colleagues, Kumar said he does not blame Sprint and the many other companies that have turned to cheaper labor overseas.

"They have to follow the model or go out of business," Kumar said.

That is precisely how Sprint explains its move toward an offshore vendor. When competitors began cutting information technology costs by turning to offshore programmers, company officials said, Sprint was forced to look at following suit.

"We've got to stay on top of our competitive position," Forsee said. Offshoring "has become a significant trend that we hadn't participated in, so we looked at that as a strategy that was important...because of the competitive aspects."

IBM, Microsoft and HP are among the U.S. companies that are sending information technology jobs overseas or reportedly plan to start. Sprint must lower its cost to keep pace, Forsee said. But he knows careers are at stake.

"When you take actions like that, you're doing that hoping to keep the company as a whole strong," realizing that there are "people and careers and jobs at stake," Forsee said. "We try to do that part very carefully. It's not without significant consideration."

Shares of FON closed Wednesday at $14.05, up 1 cent. PCS closed at $5.41, down 36 cents.

[RipSawyer]

"Can you say lower wages for Americans? I knew you could."

I can attest to the fact of wages falling fast in my area. I was just this week notified of a five percent across the board cut affecting myself and everyone else in the operation. When productivity rises faster than demand for the product what results is a glut of labor, any resulting increase in profits goes to top management and owners with workers producing more for less pay. In my case it is even worse, I believe the plant is operating at a loss currently. There is no way to sell the product for more and I expect the inevitable result will be a plant closing, the question is when.
Free Republic is loaded with those who refuse to face reality, everytime some government statistic sounds positive they start posting pictures of little Tommy Daschle who is "deeply saddened" or some such but we are not going to solve the problem by pretending it does not exist. I no longer care a whit for economic statistics, I pay attention only to what I can see going on.

[ninenot]

Fascist, Commie--I don't care.

THEY ARE ENEMIES OF THIS COUNTRY. Most "free traders" forget that. It gets lost in the micro-debate.

Since they cannot win a military engagement with the USA (at this time,) they will eviscerate the economic strength of this country, cause a bit of social unrest in so doing, and achieve their objective via economics.

Don't forget that your enemy, (regardless of who they are) might have two or three different ways of achieving victory. In most cases, a fist-fight, while the most honest and direct, is NOT the winning plan.

[Lazamataz]

Great. Now prove that .DLL came from overseas and not by some L1s here

That's not how you track it. You track it by money leaving the states. You'd need to know that anyways to put valuation on the tariff.

[Lazamataz]

Don't worry, many of us in the so-called "ivory towers" see the problem. I just don't know how to fix it. I break my hump teaching kids some pretty exotic stuff. Many of them do very well. They are honest, hardworking students who have done everything right. Trouble is, when they get out there, the system has told them sorry, we have nothing for you. Then some people say, tough luck you should have learned a trade, or get retraining, or whatever. Well, thank you very much! Just what we want to hear when we've done just what we've been told to do, go to school, get a good education, better yourself, etc. Learn a trade? What, after spending four, or six, or eight years getting a degree to hopefully do better than that? Get retrained? You said it, retrained to do what? Get more education? Cripes, a guy spends eight years after high school getting a Ph.D. and then he's told he needs education? Give me a freakin' break here.

Well done. You've put into words what has bothered me, but gone unexpressed, for a long time.

[RipSawyer]

"And this would be different from the current Microsoft OS products in what way, exactly?"

Problems would no longer be called bugs but would be referred to as "sacred rats"?

[Lazamataz]

To slap down tariffs or some of the other suggestions put forth here don't make sense to me, they'd be something only chicoms or rats (same difference) would think up.

No, the founding fathers were the origination of the idea of tariffs in America. Their vision was that the entire government be funded solely by tariffs.

[ninenot]

the Libertarians that helped China get MFN status, and join the WTO

Nope--but anything pushed through by Clinton and Gingrich (both notable for their marital infidelities, but only Clinton clearly was treasonous) deserves suspicion.

[Cronos]

Talking about Smear machines, what about what's happening to Arnie. Sheesh, the lib media is disgusting the way they're going after him. In fact, they disgust me so much, I'd consider anything bad they said about him to be a lie.

[Lazamataz]

By the by, why am I supposed to care what Bastiat writes? His main claim to fame is a series of articles defending "free trade" -- such trade that I call "unfair trade" -- and ridiculing tariffs and protectionism.

Therefore, of course you'll be able to find quotes attacking tariffs from Bastiat. Kinda circular logic, as far as I can tell: Bastiat hates tariffs, so in order to attack tariffs, quote Bastiat -- because Bastiat hates tariffs.

[Lazamataz]

In all three cases the state seizes private property.

So am I to understand that you consider the Founding Fathers to be socialists and communists?

They were the ones who most stridently championed tariffs.

[1rudeboy]

What do you suggest? In order to attack tariffs, one must only quote tariff advocates?

[Lazamataz]

Talking about Smear machines, what about what's happening to Arnie. Sheesh, the lib media is disgusting the way they're going after him. In fact, they disgust me so much, I'd consider anything bad they said about him to be a lie.

Yeah, but its so over the top that they are actually immunizing him. I mean, right out of the box, they call Arnie a Nazi. Not a lot of room to get worse, y'know? :o)

[Lazamataz]

What do you suggest? In order to attack tariffs, one must only quote tariff advocates?

I suggest that quotes are meaningless, unless they contain within solid evidence and rational reasoned premises supporting following conclusions.

[ninenot]

It's my impression from reading Bastiat's 'The Law' that he was a legal philosopher who REALLY did not like Gummint.

At least in part he was right. Problem is, he didn't leave any solutions---only complaints.

[1rudeboy]

One of the reasons that this thread is past 400 replies is because the economic evidence is thin-on-the-ground. For both sides. Witness your (rhetorical) reliance on our Founding Fathers.

[SouthParkRepublican]

”BTW, I notice more and more Freepers are starting to consider this a serious problem, both for the US and for Bush.”

It’s amazing that even with these threads becoming longer and longer there are still people posting who say that this is not an issue. I don’t know if they have a personal stake at risk or if they are just “Free Trade” purists but one thing is for sure; If W does not do something or at least give the appearance that he plans on doing something, he is going to lose quite a few voters to anyone who puts this on their agenda.

There comes a time when the “you wanna throw away your vote” and “you’d rather have a RAT in the White House” arguments grow thin. The obvious answer is “No” but if our President is going to ignore something that has substantial impact to many of his constituents he has no-one to blame but himself for turning a blind eye and driving our votes elsewhere.

[Lazamataz]

Witness your (rhetorical) reliance on our Founding Fathers.

Well, they seem to be right about just about everything. Their document(s) were brilliant. They had an incredible future vision. The documents they wrote have stood the test of time through the most incredible revolution in mankinds history -- the advent of technology.

They were strident supporters of tariffs, and never even mentioned income taxes. I'm sure its not because they didn't think of income taxes, but because they were so opposed to them that they didn't think them worthy of mention.

[1rudeboy]

Riiight. The free-trade purists have an ulterior-motive, but the protectionists act out of noblesse oblige.

[eleni121]

Now look who's jumping to conclusions...The chicoms know full well that a continued expansion of their free market sector of their economy will lead to demands for more personal freedoms among the chinese. That is why the CP maintains a corrupt reactionary hold on many of the productive sectors of their economy.

Cutting off chinese exports now will only delay any possibility of reform there. The pressure is on as long as we continue to import. If we stop, those protective tarriffs will never topple.

[1rudeboy]

You do bring-up an interesting issue: did the Founding Fathers simply see tariffs as a source of revenue, or did they, as a policy-matter, intend tariffs to favor various special-interest groups?