The Case Against Offshore
Outsourcing
by:
Zachary T. Brink
How would one feel if they showed up at work and found out that they no longer had a job? You would have to go home, tell your husband or wife that you have been fired because you cost the company too much to employ. Is that fair to you, someone who has worked there for the majority of his/her career? Most companies that are outsourcing jobs are not thinking about the families that are now left helpless because they have been replaced by someone cheaper.
Companies must not be making enough money these days. Since we have laws that establish a minimum wage to protect American workers, these corporations decided that they would just outsource the work to another country, so that they did not have to worry about those laws and could cut the costs by paying foreigners dirt cheap wages to do the same job. They would rather fire someone who has been developed in the company and trained in every situation of the job for years, just to hire someone who is cheaper to employ. In Outsource Outrage (2005) it states “while America has lost 1 million jobs since 2001, employers have been outsourcing hundreds of thousand of jobs to other countries in order to lower their costs.” Corporate greed is what it should truly be called. There is no excuse for having someone train his or her replacement, that is just cruel and chalice. I believe there should be some sort of severance package involved when employment is terminated for such reasons.
With
unemployment rates up, and the minimum wage at a plateau, the quality of life
has gone down considerably. Many people have lowered their living standards due
to earning a lot less money. Outsourcing overseas has caused thousands of
families to re-think their financial abilities due to unexpected job loss. And
with the number of jobs missing in America, it has become very hard for a number of them to find
something they are good at that covers the expenses. Most American workers that
have been victims to this terrible new trend have taken along time to recover,
if they have already. The truth is, for every single
job opening there are three
unemployed workers. So how is it there
are still being jobs sent overseas? In 2003 the president promised more jobs
from the upcoming tax cut. “The council of Economic Advisers predicted that
this alone would give work to 510,000 people by the end of 2003 and an
additional million or so in 2004. Never Happened. Total job creation was
supposed to average out at 306,000 a month, but only about 30% has been achieved
(Zuckerman 2004 p.1). American jobs have truly reached a state of crisis, and
can almost surely be blamed on the companies who are continuing to outsource
overseas. Since 2001, an estimated 1 million of the 3 million jobs lost
have been sent overseas (Sweeney 2004). Some professions have been hit very hard
by this new international outsourcing competition. Most production jobs have
been sent to China. “India is becoming the world’s back office” (Zuckerman
2004 p.1). The internet has allowed companies to access a never ending supply of
English speaking, educated and highly motivated workers who are happily willing
to take these jobs for 10 to 20% of an Americans wages. “Offshoring” is
taking over more professions also. Not only are they controlling the majority of
the high tech careers (Dell, AT&T, MCI, General Electric, etc.) but they are
now climbing up the food chain to jobs like financial analysis, engineering,
legal work, design, medical services, and accounting
Many American
companies are continually off-shoring jobs as a way to cut costs and compete with
other companies. This search around the world for cheap labor has represented at
least $19.7 billion in lost U.S. wages in 2003 alone. So you can imagine how
much money our economy has lost by now. It makes me wonder if there are going to
be any jobs left in the United States when our children graduate from college, and
whether or not they will be able to benefit from the expensive degree program
they just completed. With all the jobs being sent overseas, they may just end up
there as well! The top 10 offshoring companies in America combined have sent a
total of 100,000 jobs in 2005 alone (Outsource Outrage 2005). So many companies
have jumped on the “band-wagon” that you can very much guarantee that the
national minimum wage will not go up for a while. With the number of foreigners
working for 10 to 20% less than we do, why would a company want to pay us what
we deserve if they can just offshore the position, and get the job done for
less. It is surely just robbing the U.S. of jobs. So many companies are now
off-shoring that they are no longer just competing internationally, but now with
the rest of the world. With that said, you can guarantee that more professions
these days will start to diminish before our eyes.
If you have made a phone call to pay a bill recently, you may have had a hard time understanding who is on the other end of the line. Who knows who has access to your birth records, credit card numbers, medical records, police records, and your social security number. Many companies ensure that they would never offshore their own data security operations. I truly doubt they care to ask for our permission to offshore our own personal security information. In one case, some Indian workers were caught trying to extort money from an American company who deals with medical transcriptions. In another, a Pakistani sub-contractor threatened to post private medical records on the Internet from the medical center at U.C.S.F. unless the person who hired her paid her what she was owed (Who’s Reading Your Medical Records? 2005). Your information can and will soon be used for reasons beyond you, and since American privacy laws do not extend over our own borders, it will be hard if not impossible to do anything about it.
Some
companies have found ways to outsource within our borders to cut costs as well
as supply jobs to our own citizens. A
small company out of Tennessee called Healthcare Management Resources (HMR), who
is a hospital business office outsourcing company, has opened up a facility in a
small rural area of Tennessee. The president of HMR Dennis Schwartz
says that “hiring rural
Americans can save money, keep costs low, and keep the U.S. economy strong”.
Another company named Alpine Access, a call center provider based out of
Colorado, has also found their own way around offshore outsourcing. They have
created a virtual call center with employees working from home, taking calls
over the Internet. This has reduced costs and increased revenue per call
offered, per sale, and customer satisfaction has gone way up. Schwartz of HMR
say that “every company who’s even thinking of outsourcing abroad should be
required to reevaluated their plans and look at rural American
options”(Alternatives to Offshore Outsourcing 2004). So it just goes to show that there are other ways to
effectively cut costs other than sending jobs overseas. It just takes some
critical thinking from above. Some companies have decided to do this through
union representation. This alone gives the choice to
Some
companies are outsourcing without taking money away from Americans. Others have
followed the leader. Some have fell into bankruptcy because they simply cannot
compete. Most companies are not even thinking twice about who is on the other
end of the chopping block. They see an opportunity to save money, and they take
it. They see someone cheaper to employ, consider them hired! They are not even
remotely worried about those of us who have families. They are worried about
their own families, and are just completely overwhelmed with the greed of making
more money. They say money is the root of all evil. What do you think?
References
What Do We Do About Outsourcing? (2005).
Retrieved June 10, 2006 from
www.outsourceoutrage.com
Who’s Reading Your Medical Records? (2005) Retrieved June 10, 2006 from
www.outsourceoutrage.com
Zuckerman,
M.B. (Feb. 9 2004) The Case of the
Missing Jobs. U.S. News & World Report, Vol.136 Issue 5, 67-68
Sweeney, J.J.
(Mar. 31, 2004) Outsourcing robs U.S. jobs. USA Today 22a
Alternatives
to Offshore Outsourcing. (2004) Leader
to Leader, Vol. 2004 Issue 34, 60-61. Hoboken, New Jersey:
John Wiley and
Sons Inc.