Outsourcing = Un-American
by Jesse on Dec.15, 2008, under General
Ok – in this economic climate, it has to be said.
To those companies who continue to outsource tech-labor to third-world countries without even a good record on basic human rights, let alone strict laws and oversight on the treatment of Americans’ financial and personal data…
STOP IT!
You are both directly and indirectly contributing to and furthering the recession. I’d even dare-say you’re an active participant and maybe even a root cause in it.
Listen – It may sound protectionist of me, but I do believe that in situations where our economy is in the toilet, it’s ok to be so. We can’t continue to bolster other economies when ours desperately needs the help.
My former employer – let’s call her “Kelly Robinson” for a while outsourced a sizable portion of her business to Canada. Besides the obvious dollars that were leaving the country, never to return, there is another downside to this – Her business dealt with lending, so as a result we were also exporting names/social-security-numbers/financial information to a country that may or may not have the strictest controls in place to care for that information.
We’re doing the same thing in India. Do you realize how much financial information we send out of the country every day? Half the time I call Dell Financial Services I end up in an overseas call-center, being forced to recite my social-security-number to someone who isn’t even subject to US laws regarding information security and identity theft.
Those are our jobs. 15 years ago I got my start in technology through a support center for a major online service. This is where technology people, in large part, get their start. By exporting the entry-level jobs overseas, we are exporting the entry-point for most of our workers to enter the field.
I’m all for having a “world economy” but until we have a single governing body that actually has the authority to stomp on idiots, it can’t safely be done.
The best you can do as a consumer is to refuse to deal with the foreign call-centers, and to complain loudly when you get them.
December 15th, 2008 on 3:41 pm
Went to go read your post, and — don’t you know it? — your Google’s AdSense is now offering me all sorts of great offshore outsourcing deals. Probably not what you intended …
December 15th, 2008 on 5:20 pm
Sometimes I *HATE* Google…. Might do away with it, it’s not like anyone actually clicks on the stupid links anyway. (Rates on pay-per-impression are cheapcheapcheap)
On second thought. Anyone want to buy Ad space? Google is officially fired.
December 15th, 2008 on 10:19 pm
I find it ironic you mentioned “Canada” and “(dollars) never to return” in the same sentence. Do you know how much money American businesses earned from Canada each year?
There is a reason these jobs got shipped overseas. Are you willing to pay double for a t-shirt? $1000 more for a laptop?
December 15th, 2008 on 11:40 pm
Why is that argument used with regards to shipping jobs overseas but whenever anyone brings it up with regards to the reason we NEED immigrant labor here in the US it’s all BS? I’m speaking of lower costs of course.
In the end, yes. On the selfish side I’m willing to pay more to ensure that I have a job longer, or that my money goes further, or to keep my country/state/county/city from going broke. Just like I’m willing to pay higher taxes if it benefits me and those around me.
Outsourcing tech-support and call-center jobs does nothing to benefit the American people, it does everything to improve profitability so that stock prices go up, irregardless of the consequence.
Things costing more doesn’t mean anything if there aren’t enough people in the US working to afford them. Just as higher taxes don’t mean squat to the unemployed.
Bottom line is, as long as we continue to send money overseas we’ll find that A> the quality of what we receive in return is crap, (IE – technical support) and B> our job market will continue to suffer, causing this RECESSION to continue on and on.
Companies are putting their bottom lines ahead of the good of the country. This has nothing to do with laptops for under $1,000, this has everything to do with boosting the profit margin so a bunch of CEO’s get their multi-million dollar bonuses.
Not sure why I’m surprised though. I’ll lay even money that you work for a corporation that outsources what it considers to be it’s “grunt work”. Right?
December 16th, 2008 on 4:39 am
Jesse – does it seem fair to use the rest of the world in good times and when the US messes up its economy, draw back in? How about if the Chinese stop shipping goods to the US because they’ve got customers elsewhere they can fulfill orders with?
If you want to play protectionist, expect the rest of the world to do too.
BTW, I don’t personally agree with outsourcing as I think aside from the issues you’ve raised of security, there’s a whole culture thing and quality of service that fails when services are outsourced. Cost is not the only factor in providing someone a service.
December 16th, 2008 on 7:45 am
China to stop shipping to the US – an interesting prospect. The only way I see that happening would be if the US drastically changes their core spending habits.
We are born consumers, and the biggest market in the world, especially when you consider our population size.
Americans are rabid consumers. (We have to be – our economy is built on a consumption model – if people stop spending money…well we see what happens, everything rinds to a halt)
China would bankrupt themselves by cutting us off.
December 16th, 2008 on 8:28 am
you are EMC guru ,while now temporary leave this field ,i think you like suppoert more than pre-sale
now i am a emc learner, i come from china , symm is keep secrety by emc company.know i learn
some symm archetect by learing product guide and some other document, now i want to know more inline command not just a7,c etc , do you have symmwin guide or reference manual or something else , can you send me a copy of it ? my mailbox blackwolfdog@163.com
thanks a lot in advance
December 18th, 2008 on 8:32 pm
Umm…no.
The inlines commands are, quite justifiably very closely held.
Because putting them in the hands of someone who has a limited knowledge of the Symm could cause disastrous results, IE downtime, loss of data, plague of locusts, etc.
December 16th, 2008 on 9:48 am
Actually – in retrospect I have to correct myself.
yes outsourcing sends dollars out of the country, but that’s not as big a problem as the jobs IN the country it does away with.
December 16th, 2008 on 4:35 pm
Jesse
Unfortunately I think we’ll see the world change in the next 50 years. America won’t be the economic powerhouse it has been. China and India will overtake it (BTW, leaving the UK even further down the pile). Oh, and especially if the US manages to screw its economy like it just did with the banks.
December 16th, 2008 on 4:42 pm
I agree -
The “End of Days” has been used to describe the end of the world. But in fact it only describes the end of the world AS WE KNOW IT. (With apologies to the boys in R.E.M.)
The End of Days signifies a substantive change in the way the world works. I do suspect we might be seeing the beginnings.
December 17th, 2008 on 2:29 am
I work in telecom, and in several jobs over the years I’ve seen our call centers being moved to somewhere cheaper, either as a direct subsidiary or simply outsourced.
Do I hate these moves? Absolutely. But when long distance calls cost pennies per minute, they are inevitable. People will tolerate bad customer services, poor voice quality, even the occasional dropped calls as long as we charge 2 cents cheaper than the competition.