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Nielsen Collects FL Tax Breaks, Then Outsources Jobs
theodp writes "The poop is hitting the fan over tax breaks given to ratings giant Nielsen Co., which pocketed millions in Florida jobs-creation tax concessions but has turned around and dismissed hundreds of local workers after inking a $1.2B outsourcing deal with Tata Consultancy Services of Mumbai. Lou Dobbs is on the case. Lou may go even more ballistic once he sees the Nielsen-Tata pact, which assures Nielsen that OT worries are a thing of the past ('there shall be no additional charge for overtime work'), allows Nielsen to have unsatisfactory Tata hires replaced within 4 weeks of starting with no charge for the original or re-performed work, gives Nielsen up to 6 man-weeks of free labor when a Tata worker is replaced, and allows Nielsen to make 'any TCS Resource' disappear with no more than 5 days notice if their presence 'is not in the best interests of Nielsen.' Nielsen execs have launched a PR counter-attack, pledging not to bully 85 year-old ladies in future layoffs. In a Letter to the Citizens, Nielsen CEO David L. Calhoun explained that Tata won a 'rigorous competition' to get the job, failing to mention that Tata was also tapped by Nielsen EVP Mitchell Habib in his CIO roles at both GE and Citigroup."
You would have a point if a) the Indian company paid American income taxes, b) the Indian company adhered to all the American labor laws, c) the Indian company workers spend their earnings in America, amongst other things.
Why? Simply because the economic boundaries of most societies are also their national boundaries, i.e. their economies are designed to work as a unit within the national borders. If you operate inside such a unit, taking advantage of all of its benefits (tax breaks for job creation amongst others as was in this case) and then turn around and in order to maximize your profits redirect all of the economic benefits which your company is supposed to bring back to that society to another instead, abroad, it becomes a far bigger issue then mere "ethnic favoritism". It crosses the line into "economic sabotage".
I've worked with quite a few different Indians, both domestic and abroad. My boss is an Indian himself, and quite capable, knowledgeable, and proficient. Even he agrees that the Indians, for the most part, are incapable of being creative and thinking for themselves. All of their work is performed in a "group" and they don't know how to do it themselves. Only a handful of universities in India are worth anything, the rest are diploma mills. That's why they come here to get a degree, so it they have something meaningful. And giving an Indian a task is like giving a task to a computer program. It is very deliberate and exact. You give it something, you will get back exactly what you asked for, but if it something outside of the realm of what was expected, it is not handled well. You have to describe every possible corner case and exception that may get run into, in the hopes of you getting back something that is useful. With Westerners, I can give them something, a set of good instructions, and get back something where even the vagaries of a data set have been accounted for properly. I'll add, that these are college kids who have no knowledge of the thing I've given them, so it has nothing to do with experience....just a way of thinking.