Posted on 08/08/2003 7:41:52 AM PDT by samuel_adams_us
Aug. 7, 2003 / 5:32 PM ET Readers on outsourcing: I’ve been corresponding with readers this week about two Newsweek pieces, one on the “jobless recovery” phenomenon and the other on offshore outsourcing. It’s a major hot-button topic, particularly among IT workers, but the mail for the most part has been quite reasoned, if somewhat sorrowful and resigned. A few readers asked some pointed questions:
Name: Marc Hansen Hometown: Seattle When all the Microsoft, Oracle, and IBM software production has been outsourced offshore, and when all Intel factories are completely automated, and when all Home Depot stores have self-check-out lines. ... my question is: Who, in America, will be able to afford the food that the McDonald’s robots cook?
Name: EV Hometown: Annapolis, Md. Where do all of these upper level managers think they will be when everyone has been outsourced? Guess they better learn Hindi or one of the other 18 dialects. You are only a manager if there is someone left to manage.
Name: Daniel E. Platt Hometown: Putnam Valley, N.Y. Sixteenth century Spain was quite rich on gold from America. While they funded the industrial revolution in the rest of Europe, they were largely left behind in the end. Are we doomed to the same fate? Or should we purchase a future at the cost of lower profit margins now?
Rogers replies: All good questions. Here are some personal tales from the trenches:
Name: Toni Klinger Hometown: Massillon, Ohio I am so angry. My husband is 59 and lost his job to Canada four months ago. Yesterday, my sister-in-law was notified that her skip-tracing job was going to India. Hey, no problem, she’s only been with the company for 21 years! I have never been so frustrated in my life. People in their 50s just can’t start over. I hate life!
Name: G. Popsworth Hometown: Dallas, Texas I am struggling with what to suggest to my children for a course of study at college. It is becoming more and more difficult for college grads to find employment. Now with outsourcing rampant, they need something stable for their career opportunities. A small town dentist, doctor or lawyer might be appropriate.
Name: Thela Jinseet Hometown: Clinton, N.J. Here’s my story: I am a journalist for an online publication, and I’m bracing for impact. My employer’s entire technical staff is from India, making up nearly 50% of the employees here. The owners of the company are also Indian and they outsource to a team in India. Our Indian employees are a real bargain because they work ungodly hours: 10- to 12-hour days every day and on the weekends. They are also extremely bright. And it’s for low pay. But there’s more. My husband lost his electrical engineering job four days after 9-11 from a major Japanese company that closed its plant and moved its operations to France. Despite graduating with honors from a top university, it took more than a year for him to find work. And just in time: We had two weeks of unemployment benefits left, which was barely enough to pay for our mortgage. This time, he saw a substantial cut in pay. I am truly frightened after our experience. I am scared to buy another house. (We had to sell ours for his new job.) I am scared to have a baby. We can’t afford to save for retirement. Pensions are a thing of the past. My company doesn’t even have a 401(k) plan or even direct deposit for paychecks. I fear we will be poverty-stricken when we retire at 75. Why isn’t Congress listening?
Rogers replies: There were also some suggestions about what to do:
Name: Bill Hometown: Roswell, Ga. Outsourcing customer service jobs overseas is a double-edged sword. One side slashes the number of jobs that are available to U.S. employees and the other side slashes the income taxes that the federal government can collect. Uncle Sam ends up funding unemployment benefits for U.S. citizens who are denied jobs that have been sent overseas. One solution may be to penalize these outsourcing companies in the form of a negative subsidy so that they can help pay benefits for the unemployed.
Name: Mike K. Hometown: Aurora, Ill. Outsourcing makes for some really profitable companies, but fewer consumers have the money to buy that company’s products. That profit won’t last for long. Remember the big “Buy American” kick back in the 80s? I think we’re on the way to the “Hire American” craze. Find out who outsources and who doesn’t and support those who support America by hiring Americans.
I do have a right to have a job that is equivalent to my set of skills and training though. That is the good thing about the freedom America offers. Those who make profits off of me are under obligation to invest either directly or indirectly in those they profit off of. To think any other way would mean they think they are "entitled" to a sale or "entitled" to a profit.
For those who don't think I have a right to a job, I have the right to vote them out of office.
No, let's get this straight: you do not have ANY right to ANY job, no matter HOW qualified you are (or how qualified you believe yourself to be).
That is the good thing about the freedom America offers.
Those who make profits off of me are under obligation to invest either directly or indirectly in those they profit off of.
Wow. You mean you have the right to tell others what to do with their own money?
To think any other way would mean they think they are "entitled" to a sale or "entitled" to a profit.
They are entitled to their money. You are not entitled to one cent of their money, except those wages which you agree to when you hire on with their business, and only then in return for doing what you agreed to do.
Our great advantage over the world markets is our university system, which as bad as it is, is still far above that of any other country . . . BUT . . . native-born American students (who are plenty smart enough) don't want to work and overwhelmingly go into "social sciences," business (but especially marketing and finance, not production/manufacturing), avoid entrepreneurship, and avoid science and math.
Is this another 'Free Trade' scheme? We import students, send study centers overseas (Bangalore, etc.) and then tell our children to lower their expectations.
BTW, I'm interested in your response to my prior statement:
What China is doing with its tariffs is much like what we did with our tariffs when we became the greatest economic engine on earth. China's citizens are getting richer, their military is funded with American dollars, we are losing jobs and manufacturing capacity to them, while we educate Chinese students instead of American.
Yes.
Well, I don't.
The First Amendment means that you're entitled to be completely mistaken about facts.
However harmful over-taxation and over-regulation are, they are not the reason for offshoring entire departments to India.
You start off by questioning how harmful over-taxation and over-regulation are.
That might be part of your problem.
The stability and security of doing business within our shores is not in the past.
OPIC funds are not necessary here, (yet).
Microsoft, Dow Corning, Philip Morris, and RJR Nabisco might disagree with you.
We are still a stable country with a relatively stable society. Let us pray that it stays that way.
Oh, yeah. BIG HELP YOU ARE! You'll "pray that it stays that way." Newsflash: it isn't.
A little foresight and activism would go a long way with that prayer.
And so you complain about OPIC.
Of course, corporations get raped by regulation, taxes, and predatory litigation every day in this country. Hell, OPIC is the least America can do in return for all those tax dollars and BS civil judgements they've extorted from the EE-VIL corporations.
No. Higher education means higher education, not fixing the screwups made by lower education.
Why is our higher educational system not focused on American students?
Because American students don't want to actually learn anything, they just want a nice high grade to help their self-esteem.
OUCH! Fat, Dumb, Happy (for now) they are. Oh well.
I've enjoyed your posts tonight on this thread. I'm coming around to a more "free-trade" state of mind (although not completely). The Beautifully Brutal (tm) Free-Market.
Now you are contorting things. I have a right to a job. Thats for sure. No one said a million bucks. No one said anything about that.
If I want to go out and get some land, I can be a friggin farmer. If I want to raise cows, hell, I will be in the dairy business and you can't do anything about it.
If I want to be a banker, who are you to tell me I can't go to school and get an education and work in a bank?
Its part of the basic freedoms of this country.
If though your business takes advantage of the money I make, and you choose not to contribute to the economy, but expect a sale from me... then I have the right to take action against you.
In the case of one way importing, I also have the right to have the government take action against you also.
As a business, if your interests aren't in my interests, screw you. You (as a business) can rot and go bankrupt.
The United States has a right to impose a tariff.
The United States also has the right to demand a tariff be removed.
The United States also has the right to set the terms under which another country does business with it.
Its called National Soverignty. Either you're a country or you're not. Which would you rather be? A country or not a country?
It seems other nations have learned this simple lesson which we have chosen to forget.
No I do not seek to raise teh cost of doing business a tariff offset by some otehr tax cut merely raises the cvost of doing business in the country whose products are subject tp teh duties not in the USA. Learn to read.
Whether or not THEIR markets are open is absolutely irrelevant.
My such a fee trader if it is oiirrelevant if a nations amrkets are open then why do you protest so much to a tariffs the US Levies on Imports.
Since a Chinese general has described the economic policies of China vis a vis the USA sucvh is hardly irrelevant and in point of fact you are a better military historian than to say that asymetric warfrae bnever works and does not work. So stuff your PRC lovving diatribe and start dealing with reality. Show aq cse of where tariffs have harmered a nation. The Historical record in the USA is that when we had protective tariffs in place we became the leading nation economically on the planet.
Surely a formula for success.
Because American students don't want to actually learn anything, they just want a nice high grade to help their self-esteem.
Actually you are describing American educators, particularly K-12.
No, I am not.
I have a right to a job.
One more time: you don't have any such right.
Thats for sure. No one said a million bucks. No one said anything about that.
It's a matter of degree. You've indicated that you have a right to spend SOME of other people's money. What that really means is that you think you're generous because you're not asking to spend ALL of other people's money. In other words, you're a liberal Democrat.
If I want to go out and get some land, I can be a friggin farmer. If I want to raise cows, hell, I will be in the dairy business and you can't do anything about it.
With your own money?
No problem.
If I want to be a banker, who are you to tell me I can't go to school and get an education and work in a bank?
You can attempt to get an education. There is no guarantee that you will actually get it--that's where work comes in. You may apply at banks all across town--but none of them is obligated to hire you.
Its part of the basic freedoms of this country.
You have the right to the PURSUIT of happiness...not the ACHIEVEMENT of same.
If though your business takes advantage of the money I make, and you choose not to contribute to the economy, but expect a sale from me... then I have the right to take action against you.
Then don't buy my product. I'll go sell to other people instead.
But you're apparently saying that you have the right to spend my money.
And that, dear sir, is theft.
In the case of one way importing, I also have the right to have the government take action against you also.
Fine. I'll close up shop, cash out, and fire everybody working for me in America.
I'll give 'em your address and tell them to discuss their loss of income with you.
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