U.S. Offshore Outsourcing Leads to Structural Changes and Big Impact

cio.com ^ | August 13, 2003 | Diane Morello

[thimios]

Just one more article that will be another nail in GWB’s coffin in 2004. As a hardcore conservative and IT professional, I’m not too happy and somewhat reluctant to pull the level for GWB, and I’m not alone.

[BushCountry]

Good you deserve Dean.

[jimkress]

HAve these people stopped to consider that, after a point, every job 'outsourced' to another country is one less consumer to purchase their products? What are they going to do when no one is left to buy their goods?

[thimios]

Great reply. Let me get this right. GWB and all Washington politicians are selling out this country and we will become a third world nation because we have nothing left to produce. China and India will control the global economies and we will be getting our marching orders from Beijing.

So tell me how GWB is pro American?

Talk about zombie mentality. Wake up and smell the tea from India and China.

[Koblenz]

If the government was serious about stopping the loss of jobs, it would stop companies from implementing Enterprise Resource Planning, Supply Chain Management, Business Process Management and Customer Relationship Management software, no matter where it was written. Enterprise software makes companies more efficient and allows them to eliminate jobs. For instance, some companies produce software that allows companies to automatically process travel and entertainment expenses. The number of people required in HR and Accounting will be much less. Yet these people need jobs too. Where are they going to work now, with all these companies installing automated software? Other companies are installing software that will allow them to closely track the efficiency of their salesforce, and will allow them to target their salesforce. This will result in them hiring fewer sales people. Companies can now bar code all their inventory parts, and with a barcode scanner reduce the number of people taking inventory. Finally, the Plumtree portal will allow companies to severely reduce their paperwork, which will result in fewer document clerks. Don't these companies realize that becoming more efficient and profitable, they're actually keeping less people employed, and that these now unemployed people can't possibly buy stuff and contribute to the economy? Why are these companies so damned selfish?

[thimios]

They are killing the golden goose.

[RockyMtnMan]

You trivialize this issue to much. This is not just an 'IT' issue but will affect many other professions.

This is a very good summary of the danger of offshoring. We are potentially taking the gas out of the engine that runs our economic machine. Professional IT runs the bowels of corporate America and the inability to identify what should stay or go is a life or death decision for a company considering offshoring.

Our current business leaders lack vision beyond the next quarter and run the risk of destroying a lot of shareholder wealth in pursuit of those quarterly numbers.

[Doctor Stochastic]

And why doesn't The Government prohibit automatic door openers, that could employ at least four FTE's per door. Same for automatic elevator operators. More police would be on the streets if we did away with cold-impartial-inflexible traffic lights and these were replaced by caring traffic cops. An internal passport (useful for catching terrorists) could be introduced to employ printers and even more police who could man the roadblocks at each town gate. Other opportunities to create employment exist in highway building. There are machines (some made in Korea, some in Japan) that are taking away the jobs of thousands of American shovelers. Dial telephones cause the RIFing of thousands of smooth operators, the belles of Southern Bell.

[.cnI redruM]

I'm missing how a bunch of firms in San Francisco deciding to hire people from other countries because they work for lower wages is any US President's fault. There are a large number of variables at work here that are beyond our national government's ability to control.

If you value The Bill of Rights as anything other than a scrap of toilet paper, you don't want the US government to control who this company hires and fires. I've been layed off work and told to hit the f------ turnpike through no fault of my own before. It's not a joy-ride.

Letting it force you to seek a government solution is how government takes away your liberties. Believe me, the North Korean Government could tell Cisco exactly where it's workers would come from. You just don't want to live there.

[RockyMtnMan]

Many of those very technologies you mention create thousands of new jobs in the IT space.

The software my company makes reduces the number of personel from one section of a IT department. However the number of new jobs it creates is much larger than those it replaces through automation. The new jobs require more skills and therefore will by higher paying jobs. Those new jobs also create new products and services that can be sold for a profit.

Automations main goal is to eliminate tedious tasks in an effort to create more advanced products and services. The automation cycle gave us the dot-com boom. First came CGI then ASAPI/NSAPI, then JSP/ASP, then J2EE/.NET, now SOAP/WSDL/XML/XSL, and who knows what is next. The progression of technology has built wealth for corporations and IT personel alike.

Very little new innovation will come from the offshoring model, this you can be sure of.

[LibertyAndJusticeForAll]

"Wake up and smell the tea from India and China."

Great line thimios, I may have to borrow on this theme... "Not for all the tea in China".

[thimios]

The ripple effect of this is huge. You can’t gut the middle class and hope to remain a world leader.

Beijing is having a good laugh at our expense.

I can’t believe the number of replies on this subject that dismiss this out of hand. They bitch and moan about the UN but they have no problem running $300B trade deficits with China.

[RockyMtnMan]

I call it financing our own demise.

[Barry Goldwater]

Offshoring IT could pose a security threat to companies. There's less control over the data so it is easier to steal.
This will come home to roost, probably a bigger impact than Enron.

[hedgetrimmer]

Bump

[thimios]

Just look at the trade deficits that we are running. I guess it’s all right for these firms to call on the American taxpayer to pay to open up new markets for their products all over the world while they layoff American workers.

[.cnI redruM]

OK, let's say I'm looking at these deficits and think. "Boy these deficits are worse than a Mardi Gras bar tab!" Now what exactly is a US President supposed to do that doesn't A) Restrict foreign and domestic trade. B) Raise the prices paid by consumers for all of these companies' goods and services. and C) Abridge the rights of Free Speech and Free Association as enumerated in The Bill of Rights of The US Constitution?

[sandpit]

What if we relations with these countries goes south? What if they are overthrown by Islamics? If companies have to move their IT jobs back to the US suddenly, they may not be able to find skilled people to fill them. I'm definitely not continuing my IT education. Maybe I'll take up history and see if I can reverse some of the brainwashing that is taking place in our schools.

[Koblenz]

More police would be on the streets if we did away with cold-impartial-inflexible traffic lights and these were replaced by caring traffic cops.

My hometown, Greenwich, Connecticut, has already done this in central downtown. No joke, rain, sleet, snow or shine, from 7 am to 8 pm, there are cops that direct traffic at all the intersections in the central part of town. Some people have said that maybe traffic lights would be a better solution, but the locals all feel that somehow, this adds to the character of the town. And if pedestrians ever cross the street when they're not supposed to, they get a stern lecture from the traffic cop.

[Those_Crazy_Liberals]

Dean loving Luddite.