Slashdot Mirror
The Unstoppable Shift of IT Jobs Overseas
514x0r writes "The spectre in the back of many of our minds is that in a few years we may be replaced by an underpaid programmer in India. Newsforge.com is currently running an article about why this is unstoppable, that actually ends on a positive note...sort of." Newsforge and Slashdot are both part of OSDN.
Customer: Ok, I need a system to track sales in my coffee shop.
Evil IT provider: For $600 I can give you a copy of Starbuck's Lite. Of course, you have to buy your own SQL server for 2000. But it does include 15 minutes of tech support!
Open Source Provider: For $600 I'll write you a custom system that will run on that (blows dust off) PC. And I live down the street if you need fixes.
"Learning is not compulsory... neither is survival."
--Dr.W.Edwards Deming
Because Slashdot is generally about destroying the "IT Industry" as we know it today. That's the point of free software.
That's a good thing, for most of us at least. Like that Red Hat guy said, "We want to take a multi-billion dollar market, and turn it into a multi-million dollar market".
Most of us believe that writing software shouldn't be something that is done once, then marketed forever. We care more about the quality of software, and we believe in the inherent economic worthlessness of something that can be infinitely copied.
There will still be plenty of jobs in IT, support, programmers, hardware stuff... It just won't be the sort of sleezy industry that IT had become over the last 20 years. It will be a service industry, not one that sells you some overpriced license and then demands even more money if you want any actual service. We are rebalancing the market, taking the power out of the hands of those who had become unresponsive to market forces.
I think most free software advocates are ultimately free market advocates, even though their philosophy may look like communism to the untrained eye. Software is unlike any other marketable item.
I'm positive I don't speak for everyone. However, I'm sure when I say "we", I'm not alone.
I've had enough abrasive sigs. Kittens are cute and fuzzy.
In both scenarios, native Americans are denied jobs that they deserve; however scenario #2 is actually better than scenario #1. Scenario #1 has fostered the growth of large ethnic communities that refuse to assimilate into American society. They consist largely of people who believe that Western culture is only for "white" people and who teach their kids that they should identify with their "ethnic" culture and people. These large ethnic communities also produce most of the spies who steal Western technology to give to Beijing. The two spies mentioned in "Two Men Arrested for Planning to Smuggle High-Tech Encryption Devices to China" grew up in Taiwan and came to the USA.
Scenario #2 will result in a reduction of those ethnic communities. This reduction does not mean that, for example, Chinese will not want to come to the USA. On the contrary, Indians, Chinese, Taiwanese, etc. will still demand to be allowed into the USA in huge numbers even though there will be plenty of IT jobs in India, China, Taiwan, etc. Why? Our Western way of life is superior to what exists in Indian, China, Taiwan, etc. Please read "Hospitals see mass resignations" and "SARS doctors' ethics put to the test" to sample the quality (or lack thereof) of life in Taiwan. Instead of treating SARS victims, the doctors prefer to hide the information about the illness or to resign.
As Slashdotters, let us work together as a community and lobby Congress to terminate the H-1B program and to reduce the combined immigration quota of China (which includes Hong Kong and Taiwan) from 60000 to 2000. Let us encourage companies like Intel to pursue scenario #2 instead of scenario #1. Intel has frequently lied about the need for H-1Bs. In the future, if Intel needs H-1Bs, Intel should set up a plant in India.
I don't see any reason why it's "OK" that we're outsourcing #3. It's elitist to argue that we're outsourcing only the "lower caliber" jobs. Not everyone can be, wants to be, or is competent enough to be "the best".
Because it's not "wrong" to keep people from working just because they live in another country?
That's really the crux of the matter. I pretty much see all these anti-outsourcing types as being basically selfish little whiners.
"waaah waaah. Bobish got the job just because he's as good as I am but work for less. Waaah waah".
Cry me a river, Sheesh.
autopr0n is like, down and stuff.
My overall point stands true:
It cost far more time and money to take "solid" manufactured goods and bring them in to the U.S.
Some of those goods are taxed, some at high levels.
On a side note:
NAFTA has been horrible for the U.S. I still consider myself a conservative, but with idiots like Rush out there saying how great this was, and that smoking isn't bad for you.... Well it just sounds rediculous. There was a giant sucking sound of manufacturing jobs to Mexico, and the U.S. is not any better for it.
The more I learn about science, the more my faith in God increases.
Gotta love fear mongering.
I'm sorry but I'm not responsible for the other guys in my department. I don't care what they make and I don't think some of them should make the same amount I do.
Unions do nothing but cater to the lowest common denominator in any group. Regardless of what you may think, you don't have a right to a job and the government has no obligation to give you any. Sorry, but I don't want to have to wait for the union-approved cable maker to create a patch cable for me because that's someone elses job. I'm going to make myself more marketable to my employer by being the guy who gets shit done. Not the guy who bitches about it not being his job.
"Fighting the underpants gnomes since 1998!" "Bruce Schneier knows the state of schroedinger's cat"