Re: Outsourcing: (was: Russell / Capital Destroying Jobs / Mar 04

On Fri, 5 Mar 2004, Nicholas Bonfatti wrote:

>   What's interesting about SWANH is that they represent businesses and
> individual developers, both sides of the spectrum.

just because a few token developers show up?

> When you think about it, outsourcing is inevitable, there is no reason
> IT jobs should be any more secure than manufacturing jobs.

given neoliberal globalization, then obviously yes it is invetiable. i
don't disagree, i just avoid tautologies.

> Furthermore, what's to stop foreign software companies from competing
> with American software companies?

don't you catch the irony that the example here, Oracle, owns the "foreign
software companies"?  so are they really "foreign".  or did a u.s.
multinational just take its business to a country with IT workers willing
to earn the most corporate-attractive (read: lowest) wages.

> The quality of code coming from offshore, even if you assume it's not up
> to our quality now, can only improve.

true, but not as if code quality was ever a prerequisite for making
billions US (see:  Redmond, WA).

> However, there is one place where cultural factors among other things
> will keep America strong: innovation.

we are superior. aren't we.  (end satire)  innovation is a word of
commercial advertising, and means less and less to me.

> IT workers need to learn to be management-types as well.

That's about all there is left, middle management.

> Has our quality of life on the whole increased or decreased since all
> those manufacturing jobs left?

are you asking this, or has there already been consensus in the
"industry"?

> Another interesting point that was brought up is that outsourcing
> happens all the time.  It's offshoring that people have a problem with.

right.

>   For example, New Hampshire labor (even knowledge labor) is
> considerably cheaper than in California.  Is a company that moves work
> to New Hampshire outsourcing? Is it outsourcing when Oracle creates a
> development office in Bangalore?

these ideas are hiked from what's-his-name's blog, but you're right,
national/state borders suck.  it seems borders are helpful in caging
workers of a certain shade, and in maintaining certain working conditions
and business friendly practices.  which happens even within the U.S. on a
state-level.  thus Vermont is fucking ball-and-chained to IBM.  reminds me
of something stallman wrote:

"The states need to form a union" by Richard Stallman
http://www.stallman.org/articles/states-union.html

> What needs to be done to maintain our economic superiority is to create
> centers of excellence, such as those in India around IIT campuses. The
> governments of India and China have taken education very seriously, and
> it is showing.

Wait, isn't this the case already: that the US has "centers of
excellence"?  Isn't that why we have a variety of international students?
And it seems there's no shortage of perfectly capable IT professionals out
there.  If there wasn't, then companies wouldn't be able to pick up and
move business into another state or hemishpere.

> The US government needs to spur innovation, not implement protectionist
> policies.

This is probably true.  The reactionary protectionism that's gripping
everyone is probably a bad response.  Nationalist shit like "Buy Made in
America" sucked.  But is the US Government looking out for the best in the
interest's of IT (and other industry) workers (here and abroad) or even
innovation?  I say they fail on both accounts.  Innovation will come when
decent education and jobs are available.

But shit, I don't want to work for Oracle or IBM, anyway.  so
outsource/offshore them wherever.  unfortunately, even if i believed the
rush of jobs to India or wherever was a healthy thing, I'd demand they be
foreign jobs and not the jobs of U.S. multinationals helped by "free
trade".

> One way we can do this is through the Small Business Administration
> (that's why I wanted the quote from FFN.) The SBA currently gives out
> $12B in loans per year, they need to give more of those loans to
> innovative businesses and less to things like fast-food franchises.

Have fun waiting around for that one.  Given the quote from FFN, sounds
like the SBA needs to rewrite it's charter.

My guess is that IT worker's need to play catch up.  A lot of
manufacturing worker's figured out the lessons when jobs go abroad, that
being the hard way.  when will we figure it out?  hopefully, not too late.
this liberal shit about better education and innovation is a no brainer.
what's the real fucking problem?

/a
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