Outsourcing steals American jobs

“The latest Washington Monthly has prolly the best article I've read on this subject: Creative Class War

The author argues for a return to the policies that have made this country a center for innovation for decades as opposed to our recent turn inward and backward.”

“Okay... I read it, but you know most here won't.”

“okay, I didn't read the complete thread, so I don't know if this even fits under this thread or not...but here it goes anyway.

I am pretty pissed myself. I worked for over 6 years now as a pretty successful designer. UNTIL those websites poped-up that sell everything for a portion of what we are selling our designs here.

Their prices are rediculiously low and you can be sure that I am not a happy camper. Pisses me off.

Anyway, I just needed to vent. Don't want to get involved in anything political.”

“...

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“5,605 words but a lot to think about.”

“What do you design?”

“web sites, banners...stuff like that.”

“Last week, IBM hired computer programmers in China because they only cost $12.50 per hour opposed to $56 per hour to employ an American programmer. They interviewed one programmer that was out of work for 15 months and he wasn't happy to say the least. It's not just programmers and it's happening to other white collar jobs. When it gets to the point that Americans have to compete with the Chinese on this level I don't see how an American can have a fair chance to compete against them.”

“Welcome to the world of free trade.”

“I guess Americans will have to be willing to move out of the country to find jobs in certain fields. I do think that when kids see what is happening they might try to enter fields in jobs that can't be outsourced. It would suck to borrow money for college and graduate to find you are priced out of the market.”

“That's what's happening now, rich.”

“I noticed that from watching the latest news and I did notice too that there's a lot of angry people out there. As this practice starts to spread it could get ugly down the road.”

“Need to wash the dirt out of the white house, congress and corporate board rooms and trade all our lawyers for something useful.”

“I thought Bush said our economy was doing pretty good? He's not that out of touch is he?

nahhh, he couldn't be...”

“Some companies exporting jobs, according to Lou Dobbs on CNN:


3Com
3M

A
Accenture
Adaptec
Adobe Systems
Advanced Energy Industries
AMD
Aetna
Agere Systems
Agilent Tech.
AIG
Alamo Rent A Car
Albertson's
Alliance Semiconductor
Allstate
Alpha Thought Global
American Express
American Standard
Amphenol Corp.
Analog Devices
Andrew Corp.
AOL
Applied Materials
AT&T
AT&T Wireless
A.T. Kearney
Avanade
Avery Dennison

B
Bank of America
Bank of New York
Bank One
Bear Stearns
Bechtel
BellSouth
Best Buy
Black & Decker
BMC Software
Boeing

C
Capital One
Carrier
Cendant
Cerner Corporation
Charles Schwab
ChevronTexaco
Ciena
Cigna
Circuit City, Inc.
Cisco Systems
Citigroup
Coca-Cola
Comcast Holdings
Computer Associates
Computer Sciences Corporation
Continental Airlines
Convergys
Cooper Tire & Rubber
Cooper Tools
COVAD Comm.
CSX
Cummins

D
Dell Computer
Delta Air Lines
Direct TV
Discover
Document Sciences Corp.
Dow Chemical
DuPont

E
Earthlink
Eastman Kodak
Eaton Corporation
EDS
Electroglas
Electronics for Imaging
Eli Lilly
EMC
Emerson Electric
Ernst & Young
Expedia
ExxonMobil

F
Fedders Corporation
Fidelity Investments
First American Title Ins.
First Data
Fluor
Ford Motor
Franklin Mint

G
Gateway
General Electric
GlobespanVirata
Goldman Sachs
Goodrich
Google
Greenpoint Mortgage
Guardian Life Insurance

H
The Hartford Financial Services Group
HealthAxis
Hewitt Associates
Hewlett-Packard
The Holmes Group
HSN

I
IBM
IndyMac Bancorp
Innodata Isogen
Intel
Intl. Paper
Intuit
ITT Educational Services

J
Jacobs Engineering
Jacuzzi
JDS Uniphase
Johnson Controls
Johnson & Johnson
JPMorgan Chase
Juniper Networks

K
KANA Software
Kaiser Permanente
Keane
KLA-Tencor

L
Lawson Software
Lehman Brothers
Levi Strauss
Lexmark International
Lifescan
Lillian Vernon
Linksys
Lockheed Martin
Lowe's
Lucent

M
Maritz
Marshall Fields
Mattel
Maytag
McDATA Corporation
Medtronic
Mellon Bank
Merrill Corporation
Merrill Lynch
Metasolv
MetLife
Microsoft
Monsanto
Morgan Stanley
Motorola

N
Nabco
National City Corporation
National Life
National Semiconductor
NCR Corporation
Network Associates
Newell Rubbermaid
New York Life Insurance Co.
Northwest Airlines

O
Office Depot
Ohio Art
ON Semiconductor
Oracle
Otis Elevator Co.
Owens Corning

P
palmOne
Parker-Hannifin
Parsons E&C
Pearson Digital Learning
Pericom Semiconductor
Perot Systems
Pfizer
Pitney Bowes
Planar Systems
Portal Software
Pratt & Whitney
Primus Telecom
Procter & Gamble
Providian Financial
Prudential Insurance

Q
Qwest Comm.

R
Rainbow Technologies
Raytheon Aircraft
Regence Group
Rogers
Rohm & Haas
RR Donnelley & Sons
Russell Corporation

S
SAIC
SBC Comm.
SEI Investments
Siebel Systems
Sikorsky
Solectron
Sovereign Bancorp
Sprint
Sprint PCS
State Farm Insurance
State Street
StorageTek
SunTrust Banks
SurePrep
The Sutherland Group
Sykes Enterprises
Synygy

T
Target
Tecumseh
Telcordia
TeleTech
Texas Inst.
Thrivent Financial for Lutherans
Time Warner
Toys "R" Us
Triquint Semiconductor
TRW Automotive
Tyco Electronics
Tyco Intl.

U
Unisys
United Online
United Tech.

V
VA Software
Veritas
Verizon

W
Wachovia Bank
Washington Group Intl.
Washington Mutual
WellChoice
West Corporation

Y
Yahoo!”

“Am I the only one that finds it funny that most of the posts on this thread have been posted by people whining about the loss of American jobs while posting FROM THEIR AMERICAN JOBS?

I bet Hodgie from India doesn’t even have a connection to the internet and keeps his nose to the grindstone.”

“Nigal gets the prize.”

“My ex worked for Phillips in Ohio and his job went to another country and the government is totally paying for his re-education....”

“Nope. No prize. Nigel must be in a service job. Healthcare, right?

What will happen to your service job when there's no one left with the money to pay you? What happens when Medicare, Medicaid and the Veterans' Hospitals go belly up from the Republicans' kind attentions? Who'll be WHINING then?”

“BTW -- Last year when I was in the hospital last year, I had two very capable nurses... from Jamaica and Bermuda.”

““What happens when Medicare, Medicaid and the Veterans' Hospitals go belly up from the Republicans' kind attentions?”

Bawhawhawhaw! The sky is falling! The sky is falling! Medicaid gets a $400 billion boost (the largest entitlement in history) and the libs just keep on bashing it. If a democrat would have passed such an initiative you’d be singing it’s praise from the roof tops.

My job is state funded tilt. Not only is the funding there but I just got a raise. No whining here, nor will there be. When the average spoiled American worker start equating the amount of work they do with their pay we will be on an up swing. Driving a desk and cruising the net is not a step in this direction.”

“"BTW -- Last year when I was in the hospital last year, I had two very capable nurses... from Jamaica and Bermuda."

Nothing wrong with people immigrating here to join our work force. As long as it’s done through legal channels of course. Illegal should be prosecuted to the fullest extent as well as their illegal employers.”

“I think that Nigal points out the obvious. In my defense and take this however you guys want, I look at posting on TT, or otherwise "wasting time" at work as one of my unoffical fringe benifits. I don't get paid jack for what I do. If they wanted to pay me more, I would be more than welcomed to put my nose to the grind stone. They have lost me a loyal employee, due to there poor administation practices, lack of support and funds for my department, all the while demanding that I work for time they will not pay. Is this selfish? You're damn right it is. After getting phucked for 11 years and busting ass, I don't mind being alittle selfish. IF my employer respected what I do, allowed me to advance and compensated me accordingly, you would not see me during work hours. he problem is that some employer do not have basic respect or ahve this "you can be replaced" additude, which is not how you retain a good employee. People like to be treated like people, not meat. I'll bet ya, that if employers worked more towears making there people happy, you would see worker BE more happy.

Let it fly!”

“BTW - Nigal is in one of the only growing work fields in America. People will always continue to need the type of work he does, so I would almost concider his job secure with steady pay. Although his job is state funded, that does put is job in different situations and effected by different things than the average company, as far his pay and security.

We're going to get into this tomAto, tomOto thing here becasue people are going to agrue from how good there getting it. I would guess that most people out there aren't as lucky to have the sercurity and raises that Nigal experiance this past year and bully for him! Anyone that can get pluses in this day with this economy should feel blessed. Most, however, cannot claim that, IMHO.....”

“Go ahead and laugh.

Go ahead and defend the people who are flushing us down the tubes. I think they're guilty of treason.

HPM can attest to how difficult it can be to land a programming job these days. It looks like I'll have to move to Bangalore. I could work for an Indian company long distance, but you can't live on 12K a year around here.

But you can laugh... until they import more people to do your job, for 2/3 of the price.”

“I lost a job with RCA back in the 70's to Taiwan.....they did my job for pennies.....”

“My job’s not all THAT rosey though. This is the first raise I have gotten in three years and it was just .24 cents. But I’ll take it! I am more of a self employed worker. No insurance, no paid sick time, no vacation time, I pay nearly 35% taxes. Basically I get a pay check. I can get very burned out at times and this line of work has a higher turn over rate than McDonalds. LOL! I’ve been doing it for nearly ten years now which is unheard of.”

“That is an impressive amount of service time, Nigal and thanks for clearing some things up. I was not trying to imply you're living like Bill Gates or anything, just trying to give a little perspective at your expense.”

“And that's working 55 hours a week too. OK, yes I get to sleep at work though. LOL!

Tilt, I'm not laughing at the government. I'm laughing at YOU. LOL!”

“Sooner or later the idiots who were so Gung Ho for globalization and so-called 'free trade' are going to realise that less money coming into the country means less SALES for them. Their customers will be those same people who are working for pennies on the dollar offshore.

When the investors feel the bite, then we might see a reversal of this trend.

It reminds me of an interview I saw about 10 years ago... This woman had just been laid off for the third time by the same company, but she was saying that her company stock was going great!”

“American can't make a living on minimum wage......ileagle aliens from Mexico will work for penny's on the dollor....Big and small company's can make more money by paying less....Why don't companies just lower wages until American cant afford to work for them and hire illegals? That way we wont need to send those jobs overseas.


You would have to be a fool to propose such a thing.”

“BTW, the expense of every character I've ever posted here has been borne by Me on this end of the wire.”

“As to the posting from work thing:

I get paid to fix problems. The actual work isn't that time-consuming, and when I'm considering how best to do it, it helps to get my mind on something entertaining for a while and let it kind of stew. My company gets plenty of value from the salary they pay me.

Also, I often get called at home and have to log in. If the lines between work and home life are blurred by my employer, they have no reason to complain about my doing the same.

That said, My job could be done cheaper outside of the United States by someone more desperate for money than me. I guess the trick to keeping the US in competition is to keep our own workers as desperate as those around the world?

Do we want to live the same life as "haji" in India?”

“Here's an intersting thng. Bush seems to be really throwing this "small businesses" thing around while he's stumping for re-election. Is this Bush code for "You're gonna be screwed if you're not set up like a small buniess"? I have a friend who has a small business. He seems to be doing QUITE well these days.....”

“LOL! He looks like he's ready to puke there.”

“Believe me, I am no supporter of this administration nor of corporate America, as past posts will verify.

However, on the outsourcing of jobs:

Successful Business everywhere has always been based on getting the best price for a product while getting the materials or labor as cheaply as possible.

As long as people are purchasing your product and are satisfied enough to buy more, than the formula works.

Many years ago I worked at a place where all the help was union. I was paid good money to operate a swing saw in a foundary. The swing saw was on a hoist and I used it to sut the slag away from huge castings. Once the cut was made, I had to wait for a rigger to come and reposition the casting so i could make the next cut. This meant that I usually made a cut and then waited as long as 2 hours for a rigger to come and make the change. That meant I was doing nothing at 14.75 an hour (in the 60's.) As far as I am concerned that was absolute BS, costing my employer a lot of money for no work and vastly inflating the price of the products.

It is because of this that we are now in the position I am in.

Just as we shop around and find the best price available for merchandise we want to purchase, so do businesses. As long as the cost of American Labor is so high, companies will go elsewhere.

Personally, I currently live on $587 a month Social Security with an occasional odd job to supplement it. I have everything I need to be comfortable, I have almost everything I want and I can save to get the additional things I require.

Nothing is going to change because most people are to "me" orientated and are not willing to sacrifice comfort or inconvenience for the common good.

If all Americans Cancelled their Phones, how long do you think the phone companies would last before they lowered their rates? About two weeks! Same with Cable, Electricity, internet conneections, etc. But it won't happen because most people cannot bear not to be pampered or to be inconvenienced.

Boycott all goods made overseas, it won't take long, but it won't happen because there is no unity beyond the "WHAT'S IN IT FOR ME, RIGHT NOW!?"

I'm afraid the American Worker has created their own Dilemma.

As far as Immigrants taking all the jobs, My people were here long before Leif Erickson and Columbus, and many can't get decent jobs.”

“Anybody here got real first hand experience with outsourcing? Not just seeing people lose work but the whole mechanics of it?

I have extensive experience with it and I am scared for all of us.

Bottom line, Americans can not compete with India in the IT world. They can do it for less, they will work 24/7 and get it done faster, and because they sling so much code argueably they can do it better due to experience.

I was out of work for a freaking year. There was no dev work to be had and I was in a position that kept me from moving where the work was. I have real world experience working with Enterprise level web applications. You know AOL, MSN, Citibank ect. ? The really big boys? I worked on all those sites. The work was so scarce that $100K developers were accepting $30K gigs. Hell, I know a Scout parent with a lawn care company that currently has 4 senior developers mowing lawns.

Guess what, I need a killer developer right now and I can't afford them and meet the price point of the customer so it looks like I'll be forced to outsource the work to India and act as a broker or I lose the whole job to India anyway.

Am I happy about it? Hell no, I feel like I'm being forced to aid the enemy. The only way this will stop is if the Feds do something right NOW to stop it. If they don't we will lose these skillsets and recovery will be even harder.”

“Let me drop some prices on you.

My shop rate- $85 a hour.

Ecommerce storefront built from scratch with search engine optimization, targeted user interface, full administration control panel with content management system and populate over 500 products in 5 catagories and 12 subcatagories- 6 weeks

6 weeks at 40 hours = 240 hours
240 hours by $85 = $20,400

I have 24 quotes on my desk from Indian developers and the highest quote is $2500.

So what is a businessman supposed to do against this?”

“World Free trade. Free market economy. Lowest common denominator wins.”

“Hire high school kids to do your coding for you, pay them minimum, and get busy with the volume.”

“I had a thought (I kow there few and far between) that we might be loosing all these jobs and such to all these other countries.....think about this:

It's human to want to improve

It's human to want to have wants

It's human to want to achieve

Thinking along these lines, I would give these countries about 5 years before they start going the way we are now. These countires might be ahead in the short term, but long term, they will be doomed to travel the road we are on now. Everything goes in cycles, everything happens for a reason. We've been on top for so long, maybe it's the OTHERS turn now.....”

“I'm not interested in minimums or lowest common denominators.

I'm exploring other business models.”

“"World Free trade. Free market economy. Lowest common denominator wins."


We can’t go global Phaed! That’s going to open the door for the anti-christ to come and begin his foul work! You know, that whole NWO and a 1000 points of lights stuff.”

““It's human to want to improve

It's human to want to have wants

It's human to want to achieve

Thinking along these lines, I would give these countries about 5 years before they start going the way we are now. These countries might be ahead in the short term, but long term, they will be doomed to travel the road we are on now. Everything goes in cycles, everything happens for a reason. We've been on top for so long, maybe it's the OTHERS turn now....."

Now don’t get me wrong because I do love this country but I think we have become spoiled, especially our youth. The whole world looks at us and our “riches” and wants that. They have better work ethics than we do and this is why some Americans can barely keep their heads above water yet someone from another country can come here with next to nothing and within 10 years they own a whole chain of party stores. And the students that come here? They run rings around our kids.

I agree with you, they have the motivation and the drive that we are lacking now.

Can ya tell I haven’t had any coffee yet this morning?”

“In HPM's situation, I doubt you could even hire high school kids. To beat the 2500 bid from India you'd have to get it done for less than 10 bucks an hour. With minimum wage and overhead (unemployment ins cost, etc) you'd be hard pressed to come in under 10 an hour.”

“10 years? Chit try on in a couple, at leat in my 'hood.

Being spoiled is something I would tralk to my Grandmother about all the time before she died. She was real concerned for her off spring because of what she saw.

The problem at my stage of the game is that the cost of living is so high, it's puts us in a situation where we HAVE to live on credit cards. It's like they say out there "Don't worry, jack up those prices, they'll find a way to pay fer it. Hell, they all have 10,000 in credit cards. CHARGE!!"

I'm real pissy this mornig, so this come off bad, but it seems to me that everyday families (not all) mimick the Government way of thinking:

Short term benift

Pay for it in the Future

Trouble is, tha Government can declare backrupcy (at least I HOPE not! )”

“10 years? Chit try on in a couple, at leat in my 'hood.

Being spoiled is something I would tralk to my Grandmother about all the time before she died. She was real concerned for her off spring because of what she saw.

The problem at my stage of the game is that the cost of living is so high, it's puts us in a situation where we HAVE to live on credit cards. It's like they say out there "Don't worry, jack up those prices, they'll find a way to pay fer it. Hell, they all have 10,000 in credit cards. CHARGE!!"

I'm real pissy this mornig, so this come off bad, but it seems to me that everyday families (not all) mimick the Government way of thinking:

Short term benift

Pay for it in the Future

Trouble is, tha Government CAN'T declare backrupcy (at least I HOPE not! )”