Intel Chief: Don't Call Us Benedict Arnold CEOs

theodp writes "In a USA Today interview, Intel CEO Craig Barrett pooh-poohs arguments against outsourcing, explaining 'We do not send our basketball teams to compete against the rest of the world, saying the other teams have to play slower because our folks aren't fit enough to run as fast.' He is also fed up with being called a Benedict Arnold CEO (perhaps he'd prefer Unemployed Computer Scientist). Barrett pegs K-12 math and science education as the biggest threat to U.S. employment, but when pressed about U.S. kids who do well in both, attend excellent universities, but have no guarantees of good jobs when they graduate, Barrett remarks 'I don't have a solution to that one.'"

Comments

And for those who don't know

[krets]

What's it trying to say?

Benedict Arnold

I still don't get it.

Re:And for those who don't know

[Anonymous Coward]

Benedict Arnold was a traitor - he betrayed his country and his people for money.

These CEOs are traitors - they are betrying their country and their people for money.

Understand now?

Re:And for those who don't know

[NemosomeN]

By May of 1779, Arnold had begun bargaining with the British. Why would a man commit treason against his country, especially one who had fought so valiantly? We can only speculate. He was certainly angry and hurt over the many slights he received over the years. He probably felt unappreciated by his country and those he fought with, even sacrificing his own leg for the cause. His pride was most likely the biggest piece of his life that was damaged -- humiliation was always an affront Arnold could never take. Money, of course, played a big part. He was offered in excess of 10,000 pounds and a commission in the British military.

Re:And for those who don't know

[Gaijin42]

In reality, if a company goes belly up, the stock holders aren't going to get anything.

First, most companies have debt. Assets go to pay off debt.

Then any outstanding bonds the company has issued get redeemed.

Then preffered stock gets a their cut(and very few people own preffered stock)

Then common stock their cut.

Since you started out by saying "the company went belly up" That probably means they dont have a bunch of cash sitting around if they had cash, they wouldnt be belly up. And most companies assests are cannablizied long before actual "belly-up-ness" in order to have the dying gasp of air, or maybe recover.

The only way you would ever get assets really, is if the compnay voluntairly closes. (This only really happens in the case of a competative buy-out, when Comapny A buys B, and then just shuts down B because they didnt want the competition, or needed a patent or something)

Also assets could get distributed in the case of a "poison pill" but that is pretty rare too.

and the Indian educational system is good?

[deadmongrel]

Honestly I don't how the US educational system is but blaming it for moving jobs oversees is ridiculous. Are they saying the Indian(which i can speak for) educational system is better? India has a poor educational system. And they are finding fault with US education system? Before the flames start let me tell you something I am Indian and have survived the Indian Educational system. We have really few "good teachers" and a lot of good-for-nothing ones. The text books are outdated and so are the teaching tools. The education system is more about memorizing stuff than understanding it. Most of the exams results are like gambling. Nothing but luck.

Re:Look at medieval Europe for a rebutal.

[DAldredge]

A fucking box of corn flakes doesn't have to cost 4 USD. The store brand of damn near the exact same product costs 1.39 USD. I know, I just bought some two days ago.

Re:"good for the economy" my ass.

[Anonymous Coward]

Shame that the "average Joes" you mention as shareholders account for very little of the total market. Most investments are held by large companies and insanely wealthy individuals... NOT the "average Joe" who hardly affects the stock market at all with his poor investment decisions.

"good for the economy" my ass-Global foot shooting

[Anonymous Coward]

It's funny you should mention pension plans and investments. In keeping with that the other AC's are saying. One people are cashing in their investments in order to keep food on the table, and roof over their heads. Also with Worldcom, and Enron (among many), the small guys lost big time, and not just their jobs. Now we come to the Pension scandals, and the curtailing, and doing away with pensions for new workers. Throw in the soaring health costs, and overextensions (for various reasons), as well as "investments" (like education) that didn't pay off, and you'll find that we are going to crash bigtime, and lest you forget the "global" part of globalization? That WILL affect the rest of the world in a big way. So lets continue down this foolish path, after all we're ONLY hurting ourselves.

Re:Low standards in K-12

[swillden]

K-12 is a measure of ability and to a certain extent, intelligence. Down's Syndrome doesn't affect either of those.

It doesn't?

From Wikipedia:

Down syndrome at immediate disadvantage as compared with children who do not have DS. The IQ of a child with Down syndrome is rarely measured above 60. The brain of children with Down syndrome is usually small and underweight. The cerebellum and brain stem are unusually small. So is the superior temporal gyrus. Educational progress may also be damaged by illness and disabilities such as recurring infectious diseases, heart problems, eyesight, and hearing problems.

Look it up in any medical text if you don't like Wikipedia. Beyond that, spend some time hanging out with people with Down Syndrome... they're frequently kind, friendly, loving and fun to be around, but while their intelligence does vary, even the brightest among them are barely smart enough to get by in life without significant assistance.

Re:Low standards in K-12

[dasmegabyte]

I call foul. Take New York as an example, there are several different stadards for students. Almost all students have to get a Regents diploma, which is actually quite tough (last year something like 70% of students failed one particular Regents exam) but students with learning disabilities can graduate with a special needs or school level diploma.

It's hardly fair to ask these kids to take calculus and write essays or remember obscure historic facts. So instead they learn specific life skills. And that's what that diploma certifies -- that they can do SOMETHING. NY employers know what this means.

Furthermore, you can graduate with an honors diploma, which says that you passed all the regents course, took a certain number of honors level classes, put in some community service time, and performed a massive research project.

IEEE position

[dslbrian]

For those who haven't bought into the "outsourcing is great for America" BS, check out this discussion about IEEE-USA's stance against outsourcing. The IEEE has also released a position paper on the topic.

Looking at the economic side of the argument, there is also a short article about a finance professor arguing against placing blind faith in outsourcing and the "externality" that companies are exploiting given the current labor and tax laws.

Want to do something about it? Try using your vote. Bush and Kerry have established their position on outsourcing (Bush is for, Kerry is against). Being unemployed does not mean you lose your right to vote, so make it count.

Perhaps its not that bad.

[Anonymous Coward]

I just feel like pointing out a recent article in Infoworld that suggests that offshoring is good and the related press release of a study by the ITAA.

Re:It's not about quality, it's about cheap labor

[ashayh]

Informative ??? What crap ..
I dont know what you are smoking .. I'm from India and let me tell you a US$ 30K salray in India is equivalent to a US $500K salary in the US.
The average programmer makes 20 000 Rs a month .. thats 5500 US$ a year. Many people make less than that.
If people could make 30K a year there, why do you think thousands like me want to come to the US ?
As for being able to afford maids etc .. its not that rosy. The difference is a maid in the US can do something to make her children go in good schools and have a better life. The maid who works for my landlord in the US comes to work in a toyota Highlander SUV... a car that only the super rich in India can afford. Hyundai sells a "high end" SUV in India which sold a grand total of 35 units in Feb 2004.

Re:Unpopular Truths About Outsourcing

[mabu]

A lot of the reason you see so many complaints about outsourcing on Slashdot tends to be the reinforced tendencies of self-selected sets.

Oh, and yours isn't?

The National Review. Shill for selected sets of political agendas propped up by the likes of Pfizer, Merck and Halliburton. There's a publication that's the bastion of objective and well thought out journalism.

Oh, and let's talk about the "distinguished" CATO Institute, a right-wing organization masquerading as libertarian to further the agenda of a select group of uber-powerful business interests. CATO was founded by a huge grant from a Chemical/Petroleum industry heir named Charles Koch.

* Cato leads the right-wing's push for privatization of government services. In 2001, the Washington Post, noting Cato's influence, said it "has spent about $3 million in the past six years to run a virtual war room to promote Social Security privatization."

* Cato supports the wholesale elimination of eight cabinet agencies - Commerce, Education, Energy, Labor, Agriculture, Interior, Transportation and Veterans Affairs - and the privatization of many government services.

* Right-wing foundations that fund Cato include: Castle Rock, Sarah Scaife, Koch Charitable, Olin, Earhart, and Bradley Foundations.

* CATO's corporate benefactors include:
Philip Morris, R.J. Reynolds, Bell Atlantic Network Services, BellSouth Corporation, Digital Equipment Corporation, GTE Corporation, Microsoft Corp- oration, Netscape Communications Corporation, NYNEX Corporation, Sun Microsystems, Viacom International, American Express, Chase Manhattan Bank, Chemical Bank, Citicorp/Citibank, Commonwealth Fund, Prudential Securities and Salomon Brothers. Energy conglomerates include: Chevron Companies, Exxon Company, Shell Oil Company and Tenneco Gas, as well as the American Petroleum Institute, Amoco Foundation and Atlantic Richfield Foundation. Cato's pharmaceutical donors include Eli Lilly & Company, Merck & Company and Pfizer, Inc.

I wonder how many of the above companies are outsourcing? Probably every one of them.

The Washington post characterize'd CATO's agenda as, "A soup-to-nuts agenda to reduce spending, kill programs, terminate whole agencies and dramatically restrict the power of the federal government." That sounds really good in theory, but the underlying agenda of CATO is to pump out polarized "research" to further this cause, which ultimately divests critical responsibilities to a small set of mega-corporations, which probably have less a sense of responsibility and ethics than the government.

I'd be real scared of the future they're promoting..

Re:Go see Grapes of Wrath

[Schnapple]

The flaw in that idea is this - the movie for Grapes of Wrath, IIRC, actually has a happy ending and ends on an up note. The book, however, does not - it ends much worse than it starts.

Seeing the movie without reading the book is more akin to saying you read Starship Troopers when in fact you've only seen the movie.

Re:He DOES have a point

[Dash-o-Salt]

If you would like to know what O(n) notation is, I suggest you look at this page.

These are slides taken directly from the CSE 143 class I took here at college recently.

If the people you're hiring don't even know THIS basic information, you really should be looking at which colleges these people graduate from.