It surprises me to see how negative many of you are about the future of the US. Does globalization mean the end of life as we know it? I do not believe that to be true.... On the contrary I think that it will be a good thing for Europe, the US, and the rest of the 1st world counties that are the 800 pound gorillas in this game. Having the deepest pockets always makes you a player in the ever changing word of business. There will be various International shifts in the labor force as there have been in the past. This will displace many workers, but I truly believe that when one door closes another opens. In the case of globalization many doors will open. Businesses in the US have the deepest pockets, a government that embraces business growth and the entrepreneurial spirit. Open your eyes, we are in the the best position to exploit the opportunities that lie ahead.
Turlo, I hope your right. But it seems the US has had a lock on these advantages for a long time and this is no longer the case. The walls which allowed the inefficiencies to exist are being eroded, and it seems that the only thing which can occur is a revision to the mean. Capitalism will drive the inefficiencies away, which means that all pay rates will approach the mean globally. Now compare our standard of living to these other countries and I would SHORT us and COVER at the mean Isn't this already happening? Seems to me, my generation has to work a LOT more to make ends meet than even our parents did. Single income households with 2 cars and 3 kids are a thing of the past. I think this will take a very long time though, and there will hopefully still be plenty of time to enjoy our advantages. I hope new doors open for us as well, and give us another monopoly on an inefficient market. peace axeman
Tuesday December 23, 5:32 pm ET By David Zielenziger NEW YORK (Reuters) - U.S. corporations are picking up the pace in shifting well-paid technology jobs to India, China and other low-cost centers, but they are keeping quiet for fear of a backlash, industry professionals said. Morgan Stanley estimates the number of U.S. jobs outsourced to India will double to about 150,000 in the next three years. Analysts predict as many as two million U.S. white-collar jobs such as programmers, software engineers and applications designers will shift to low cost centers by 2014. But the biggest companies looking to "offshoring" to cut costs, such as Microsoft Corp. (NasdaqNM:MSFT - News), International Business Machines Corp. (NYSE:IBM - News) and AT&T Wireless (NYSE:AWE - News), are reluctant to attract attention for political reasons, observers said this week. "The problem is that companies aren't sure if it's politically correct to talk about it," said Jack Trout, a principal of Trout & Partners, a marketing and strategy firm. "Nobody has come up with a way to spin it in a positive way." This causes a problem for publicly traded companies, which would ordinarily brag about cost savings to investors. Instead, they send vague signals that they are opening up operations in India and China, but often decline to elaborate. Moreover, on the threshold of a U.S. presidential election year, job losses are a hot button issue. A company that highlighted a major job transfer could wind up in the campaign debate. Multinationals find that when they trumpet expansion overseas, they cause problems at home. When Accenture Ltd. (NYSE:ACN - News) executives in India this month announced plans to double their staff to 10,000 next year, they triggered a flood of calls to the company's U.S. offices about U.S. job losses. Offshoring companies "are paying Chinese wages and selling at U.S. prices," said Alan Tonelson, of the U.S. Business and Industrial Council, a trade group for small business. "They're not creating better living standards for America." The U.S. sales director for one of India's top computer services providers said his company has won business from customers such as Walt Disney Co. (NYSEIS - News), Time Warner Inc.'s (NYSE:THA - News) CNN and the Fox division of News Corp. (Australia:NCP.AX - News) -- none of which want public disclosure. In India, some technology companies have recently adopted lower profiles. Microsoft Corp. (NasdaqNM:MSFT - News) has been removing its name from minibuses used to ferry engineers on overnight shifts. Major Indian beneficiaries of U.S. business such as Infosys Technologies Ltd. (Bombay:INFY.BO - News), Wipro Ltd. (Bombay:WIPR.BO - News) and Satyam Computer Services Ltd. have stopped identifying new customers. While there have been reports that IBM intends to ship 4,700 high-end jobs to India and China next year, they mark a rare instance when figures "have been reported in black and white," said Linda Guyer, president of Alliance@IBM, a union that has tried to organize IBM employees. Those numbers were not released by IBM, but rather disclosed by the Wall Street Journal, which had obtained an internal memo. The company has declined to comment. Guyer believes as many as 40,000 of IBM's 160,000 U.S. jobs will be transferred overseas by 2005, a figure she says was gathered from phone calls by IBM employees. Previously, IBM has pointed to a report by the McKinsey Global Institute that concludes the U.S. economy ultimately will benefit. The report was commissioned by Nasscom, a group made up of Indian tech companies as well as IBM's Indian services unit -- showing an effort by those invested in offshoring to sway public opinion. Recently, AT&T Wireless told the U.S. Securities & Exchange Commission that it would lay off 1,900 employees this year. Communications Workers of America (News - Websites) members obtained an internal memo prepared by Tata Consultancy Services of India that discussed how it would assume those U.S. jobs. Subsequently, AT&T Wireless officials acknowledged it was exploring the job shifts but didn't offer details. While some companies, such as Electronic Data Systems Corp. (NYSE:EDS - News), CAP Gemini Ernst & Young and Sapient Corp. (NasdaqNM:SAPE - News), acknowledge they shift jobs abroad to exploit cost advantages and around-the-clock work, IBM asserts that it is not moving jobs but creating new ones. "It's a business strategy, period. You cut costs. You revamp. You look at what your mission statement says and try to turn a profit," said Sylvia Thomas, who was laid off by chipmaker Agere Systems Inc. (NYSE:AGRa - News) after declining offers to relocate to headquarters in Allentown, Pennsylvania -- or to Singapore.
nice article....but in all honesty, you can find versions of the same article from the 60's. 70's, 80's and 90's....I remember when japan was dirt cheap labor and was going to replace all of detroit.....now I hear where Japan is more expensive....and that china and korea are doing to Japan what they did to us....it is a cycle and just like in trading , cheaper does not mean better.....think of it....where do you trade? if cheapest was the only measuring stick, wouldn't a few firms ( which i will refrain from mentioning) be dominant? same with software too????
Good point. also lets not forget there have been miracle countries like India. Russia and China before. Many years back it was South America. Then there were Asian tigers and miracle economies like Malaysia, Indonesia and Thailand. What happened to them ? It was exactly the same argument about lower cost that was in these countries favor. Cost advantage does not mean anything unless there is a good political system, good judicial system, infrastructure and lot more.
I'm curious if companies are really having good experiences with foreign outsourcing. I know a couple of guys who have had experiences with it and it was miserable for them. Trying to communicate with someone who barely spoke english and was 10 hours different in time zones was almost impossible. I guess I guess I'm saying that I believe many jobs will go overseas but that some of these intangible ineffeciences will limit the total. Security is another reason. Some executives will feel uncomfortable placing some of their critical IT operations overseas...
I've read in a book that if you are looking for a job you should not talk to a person who is also looking. It makes a lot of sense looking at these messages. Fear begins fear. Stop looking at numbers and announcements. The US economy is a lot stronger and will be stronger not because US trying to protect the wealth in this country but because people in this country want to be wealthier. You have no idea what is going on in countries like China, India and Russia. Being a programmer in Russia would make me 10 times less productive because people there are not interested in it. The same is true about China or India. I know that it is very hard for you to understand but that is the way it is. If people here started taking 1 - 2 month vocations, started drinking and celebrating 1/3 of the year and come to work to chat or have fun - it would make me a lot more concern. Those companies can export all they want. It will balance out. They will discover that the grass is greener from the distance. That one good programmer here that knows the customers, knows the business and wants to prosper is better than 5 programmers in India, China or Russia that have none of that. Salaries for US programmers will drop some; salaries for India and China's programmers will rise. Students in US will stop going for Computer Science degrees. It will be a shortage of technology workers again. Also, there are not going to be much other kind of workers in the future because that what technology does: it makes other professions absolute
Can you elaborate a little on this? I kind of picture non-Western programmers as "hungry workers". Are you saying that the work ethic - simply because of differing cultures - outside of America is sometime not what we're used to over here in the States? Or am I misinterpreting?
Running after every economic fad is foolhardy. Every industry/profession changes over time and experiences spikes in demand and price and changes in business structures. In any business on which you choose to focus your attention/efforts you will prosper as long as you adapt to changing conditions. Over my many years in business I have heard these doomsday predictions repeatedly. I have learned to ignore them and focus on the task at hand. You should too.
"Are you saying that the work ethic - simply because of differing cultures - outside of America is sometime not what we're used to over here in the States? Or am I misinterpreting?" Imagine this. You are talented and hardworking person (which you most likely do not have to imagine). You come to work and your manager is an hour late because he made it to managers and it gives him this right. You trying to work harder while everyone else is smiling at you and do nothing and think that you are an idiot or even worth you are trying to be "better" than everyone else. You graduated from a college after 5 years of hard work and you are sitting next to someone who is getting the same or better money because his father happen "to know" a college head who gave him a fake "graduation papers". Not just that, but this guy constantly reminds you that being honest is for fools like you. How would you feel? Would it make you more productive? Would you create more wealth for yourself and your country?