IBM Moving Developer Jobs Overseas 1346
helixcode123 writes "According to the New York Times (also on Yahoo News), IBM is planning on moving a substantial number of high level jobs overseas to 'India and other countries.' IBM argues, in essence, that they need to do this to stay competitive. The article
quotes that Forrester Research '...estimated that 450,000 computer industry jobs could be transferred abroad in the next 12 years, representing 8 percent of the nation's computer jobs.'"
I have a plan... (Score:5, Funny)
Re:I have a plan... (Score:4, Funny)
Re:I have a plan... (Score:3, Funny)
Plus, all those free cows roaming the streets!
And don't forget the lovely smell of the river. *hack, cough*
Paid $10,000/yr? I think not! (Score:5, Insightful)
Please.
What happens in a case like this is that a VP hears or is told by his underlings that his company can save significant amounts of money by shifting jobs overseas. He waits a bit, notices that some competitors have done so successfully. He reads a couple articles in Forbes (always enthusiastic about new trends, as their folks are terrified about missing one). They're from high-level execs from companies that have shown savings preening themselves and trying to build up their personal recognition by talking about what a good move it is.
He gets a group of people at his company to evaluate the possibility of moving jobs overseas. They, knowing that this is a pet project, work damn hard to show that doing so is profitable and hand him back the results. The company then contracts out to some company to assist in transitioning jobs overseas.
Five layers down, a few months later, a bottom level manager is stuck with a mandate that he hire only (for example) Indian workers unless he can show good cause otherwise. He doesn't really care about company money -- as a matter of fact, if he's significantly under budget, his budget for next quarter will be simply cut to match updated expectations. He only cares that the job gets done (the one thing that *will* make his boss tromp on him). He simply finds the company in India with the best reputation, and ignores cost. He doesn't care.
A couple of Indian businesspeople start a company, grab a few Indian folks with a reputation, probably bootstrapping their new (or existing) company with some foreign (American, European) people who are well-known and can give the company an appearance of strong competency.
Prices start out somewhat low, but rapidly rise. The consulting company wants to jack prices as high as possible, and the manager contracting out doesn't care about cost (up to his budget). They hit near-US prices. If managers were worried about cost, US-based contractors wouldn't be paid what they are today.
Moving jobs to India won't have a major long-term improvement in savings.
However, it will move a significant chunk of the world's wealth, which has been very much tied up in the US, over to India. Smart investors can, as always, take advantage of the situation by investing in emerging firms overseas.
Re:Paid $10,000/yr? I think not! (Score:4, Insightful)
1. The wealth in the US is primarily held by "the captains of industry" who are the same people sending all this work away. They will continue to make money from these companies. It is the employees in the trenches who will pay the price. Even when things get bad, the majority of the people in the higher echelons are sufficiently wealthy to ride out the repercussions of their actions.
2. By definition, the amount being spent in other countries is relatively small, otherwise this wouldn't be happening. Other countries are not going to get rich off this, not even by their own standards. There will be no cleansing redistribution of hoarded US wealth. The poor will not enjoy the luxuries of American standards of living. A great equalization is not just around the corner.
3. The good old entrepreneurial spirit ensures those running the offshore development companies are looking at wealthy American corporate officers as a role model. They want a cut of that pie, and coming from less well-developed nations, and probably a less comfy background, they are probably even more ruthlessly unconcerned about stepping on their fellow citizens to get it. Consequently, you will end up with the same situation overseas, where the top few are doing well (by their standards) and their workers are doing slightly better than average, at best. This will be worse outside the US as those other countries rarely have the kinds of anti-exploitation protections in place that US workers enjoy, and it is to the advantage of the governments of those countries to avoid that kind of protection to encourage further US investments.
Middle- and even low-end managers are very much involved in budgetary concerns in large companies. The problem is, they have no choice. Where I work, it was recently mandated that MOST work (nearly three quarters) must be done by Indians. Ok, they said "offshore" so we have a few Russians in the mix, but it's mostly Indians. The costs will rise due to natural market forces, not because managers don't care. It has already been documented that offshore development costs a great deal more now, across the board, than it used to.
This problem will not affect the US alone. Read The Register. Jobs are already being lost in the UK. The India and China have more than enough warm bodies available to completely trash the economies of the rest of the civilized world. It has been said that the Japanese never considered WWII to have ended, they merely shifted to an economic form of warfare. They may have been on to something. I do not believe India has any dark intent, they are merely looking out for themselves, and I lay the blame on US companies for selling out their own people -- but I believe the US may have no choice but to take a dim view of this. Unfortunately there seems to be no good solution.
Finally, eventually the same problem will hit India. They will experience their bubble, and it won't last as long as it did here because they have less to offer. I have already seen one news story about fears in India about losing their jobs to literally-dirt-cheap offshore contractors in the Philipenes and the former Soviet republics. It's only a matter of time.
I see no end to this, and I believe it will cause severe and long-lasting damage to the US economy. And don't be so naive as to believe the rest of the world can withstand long-term major economic distress in the US.
Re:I have a plan... (Score:4, Funny)
Woohoo, IBM is paying us to move overseas! Isn't this great guys? I wonder if they will offer free roundtrip airfare on the weekend back to the states...
Re:I have a plan... (Score:4, Insightful)
Stop your crying. Listen, this has been happening in all industries since the dawn of the industrial age. Remember, the NorthEast US used to make textiles. Sugar Cane used to be grown in Hawaii. Steel used to be made to in Pittsburgh. And, televisions once were made here as well.
Programming is simply a commodity. I oughta know, I am a programmer. My job will go overseas sometime soon. I'm just trying to make as much money as possible beforehand, in the opes that I am prepared.
Re:I have a plan... (Score:5, Interesting)
You have a bank. That bank runs on a mainframe. That mainframe is programmed in something like COBOL or somesuch. There's a problem getting COBOL programmers. Not many people want to learn or work with COBOL any more, so when these existing programmers retire or die (which will cause the pool of COBOL programmers to dwindle 15% in the next decade), they're going to be hard to replace. But in India there's a crapload of people willing to do the work. It would be considerably cheaper to outsource the maintenance on the existing system than it would be to rewrite it in flavor-of-the-month language/platform, so to India the jobs go.
Yes, throw in the factor of "lay of tons of people about to retire and outsource them now" and the situation gets all shitty, but why doesn't it ever occur to people that sometimes the jobs are outsourced because no one wants to do it anymore?
A place I interviewed at outsources their document imaging to India - and the nature of the business meant that millions and millions of documents are done this way. True, they saved a lot of money by not paying rows and rows of Americans a minimum wage, but the other problem was that there simply weren't enough Americans willing to do it, period.
Re:I have a plan... (Score:4, Insightful)
There are a few places where you can't practically outsource a job. Ever tried outsourcing your car repair to India to fix its air conditioning? Fixing things like air conditioning can be very labor intensive, easily a full day in some cases. It was 105 degrees here in CA today, if my A/C was broken it'd be winter by the time someone in India could have in fixed and back to me. (Including the ocean voyage.)
Another case is health care, if you're sick in a hospital in San Francisco, does it matter that there are nurses in a 3rd World Country? Nope, all the matters is that we don't have enough nurses HERE.
You can't outsource the ice cream shop down the street, you can't outsource the gas station, you can't outsource moving someone from one house to another to somebody in India. You can't outsource services that require a "personal touch."
Here's the plan: Develop the "personal touch" that the person in India can't. Expect to have to change careers. Accept that the 90s are over and you can't work at Starbucks for $10/hr until the economy improves. What you did in the past may not necessarily be what you do in the future, but make a plan for when the future throws you a curve ball.
Re:I have a plan... (Score:5, Interesting)
Programming is simply a commodity. I oughta know, I am a programmer. My job will go overseas sometime soon. I'm just trying to make as much money as possible beforehand, in the opes that I am prepared.
I'm a programmer too, and I find little logic in your comment. Why should a company which is based in the U.S. be allowed to benefit from the infrastructure here while offshoring jobs? Why should the company get a free ride when their employees no longer pay U.S. taxes or pay into Social Security, and the company no longer pays the mandatory matching contribution? Sure, the company might make more money in the short run (and shareholders in whatever country make a few pennies), but it is at the expense of the American taxpayer. Companies that offshore their labor should do the right thing and offshore their headquarters and management as well, so they can adequately supervise their operations.
Since U.S. executive compensation is so horribly out of whack compared to the average worker's in comparison to the rest of the world (over 500:1 at last count), why aren't the executives' jobs offshored first? That would be the most logical place to start cutting costs and improving profits. And if managerial brains are not a commodity, what is? IBM's position is: "Ooh, ooh, other companies are doing it, so we gotta do it too." I liked the old IBM better. Then they had real management that appreciated the fact that the current employees made the company what it was.
Re:I have a plan... (Score:4, Funny)
Re:I have a plan... (Score:4, Insightful)
How dare you benefit from the infrastructure here while offshoring the manufacture of your clothes and appliances!? Why should you get a free ride when the people who make those things for you no longer pay US taxes or pay into Social Security?!
Re:I have a plan... (Score:5, Interesting)
Originally it was just to protect sugar growers, but after corn syrup became the number one sugar substitute, it's now used to keep domestic sugar prices higher than corn.
Why would this be that important? Well because the first political primary is in Iowa, of course, corn capital of the world. Historians will look back at the US and wonder why in the hell corn farmers had such a huge impact on the policies of the most powerful nation in the world.
Re:I have a plan... (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:I have a plan... (Score:3, Insightful)
However, if you are truely good, creative, proactive and original you will always find good work (or create it).
But if you are a typical CS graduate who says "all jobs are going overseas and there is nothing on a plate for me here" I have no sympathy.
Re:I have a plan... (Score:4, Informative)
With unemployment higher than it's been in decades and companies sending thousands of jobs overseas, this is a bad thing.
Dell starting sending jobs overseas this year too and my department was the very first to go. It was my early Christmas present.
I'm just spending my time off learning more *nix flavors & learning c++ & Perl.
Re:I have a plan... (Score:4, Insightful)
You're only fucked if you end up one of those computer guys who sits on
Basically, the world does not revolve around anyone except big CEOs. Hey, maybe you could change majors.
Re:I have a plan... (Score:4, Insightful)
Hi. I also received my BSc just as the dust from the IT market collapsing was starting to settle. Here are some random pieces of advice for you, they served me pretty well:
Keep all this in mind. And keep one ear open all the time - lean on your friends for leads, read the paper, start applying for positions now. And when that opportunity for an IT job comes along, jump on it and pound it into submission - I did, and I'm still holding that job almost two years later.
Good luck.
Re:I have a plan... (Score:3, Interesting)
And guess what, India is an Affirmative action country.
So what would happen if American's moved to India, protested for jobs under India Affirmative Action, and then requested US salaries since they are still US citizens working for a US company?
Re:I have a plan... (Score:3, Informative)
Um, they wouldn't get hired. Hate to be the one to break it to you, but affirmative action doesn't let you demand triple salary here; it's something you can sue for when the company shows a pattern of hiring against a group when there are equivalent workers available. That's why, even though PA had 1-1-1-1 laws for
Re:I have a plan... (Score:3, Insightful)
"It's in India" DOES cut it I think you'll find. Once you are in India you are subject to Indian law and Indian trade practices, any US law/custom has nothing whatsoever to do with anything in India. If they want to pay you 50 Rupees a month they can, just as you can refuse to work for that sort of money.
Welcome to the global free market.
Re:I have a plan... (Score:4, Interesting)
India has around 1500 distinct dialects of 110 languages, of which 19 are official. When Indians with different languages want to speak to each other, especially about technical matters, they tend to use one of the official languages: English.
Incidentally, language is one of the barriers for hiring cheap overseas help -- in some situations you want someone with more than an average English language skill, and while there are lots of really good linguists in India and elsewhere, they don't tend to stay to work a tech job at $150-300 biweekly pay. Thus you get error messages in Indlish stating "[process name] failed to restarted", "Error is occurred" and default menu choices for nine different languages -- all Indian. I'm not kidding -- these are all real life examples from major apps I work with daily, where the development has been outsourced
--
*Art
Re:I have a plan... (Score:4, Insightful)
Ha ha, only serious :)
Once enough of these jobs are located in India, the wages companies will have to offer Indian workers will rise.
Until that happens, those of us in the Western world can invest in companies that are relocating or doing outsourcing work. As these companies become more profitable, their shareholders can win too.
What's that you say? Shareholders? Who are they to profit? Oh, those horrible corporations making scads of money, setting up a new aristocracy of shareholders as the companies they own become more profitable? Oh, the horror! How dare they! How exclusionary, how elitist! Damn those corporations with their Congress-bought laws that prevent Joe Sixpack from joining the New Elite by, umm... opening up a brokerage account, hey, that was easy, but I'm sure the Evil Business Conspirators exclude undesirable rabble from, umm... buying shares with the, umm... click of a mouse. Umm, but it's all a part of the violence inherent in the system! Yeah! Help, help, I'm bein' repressed!
Re:I have a plan... (Score:3, Insightful)
Once enough of these jobs are located in India, the wages companies will have to offer Indian workers will rise.
You know there's almost a billion people in India, right? And even with our current job situation in the US, wages have fallen through the floor. How many of these jobs do expect to be created in India? 100 million? Think.
Damn those corporations with their Congress-bought laws that prevent Joe Sixpack from joining the New Elite by
Re:I have a plan... (Score:4, Insightful)
Ah, the first signs of enlightened argument.
You know there's almost a billion people in India, right? And even with our current job situation in the US, wages have fallen through the floor. How many of these jobs do expect to be created in India? 100 million? Think.
Because clearly, the entire billion-strong population of India are computer programmers. Also, because Visual C++ has such wonderful Hindi support, as well as the other 17 languages recognized by their constitution.
Also, there's such a strong tech sector there, and they've all got such easy access to PCs.
So as long as you're being sarcastic at someone else for thinking things through, you might try it yourself. He didn't say they'd go up to American salaries, but he's right, they certainly will go up; this is just how supply and demand works. There is
Damn those corporations with their Congress-bought laws that prevent Joe Sixpack from joining the New Elite by, umm... opening up a brokerage account, hey, that was easy
Remember: JOE SIXPACK NO LONGER HAS A JOB.
Isn't it nice when the person that replies to you in a yelling fashion is yelling exactly what you're being sarcastic about? Here's a hint: the reason he was making it seem uncertain is that he was talking about a steel worker going online and becoming an online broker. It's a fantasy; the market doesn't make money, it only exchanges it. And it's generally the untrained that are doing the losing, despite the legions of Slashdotters who are sure that they missed the RedHat IPO boat but the next one's on its way.
Please stop jumping on posts you clearly don't grok.
Re:I have a plan... (Score:3, Insightful)
Let's say that one percent of the people in a given population have what it takes to be a programmer.
That means there are about 10 million people primed and ready for action over there.
How about china? 16 million...
US is down there at 2.5 million... how many programming jobs in the world do you think there need to be?
I know I'm looking to get out.
I guess... (Score:3, Funny)
My only question is, if you have questions with the code, aren't you going to need a translator for the comments?
int a; #Es un variable para el funcion de la red.
American Programmer: Buh?
Re:I guess... (Score:4, Funny)
Huh? What file, why, when and a loop?
Re:I guess... (Score:3, Funny)
Re:I guess... (Score:5, Informative)
English is the international language for software development. Most companies that have overseas work, or open operations will have business-level English speakers at hand for this stuff. We have 3 Indians here, all of whom speak excellent English (although one has an accent exactly like Apu) just for that reason.
And what's a network function variable?
Re:I guess... (Score:4, Funny)
Most educated indians can read and write english (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:I guess... (Score:4, Funny)
Wait, people comment code? And here I thought I had an eccentric hobby.
Guess it's time to move back to
Time zone difference seen as an advantage? (Score:3, Insightful)
I wonder if the time zone difference might be seen as an advantage, i.e., as a way to have skilled, white-collar employees working on a problem 24/7 without having to pay them a p
Re:I guess... (Score:3, Informative)
IBM isn't hiring these guys; instead, IBM would be paying some sort of Indian-Middleman-Company(TM) to.
Actually, IBM India [ibm.com] is large and growing very quickly. I can't find any information on the number of employees there, but I'll bet it's close to 10,000.
reduce costs? (Score:5, Interesting)
well.... it works like this (Score:5, Funny)
Re:reduce costs? (Score:5, Insightful)
Thanks to globalization, the middle class will find themselves increasingly distanced from the wealthy. The IBM situation is merely one example of this.
Maybe it's time to get realistic. (Score:5, Insightful)
There is a remarkably arrogant attitude here in the US that we Americans are born with a soverign right to get paid more than someone with equivilant skills in other countries, and the coming years are going to give a lot of Americans expecting to live better than their foreign counterparts a serious moment of pause.
IBM needs programmers. They can hire one American, or three people in another country. To a business, it's a no brainer. Sensible economics. Will it have a downard effect on the standard of living in the US? Yes, probably. Maybe we're due (or overdue) for that to happen.
Everyone is forgetting Adam Smith (Score:5, Insightful)
Behind every producer is a consumer. If you artificially inflate the price of a good because of protectionist policies, like preventing the production process to go overseas, then the consumer suffers.
For example, if you were forced to buy $200 shoes in California because the governor prevented shoe production going to Kentucky that would make the shoes $100, you'd be pretty pissed off as a consumer.
Likewise, behind every corporation is a stockholder, who could be you or me, who doesn't get a good return on investment because it prevents the company from acting competitively. Perhaps it's not in your interest as a producer because it'll mean losing your job, but you are not the only American citizen involved in the American economy. There are citizens who buy IBM's services who would like it to be cheaper and better.
Re:reduce costs? (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:reduce costs? (Score:4, Insightful)
This happens!
Lean and mean 1970's SONY repleaces fat-and-bloated RCA
Lean and mean 2010's Samsung replaces fat-and-bloated SONY
Lean and mean 1970's Honda replaces fat-and-bloated AMC
Lean and mean 2010's Hyundai replaces fat-and-bloated Honda
Re:reduce costs? (Score:3, Insightful)
Bullshit. "They" ARE the quality top management.
Do you really think that there aren't any smart, charismatic, suitably amoral businessmen in China?
Do I need to point out specific instances of managers lining their pockets at the expense (direct or otherwise,) of share-holders?
Now, how many instances do you know of where shareholders force out their overpayed management? I know of several insta
Re:reduce costs? (Score:5, Funny)
I'm sure that someone with a higher IQ than the next 10 average customers in line combined wouldn't be good. I had a hard enough time dealing with idiot customers who couldn't figure out how to articulate their order when I worked there as a kid. I can imagine now:
Customer: I want 3 happy meals and 2 big mac meal deals.
Me: What kind of happy meals?
Customer: What kind are there?
Me: Its on the menu. The same place its been since I was 17 years old and working at this joint.
Customer: Hmm...lets see...where is it?
Me: *sigh* in the corner...hamburger, cheesburger, or mcnuggets?
Customer: All hamburger.
Me: Ok, what kind of drink with those?
Customer: With what?
Me: What were we just talking about? Wasn't it happy meals? What kind of drink with the happy meals?
Customer: oh, orange sprite (the list of drinks would have sprite follow orange on the menu, so it was common to have people order "orange sprite")
Me: No, its either orange or its sprite. Which one?
Customer: But it says orange sprite right there.
Me: Oh, so you couldn't find the damn happy meal, but can find the one spot on the menu where the order in which the choices of drink flavor are enumerated is a little ambiguous? It also appears to say diet coke ice-tea there too, but you know that would taste like shit and wouldn't order that. So, no orange-sprite, just orange or sprite. They are mutually exclusive, DO YOU KNOW WHAT THAT MEANS?!?
Customer: ok, orange. I also want ketchup only on one of the happy meals, pickles only on one, and cheese only on one.
Me: Ok, first, why the hell didn't you specify the toppings were something other than the default back when we were standing on the imaginary circle in the imaginary state diagram that everyone in the world except you seems to follow when ordering fast food? And there is no CHEESE on a HAMBURGER you fucktard! Sorry, state token has expired, YOU EAT THE DEFAULT BIATCH!
Customer: You're rude, I want to speak with your manager!
Manager: What seems to be the problem here?
Customer: I was just trying to order some happy meals and your employee here was being rude and won't give me orange sprite.
Manager: Orange sprite? We don't have orange sprite.
Customer: It says so right there on the menu.
Manager: Hmmm....I see all the drinks, but I don't see orange sprite.
Me: She thinks because orange is next to sprite that it means orange sprite numnutz.
Manager: Oh, we're not allowed to mix drinks.
Me: Can we get this over with please?
Manager: Patience my young padawan burger flipper.
Me: Ok, thats it....where is the nearest sharp instrument? Or would you prefer to be stuffed into the ice machine?
Ah, to be young again....
Works for me. (Score:4, Funny)
That means that 92% of us will still be around.
Yippee!!
ee
yikes! (Score:3, Funny)
It wouldn't do any good (Score:5, Insightful)
Honestly, did you 'look for the union label' before buying your clothing? Why do you think anyone else is going to care if their software was made in the USA? Ultimately, they just want the lowest price.
The situation sucks, but I'm not sure what we can do about it. Maybe tax breaks for companies that hire American workers in America, but even that would probalby not helpt too much.
in the future (Score:5, Insightful)
"Grandpa, you're pulling my leg!"
Some history & background on H1B & offshor (Score:4, Informative)
Maybe your grandkids will be lucky and get into the India's future version of the H1B program to encourage tech workers to move and work there.
Seriously, there will always be a need for a highly skilled and highly educated workforce.
In case you're interested, here are some more links about this and other related issues that we have seen before.
Leaked: IBM Execs Urge Moving Jobs Offshore in Internal Teleconference
An internal recording of an IBM teleconference about moving jobs offshore was leaked [nytimes.com] (Google [nytimes.com]) to the New York Times by an upset employee. From the article: '...under increasing pressure to cut costs and build global supply networks... I.B.M. needed to accelerate its efforts to move white-collar, often high-paying, jobs overseas even though that might create a backlash among politicians and its own employees. "Our competitors are doing it and we have to do it," said Tom Lynch, I.B.M.'s director for global employee relations. He also said that 3 million service jobs were expected to shift to foreign workers by 2015 (based on a Forrester Research [slashdot.org] report, which represents about 2 percent of all American jobs) and that I.B.M. should move some of its jobs now done in the United States, including software design jobs, to India and other countries. Oracle plans to increase its jobs in India to 6,000 from 3,200, while Microsoft plans to double the size of its software development operation in India to 500 by late this year. Accenture has 4,400 workers in India, China, Russia and the Philippines.' Critics say 'schools will stop producing the computer engineers and programmers we need for the future' as a result of these moves. Listen to the IBM recording in Real format [nytimes.com] (direct link at pnm://audio.nytimes.com/audiosrc/2003/07/21/busine ss/20030722jobs.audio.rm [pnm]). More at the SJMN [siliconvalley.com], Inquirer [theinquirer.net], and CNN/Reuters [cnn.com]. Slashdot has discussed [slashdot.org] Global competition [fastcompany.com], offshore outsourcing [slashdot.org], lower cost replacement workers and the ensuing legal turmoil [slashdot.org] before.
To paraphrase from the movie Jerry Maguire:
It's not technology friends, It's technology business.
I'm going to go down for this. (Score:5, Insightful)
It also means that while developer positions are harder to come by, more jobs in other sectors will be created to satisfy the increased revenue IBM has available.
So, before you flame IBM try to see how this isn't a greed manuever but something that can benefit more people outside of the software development industry.
Re:I'm going to go down for this. (Score:3, Insightful)
Let's see and those jobs would be for:
Lawyers, Marketeers, Sales droids, and more Wall Mart clerks. Yipee! What a wonderful future we'll have.
Re:I'm going to go down for this. (Score:5, Informative)
The solution isn't to weep and wail and whinge, but to innovate. That's how the US got where it is in the first place. But you should understand it never stops. Free your mind and get rich!
The problem is the lack of social equity (Score:5, Insightful)
Do we really want to 'Flint, Michigan' the entire high-tech industry? At the very least, lets insist that only countries with similar social standards as ours can get looked at for this kind of expatriation of jobs.
Personally, I'm not interested in returning to the days of the Industrial Revolution where workers had no rights-- cause thats what it's like in many third-world countries.
What the hell, lets just expatriate everything... I'm sure we can find dollar-a-day workers for it all over there-- course by then they'll be nobody to pay the lawyers and buy the goods they want to sell to us-- at least the lawyers will all die of hunger too, thats should be a good thing.
Re:I'm going to go down for this. (Score:4, Insightful)
Your lack of innovation doesn't mean that companies are required to help you in your laziness. If you truly believe you came first, you would take care of yourself instead of relying on others to do it.
Indians have obviously worked hard to get these types of deals worked out. Americans have become complacent. It happens in all industries until the next innovative push of technology.
Admit it... (Score:5, Insightful)
The meek might inheret the earth, but they'll be in India.
Disturbing... (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Disturbing... (Score:3, Insightful)
Dont feel too bad for yourself though, because while you may no longer be able to buy that awesome SUV you've always wanted, people in India are getting that health care they've always wanted.
Oh my god! (Score:5, Insightful)
That's just so wrong!
Re:Oh my god! (Score:5, Funny)
I hear they are going to change their name to Indian Business Machines
Third world (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Third world (Score:4, Insightful)
It's probably about the same cost to build a car in these countries as the US, but it costs a lot to actually ship automobiles by sea. American cars sold in Europe are generally made in Europe as well.
To ship your software product just takes a file transfer or at the most a CD via FedEx.
Plenty of American jobs still... (Score:5, Funny)
Don't be too perturbed if they make fun of your American accent though.
What's the alternative? (Score:3, Insightful)
Implications to Organizational/National Security (Score:4, Interesting)
The beginning of the end (Score:3, Insightful)
What we're pretty much seeing, yet again, is the valuation of the company over the individual. People like Larry Ellison and Bill Gates and pretty much every other CEO in the tech industry are getting richer and richer at the expense of the people who keep them there.
Where will this end? Equilibrium? I honestly can't see that happening. I'm pretty sure you could ship every technical job to India and China, and their cost of living, and hence their salaries, would still undercut the US by a massive margin. So what's to stop the flow? I think that legislation might be the only way. Hey, Mr Gates, if you want to use this country to stay rich, then you have to pay it back, your workforce has to be a certain percentage American.
Without that sort of thing, I worry, I honestly do. All I can try to do is be the best in the global market, not just the local market. But how good can I be. You can hire 5 or 10 Indians for what it takes to keep me in a job here in the States. I just can't compete any more.
Re:The beginning of the end (Score:3, Insightful)
We're still in the early evolution of megacorporations. Up until the 1950's it wasn't practical to manage a company as large as they come today. They haven't figured everything out yet.
They think they're making more money, but at some point they'll have taken all the good jobs--along with all the spending money--away from their most loyal customers. That's when they'll start reconsidering how
More outsourcing needed (Score:4, Interesting)
What are the boards going to do when they realize you can get a CEO for only 100k / year in India or Russia ? If Ed Whitacre (SBC) was replaced, the 82 million a year savings (yes, look it up) would nearly be enough to make SBC profitable, for the first time since they hired him !
Corporate Boards themselves are much cheaper overseas; in some cases you only have to go as far as Canada to get boards that work for a tenth the price of boards in the United States.
These changes are the inevitable reflection of the market, and passing laws against it just damages our competitiveness. American CEOs will always be able re-train to other jobs to stay competitive.
Best of all, the savings to the bottom line can be feed into tax-free dividends, which help keep the stock market strong.
The IPs of those who respond against this post or mod it down will be reported to Asscraft as Al Qeada agents.
Bad for us, good for all (Score:5, Insightful)
1. Brush up your Hindi/Cantonese/Tagalog/Mandarin.
2. While we in the US can keep crying about this (and will) don't you think it is a good move for the globe? This is practical wealth redistibution. Instead of 1% of the world population, now the wealth generated by IT can be shared with 20-30%. Isn't it just fair? Specially if you notice that this is not only an IT related phenomenon.
Effactively the US corporate giants (mostly Republicans) are doing what the liberals have been preaching for a long time (not Democrats, but Greens).
What do ya know?
Re:Bad for us, good for all (Score:4, Insightful)
Any thoughts on another line of work? (Score:3, Interesting)
I'm not going to get stuck like people in the muscle industries have in the last few decades, clinging to the shrinking number of jobs for less pay for more work. I'm still in a good position, it's time to start gearing up to switch to an industry that's not getting shipped overseas.
Whadya think? Management's probably good -- those fuckers will never reduce their own numbers or salaries, but I hate sitting in meetings and being useless. Health care? Big barrier to entry, though... What else isn't going away?
Re:Any thoughts on another line of work? (Score:5, Insightful)
Get involved in infrastructure work - all the suits left here aren't going to be communicating with the slave labor over there via the US Mail - they'll still need computing infrastructure here, like Internet access, email, and decision support systems.
I would say that you should look at computer security, but over the years I've tried to train a lot of people in it (my field) and I've become convinced that it just takes a certain kind of person to do it - you're pretty much always interested in it, or you're not and can't get that way by training.
I've got some karma to spend, so I'll say it - a certain amount of this will be good for the industry as a whole. A lot of the people getting weeded out by this outsourcing are the ones who took their classes to become a developer and "make the big bucks". Over time we'll realize that IT in the US will be left with the people who think up the cool stuff to do and leave it to the overseas grunts to actually execute.
That said, I also want to say that I'll be the first to laugh when one of these countries (probably not India, though) becomes the next Iraq and some US companies get put in a serious bind.
As for those saying that this will redistribute the wealth globally - get real! We're creating a new overseas worker class, not new overseas companies. The jobs are going there because the people will work for peanuts, not because they have great skills and deserve huge salaries.
Get off your ass and learn. (Score:5, Insightful)
I say: Good. It's about damn time.
Why does America deserve to have all the wealth that it has? If someone in India can do my job at 1/10th the cost, why exactly should anyone pay me to do it? Simply to support my American way of life? No. The American way of life is not a birthright. It has to be earned. You earn it by doing what those guys in India and China and Russia can't do. You earn it by innovating, and by taking risks. You earn it by seizing on oppertunities that those guys simply do not have access to.
It's time to wake up people. Being able to sling a little code, set up a webserver and talk your way around a design meeting is not going to cut it anymore. You need to get off your ass, put the time in on the weekends and:
1) Identify what it is that you can do that cannot be done by anyone else (or at least, anyone who is willing to work for your salary)
2) Train yourself to do it well.
Otherwise you will not have a job. Simple as that. Just like during the manufacturing boom in the 50's and 60's, America (and Western Civilization in general) had gotten fat and lazy in the last few years. Now there is simply no reason why you are worth 10 times more than the rest of the world. So you had better come up with a reason, or move to China.
Re:Get off your ass and learn. (Score:5, Insightful)
While I think you have a valid point in your post, I do object to this - there is one very good reason why Americans are worth 10 times more than the rest of the world - because the economic capital (read: technological infrastructure/overal education level/economic rules) developed in the US is far greater than India's.
I don't think it's accurate to say that Americans got fat and lazy all of a sudden. Rather, it's that in 1980, American developers were (let's say) 20 times more productive than Indian developers, because the infrastructure in the US for computer development was (let's say) 40 times more developed than India's. Today, US developers still make 20 times as much, but are only 10 times as productive - because in that time, India has caught up in terms of computer education, internet infrastructure, etc.
The numbers are made up, but you get the idea.
Re:Get off your ass and learn. (Score:3, Interesting)
Why should I suck it up and get reamed up the ass so some overpaid CEO can get another multi-million dollar bonus for cutting costs again and providing yet another stellar earnings statement for the latest quarter?
We're not talking about the local iceman losing his job because everyone moved to electric refridgerators or the guy running the local Singer shop going under because no one makes their own clothes anymore.
wrong (Score:5, Insightful)
because we deloped global capitalism.
Because we set the standar for other to achieve.
"1) Identify what it is that you can do that cannot be done by anyone else (or at least, anyone who is willing to work for your salary)"
Well, that would be aahhhh nobody.
"2) Train yourself to do it well."
I do programming well. you would be hard pressed to find an area of programming I have not done. yet, I still will loose a job overseas.
Nobody has gotten fat and lazy in the last few years. That is always the perception because we work harder then most countries, but we also play harder.
well, thats a great attitude you got there, lets see what you have to say when your living under a bridge.
Hell yeah, America first.
Re:Get off your ass and learn. (Score:3, Insightful)
We are worth 10 times more than the rest of the world, because we BUY the pro
Re:Get off your ass and learn. (Score:3, Insightful)
The reason that I cannot compete on price with that Indian developer has nothing to do with my willingness to work and everything to do with the fact that I will always pay more for real estate in America.
Even Arkansas farmland is going to be more expensive than a good place in India.
Not to mention that goods and services here are more expensive because everyone around here has to pay the same real estate prices.
If I had a million dollars right now, I'd be investing
You Competely Missed The point (Score:5, Insightful)
Working 60 hours a week, or 80 hours a week will not save your job. Please re-read step #1 carefully:
1) Identify what it is that you can do that cannot be done by anyone else
A programmer in India can obviously work however many hours per week that you work +1, for whatever you get paid -1. Working hard is not a differentating factor between you and Samir over in India.
I am NOT just saying "work harder". Not at your current job, anyway. What i'm saying is that you cannot stick you head in the sand, casually learn whatever new programming language or operating system is in vouge at the time, and expect to keep your job. You have to LOOK AHEAD and LOOK AROUND.
Looking ahead means figuring out what skills will be desirable in the next 2-5 years that would be difficult to learn overseas, and learning them. These skills may not be limited to Information Technology. If, for example, you want to be a coder, and you think that Informatics (Medicine + IT) is the next big thing (as many people do), then you might want to take some classes at your local university on medicine and biology. That's something that a coder in china probably won't be able to do. Combining domain knowledge that is specific to U.S. companies with your IT knowledge will make you more qualified that those guys offshore.
Looking around means trying to find oppertunities here in the states that are not available to overseas developers. Do you think that an overseas developer can afford the $10,000 in airfare it would take to go to a professional conference like JavaOne? You, however, might be able to make a day trip out of it, learn a few cutting edge skills, and meet a few contacts that those developers in India simply won't have access to.
In the end, it does no good to argue with me. This is going to happen, just like it did in the 70's. You can spend you time whining about capitalism, globalization and the evil multinational corporations... OR you can deal with the situation by making yourself irreplaceable. Not by working harder, or taking less money, but by thinking ahead.
Re:You have missed the entire point. (PLEASE READ) (Score:4, Insightful)
The reason that companies look for cheaper labor is so that they can produce cheaper product. Every dollar they can save is another unit that they can sell for profit.
A common misconception is that companies are the sole beneficiaries of increased revenue. They are already maximizing their profit. It's maxxed out. They will milk every single dollar out of the revenue that they can at any given second. Since companies are already at a maximum profit ratio for their revenue, they need to increase revenue by reducing costs and increasing output.
When these jobs get send over, it's true that some workers will get paid less... but the prices for the products go down as well. Every company that is implementing an IBM solution then saves some money in software costs. Some of that money goes to profit the fat cats, some of that money goes to expand their respective businesses. This growth caused by cheaper prices leads to more and more jobs.
Who loses? The no longer "needed" workers who must retrain and reinvest themselves. Who wins? Everyone else. Cheaper prices for the direct beneficiaries, greater growth for the companies using said products, greater P/E for the stock holders of the beneficiaries, then more jobs for the general workers.
As far as your "investor" class? Look around, we're all around. Pensions and 401k's are the largest block of capital of the planet. In fact, CalPERS typically owns 5% or so of every market in the world. That "investor" class that makes money, yeah, that's all of your workers you say are getting screwed.
This is a New World Order, it's a change from the socialistic trade practices of yesteryear for a time where the individual can do as they see fit.
Some people may be too blind to see the true effects of globalization. Too awed by the very visible negative effects, and too blind to the amazing almost intangible benefits. Everyone that loses a job that can be even kind of blamed on globalization does so, but no one goes to the store and says, "Wow, I'm so happy globalization makes it possible for me to buy three times the goods with my wages then I could have otherwise."
If globalization were truely a race to the bottom that you describe, then prices wouldn't be falling like they have been for ages. If globalization were truely the damning of the poor that you describe, then the liberalization of the Chinese economy would have been a disaster. Instead, 300 MILLION people were brought out of poverty.
300 MILLION. More humans were brought out of poverty by globalization in China alone than the entire population of the US.
The fact is, maybe the US doesn't have a competitive advantage in the basics of computer science as it did before. Then there's no reason to expect that Americans should be flocking in mass to basic computer science jobs. It's just stupid to overpay for labor like that. It's a waste of valuable resources that should be put to good use elsewhere.
For the programmers in the USA... (Score:3, Redundant)
It's always a good idea to have a backup plan.
best Indian engineers come to US (Score:5, Interesting)
While it is true that many technical jobs have been moved to India, the best Indian engineers actual come to the US to have jobs here.
CBS's 60 Minutes had a segment on students of the ultra-competitive Indian Institute of Technology [cbsnews.com] a while ago. And apparently all the graduates from IIT want to come to the US.
Therefore, I have the thesis that technical jobs in the US are simply getting more and more advanced, whlie "easier" technical jobs are being moved overseas.
Re:best Indian engineers come to US (Score:4, Insightful)
> in the US are simply getting more and more
> advanced, whlie "easier" technical jobs are
> being moved overseas.
No, this just means that the US has either still better living conditions* or just better propaganda than India.
Indian engineers wanting to come to the US might just mean they are ill-informed about the US.
*actually, I think living in the US isn't too bad. If I could freely choose where to live the US would definitely be somewhere in the top 20.
In India, Asok has an intern... (Score:5, Funny)
moving right along... (Score:3, Interesting)
Maybe I should move to Bangalore, use my established clients to continue work in the US, and use the drop in my own housing/personal/family expenses to remain competitive. My old college roomie did a version of this -- telecommuting to consulting gigs in Los Angeles from a very nice house in Arkansas. I can think of half a dozen places to go that wouldn't suck at all. Hell, given the way the state & federal economy's been run into the ground here in the US ($450B+ deficit!), maybe my kids will get a better public education abroad.
Then again, I find that if I drop the price for my services below a certain level, then the client no longer respects the work as coming from an expert (and thus exclusive) source. It's sad to think that I tend to get the most abuse from clients to whom I've given cut rates. Maybe I should raise my rates? If I keep my fees well above the internationally-outsourced folks, but below the top decile (easy targets for that 8%), I should be in good shape, no?
J
Saying this on /. may be suicide but.. (Score:5, Insightful)
Sure, there is science in the mix (mostly logic, math), but how many programmers actually make use of this stuff on a daily basis? Most programming that is done in industry is relatively routine stuff;
Code, Run, Debug, Repeat.
Only a lucky few are developing completely new algorithms, and doing what can really be called 'research'. The rest are just engineering jobs, if that.
Now the former, research-related stuff, will stay in the country. Our universities and research are still much better.
The latter type of programming, which unfortunately is what most people are doing, like writing VB programs to solve relatively simple tasks and such, cannot compete.
There is no reason to keep those jobs in the country if someone else can do the same thing cheaper.
And that's just fine with me. For nations like India, it's still one step up on the ladder of technology, and for us, it's a motivation to keep pushing upwards towards the new areas that really are "high-tech".
Re:Saying this on /. may be suicide but.. (Score:5, Insightful)
There are many instances in every job where a level of commonality is reached. In this level, a "trained monkey" could do the job. But that doesn't cast the entirety of the profession onto the manual-labor streetcorner.
I have wormed my way back into IT (serendipity played a large part of that, however), and I find myself writing a lot of procedures for others to follow. The procedures are for even the lay person to follow, since time is always of the essence. But it took my little skilled self to not only write them, but to come up with the need to have them written in the first place. Corporate memory arises from Human action, and those acts are skilled ones.
Added to this is the sad, sad truth that too many people cannot even construct logical thought processes necessary to be an effective professional. IT work is brutally logical and missing details leads to almost catastrophic results. IT is laboring under the weight of that old song or poem about For The Want of a Nail. The need for disciplined thinking alone puts such work into realm of "uncommonality".
In summary, yes, you are broadly correct that pushing VB routines around is more of a commodity skill and as such can be priced down to minima. However, programming itself is a profession requiring years of dedicated practice and study, and you will be hard pressed to demand a 4-year degree for a 4-year career, or a 16-yr-old's wages.
Re:Saying this on /. may be suicide but.. (Score:4, Insightful)
Um, I'd call engineering jobs "high-tech." I don't see why you are saying that high-tech implies research, the two are completely separate things.
From Central European perspective... (Score:5, Insightful)
I have a Masters Degree in Physics, and I am finishing my Masters thesis in Law. I'm 25 and still living with my parents in a flat (let's just say, that renting one room flat costs over 500 zlotys (half of my pay)) and I consider myself very lucky having a place to live, a job, and at least some perspectives.
So whenever some US corp. is moving out of US, we people from underdeveloped countries, are rather happy, as this means better future for us.
Effects of Free Software (Score:4, Insightful)
After reading the usual bitching and moaning about tech jobs going overseas, it struck me odd that the same people who are proponents of Free (not necessarily *free*) software are some of the loudest whiners. Ok, so you can charge for Free software, but once it is in the wild, then what? Well, you are shit out of luck! Unless you can talk a user of your software into a maintenance contract or whatnot, you are never going to see another penny from your software unless some do-gooder decides to pay for it even when they can get it for free.
Guess what? If I am a large multinational that makes, say, CRM software, and along comes some Free and kickass version that my customers start using then I start fucking laying people off or shipping my work overseas. Why? Because I am not making as much money. That in itself may not be too bad -- a little competition is a good thing -- but in this case now *no one* is making any money. Whoohooo!
People may want to see MS go down, and I can't necessarily say I am not one of them. However, stop for a minute and think of the mind-numbing and crippling effects that would have on the entire worldwide software industry. There are thousands and thousands of companies that make their money from supporting MS products, writing add-ins, etc... In the Seattle-area I would venture to guess that about 95% of the solutions providers and about 80% of the development shops rely on MS. MS goes away? Thousands and thousands of jobs go away as well. Fun fun.
</RantingTangent>
Outsourcing is the death of the US Middle Class (Score:3, Insightful)
Face it, technical jobs are becomming increasingly a commodity that can be filled as easily by someone in Bangalore as Boston. So, when the Joe CEO of Moneygrubberscorp realizes that he can slash costs by many times through overseas outsourcing, what do he's going to do? That's right, he sees that lower costs = higher profit = more money for Joe CEO, his cronies, and the all mightly shareholder. Almighty capitalism at its finest!
Unfortunatly, that means that means that the middle class workers he just eliminated are SOL. Their piece of the pie is gone, eaten up by Joe CEO so he can afford another villa in Switzerland. Poor John Programmer now must try to find another job - but unfortunatly, no other company can justify the cost to hire him.
As more companies outsource, those who don't, out of patriotism and respect for their countrymen, have higher costs, realize less profit, and lose their competiveness. Eventually, they will either: A) Be eaten by Microsoft / Oracle / etc B) Go out of business.
What does this mean? IT MEANS THAT SOON, THE ONLY COMPANIES LEFT WILL THE ONES WHO HAVE OUTSOURCED ALL THEIR WHITE COLLAR JOBS. John Programmer will have to find something that has not / can't be outsourced, such as the trite example of flipping burgers. Thus, bye bye middle class.
Who wins? Joe CEO, Moneygrubberscorp, its shareholders and all the other's companies like it make out big time by pocketing the difference between the salaries of thousands of John Programmers.
What can be done? I'm not going to preach here (I'll leave that for another time). Just be aware that this is happening and ITS ONLY A MATTER OF TIME BEFORE IT HAPPENS TO YOU!
Yay more Ramen and El Monteray Burritos! (Score:3, Funny)
So clever... (Score:4, Funny)
UNIONIZE (Score:5, Interesting)
Why aren't we unionized? What are the actual benefits, downsides, and what does it take to get there?
This is obviously the beginning of a downward spiral, so I say we should act now while we have a chance.
This is part of a larger problem in which everyone looks out for #1. If we would only concider our actions on the scope of our community (speaking nationally), things might be different... from copyright laws to workforce management.
Not sure if it's as scarey as it sounds... (Score:5, Insightful)
First, as more companies invest in places like India, wages will rise (just as they may fall in the US).
Second, developers in India will leave American companies and form spin-offs or direct competitors, which requires more local employees, reducing the number of developers available for the US firms, also driving up wages in India.
Third, India will eventually develop a market for software, rather than just be a supplier. As that market grows, more and more Indian developers will be employeed to fill the demand, and American companies can compete as well.
Fourth, many jobs can't or won't be moved over, and IT is in general still a growing field. Computers and software are even more ubiquitous than ever, and the demand for domestic workers will still exist.
Fifth, only large companies can really afford to do this. They're usually the shittiest jobs anyway; I'd rather sand-blast my ass-crack than work for IBM. Working for a small-to-medium sized company is far more exciting.
Wow! (Score:5, Funny)
I didn't know IBM had that kind of clout with Apple. Poor Steve, did he have any say in this at all? What about his family, are they moving too?
Re:this is becoming too repetitive now! (Score:5, Insightful)
That's like saying "Learn to swim better guys, you can out swim this tsunami!" as the tidal wave breaks over your head.
You think they don't have quality workers in India? You think the USA is the only place which has quality workers?
Now the game is all about price anyway, and we're way overpriced compared to quality workers in India. Time to learn how to fix cars or teeth.
Re:Nationalism (Score:3, Insightful)
Therein lies the problem, eh? Capitalism, i.e., "rob[bing] our citizen's of jobs in a effort to enrich few." is at the heart of our nations culture. You can't really blame IBM for the fact that American culture is - erm - cannibalistic.
Re:When all the jobs are gone here, (Score:5, Insightful)
What will happen is that the middle class will fade away, and we all will be liuving in run down shanties thankfull for the pittence they pay everybody in the world.
Re:When Economics Attacks (Score:4, Insightful)
No, but I bet my cost of living is at least 30 times higher. The falacy of your argument is that it doesn't take into account the differences in cost of living. I could not survive, to hell with keeping my house, on the wages of the people they are outsourcing these jobs to.
And where are the saved costs going? Will the price of IBM software and services go down? Or will the CEO get a fat bonus and the stockholders get a nice dividend?
Re:Slashdot economists, sheesh! (Score:4, Insightful)
More jobs to India, Indians have more money, Indians buy more stuff or capitally invest, this spreads around wealth, India is now a richer country, Indian salaries go up. The same thing already happened to Japan. Is Japan being a rich country good or bad for us? It is good. India getting richer will be the same.
I guess a lot of American IT people really are bad at math. Japan has a population of "only" 120 million, the US has 280 million, and India has about a billion. India could eat up not only every IT job in the US, but every job period, and still not be able to command anywhere near US salaries.
A few other points that make the Japan analogy false. Even in the 60's and 70's Japan had a much higher standard of living, and hence commanded higher pay, than India does. What's more, Japan basically built its economy on its own (albeit with the help of some serious protectionism). In the case of India, and to some extent China, US corporations are falling all over themselves to build up their economies both via capital investment, and more importantly, by handing them American expertise.