Jobs to India -- A Broad Look

dumpster_dave writes "Wired has an excellent 7 page article on the current and future trend and nature of IT outsourcing from the United States. The conclusion: the smell of inevitability--the economy will survive, though your job, as it is currently, will likely not. Outsourcing is expected to expand from Service and code projects to the creative aspects as well, with obvious correlations experienced in the manufacturing industry during the 70s and 80s. An excellent read that provides good coverage of the perspectives of players on all sides."

Comments

Timothy was outsourced to India

[FallLine]

Enough said.

You know it's a dupe when...

[Anonymous Coward]

...the link to the article is already colored visited from when you read it last Friday.

Maybe I should karma-whore a little bit and repost some of the highly moderated comments from last time?

Duped article, so I'll dupe my comments

[GreenCrackBaby]

Rather than rehash what I said about this already, i'll just link to my previous post regarding outsourcing.

Nobody ever talks about how this will affect our industry 10-20 years down the road!

Re:Duped article, so I'll dupe my comments

[Sanksa Wott]

I agree, and I feel like the effects are evident already. Ive completed a MS in CS, and it seems harder and harder to find jobs that let you "get your foot in the door". Everybody wants 10 years of blah-blah experience, but how do I get experience with specialized enterprise development tools when I do tech support all day? I mean, I cant even get an interview at my own company (300k employees, worlds largest courier service...) because I dont have copies of BEA software installed at home to play with.

I mean, if it's guaranteed that those entry-level/junior positions are going the way of the buffalo, I will have no experience for those mystical "pure knowledge" positions, should they ever appear. Have I mis-invested 7 years and tens of thousands of dollars on the wrong college degree? Should I just say F*** it all, give away all my hardware, and go get a paper MBA from Sallie Struthers and become a store manager at a Target or something? It's like having a degree in model ship building. Sure it's hard and it takes decades to be considered a master, but only a few really make money for doing it the old fashioned way, and most people just get their model ships from a store that buys them from overseas where they are made for cheap.

From the duped article, p5: "Your very nature will drive you to fight," Lord Krishna tells Arjuna. "The only choice is what to fight against."

sorry for the rant, but its tough these days

--B

Re:Duped article, so I'll dupe my comments

[adamontherun]

Its not as simple as, yes it will, or no it won't happen. From my experience, it was a mixed bag.

Used elance.com to find Sidharth over in Bangalore. Sid was cool, spents lots of time with us, hours of Q and A on our online spring break site. He did a good job on the coding, but when it came to getting the ever important cultural aspects of the project, it was a disaster.

Our launch day promoted our Discount Trips to Cancum.

Ummm. Sid, no, Cancun...

Oh. Very Sorry Sirs... next Day. Diskount trips to Cancum ... you get the icture

IT Fads

[Goody]

Outsourcing everything to India was in vogue around '97 or '98. It didn't work then and it's not going to work now. But everyone forgets the problems and history repeats itself.

If you don't like this fad, wait five minutes...

Re:IT Fads

[Wister285]

I'm sure it's a fad much like the moving of American steel, automobiles, textiles, and a variety of other industries were. Oh wait, apparently companies have no shame in erroding their own customer base.

Re:IT Fads

[savagedome]

Don't forget that it was 97 and 98. *Everything* here in US was working then. Every startup was touted to be the next biggest thing. The 'hope bloat' if you will.

Times are different now. The bubble has burst and the companies (in a true capitalist way) are looking to strengthen the bottomline. If you cannot make money, well then atleast cut the costs (and yeah, I am aware of the cultural,social et al differences that are not factored but add up) and effectively, you've *made* money.

I do not want to rob you of your 'fad' but I have a feeling that this one is for real.

Re:IT Fads

[SoSueMe]

If you don't like this fad, wait five minutes...

...and it will be reposted on /.

Re:IT Fads

[ackthpt]

Outsourcing everything to India was in vogue around '97 or '98. It didn't work then and it's not going to work now. But everyone forgets the problems and history repeats itself.

And probably one of the main reasons was they weren't ready for it. Now they are and as one indian service provider stated, they've worked to improve their product. Even getting the indian workers to adopt western names, 'Shawn', 'Jessica' etc. and working on pronounciation. While these may seem to be minor, consider the last time you had a grad student lecturing for the instructor of a college course and you couldn't understand a word he said (real teachers don't teach, they get grunts to do it and are actually working on grant projects or university fundraising, those who can't, do teach)

Power and communications were a problem, now these people who own and run the companies have their own generators and satellite communications systems.

Don't assume they didn't learn something and everything is as bad as it was. Dell's failure may well be attributed to only one service vendor who wasn't as polished as others.

Re:IT Fads

[SmilingMonk]

Outsourcing software development was "in vogue" in 1992 at the engineering company where I worked at the time. I trained my replacement for three months. He and his team of three returned to India. I was shown the door and the black asphalt beyond the sidewalk.

It's coming back around. Only when corporate leaders (followers?) understand that this isn't making them as much money nor as quickly as they thought they would will any jobs return. But then I think of steel, glass, textile, photographic equipment, TVs, and I wonder.

Maybe we're nothing but expendable resources in a protected capitalist system? Ya. That's it. Nice dream, eh?

Re:IT Fads

[comedian23]

Umm, what country are you living in? Unemployment is high. Jobs are not being created. Uneducated people can only work at Walmart, restaurants, and other jobs making a few dollars above minimum wage and producing nothing. How is that strengthening our country? So a few highly trained people can get jobs in bi-tech? Great, that takes care of about 1% of the work force, and the rest of the people are supposed to take hand-outs from them? Or live of wellfare funded by the taxes paid by the rich which are constantly increasing.

I don't want to strain you here, but if we have 1% of the population actually producing something, and the rest simply serving those elite few, A) we have no middle class, B) we have a HUGE trade imbalance and C)we are making other countries rich off of American ingenuity. This doesn't bother you? Maybe you want your children to compete for a few highly coveted jobs which pay extremely well but are taxed at 50%, or else give up and work at burger world as a slave to the rich. The rest of us want the US to actually produce and sell a variety of good all over the world so the US can grow and prosper even more. And yes, we would be better off if we made memory chips here and charged enought to make a profit. We can counter competition from other countries by adding tariffs to cover differences in price and use that money to pay off the deficit. Of course the deficit wouldn't be nearly as high because we would actually be producing and selling stuff rather than just consuming as fast as we can.

-Comedian

Re:IT Fads

[frank_adrian314159]

The bubble has burst and the companies (in a true capitalist way) are looking to strengthen the bottomline.

And this is the real problem - there is no sustainable advantage in outsourcing. Eventually, everyone who can outsource something does outsource it and then you're back in the same boat of no revenue growth, but it's five years later and you actually have less control over the situation. Plus, you've given your new foreign competitors the capital they need to create most of the infrastructure required to invade your market. The idea that capitalism requires the destruction of your economy ten years from now because it makes money a year from now is the main reason why we Capitalists are going to see our system collapse the same way that the Soviet system did. The main issue is that rewards will flow to those who have the discipline to wait for rewards, not those who choose to have them today. It's simply a case of short-term vs. long-term and we're on the wrong side of the equation here. If you think you're getting bit in the ass now, just wait a few years when the chickens finally come home to roost.

Re:IT Fads

[be-fan]

:: stands speechless ::

If people did what you actually suggested, the global economy would revert to the 1700s.

Clue: Free trade is good. Economists say it is good. Economic theory shows trade tarrifs always lead to a reduced GDP in the long term. History shows it is good. Consider France. Before Napoleon, the various provinces were independent, and each had trade barriers (tarrifs, laws, etc) with each other. Napoleon got rid of them, and the entire economy prospored. Consider Europe as a whole. By tearing down trade barriers between countries, the European economy as a whole is becoming more competitive in the world. Consider the US trade relationship with Canada. It directly supports millions of jobs in each country. Hell, despite early criticism, even NAFTA has been successful!

Re:IT Fads

[comedian23]

Trade is fine you have something to trade. The US comes up with an industry and gives all the jobs to outsiders while our own people can't find decent paying work. We have to protect our jobs, and actually make something. I can't be the only person in the US seeing rows of closed factories in almost every city but a Walmart and Starbuck's on every corner. Answer me how Starbuck's is helping our GDP. Great, if there is a latte shortage in the world we can be there to help.

The US is manufacturing virtually nothing compared to what we used to. Take a look at our trade imbalances with EVERYONE and then tell me Free Trade is good. Also don't believe everything you read or hear, take a look around you and see for yourself. I see people with Masters Degrees working at Circuit City, and some people have been out of work for almost a year with no end in sight. Doesn't sound like moving into the future to me. Sounds like the a bunch of our states are nearly bankrupt and the US debt is huge.

Every job we send overseas is less money and less power for the US. But believe what you want.

-Comedian

Re:IT Fads

[wideBlueSkies]

I'm an Application Architect in NY putting together a $10 million system for a big bank. We have a handpicked core of requirements and design people here in NY.

We've painstakingly gathered over 1200 pages of business and functional requirements, laid out the high level framewwork for the system, and now we're in the detailed technical design phase of the project.

We have a team of 15 people in Mumbai. All Java centric programmers. A couple of senior guys with 10 years experience, (C++ before Java), and the rest are intermediate level (6 years and less). These guys are all taking part in the detailed design work.

What a freakin mistake this is.

Damned Indians are so used to reusing prepackaged code and components that they can't think about good design. What I mean is that they don't think about a problem and then how to solve it properly, they try to change the problem to suit the code they have lying around or have found on the net.

I keep asking for language independant design documents. Give me a UML or even a freakin VISIO flow from which I could write a component in any language. But I just keep seeing the same old J2EE centric crap. Using Entity beans and Service locators instead of more generic descriptors. I should be able to look at a design doc and figure out how to write a system in Perl, or C++, or Java or COBOL.

Java is all they know. Thank god. It sucks for my project, but I think this is good for American tech jobs. These Indians can't think outside the box. So the best I think they'll ever be able to accomplish is grunt coding work, after being spoon fed requirements and design work.

Oh yeah, they don't like to read any more of the requirements docs than they have to. Nobody in Mumbai has the big picture about my project. The knowledge is here in NY.

If I had to, I could find 10 guys in my division to learn about this system and crank it out (and I already know 5 top knotch guys that I can call if need be, and the other architect has a couple more), but it'll never happen. Better that the company pays 1/10 wages than have the system written properly.

So anyway, bone up on your design skills boys, and get used to spending time talking to clients about the business. This is how to keep a tech job in the US. Package the grunt work and send it to Mumbai. Don't let them make decisions because they can't.

wbs.

Also see

[nil5]

Bob Cringely has a good article on this as well, aptly titled "It's our own damn fault".

Also, from another perspective is this article from the India Times

Re:Also see

[glinden]

Excellent article by Cringely. A key point from the article:

• If a resource doesn't give you a competitive advantage, you can outsource it without any damage. But if it is a key differentiator, NEVER outsource it.

Too many companies seem to be forgetting this these days. If it's your core competitive advantage, you can't outsource it.

If you need to develop better technology, if your products need to be higher quality, if your customer service needs to be better than your competitors, you can't outsource that part of your business. Any competitor can duplicate anything you've outsourced, often as easily as hiring the same subcontractor, so anything that is oursourced can't be a source of competitive advantage in your market.

Please explain....

[Kenja]

Please explain how the economy will survive when there is no longer a middle class because all the white-collar jobs have been moved over seas.

Re:Please explain....

[RickHunter]

Good question, and one no-one seems to want to answer. Most will handwave and make vague comments about "expanding economy" or "dealing with people" or "management", but that's bull. This is the start of an offensive to eliminate the American middle class, and replace it with a permanent base of slave labour in "developing countries".

Re:Please explain....

[be-fan]

Its quite a strech to say that "all the white-collar jobs have been moved over seas" when programmers hardly comprise all white collar jobs.

And I hate to put it in these terms, but I don't see a whole lot of difference between a certain class of programmer jobs and manufacturing jobs. I mean, isn't that the whole point of languages like Java? To structure things so tightly that programmers are basically just there to put pre-built parts together in a certain order? Does it really less skill to assemble a car engine than to make a Java servlet that processes customer transactions?

Re:Please explain....

[gengee]

Easy: We cannot import from India more than the sum of what we export (to all countries). When we outsource American IT jobs to India, we are merely importing labor -- the same as we would import a car, or electronic device.

When an American company -- a company which sells the majority of its services or goods in America, for American dollars -- hires an Indian, the American company must either:

a) Pay the Indian employee in American dollars, or
b) Convert the American dollars to rupies, and pay the Indian employee in rupies

Either way, the result is the same: At some point in the chain, someone is taking dollars for rupies, whether it's the employee or a third party. That party is not taking dollars because they like the smell of them. They're taking the dollars because they intend to buy American goods with the dollars. (Or they intend to convert the currency to another foreign currency -- and so the chain goes).

That we cannot import more than we export -- over the long term -- is true. To believe otherwise would mean we somehow live in a bubble where foreign countries work for us for free.

There is simply no way, over the long term, that we could outsource all of our jobs, to India or anywhere else anymore than they outsource their jobs to us. (More on that below). It's just not possible.

The special interests will come up with all sorts of nonsense, all manner of jargon to support their fear mongering. They'll talk of
races to the bottom, living wages, social justice and other such things. But what they really mean is "gimme." (Read: I deserve to be making higher real wages for the same equivalent work because I am an American. When protectionists speak of races to the bottom, they ignore the flip side of the coin: a race to the top).

We can rack up debt in the way of trade deficits. Debt which will doubtlessly have to be paid off eventually. But sooner or later the dollar will fall against foreign currencies -- as it is currently, btw -- and foreigners will begin to receive repayment of their loans to us, by way of American exports.

As American exports increase, so too will employment, barring commensurate increases in productivity.

One other important point to make is the falsity of the assumption that only American companies are offshoring. This is the most ridiculous assumption of all, and I suspect it's the root cause of Americans' uneasyness towards offshoring.

Foreign companies offshore jops to America, too. In fact, more jobs are presently "offshored" -to- America from foreign companies than the opposite.

We all know how Flint, MI was hurt by General Motors' offshoring of factories to Mexico. Michael Moore even made a movie about it. But most people don't know about the tens of thousands who are employed in America by Toyota, by Mazda, or other Japanese car manufacturers. An American factory closing and moving to Mexico makes a great fear-mongering evening news story, but a similar-sized new factory operated by a foreign company in America does not.

Capitalism is inherently cyclical. It's the job of policy makers to make these cycles as painless as possible. But the cycles will always remain.

There is no need to blow a fuse over it.

Re:Please explain....

[DukeyToo]

Silly troll, you make the classic mistake of likening programming to manufacturing. There is *no* similarity, because each programming project is different. No manufacturing plant in the world makes each item different.

Artists and craftsmen make unique items, and so do programmers (yes, even in Java). It is an inescapeable fact.

Outsourcing has a chance at working, not because it is the same as manufacturing, but simply because it appears to be cheaper than doing it locally.

What's Left?

[RickHunter]

So if service jobs, creative jobs, research jobs, and development jobs all get outsourced... What's left and why, exactly, will the economy survive? Oh, right, we'll all get jobs dealing with people face-to-face, selling things to people with no money. Or we'll all wind up being managers.

Excuse me while I look skeptical and write this off as one more piece to make executives feel more comfortable about destroying their country and killing the population.

Re:What's Left?

[GnrlFajita]

You're just not looking at it in the long term. If everyone begins outsourcing to India, then the law of supply and demand requires that eventually the cost of doing this will rise. So they'll begin to outsource to some other, cheaper, country. The cycle will repeat itself until eventually the U.S. is the cheapest place to 'outsource' jobs to.

It's all about perspective, man. Look at the big picture.

Re:What's Left?

[alan_dershowitz]

There will be the people who own companies, and the service industry to maintain their lifestyle. Don't expect to get paid good for that either, since illegal and legal immigrants will do crap jobs for less money.

You could learn a trade, but don't expect to work your way up to running your own business. Trades will be corporatized, so if you want to be a plumber you'll have to work for National Plumbers, inc.

So, basically there will be a two class system, since they've effectively figured out how to eliminate the merchant class and the professional class.

I for one...

[Westech]

Please to be joining me in welcome our hand-coding hundu overlords.

Re:Note to fat USians

[Diaspar]

interesting... when reading the article, i notice the cost of their daily lunch is around 50 cents. now, for comparing:

average college cost - $70,000
average apartment cost - $800
daily lunch - around $7

just a few items. hey, to be honest i'd be happy making $20,000 per year if my lunch would cost 50 cents daily, apartment $30 per month (or free, as it is in many countries) and the best college runs around $3,000 for all 4 years.

all the amounts people make are relative to what they have to spend. would you like to make $300,000 per year? if your rent becomes $20,000 per month (hypothetically, for the sake of comparison), all of a sudden that doesn't seem like that much money.

I just love how people assume that in america everybody is fat and have free money growing on trees. we work 50 hours per week and our bills are very expensive!!!

Here come the lawyers

[charnov]

I was just reading up on Sarbanes-Oxley compliance and how we have to be responsible for everyone who ever touches or affects our digital documents (and we are financially responsible for damages real or perceived). Our lawyers seem to think that if you read the law strictly (as any lawyer trying to sue would) that means that any offshoring that results in any damage or dissemination of data could cause us an enormous amount of money. We already carry a $100 million bond against accidental release of data (we deal in multi-billion dollar international contracts) and our carry gave a big 'NO" to outsourcing in any way shape or form. Hell, I can't even get opensource software in here because if something goes wrong, there is no one to sue.

Crazy world...

Worrisome

[dustmote]

This is one of the reasons that I am relieved that I no longer work in IT. I worry a lot about those friends of mine who still work in the industry, especially those who have kids. I think that part of the problem is also that the market was oversaturated, so to speak. IT became the big degree to get in the 90's, because "that's where the money is", so the jobs that do remain have a number of people applying for them. Post-boom, post-outsourcing computer field sucks.

If my job is going away soon...

[Arslan ibn Da'ud]

can I get a job as a Slashdot article duplication identifier?

Makes me growl.

[Faust7]

The six Hexawarians are sympathetic but unmoved. They disagree with the very premise that cheap labor is hurting the US.

Seriously, then they need a brain refresher. This is one of the core issues, and it's really simple: Companies seek to maximize profit and minimize expenses. Expenses decrease with cheap labor. If cheap labor is outside the U.S., and can be logistically implemented for the company as such, there's a good chance they'll move some operations offshore. And this has in fact happened.

And they think it's somewhat laughable that, because things aren't going exactly our way, ordinarily change-infatuated Americans are suddenly decrying change.

How on earth is this a laughable thing? Change for the better, change for our better, is a totally pragmatic and understandable goal. When this goal is hurt, yes, we decry it. There's nothing laughable about that at all.

Translation: We're not just cheaper, we're better.

Tell that to Dell.

An indian perspective

[frodo from middle ea]

If all these jobs are related to call center, I say LET them NOT move to india.

Yes you heard me , let them NOT move to india. The last thing I want as an Indian, my country to be columbia/mexico of the IT industry. I think indians should be ashamed to be the janitors of IT industry.

Also for those of who are going to point to M$ and IBM and HP research centers being moved to India. I would rather see our own Indian companies becoming more self relient and working for the benefit of Indian consumers than US.

The more India depends upon foreign lands to create local jobs, the less it becomes self relinet and lesser powerful.

India for one should take lessons from its colonial past. Rememer East india company came as traders looking for spices and ended up ruling the country for 200 years. This time its going to be different, its economical slavery that we should be afraid of. In this day an age no power is better than economical power and serving joe six-packs for their problems loggin on to AOL, though a short term profitable business , is ruining the resourses of the country.

I am not ranting against US. Infact exactly the opposite. The US and its companies should also strive towards self serving economical structure.

Re:An indian perspective

[donutello]

Nonsense. That is the exact kind of thinking that has led to India staying poor for the past 50 years. India's closed economy ensured that Indian companies could be successful without striving to improve their products. Compare the average quality of goods you can buy in India to the average quality of goods you can buy in the US.

Here's a newsflash: India is neither self-reliant nor powerful. Open trade improves the economy and the living standards. There are no self-reliant countries anymore. Every country depends upon other countries for essential resources.

And it's not as if the call-center jobs are taking resources away from other, more productive endeavors. Until recently the unemployment rate in India has been through the roof. You would have a very good point if these outsourced jobs meant that people were not doing other stuff that would be more useful to the national economy, however that is not the case.

The East India company took natural resources away from the country. No money was input into the country in exchange for these resources - rather money was taken away from the country when the products of these resources were sold back to India. This is not the case here. Outsourced jobs infuse valuable foreign exchange into the country and provide employment to a large number of people, improving the overall lifestyle.

Don't trip over the FUD

[AndroidCat]

Keep in mind that while some jobs are being outsourced to India, it serves companies even better to amplify the FUD about it. They don't have to actually do it, and their wage-slaves are bullied into terror, submission and lower wages -- especially the new-hires.

Stop government aide

[www.sorehands.com]

Stop the government aide to the companies outsourcing to foreign countries. When a company outsources, we still allow them to deduct that cost from their federal (and state) taxes. Lets stop that.

Have anyone considered the privacy and security issues when sending this information to foreign companies? The call center for American Express in India may not have the same security and legal protection for your records -- but then again with the patriot act, we don't have any privacy anyways.

Obviously this article is biased.

[big-giant-head]

Yes, why don't we outsource congress, what do we pay those assholes?? I'm shure we could pay a bunch of Indian PHD's (PHD in Poly Sci or something) to come up with laws at least as good as what comes from congress, at probably a tenth of the cost. Shit we would'nt even have to pay for all those building in DC. They could just email us our laws in PDF format and we could turn the capital into a 200 screen movie theater.

I thought sending manufacturing jobs overseas was a bad idea 20 years ago and sending Software jobs overseas is a bad idea. Eventully you have to do or make something cars, planes, software, genetic s, spaceships SOMETHING. We can't all sit around selling each other stuff at wal-mart.

People poo-poo this point of view, but I have yet to see any of these supposed "pure knowlege worker" positions advertised in the local paper. My guess is they don't exist and never will. They are the very wealthy elite's attempts to smoke screen the middle class.

In the 90's the laid off manufacturing were promised great jobs in IT or related fields. Now those jobs are being sent overseas. Next we are promised jobs as 'knowlege works' WTF is that. I 'm waiting for someone, anyone to show me ONE of these supposed position anywhere. You can't because they don't exist.

Re:Obviously this article is biased.

[big-giant-head]

It is not resonable to expect every member of your society to be a research scientist just to earn a decent living. What we are gravitating towards is a society composed mainly of very poor people controlled by a few very rich people. When that happens you should review your French history particlulary the period from say 1780 through 1812, give or take a few years. Alternately look at Russian history from say 1905 - 1920.

'They're called lawyers, professors, researchers, and executives.'

Most laywers don't care one way or the other. Academics (professors) are fairly split over whether all this is a good idea. Executives love it because they give themselves fat bonuses with the money they make sending jobs overseas. Most researches are either blissfully unaware or are wondering when they will be outsourced as well.

After all research can be done much more cheaply in India than here. PHD's grow on trees, no EPA to deal with, no FDA. Want to run clinical trials, go get some low caste individuals sleeping on the sidewalk and wala test subjects. If a few die no one will care. Point is, almost everyjob can be done overseas more cheaply, including yours, however we americans have to SOMETHING.

In your world Jonas Salk would'nt have cured polio either, because his work could've been done more cheaply in India. Then the Drup company that paid for it could supply the vacine to the suffering masses at outrageous prices, and if some could'nt aford well, who cares, certainly not George Bush or his friends.

Jonas Salk did what he did to help suffering people, not to help the corporate profit sheet.

Re:Obviously this article is biased.

[silentbozo]

Through the power of lending we can increase our GNP completely through services.

And what happens when the Indians and the Chinese have absorbed so much of our know how through on-hands tech-transfer, that they don't need us anymore? Indian firms are already partnering with US drug companies, not as low-cost manufacturers, but as co-developers. Chinese firms are already buying whole US plants, lock, stock, and barrel, AND the company name/brands (ie, DustDevil). It wouldn't be too much of a stretch to imagine a future where the US is nothing more than a stock market, and a few banks - and what happens when foreign banks/stock markets adopt US style accounting/regulation, and start undercutting us?

I think the key problem is that to meet the future you envision (ie, pure knowledge/research/services), we need to train people who are technically and creatively competent to work and innovate in those fields. I don't see that product coming out of our school system, which keeps churning out workers fit for that was hot 5-10 years ago, and not for what will be hot 5-10 years from now.

We might benefit from deflationary pressures on foreign-made products and services for a long time. But we'll have become a nation of extreme debtors, with a bedrock in agriculture and finance, and everything else outsourced.

While best will survive (ie, small machine shops, small coding shops, etc.), where will everyone else go? Unless we develop completely new industries that will require jobs in the US, we're going to have a large surplus of labor, just as we did in the 80's during the last big transition. Space exploitation maybe, or maybe US migratory workers going to Mexico and Canada, instead of the other way around?

Ironically, I'd suggest that manufacturing might be the salvation of the US economy - provided that we can lower the cost of raw materials and energy. With mechanization reducing labor costs, cheap energy and raw materials would allow the US to compete with foreign manufacturers, and allow the employment of more US sale agents, distributors, transporters (ie, truck drivers and train engineers), and lower the cost of shipping those goods.

In other words, you want more jobs in the US? Then we either need more nuclear power plants, or we need to invent working sustainable, net energy out fusion, quick.

Re:Obviously this article is biased.

[Free_Meson]

It is not resonable to expect every member of your society to be a research scientist just to earn a decent living.

And what is a decent living? Americans have an incredibly high standard of living and, barring an invasion, they will from this point forward. The geographical advantages of the United States, combined with the incredibly high education rate, will ensure that the average American can feed and clothe himself with more disposable income left over than workers in most other countries, regardless of brute labor outsourcing.
Just because you don't have the education to pull down a mid-6 figure salary doesn't mean the system is broken. If you don't like your job, get a new one or go back to school instead of whining about some guy in India who is better suited to do your job than you are.

What we are gravitating towards is a society composed mainly of very poor people controlled by a few very rich people. When that happens you should review your French history particlulary the period from say 1780 through 1812, give or take a few years. Alternately look at Russian history from say 1905 - 1920.

How can someone dense enough to think like this actually float? I know you're trolling, but I'll answer anyway. The United States has a far more even distribution of wealth now than Russia or France had during their revolutionary periods. It's less equal now than it was 5 or 10 years ago, but there are fluctuations up and down w.r.t. the distribution of wealth. Anyway, if you have a job, odds are you get paid a lot better than the military you'd be counting on to help you with your revolution, and whining to some soldier about how you're only making $20k more than them instead of $30k because you're no better educated than some guy in India isn't really going to win him over.

Most laywers don't care one way or the other. Academics (professors) are fairly split over whether all this is a good idea. Executives love it because they give themselves fat bonuses with the money they make sending jobs overseas. Most researches are either blissfully unaware or are wondering when they will be outsourced as well.

Whether or not these workers are aware of the situation has nothing to do with the fact that they are the "pure knowledge workers" that you claimed do not exist. Believe it or not, a company won't outsource their CEO's and it's not possible to outsource legal work. Our professors are the foundation of our economy and our researchers develop the technology that is new enough to manufacture profitably in the united states. The united states has the best higher education system in the world and, because of critical mass issues, this is unlikely to change. The pre-college education system in the united states is also much broader than it is in almost any other country, and while the graduates of most other countries' school systems have more developed skills, American graduates have a broader range of skills and knowledge, making them ideally suited to the entrepreneurial environment encouraged by the current economic climate.

After all research can be done much more cheaply in India than here. PHD's grow on trees, no EPA to deal with, no FDA. Want to run clinical trials, go get some low caste individuals sleeping on the sidewalk and wala test subjects. If a few die no one will care. Point is, almost everyjob can be done overseas more cheaply, including yours, however we americans have to SOMETHING.

The cost of the medical research you seem to be focusing on isn't product development, but FDA approval. Why do they get this? Because they want to market the drug in the U.S. They could sell the drugs in india much earlier, often ten years or more earlier, than they could sell them in the United States. This is why many patients awaiting unapproved medication go to mexican pharmacies when conventional treatments fail to cure them. Unsurprisingly, most of the research is conducted in developed countries, and b

Offshoring my own job

[Nonac]

About a year ago I hired a developer in India to do my job. My employer is none the wiser. I pay him $12,000 to do the job I get paid $67,300 for. He is happy to have the work. I am happy that I only have to work about 90 minutes per day (I still have to attend meetings myself, and I spend a few minutes every day talking code with my Indian counterpart). The rest of the time my employer thinks I'm telecommuting. They are happy to let me telecommute because my output is higher than most of my coworkers.

Now I'm considering getting a second job and doing the same thing with it. That may be pushing my luck though. The extra money would be nice, but that could push my workday over five hours.

parallel example

[theMerovingian]

I am reminded of when Coke tried to penetrate the Indian market with their sugar water. They hired a high power American ad agency, who made these commercials about the 'heart of India', with misty images of the Taj Mahal and such. It flopped.

Then, Coke hired an Indian ad agency. These guys made commercials with sexy women and fast cars, and Coke sold like hotcakes.

The moral of the story: creative work is more likely to be relevant in the culture it was created in.

And so it goes... unless we the people stop it!

[SmilingMonk]

So it all comes home to roost, eh?

Back in the early part of the previous century, few middle class, and certainly no upper class people complained when textile, glass production, steel, and later manufacturing were shipped off shore. Many people just smiled and wagged their heads whenever Unions complained about jobs going overseas. Some people warned that off-shore job movement would sink the US economy.

Fast forward to the present. Who's complaining now? It appears to be whoever is left in the middle class. The upper class still doesn't care. One difference this time is that the middle class is largely un-unionized and therefore un-represented during job/salary reviews and other decision making activities.

If people want to change things, here are several things to consider:

Corporate law specifically states that actions taken or products produced by corporations must be in the public interest. Yes, it says that. So a good question to ask is Is it in the public interest to put them out of work by moving their jobs overseas?

Corporate leaders currently earn over 600 times the average salary of their employees. Moving jobs off-shore is likely to make a small percentage of the US population even more wealthy.

Yes, it's still about the economy. For all his other failings, Henry Ford had an interesting idea that his employees should be paid well enough to be able to afford one of his products.

Until corporate officers are encouraged to employ people from the country that issues their charters, the gap between the have's and the have nots in the US will continue to grow.

interesting quote from article

[avandesande]

So I toss a slur across her desk. I call her a protectionist.

"Oh, and I'm proud of it," she responds. "I wear that badge with honor. I am a protectionist. I want to protect America. I want to protect jobs for Americans."

"But isn't part of this country's vitality its ability to make these kinds of changes?" I counter. "We've done it before - going from farm to factory, from factory to knowledge work, and from knowledge work to whatever's next."

She looks at me. Then she says, "I'd like to know where you go from knowledge."

Re:Holy crap!

[cybermace5]

Oh, we'll be telephone sanitizers, middle management, hairdressers....

The automotive industry

[Dr. Evil]

Isn't the automotive industry heavily regulated regarding foreign content? Isn't that the case for precisely the reason that Wired is blithering on about?

Also in the past fourty years haven't we seen the demise of the single-income family? Hasn't the price of goods, services, taxes etc all outpaced the increase in income? Don't Americans have the least time off and the worst hours in the industrialized world?

I don't see how the automotive industry is an example of how outsourcing overseas is a win/win scenario.

Am I missing something?

thank our tariffs on auto imports for those jobs

[SethJohnson]

Those Japanese car factories are located in America because tariffs on imported cars make it more economically sound to build the cars in America. While you seem to be espousing free-market trade, you use an example that is in fact protectionist. You get rid of those tarrifs and those Toyota and Mazda factories will evaporate back to Asia.

Re:Holy crap!

[crymeph0]

...you can rest assured that things will work out in the long term.

A deep, unwavering belief is a sure sign you're missing something...

Your .sig is so ironic.

No

[geekoid]

There are too many people in India. When programmer A wants a nickel more, they will get rid of them, and get someone else who doesn't have an uppity attitude about money.

The only way the US will compete, ever, is if our standard of living drops...a lot.

Now, If everything I need to survive decently had its cost cut by 90%, then I'd be able to compete.

Personally, I'd like all corporat tax breaks be removed from any company that outsouces. If it makes them so much money, it shouldn't be a problem, right?

Please explain where this all ends

[HangingChad]

The manufacturing and customer service jobs go first, then the tech jobs and it suddenly stops there. Bull-shit. After that it's accounting and HR, graphics and creative positions, account managers, sales. So, what's left? What's your next adjustment career? Anything that India and the Cheney administration are arguing for is guaranteed to be BAD for you.

Big Picture

[weston]

"The market can remain irrational longer than you can remain solvent"
"In the long run, we're all dead" - Keynes

No matter how true the rosy big picture may be, the devil is still in the details for those suffering from the change. If there are things we can do to make the transitionless volatile, why not do them?

Re:It's a risk that they think we can afford?

[TheSync]

US exports to developing countries like India and China are continuing to rise. As the economies of these countries improve, they purchase more from the US as well.

re: Shawn & Jessica Nahasapeemapetilon

[Anonymous Coward]

In the past 6 months I've been on the line with no fewer than 5 different outsourced support lines in India, and let me just say this....

You can replace "Patel" with "Josh" all day long (which BTW totally fucking cracks me up) but it is extremely difficult to get rid of the accent. Hell, you see the same problem in the US with children of immigrants who, while they've essentially grown up here, simply don't speak English outside of school due to their family situation or their circle of friends. I actually feel sorry for them, because many sound no better than their cousins who are FOB (Fresh Off the Boat, a word I learned from some Iranian immigrant pals) arrivals to the US. Call me racist if that's convenient for you, but I've found that in the case of Shawn and Jessica working for Dell in Bangalore it totally impedes the support process.

Even worse, there is a common tendency to be extremely polite and deferential (perhaps a cultural thing?) while simultaneously simply not understanding what the fuck I'm getting at yet refusing to deviate from the script or think outside the box. I count it among the most maddening things I've ever experienced on a telephone.

Brontitol

[lactose99]

OBHHGTTGR

Your reference to shoes brings to mind the Shoe Event Horizon from the Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy's planet Brontitol.

"The Shoe Event Horizon is now a firmly established, and rather sad economic phenomenon which, in future times will be taught as part of the basic Middle School Life, the Universe, and Everything syllabus. ...

TEACHER: Stand up! Harsh Economic Truths, Class 17. You are standing up?
STUDENT: Yes.
T: Good. You are living in an exciting, go-ahead civilization. Where are you looking?
S: Up.
T: What do you see?
S: The open sky, the stars, an infinite horizon.
T: Correct... You are living in a stagnant, declining civilization. Where are you looking?
S: Down.
T: What do you see?
S: My shoes.
T: Correct. What do you do to cheer yourself up?
S: I buy a new pair.
T: Correct! Now, imagine everone does the same thing... everyone buys new shoes, what happens?
S: More shoes.
T: And?
S: More shoe shops.
T: Correct... and in order to support all these extra shoe shops, what happens?
S: Everyone must keep buying shoes.
T: And how is that arranged?
S: Manufacturers dictate more and more different fashions of and make shoes so badly that they either hurt the feet or fall apart.
T: So that?
S: Everyone has to buy more shoes.
T: Until?
S: Until... everyone gets fed-up with lousy, rotten shoes.
T: And then what?
S: Massive capital investment by the manufacturers to try and make people buy the shoes.
T: Which means?
S: More shoe shops.
T: And then we reach what point?
S: The Shoe Event Horizon! The whole economy overbalances. Shoe shops outnumber every other kind of shop. It becomes economically impossible to build anything other than shoe shops.
T: Now, what's the final stage?
S: Um... every shop in the world becomes a shoe shop.
T: Full of?
S: Shoes no one can wear.
T: Result?
S: Famine, collapse, and ruin. Any survivors eventually evolve into birds and never put their feet on the ground again.
T: Excellent! End of lesson."

Simple solution

[Anonymous Coward]

There is a basic simple solution to this whole off-shoring debate.

Give in and realize that
a. Software for life critical things (airplanes, military, nuculear reactors, etc) will remain the the US.

b. Software jobs for just about everything else will move outside of the US.

c. Linux and open source software will lower the costs of software so that there are significantly less paying software development jobs worldwide.

d. US based IT jobs will center around:
1. Data managament and security (DBA for a bank)
2. Data analysis - high level decision support for financial data
3. Physical presence jobs - on site IT/network work (pulling network cables, rebuilding pc's, etc)

e. The total number of IT related gradutes from US universities will drastically decline since the perceived job prospects are declining.

f. Commodity hardware ($300 dell machine), bootable OS CD's/firmware, and web based services will greatly reduce the number, type and size of programs installed on an end user's local machine. This compounds the reduction in support and development jobs since all of those installation program developers will be obsolete.

g. Mainframe type data centers will be the big dollar items in corporate IT budgets.

I think, with 10+ years paid programming under my belt + 2 CS degrees, that
a. there will be IT jobs in the US
b. the jobs will pay better than other skilled jobs
c. the pay will be lower in real terms than the current level when adjusted for inflation
d. that it workers in the US will have a lower standard of living than now, unless there is a drastic lowering of taxes at federal, state and local level from their 50% plus percent today.
e. that significant simplifications in government regulation at all levels are needed to make the US more compelling to operation businesses and employ US workers
f. that the ratio of people producing product to the people not producing product will have to be corrected from the projected major decline from todays level. The not producing product includes government workers at all levels plus those receiving handouts from the government (e.g., social security, medicare, ssi, unemployment, etc) .

Re:Simple solution

[Genda]

There is a basic simple solution to this whole off-shoring debate.

Give in and realize that
a. Software for life critical things (airplanes, military, nuculear reactors, etc) will remain the the US.

b. Software jobs for just about everything else will move outside of the US.

Your response is interesting, but moot... it ignores;

1. Business will do what it bloody well feels like doing, and unless you write laws or change laws forbidding the export of jobs from the U.S., you can pucker up now, because those jobs will be gone sometime early tomorrow morning, and you might want to kiss them bye before they get on board that jet to India. Welcome to economics 101...

2. The nature of software must dramatically change. Our hardware is thousands of times more powerful today than 25 years ago, but our software keeps finding new and horrible ways to piss away useful work, meaningful process, and sane cooperation between it's desparate parts. We as a technological community need to stop this incessant process of polishing turds for business people who have spent the last quarter century trying to carve up the IP universe so that they might better charge us for the bits of data flowing through the wires. Instead we need to actually begin to look ahead and design software that utilizes the tremendous horsepower now available in new and exciting ways, and truly lay down a pathway to creating externalizations of our own intellect, that we might begin to finally draw from our inventions that which we dreamed of when we first began this journey of conception...

3. The use of software is soon going to be a diverse universe unlike anything any of us have ever imagined, from smart household appliances, to intelligence in your car's tires, to bioinformatics, and advanced modeling in proteomics, to 3-D interfaces designed to allow molecular engineers the needed tools to model nanotechnological systems manufacture. The stuff IT engineers do today is going to change tremendously over the next few years. How much of that should be outsourced? None? Some? All? The impacts of any of this stuff could be tremendous. How do you choose? What of software that writes software? What of software that converts human intent into meaningful instruction?...

There needs to be a completely different model for the production of software. Maybe we need a guild. Maybe we need some sort of Protected Status, as a critical and endangered national resource. If American allows it's intelligence to emmigrate, it will ultimately collapse. We need to create an environment conducive to the growth and development of human intelligence through the medium of external process... it must ultimatele be unhitched from the profit motive because profit takes IT in stupid directions. That is, direction inherently contrary to the expanding expression of human intelligence. Business must benefit from the fruit of that work, and should therefore contribute to it's perpetuation, but IT must be free to grow where it needs to grow to address and resolve larger social and human problems. Problems supplied by business should be resolved, or problems should be refactored to prevent unseen conflicts between the business intent and larger social considerations (eg. don't give a businessman a working program to run a fusion reactor that is itself poorly designed and will make a 6 kilometer crater when first tested.) Let collaborations between software engineers, social engineers, mathematicians, cosmologists, anthropologists, philosophers, artists and asthetics, architects, business visionaries, and financial planners occur, in fact make them occur. Generate societal infrastructure to make the creation, management, flow, storage, and utilization of information, in all it's forms consistent, seamless, and transparent to the average citizen. Begin laying down a future by design, as opposed to one that is mindlessly sputter blasted across the scenery.

Use labor resources around the world, but make sure tha

Re:Holy crap!

[vsprintf]

What did we produce after we stopped producing shoes, then cars, etc? Other stuff!

When the jobs in agriculture started disappearing, people were told to retrain and get jobs in manufacturing. When the textile and manufacturing jobs were being sent overseas, we were told to reeducate ourselves and move up the food chain to knowledge work. If you'd read the article (either time it was posted), the looming question that nobody can answer is, *what comes after knowledge?* The author waved his hands, and like you, said *oh, something else*.

The point is, this is the first time in history when people have been educated for and lost two careers to outsourcing in a lifetime. The agricultural period lasted about 100 years, the manufacturing period lasted about 40 years, and the IT period about 20 years. It takes many people 25 years to pay off an education in the U.S. It is now a losing proposition. Whatever this next, great unknown thing is, the trend indicates it will last for 10 years (if it happens). Tell us now what the people who are losing their jobs need to be learning.

Capitalism works because human progress is unlimited.

Can you supply some proof that capitalism works? Where has it been tried? Certainly not in the U.S., where we have the worst mismash of capitalism and a centralized, regulated economy. Ever heard of the FRB, the FTC or a dozen other federal regulatory agencies? Ever heard of wage/price limits, minimum wages, tariffs, duties, NAFTA, favored trade status, or fast-track trade agreements? How about H-1B/L1 visas where certain industries are allowed to freely import cheaper labor denied to other sectors?

Unless you believe that progress will come to an end, you can rest assured that things will work out in the long term.

Nursing a burger patty from frozen pink disk to hot brown lunch is "progress". Got anything a little more substantial? As a previous poster pointed out, having your sig on that comment is classic.

Re: Shawn & Jessica Nahasapeemapetilon

[Shakrai]

Even worse, there is a common tendency to be extremely polite and deferential (perhaps a cultural thing?) while simultaneously simply not understanding what the fuck I'm getting at yet refusing to deviate from the script or think outside the box. I count it among the most maddening things I've ever experienced on a telephone.

My Dell phone call from two weeks ago: (note: My company has a three year next-day service contract with Dell -- they are no longer supposed to be sending the Commercial Clients to India yet somehow I wound up there)

[Indian accent]: "Thank you so much for calling Dell support my name is Josh how may I assist you with your problem today?"
[Upstate NY accent]: "Yes, this is Timothy [xxx] from [xxx], I have a Dell here with a bad power supply, I need to get a replacement sent to me. The service tag is [xxx]."
[Indian accent]: "Yes sir, thank you so much. Let me pull up your information sir. Ah yes sir I have it here. Tell me Sir what is your name?"
[Upstate NY accent]: "I already told you, my name is Timothy [xxx]. I'm listed on the account as the contact."
[Indian accent]: "Ah yes sir, thank you so much for giving me that information. Sir I need to understand your address."
[Upstate NY accent]: "It's [xxx]."
[Indian accent]: "Ah yes sir, thank you so much for giving me that information. Sir I need to understand your telephone number."
[Upstate NY accent]: "*sigh* This is all listed on the account. It's [xxx]."
[Indian accent]: "Ah yes sir, thank you so much for giving me that information. This is a Dell Optiplex correct sir?"
[Upstate NY accent]: "That's correct."
[Indian accent]: "Ah yes sir, thank you so much for giving me that information. How may I assist you with your problem today?"
[Upstate NY accent]: "Like I said, this unit has a dead power supply and I need to have a replacement sent out. We have a service agreement."
[Indian accent]: "Ah yes sir, I am understanding that you have such agreement. It expires in March 2005."
[Upstate NY accent]: "That's right, now can we make this happen?"
[Indian accent]: "Yes sir, we will do that. I need you to insert your Dell resource CD so we can run system diagnostics to confirm the problem."
[Upstate NY accent]: "Umm... the power supply is dead. I know what the problem is."
[Indian accent]: "Yes sir I am understanding that you think the problem is that, but I need you to insert your Dell resources cd so we can run diagnostic to confirm the problem."
[Upstate NY accent]: "Your not listening to me. The power supply is dead. I can't turn the unit on."
[Indian accent]: "Yes yes, I am understanding your problem, but we need to follow procedure. Please insert your Dell resources CD so we can run diagnostic to confirm the problem."
[Upstate NY accent]: "I can't open the CD-ROM drawer because the computer has no power. What part of that can't you understand?"
[Indian accent]: "Yes sir, I am understanding that the computer has no power. Is the computer plugged in to the wall outlet sir?"
[Upstate NY accent -- getting louder by the minute]: "You are not listening to me. The power supply is dead. That means it's not working. I can't turn the damn thing on -- please set up the service call for me."
[Indian accent]: "Yes sir I am understanding that you think that is problem, but we need to confirm it."
[Upstate NY accent]: "Alright this is going no where. Let me talk to your supervisor."
[Indian accent]: "No no sir, I can help you with this problem. Please insert your Dell Resource CD into the CD-ROM drive so we can run diagnostic to confirm the problem."
[Upstate NY accent - loud enough that the entire office can hear me]: "Ya know what? Fuck off. That's an American insult if they didn't teach you that in training."
[Indian accent]: "Yes sir, I am understanding your problem. Please insert the Dell resourc...."

[sound of phone slamming onto receiver]
[sound of me walking around the office threate

Sorry to piss in your cornflakes, but...

[IANAAC]

The agricultural period lasted about 100 years, the manufacturing period lasted about 40 years, and the IT period about 20 years.

Everything you mention above is still alive and well in the US. Perhaps not in the form you're thinking, but definitely alive and well. And guess what? Agriculture, manufacturing and IT have all overlapped in certain parts of the business process. Being an admin for a biotech company, I can tell you first hand that all three are pervasive in this industry.

Re:Holy crap!

[Anonymous Codger]

>Can you supply some proof that capitalism works? Where has it been tried? Certainly not in the U.S...

Try the US at the end of the 19th century, and to a lesser degree, the early 20th. The results (depressions, dislocations, mass poverty, child labor, corporate thugs beating and killing workers who object to being exploited, wealth concentrating in the rich investor class, etc.) show that capitalism doesn't work. Of course, communism doesn't work either. The lesson we as a nation should take from the last 150 years is that what does work is a system in which capitalism provides the engine of the economy, but its excesses are restrained by strong government regulation. Too bad the right didn't learn this lesson.

Re:Rubish.

[wideBlueSkies]

>>Modern software is designed with resuse in mind.

Agreed. Reuse is great. Where it makes sense.

>>If you are trying to re-invent it the one that is completely out of toucvh is you, not your Indian counterparts.

I'm not advocating reinventing the wheel. What I'm saying is that you need to lay out and understand the problem that you have to solve.

Then pick the proper tools and components with which to solve the problem. It doesn't make sense to 'turn the problem around' and shovel it into a solution.

Show me how Java and J2EE can solve the business problem. Show me how this code block or an Entity Bean will solve the problem. Not how the problem can be looked at in such a way that it fits the code/framework.

There's a subtle difference there. Knowing that difference is part of knowing the difference between good and bad design. A 'closed in' design methodology does not work, it is not flexible, is not extendable and will not handle future requirements gracefully.

Reuse rocks. But good design rules.

wbs.