The key question you ask is why American workers are entitled to pay well above market rates. It depends on just where that market is... The article mentions American programmers who earn $60,000 a year, vs Indian programmers who earn $6,000 a year. When you out-source, off shore, the market hasn't changed for the employer. What's changed is simply the need to pay employees what you would have to pay them if they lived in the US. So that pay has nothing at all to do with what the job value is in the market. Sort of like how a company like Nike makes shoes that they sell in the US for $175 a pair, but only costs $12 to make, including labor (which isn't the greatest cost of the the shoe). Interesting how those savings aren't put into making their products and services more affordable, and therefor, more competative, insn't it?
What it boils down to is simply trying to increase profits at all costs. Never mind how destructive those costs happen to be. I've seen some "free marketers" go on about how when people find themselves without a job, they just need to move on, move to a new place to get a new job, and all will be well. They just have to get off of their "lazy butts." That's all well and good, if it's possible for them to move. But what about the people who have lived in a town all their lives, where a factory is the primary employer. These people have been paying a 30 year mortgage for the last 20 years while "living the American dream." Now, the factory is closed. People have lost their jobs. This family who still has another 10 years of payments to make on their home, their #1 investment, have just been wiped out, since the value of their home is now gone: Since the factory closed, nobody can buy a house... So, how do they move to a new city to find new work? I suppose that they could just abandon the house, maybe declare bankruptcy, and just move on. Yup, nothing to look at here, just move along.
Mark
Welcome to Capitalism 101. The market is whatever is available to a consumer at a given time. If Indian programmers are available then the wages demanded by Indian programmers are part of the market. In any event, the market is global with global producers and global consumers. You can call me an internationalist all you want but the fact remains that people almost everywhere are capable of producing most goods and services and are consuming global goods and services.
Even if we didn't hire a single Indian programmer, the Europeans or Japanese would and they could underbid our software companies. Even if we put up tariffs, the South Americans wouldn't and American firms would be outsold in South America.