Free Republic

MARCH 02, 2004 - The U.S. needs a plan that clearly describes the risks, rewards, opportunities and challenges of offshoring. The national debate over this highly visible phenomenon is escalating, but it seems deadlocked. To get past this impasse, the White House should commission an unequivocal report that defines the benefits and drawbacks of offshore outsourcing, describes its full impact on the U.S. and world economies, and provides very specific details on how to cope with it with minimal stress and disruption.Without a national plan, the issue will remain undefined and be allowed to meander. Statements made by the Federal...

Two laid-off U.S. workers testified before a U.S. House of Representatives committee yesterday that they were fired by IT companies and replaced with cheaper labor brought to the U.S. under a worker visa program designed to fill jobs needing special skills. Patricia Fluno, a programmer from Orlando, said she and about 14 other employees of Siemens Information and Communications Networks Inc. were laid off in mid-2002 and forced to train their replacements from India. "We lost our jobs, and we had to train our replacements so there would be little interruption to Siemens," Fluno told the House International Relations Committee....

Got two Y Chromosomes, an advanced IT degree and a H1-B or a Green Card? Didn't make $68,000 last year? Maybe you're being being short-changed on your pay-packet. Whoa! It's not that simple, actually, according to data released by IT job researchers Dice. For that figure is just the average salary of IT pros across age-groups, specialisation baskets and geographies. The same figure for women, predictably, is lower - at $62,000. Actually, sex and age have a lot more influence on tech salaries in the US -- the source of sustenance for the majority of Indian H1-B and L-1 pros...

FEBRUARY 02, 2004 ( ) - The most frequent reason companies turn to outsourcing is the need to increase profits. Replacing premium-priced labor with workers earning less has led to lower costs for products and services. That in turn has led to an increase in the purchases—that is outsourcing—of materials, components, parts and services by the companies. The value of outsourced goods and services for U.S. companies now averages 65% of the value of their sales. This kind of calculation is in the spotlight because this phenomenon has become the central concern of what's called the "globalization" of commerce. Accordingly,...

WASHINGTON Intelligence shortcomings, as we see, have a thousand fathers; secret intelligence triumphs are orphans. Here is the unremarked story of "the Farewell dossier": how a C.I.A. campaign of computer sabotage resulting in a huge explosion in Siberia — all engineered by a mild-mannered economist named Gus Weiss — helped us win the cold war.Weiss worked down the hall from me in the Nixon administration. In early 1974, he wrote a report on Soviet advances in technology through purchasing and copying that led the beleaguered president — détente notwithstanding — to place restrictions on the export of computers and software...

A decision by the Washington State Health Care Authority to use offshore labor for a major IT project was based in part on some pretty simple arithmetic: The contractor's bid was about $3 million below the next lowest bid. But the project hasn't worked out as planned. It's running over budget, and an internal state document written in October warns of a "significant risk" that it won't meet the agency's requirements. The project has also prompted state legislation that would effectively bar state agencies from future use of offshore contractors. "I don't think that Washington state tax dollars should be...

NOVEMBER 10, 2003 ( ) - A London-based travel agency has taken outsourcing to a new level, shipping both call center jobs and the workers who perform them to India.Starting with five young Finns who moved to New Delhi in July 2002, Ebookers PLC is sending Europeans to answer phones and e-mails at a call center in India for wages that are roughly one-fourth what similar jobs fetch at home. Now Ebookers' Indian subsidiary plans to expand and sell the idea as a service to other businesses. The company is pitching the jobs as a way to see the world,...

About 150,000 IT positions were lost in 2001 and 2002 SEPTEMBER 17, 2003 ( ) - DALLAS -- Unemployment for IT workers reached 6% this year, an "unprecedented" level for a profession that was once a sure path to a well-paying job, according to a new study that also found that foreign-born workers now account for a fifth of all IT employees in the U.S. The report also found that the percentage of laid-off foreign-born IT workers is slightly higher than for U.S.-born workers.The study, which was presented at a congressional forum today by the Washington-based nonprofit group Commission on...

High-Tech's Use of H-1Bs Drops But some IT industry groups fear Oct. 1 decrease in visa cap will hurt economy Story by Patrick Thibodeau SEPTEMBER 15, 2003 ( ) - WASHINGTON -- Companies will likely move quickly to gobble up H-1B visas next month, to ensure that they get the workers they need before the new, sharply reduced cap of 65,000 is reached, immigration experts said last week. The cap will decline from 195,000 on Oct. 1, the start of the new federal fiscal year, and that's almost certain to bring pressure from high-tech groups for Congress to raise it....

By next year, 80% of CIOs will have marching orders to take some IT offshore. Story by Julia King SEPTEMBER 15, 2003 ( ) - Globalization will hit virtually all large corporate IT departments within the next year. By 2004, eight out of 10 CIOs will have direct marching orders to move offshore at least part of the technology services they provide to their businesses. Four out of 10 companies will already have done so, according to research from Gartner Inc. in Stamford, Conn. "We see this as an irreversible megatrend," says Gartner analyst Rita Terdiman. The short-term reason: Cost...

Most companies have a number of application systems that are core to critical business operations such as finance, marketing, human resources and sales. These applications are generally first- or second-generation systems that have been developed and enhanced over the years. Industry experts say close to 75% of IT budgets are eaten up by supporting existing applications, which draw funds and resources that could be spent on higher value-producing opportunities. Besides being expensive to maintain, legacy applications have quality problems. Since they're required to run the business, defects, outages and other productivity drains can have a drastic impact. Maintaining quality becomes...

<p>SAN JOSE, Calif. (AP) - Scott Kirwin clung to his job at a large investment bank through several rounds of layoffs last year. Friends marveled at the computer programmer's ability to dodge pink slips during the worst technology downturn in a decade. But it was tough for Kirwin, 36, to relish his final assignment: training a group of programmers from India who would replace him within a year.</p>

Dear Senator,As many of your colleagues’ as well as your own constituents, I find myself at wit’s end in my efforts to secure an income. Research on this problem reveals two (2) glaringly obvious obstacles, as related to the Internet implosion:1. The number of H1B and L1 visas has not decreased accordingly. These guest workers, which might have been a good idea at the time, have overstayed their welcome, because: a. The drastic reduction in the number of jobs available makes their continued high numbers inappropriate, andb. They represent unfair competition, because of on the one hand, the extraordinary difficulty...

<p>Bob Simoni has been fuming ever since Toshiba America () replaced him last year with a foreign worker. Simoni recently found a short-term gig, but he wants Congress to do something about the H1B visa program that allows companies to bring in skilled foreign workers. The 39-year-old software engineer says he lost his job to such a person, in his case an Indian. Toshiba says the outsourcing of jobs "enables us to be more efficient." But to add insult to injury, says Simoni, Toshiba asked him to train his replacement: "I never thought this could happen in my field."</p>

<p>SAN JOSE, Calif. — Scott Kirwin clung to his computer programming job, but it was tough for him to relish his final assignment: training a group of workers from India who would replace him within a year.</p> <p>"They called it 'knowledge acquisition,' " the Wilmington, Del., resident said. "We got paid our normal salaries to train people to do our jobs. The market was so bad we couldn't really do anything about it, so we taught our replacements."</p>

Just three years ago, Congress voted to allow more foreign workers into the United States. Times have changed. Politicians are proposing tough — opponents say misguided — steps to keep jobs at home in the face of rising unemployment, a growing number of white-collar jobs being transferred to India and other countries and lingering anger over some U.S. allies' opposition to the war in Iraq. The House has passed measures to require the Defense and State departments to buy a larger share of equipment from U.S. firms. The measure, which has provoked a corporate and political uproar, has not been...

Not so long ago, India's Wipro Ltd. sold cooking oils and knockoff PCs. Now its 15,000 technologists cook up vital software applications and research for Ericsson, GM, the Home Depot, and other giant customers. Are you prepared to go head-to-head with the best the world has to offer?There are certain moments when you can see the future with such clarity it nearly takes your breath away. I went to India and witnessed the future. I am certain of this, because I saw the explosions. I arrived in Bangalore at the start of the Hindu festival of Diwali. Diwali is a...

For education and discussion only. Not for commercial use. US senator John Mica, known in India for his bill restricting the use of L1 visas, wants the US government to fund training of US citizens from the money collected from H1-B visas holders. According to sources, Mr Mica is looking for funds to create a government programme  to help workers who have lost their jobs. He has moved a bill, called the Job Assistance and Creation Act. The bill directs the secretary of labour to make grants to regional consortia, which meet the specified criteria. This will improve the job...

LOS ANGELES -- Offshore outsourcing is so mainstream that by next year, more than 80% of U.S. companies will have had high-level discussions about the topic. And 40% will have completed some kind of pilot program or will be using near-shore or offshore services. Despite that assessment, made by Gartner Inc. at an outsourcing conference here last week, offshore outsourcing remains a difficult issue for executives to talk about. In fact, many attendees were skittish about responding to questions for this article, except in the most general terms. Corporate officials did, however, acknowledge trends related to the politically charged issue....

BANGALORE: Just as one threat is defused, another bomb waits to explode. There’s some good news on the outsourcing/visa front in the US. But there’s some bad news also. As if the pressure on billings from a global slowdown was not enough, US politicians have now begun pick “stop outsourcing to India” as the cause of the season.The good news is that the landmark New Jersey (NJ) legislation, proposed by state senator Shirley Turner,  to ban outsourcing of government work to non-US destinations, was withdrawn last week after the Democratic Caucus voted against it. The bad news is that Rosa...