In defense of IT outsourcing

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I would like to bring up a topic that probably affects many of you. Many of you want to go into IT related jobs. No doubt many of you have heard of the outsourcing practice. I would like to know what you all think about it. I will say I think it is good for the economy and good in general. Capital markets reward those who use resources efficiently. You have to look at it from the perspective of a business. If they can pay an American IT worker $50,000 or an Indian $10,000 to do the same thing at the same level of quality, why should they pay the American more? If a company doesn't operate at the lowest possible cost, their competitors will, then lower their prices and drive you out of business. When you drive down costs you can increase profits, which is in general good for the economy. Plus you are paying these people in India and China far more than they could ever make otherwise, and are thus pumping large amounts of cash into their economies, which will stay there and grow their economies in the long run. Partly because of outsourcing, the Indian and Chinese economies are some of the fastest growing in the world. What do you all think?

What kind of BS post is this?! You're either a troll or complete idiot who likes to talk out of his ass. No!, outsourcing any kind of job in America not only hurts the economy, but kills it. Think about it. Sure companies cut costs by using resources more effciently by paying someone less, but how does that help the economy when alot of people are without jobs? The people that don't have jobs are unable to afford the companies the products or services so how the hell does that increase profits?


And why are you posting this anyways? their are alot of people here that are in the IT field or purseing a career in the IT field(including me). Do you realize how upseting it is to read something like that.


Again you must be a complete dipshit or a troll. In any case think before you speak!

Reality sux, eh?

Remember this argument when all the 'good' jobs have been outsourced to India, China, and the like, and you're spending 80 hours a week operating a fryolator at McDonald's for Minimium wage to pay back your student loans.....remember it very well.

Wow, it is easy to make jman behave rudely! Any topic that causes prospective IT workers so much outrage is very important to talk about with them. If it wasn't such an important topic to their careers, it wouldn't make them so outraged I mean, if I wanted to join, say, the Army, it would be bad to always talk to me about the benefits of being in the Army and the ideologies applaud it, but never talk about the risks and the ideologies that oppose it.

If you want an IT job and will never leave America, then you are probably disturbed by outsourcing. If you want an IT job and don't care where you live ("citizen of the world"), then you are still probably disturbed; now you can't make as many dollars doing it.

But in the long run, I don't see how it hurts a 'world economy', or even the US economy. I mean, it would hurt the NY state economy if residents were forbidden to buy food from other states, in order to save the jobs of local farmers. Even if NY farmers are really good at their jobs. The analogy here = NY farmers : NY state economy :: American IT workers : American economy. How is it wrong?

Jman is right about outsourcing being bad for the United States economy. On the other hand...

Sure, its easy to outsource a $50,000 "IT" Job to india but when you start hiring software engineers for mission critical operations such as defense, or high level company infrastructure, who have salaries at around $150,000, there just aren't any foreigners who have enough training.

DoD employs the largest number of Computer Science majors, or something. They don't outsource. In addition to the government, there are tons of *private* defense contractors who don't outsource. So there is always going to be a place to get a stable job that you guarantee will be around for a longgggg time.

This is true for real estate bubbles and other commodity bubbles with no outcome, but a tech bubble is *essential* for creating infrastructure neccessary in the future. Sure, it will burst, but the infrastructure will remain. In fact, the next tech bubble will probably be worse than the first. I'd say the 90's bubble burst is probably equivilent to the automotive bubble burst which occurred in 1919. Now, that bubble burst was about as bad as the 90's one, but like the 90's one, it was required to create the infrastructure (in this case, the infrastructure was needed for the mass production of automobiles). The real bubble burst would be the 1929 stock market crash.

For someone who has been ambitious, very skilled, and interested, in tech for his whole life, there is no problem in finding a job, but for someone who is only interested in tech for a career, sure, its going to be hard to get a job. Thats true in most fields.

Problem is, not always does outsourcing produce the same quality work as hiring natives. Just see, for instance, how many people are upset with certain major computer companies' technical support departments. If the outsourced programmers are as inflexible and unknowledgeable as the Indian support personnel I've had to deal with, it might not be such a cost-efficient move after all...

I can see that this bothers you. What is amazing is that I bring up a point for debate and you question my motives. What is this? The Soviet Union? As for outsourcing, your argument doens't hold water (and despite the outsourcing, the US economy is hardly dead). As for the predicited mass unemployment as a result of outsourcing, the unemployment rate just recently dropped again and is now only 5%, which is the lowest it has been in 4 years. The ranks of the IT workforce are not so vast that outsourcing is going to risk mass unemployment. IT workers only make up a small fraction of the laborforce. In an economy everyone can't be happy and some are going to be hurt. What typically happens, is those people who are hurt retrain or find something else to do. If you are young you can still do this with no problem. Actually the number of students entering computer science/engineering programs has plumeted due to this.

I am posting this for that very reason. A lot of people here want to go into computers due to their poor social skills, which is why a debate is healthy. If you cannot stand the heat, stay out of the kitchen.

Im sorry but it's hard enough when you have a disablity to get a job.....and I am real worried about my future. It's a like a slap in the face when someone says your job is going to be outsourced ( in which is their is %50 chance of that happening) I've had a tough enough life, I don;t need more discouragement.



Oh and about "healthy debates" this forum is not for debates, it's for support. Im sorry but bringing up a debate on something that is a very sensitve issue for some of us is not a wise idea.


You say when people get laid off from their job they go into another field. Thats easier said then done from some of us. You need to keep that mind before saying something like that.

Im sorry I chewed you out but your post really struck a nerve with me.

Would like to say in regards to the "troll or complete idiot" accusation towards HugoBlack that that is completely false.

Troll: Hugo is a friend of mine via an Aspie chat room and has come here due to my invitation and my having said how much I enjoy this forum. Thus, "troll" is wholly inaccurate.

Idiot: He is also an incredibly intelligent, logical, and realistic man and I can assure you FAR from an idiot.

Conclusion: Hypotheses disproven.

~Sophist

(I'll say nothing about Economy and Business because I know little about either. Though from what bits I do know, outsourcing in many instances can be absolutely necessary.

Good attempt! You're tackling a very controversial subject, and your try at the unpopular side is valiant. But the popular side is popular for a reason this time. Let me just deconstruct a little bit.

Whine whine whine. It's ever so impossible to live decently, so why do you even try? Just give up and accept the fact that life is horrible, and let the companies outsource your job. Bow before them, don't fight back, and accept their demands. Yeah, well, that's a fallacy known as false dilemma. You are saying that "Either you must accept a lower quality of life, or companies will go out of business."

That is not necessarily true though. How many companies do you know whose managers have ever fibbed about its success even just a little bit? I dare say I haven't met one yet who doesn't. Companies will overinflate their worth to investors, and will underinflate their worth to employees. That means employees think times are tough, and stockholders think times are good.

Thus your claim that a company can dictate to us to take a lower wage on the argument that (adopts whiny tone of voice) "It's too haard!" is fallacious, because that company is likely over-emphasizing the difficulty, much in the same way workers will over-emphasize their own ability to get a higher wage.

What we need are companies that aren't profit driven. If we can form sustainable companies whose profits return to the workers, then it doesn't matter: manufacturing, tech, agriculture, no matter what we work on, we will get back exactly as much worth as we produce. If that means accepting a $10K wage, then yes I'll do it in a heartbeat. But you're trusting business executives, bought lobbyists, and professional lawyers to dictate whether that wage truly is the worth of the worker or not. Companies will always undervalue the worker, because being profit driven, they want to maximize profits.

Sophist that is not the issue here, he said something that offended me and i attacked and apologized and its over.

Please drop it and stay on topic.[/b]

You have a mistaken understanding of supply and demand. Yes there are some IT jobs that cannot be outsourced. However they are a small fraction of all of the jobs out there. Across the board there is a reduction in demand due to those jobs that are outsourced. Do to this, and the fact that there is so much supply left over from the boom times of the 1990s that the supply increases relative to the demand. That drives down the price in terms of wages due to the decreased demand. That makes it harder to find a job, harder to keep a job, and the jobs pay less.

Ok lets assume that a lot of infrastructure was created. Does that mean anything in terms of future demand for domestic IT workers? No it doesn't. The reason why so many were employed during the bubble and so few after the bubble was because of all of the money being artificially pumped into the industry that shouldn't have been. When a company is not profitable, it shouldn't go public. The employment situation can only improve if the activity in the industy returns to what it was during the bubble, but that activity was artifical compared to what the industry could sustain. A lot of people were trained during the bubble. Many are unemployed now, which increases the amount of supply. But since the activity is less now, and much of what is still going on is being outsourced, the demand is less.



In the ideal world yes. Even if that is true, most people cannot be among the most ambitious and most skilled. The newly trained graduates certainly cannot be.

Regardless of who is whose friend, I don't want people to be trolling. I think Jman made a valid point, despite his lack of tact.

...what does IT stand for?

Why not? Are Indians any less intelligent or less able than Americans? Of course not. They are able to do the same quality work (partly because most of them speak english). Indian tech support people are able to do a fine job. Besides tech support is a cost center. It doesn't create any revenue. It is a fairly low skill job anyway. It also doesn't add much value. Why pay an American 25k to do tech support when you can pay an Indian 5k to do the same thing. Problem is if you decide that you are going to take the moral high ground and not outsource, then your competitors will, and they will thus decrease their costs, decrease their prices and you will go out of business.