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Thursday, February 26, 2004
OTB points to Thomas Friedman in the NY Times, on outsourcing:
Yes, I want to be able to huff and puff about complex issues — like outsourcing of jobs to India — without any reference to reality. Unfortunately, in this life, I’m stuck in the body of a reporter/columnist. So when I came to the 24/7 Customer call center in Bangalore to observe hundreds of Indian young people doing service jobs via long distance — answering the phones for U.S. firms, providing technical support for U.S. computer giants or selling credit cards for global banks — I was prepared to denounce the whole thing. “How can it be good for America to have all these Indians doing our white-collar jobs?” I asked 24/7’s founder, S. Nagarajan.
Well, he answered patiently, “look around this office.” All the computers are from Compaq. The basic software is from Microsoft. The phones are from Lucent. The air-conditioning is by Carrier, and even the bottled water is by Coke, because when it comes to drinking water in India, people want a trusted brand. On top of all this, says Mr. Nagarajan, 90 percent of the shares in 24/7 are owned by U.S. investors. This explains why, although the U.S. has lost some service jobs to India, total exports from U.S. companies to India have grown from $2.5 billion in 1990 to $4.1 billion in 2002. What goes around comes around, and also benefits Americans.
I don't always concur with Friedman, but this analysis hits the nail on the head. In a dynamic economy, resources must periodically be reallocated. If they weren't, we would still be travelling by rail, and telecom would likely be relegated to the use of Morse Code. In a sentence, technological advances are good for the economy, even if it means there is some short term upheaval.Labels: Archives_2004
.: posted by
Dave
11:57 AM
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