“9 for 9, the outsourcing was hurting them in quality and speed of deployment.”
Perhaps quality and speed of deployment was not the objective function, and profits were? Was it hurting them in terms of profits?
Again, no one disputes that a Lamborghini will get to 60 mph faster than a Kia. But if the objective is to go grocery shopping, would you personally buy a Lamborghini, especially if you don’t have the money to do it?
May be you will, but most people won’t. So why expect the companies to do that?
The main issue with IT managers is that they want to change the business objective away from profits. That won’t work. Prove that profits will improve by onshoring, and everyone will listen to you.
“The political reaction to the increasingly common viewpoint that the business and political establishment cares nothing about the common working person, or actively promotes policies to make the common working person poorer, can be quite ugly, in the rise in support for nationalist authoritarian politicians (either nominally left or right wing, often bringing a lot of other political garbage along for the ride) who take advantage of the generated discontent. Of course, they promote a false hope, in that if they win, things are likely to get worse for everyone.”
I can only speak for businesses on this forum, as my hand has been slapped for talking politics. Yes, businesses care only about shareholders. They should. Corporate managers have a legal fiduciary responsibility to do so. I don’t understand why there should be any backlash for something that is trivially true. What did people really expect?
Is it actually possible that computer graduates are looking for jobs in the wrong cities? Fast Company did a list of top 10 cities for technology: Austin, Raleigh, Provo, Fort Collins, Hartford, Indianapolis, Boise, Manchester (NH), Nashville, and Eugene. Are graduates willing to relocate to places like Fort Collins or Boise … or are they bound and determined to work in Seattle or Silicon Valley and refuse to look elsewhere? People tend to want to live in “glamour” cities where competition will be tighter. This may also play into the larger percentage of older workers unemployed. Once you’re over 40 with a family, mortgage, and roots in a community, it is more difficult to just pick up and move.
Easy answer - because then they would have to be responsible for the failures. People talk a lot. but wimp out when it comes to actually stepping up and doing something they think should be done.
Explains why they complain endlessly. It is easier to complain than it is to do the hard work. Then they get mad when the executives get richer and richer and they do not. Interestingly, they have not figured out they are not doing things to get richer, so rather silly to expect it.
Immigration restrictions are also often politically based on hostility toward those of different race, ethnicity, religion, etc. rather than just economic motivations. Also, not everyone wants to migrate to a place where they will face such hostility.
However, while the global poor, the executive classes, and the capital owning classes generally benefit, the middle income labor in rich countries (probably global top 5% excluding the global top 0.1%) are probably most vulnerable to becoming poorer, or at least believing that they will become poorer*. As noted before, since they are concentrated in the rich countries, political reaction in favor of nationalist authoritarian politicians can occur in those rich countries.
*Note that the observed effects of increased trade tend to highlight losses (e.g. loss of one’s job) while the benefits are often much less noticeable (e.g. one’s employer getting increased export business, or one’s greater choices including imported goods as a consumer). A smaller number of larger losers (those who lose their jobs) are likely to be more politically vocal and angry (and influence others to fear similar losses) than the larger number of small winners (who may not even realize what they gain).
That you do not understand why any backlash could occur does not mean that no backlash will occur (and such backlash has occurred in many countries). Profit-making companies may want to account for the political environment when assessing how decisions can affect their profit-making ability in the future.
“However, while the global poor, the executive classes, and the capital owning classes generally benefit, the middle income labor in rich countries (probably global top 5% excluding the global top 0.1%) are probably most vulnerable to becoming poorer, or at least believing that they will become poorer*.”
If they are 5% of the global population, I would rather have the remaining 95% benefit at their expense.
However, it is not true that they will become poorer. What is true is that they will have intense job insecurity. They may earn less, but cost of goods and services will drop tremendously as well, hence in effect increasing their real purchasing power. However, I do agree that people look at nominal pay and not real purchasing power.
Perhaps that’s where USA is failing its kids. We need to teach kids a lot more economics than we do today.
“That you do not understand why any backlash could occur does not mean that no backlash will occur (and such backlash has occurred in many countries). Profit-making companies may want to account for the political environment when assessing how decisions can affect their profit-making ability in the future.”
They do. It’s called campaign financing. It is shameful in my view that corporations have such an influence on politics, but hey, who am I to argue against the USSC?
Trade Theory also says that countries should tax those benefiting disproportionately from free trade (shareholders of corporations) and distribute that to those that are suffering disproportionately. As a tax and redistribute liberal who also believes in free trade and free market capitalism, that sounds like a very elegant solution to me. Everyone wins in that case.
One thing to think about is moving/relocating has real financial costs many lower and some middle-income families may not be able to sustain.
Saw quite a bit of this in my NE Ohio college town where many former factory workers had been unemployed/underemployed for nearly a generation by the time I arrived up there for undergrad in the mid-'90s. In a town where a car was a serious necessity, most had no cars because of mechanical breakdowns and lack of funds for repairs or the car got repossessed. If they were lucky, they had a HS diploma at the most with many being HS dropouts who were the last to be hired during the latter end of the boom times before their industries hollowed out and they were laid off and left to their own devices financially.
Also, in the case of Hartford…one good reason why many folks not just in CS, but also in general are not willing to relocate there is due to serious perceptions Hartford has a serious crime safety/issue and the fact there’s not much for young professionals to do outside of work hours.
I’ve seen some of this firsthand while traveling through there and heard this cited as a reason why a Boston based friend and some of his HS friends* from Western Mass refused to consider staying in Western Mass and commute to Hartford even though it would have meant much cheaper/free housing and a 20 minute or less commute by bus/car.
And most of them work in an industry which has had a major presence in Hartford…insurance.
All were working/lower-middle class who managed to get enough FA/scholarships to go outside of the area for college and later, relocate permanently away from the area.
BUT willo Amazon hire anyone over 40?? Or 35?? Do many want to work for what is often considered a cult company with insane work expectations and treatment? Maybe not.
So, you want to make Americans poorer (I would rather have the remaining 95% benefit at their expense) in two ways: have their jobs transferred offshore AND redistribute their money offshore.
Oh, @barrons, I completely agree with you. I do have a friend who is in her late 50s who works there (not a tech role). She does not say much, but does not seem happy there.
Cobrat, The cost of relocation and retraining is very real. That’s where the Govt has to step in and help, and fund it by taxing those who benefit from stock price appreciation from offshoring. However, when an young person says that (s)he can’t relocate because the new place doesn’t have anything to do in the evening, I don’t have much sympathy. I work with extremely bright young people who work their rear end off pulling 80 hour weeks with no time left for evening and weekend frolicking. They also get paid very, very handsomely. 99% are graduates from the absolutely top selective colleges. I would rather have a country of young people who have the latter attitude than the former.
droppedit, No, the redistribution will be done in the USA to help those that lost their jobs to outsourcing/offshoring.
barrons, intparent, I guess Americans can’t then complain if each and every of these 11,000 jobs go to H1Bs, eh?
This has got to be one of the most depressing CC threads I have yet encountered. I have a daughter in high school right now and “Go into STEM!!! Huzzah for STEM!!” is being shoved at them front, back and sideways, eight days a week.
And I read this thread and I think, “Why the hell should any of these kids let us force them into such a nightmare?? Why should they want to go into IT (especially girls)? Why pursue coding or CompSci? Just so they can be chewed up and spit out? THAT is why they should be doing all-nighters at 15, 16, 17 years old, so they can get that great ACT/SAT score, so they get into that great school, in order to beat out some H-1B applicant?”
The thing is, that H-1B Visa job-cog code jockey most likely isn’t dealing with $30K, $40K… up to $100K+ college debt!!
This whole thing is nuts. CompSci, STEM, whatever! … it’s very hard to champion these as career paths to these Race To Nowhere high schoolers, the poor things. And it’s even harder, as the parent, to imagine paying college tuition in order for them to end up where this thread seems to suggest they would end up: either working offshore (really? and pay off their college loans how, exactly, @1Wife1Kid?) or earning as much (or less?) as a Musical Theater major, with worse hours.