Even I have posted items on outsourcing to other countries, mostly India. However this little gem put my mind at ease (chuckle!)
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For Those Worried About Outsourcing
- Thread starter Onyxpurr
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sleipnir214
Programmer
What's that old Gospel lyric?
"Will the circle,
be unbroken..."
Want the best answers? Ask the best questions: TANSTAAFL!!
"Will the circle,
be unbroken..."
Want the best answers? Ask the best questions: TANSTAAFL!!
dilettante
MIS
sleipnir214
Programmer
Well, if this story is any indication, the IT support outsourcing should have used bats:
To use Dell as an example...
It's reasonable, I think, to assume Dell sells most of its computers in the contiguous U.S. And I think it's reasonable to expect that most of Dell's support calls will arrive between 7am US Eastern time and 9pm US Pacific time. Which is, I think, from 5:30pm to 10:30am Mumbai time.
Want the best answers? Ask the best questions: TANSTAAFL!!
To use Dell as an example...
It's reasonable, I think, to assume Dell sells most of its computers in the contiguous U.S. And I think it's reasonable to expect that most of Dell's support calls will arrive between 7am US Eastern time and 9pm US Pacific time. Which is, I think, from 5:30pm to 10:30am Mumbai time.
Want the best answers? Ask the best questions: TANSTAAFL!!
sleipnir214
Programmer
Sorry about that. I pasted the wrong link
Try this one:
Want the best answers? Ask the best questions: TANSTAAFL!!
Try this one:
Want the best answers? Ask the best questions: TANSTAAFL!!
GlenJohnson
MIS
I saw both Dilbert and the primate page. Hilarious. The company I work for recently did away with our IT jobs and put us out in the shop running machines. Cut our pay, then hired summer interns. STAY AWAY FROM ANY MANUFACTURING JOBS! Thinking about going back into nursing. I've been outsourced. ![[sadeyes]](/data/assets/smilies/sadeyes.gif "[sadeyes] [sadeyes]")
Glen A. Johnson
Johnson Computer Consulting
MCP W2K
glen@johnsoncomputers.us
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Glen A. Johnson
Johnson Computer Consulting
MCP W2K
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TimRegester
Technical User
My fave outsourcing story is this (not IT but symptomatic)
In the 1990s the UK government set up the Highways Agency to 'manage' the motorways and trunk roads (interstates in the US) They tendered on the basis of price.
One council had a direct labour force that previously gritted all the roads in the county in winter. They lost the contract for the Trunk roads etc but kept the littler roads as it were. The winning company for the trunk roads had no gritting lorries so outsourced to the council to do it for them.
The council were able to charge more per mile for this work than they charged previously, but had to use different grit and different lorries (with the appropriate logos on) so each night there were two fleets of lorries some travelling on ungritted Trunk roads to get to the little roads and one fleet travelling on ungritted little roads to get to the trunk roads.
Daft but true.
In the 1990s the UK government set up the Highways Agency to 'manage' the motorways and trunk roads (interstates in the US) They tendered on the basis of price.
One council had a direct labour force that previously gritted all the roads in the county in winter. They lost the contract for the Trunk roads etc but kept the littler roads as it were. The winning company for the trunk roads had no gritting lorries so outsourced to the council to do it for them.
The council were able to charge more per mile for this work than they charged previously, but had to use different grit and different lorries (with the appropriate logos on) so each night there were two fleets of lorries some travelling on ungritted Trunk roads to get to the little roads and one fleet travelling on ungritted little roads to get to the trunk roads.
Daft but true.
Currently, a lot of the world's software writing is 'outsourced' in America, your products and especially Microsoft have put foreign companies out of business. Now a lot of the work is moving to places like India, where there are clever and well-educated people with a lower standard of living. Is that so unfair?
sleipnir214
Programmer
GwydionM:
Are you saying that any time you buy a product, you have outsourced a service? Even if you have never produced that product nor intend to produce that product?
Want the best answers? Ask the best questions: TANSTAAFL!!
Are you saying that any time you buy a product, you have outsourced a service? Even if you have never produced that product nor intend to produce that product?
Want the best answers? Ask the best questions: TANSTAAFL!!
The way basic capitalism works, GwyndionM, is that the best companies with the best products survive. Inferior products only survive under protection (i.e. tariffs). So if Microsoft put an operating system company out of business in India, I'm not going to cry a river.
And nobody claims that software jobs going to "well-educated people with a lower standard of living" in India is unfair. What people say is that:
(a) USA's tax dollars shouldn't be spent to employ programmers in India (which makes sense)
(b) In the long run, having your Intellectual Property in-house outweighs the cost benefits of outsourcing. My company is completely turning its IT around and has begun "insourcing" again, which I believe proves the point.
RJ
************
RudeJohn
************
And nobody claims that software jobs going to "well-educated people with a lower standard of living" in India is unfair. What people say is that:
(a) USA's tax dollars shouldn't be spent to employ programmers in India (which makes sense)
(b) In the long run, having your Intellectual Property in-house outweighs the cost benefits of outsourcing. My company is completely turning its IT around and has begun "insourcing" again, which I believe proves the point.
RJ
************
RudeJohn
************
sleipnir214
Programmer
rudejohn:
Please, let GwydionM tell it. I really am looking forward to hearing the inferences that prompted that statement.
Want the best answers? Ask the best questions: TANSTAAFL!!
Please, let GwydionM tell it. I really am looking forward to hearing the inferences that prompted that statement.
Want the best answers? Ask the best questions: TANSTAAFL!!
This may be a bit off topic, but since you asked, I'll explain.
The doctrine 'capitalism works' is proved by applying the lable capitalism to anything that works. Anything that doesn't work gets classed as non-capitalist.
China currently gets lumped in with the 'capitalists' in the media. Actual working capitalists or businessmen know better, that markets are very far from open and that 'connections' are everything. Also there is no currency convertability.
Asian Tigre economies were classed as 'capitalist' up until the crisis of 1997, when they were re-classified as 'cronyist'. But Lee Kwan Yew of Singapore pointed out that they had been just as cronyist and corrupt in their years of fast growth. What changed in the 1990s was a massive freeing of capital markets, which led to foolish borrowing and a currency metldown.
Up until the 1970s, Britain and the USA defended their systems as 'Free Enterprise' or Mixed Economy and denied that they were capitalist. They are still very far from the theoretical models advocated by New Right economists. Big Business insists on a whole host of rules and regulations for their own interests, and are quite right to do so. Classical capitalism crashed in the 1930s and has not been restored. The same name is now being used to refer to a whole host of different things.
The doctrine 'capitalism works' is proved by applying the lable capitalism to anything that works. Anything that doesn't work gets classed as non-capitalist.
China currently gets lumped in with the 'capitalists' in the media. Actual working capitalists or businessmen know better, that markets are very far from open and that 'connections' are everything. Also there is no currency convertability.
Asian Tigre economies were classed as 'capitalist' up until the crisis of 1997, when they were re-classified as 'cronyist'. But Lee Kwan Yew of Singapore pointed out that they had been just as cronyist and corrupt in their years of fast growth. What changed in the 1990s was a massive freeing of capital markets, which led to foolish borrowing and a currency metldown.
Up until the 1970s, Britain and the USA defended their systems as 'Free Enterprise' or Mixed Economy and denied that they were capitalist. They are still very far from the theoretical models advocated by New Right economists. Big Business insists on a whole host of rules and regulations for their own interests, and are quite right to do so. Classical capitalism crashed in the 1930s and has not been restored. The same name is now being used to refer to a whole host of different things.
On the narrower point of 'outsourcing'. You complain that work you used to do has been given to someone else in a foreign country. But places like India have also started buying US versions of things they used to make. It's the quid-pro-quo that makes trade deals acceptable, or at least seem acceptable.
As for tarrifs, I suggest that you look at the history of the USA. Without the tarrifs you had in the 19th century, you would never have developed your own industries, whose products could not have competed with British stuff in the early days. The same was true of Germany. You should look up the work of Friedrich List, a German economist who lived before Karl Marx and who should not be confused with the Polish pianist with a similar name. His economic model suggested that every successful economy needs protection, and every successful economy does indeed have protectionism. Almost all had a period of intense protectionism before they could risk free trade.
As for tarrifs, I suggest that you look at the history of the USA. Without the tarrifs you had in the 19th century, you would never have developed your own industries, whose products could not have competed with British stuff in the early days. The same was true of Germany. You should look up the work of Friedrich List, a German economist who lived before Karl Marx and who should not be confused with the Polish pianist with a similar name. His economic model suggested that every successful economy needs protection, and every successful economy does indeed have protectionism. Almost all had a period of intense protectionism before they could risk free trade.
For a definition of 'protectionism' and 'unfair tariffs' see US steel industry.
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You can argue the symantics of the term "capitalism" with me all day long, GwydionM, but it does nothing to prove/disprove the points I argued above.
I assumed that, like most rational people, you could recognize my use of "capitalism" as the commonly used street term today, not the Utopian system advocated in the 19th century. Much like Russian "Communism" was really not Communism in the Marxist sense.
The points (a) and (b) I laid out above still stand unchallenged.
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RudeJohn
************
I assumed that, like most rational people, you could recognize my use of "capitalism" as the commonly used street term today, not the Utopian system advocated in the 19th century. Much like Russian "Communism" was really not Communism in the Marxist sense.
The points (a) and (b) I laid out above still stand unchallenged.
************
RudeJohn
************
RudeJohn, if you are suggesting that the USA writes all software used in the USA, and India writes everything used in India, I'd be all for it. I believe in human diversity, and market-driven homogenisation is likely to produce a very boring world. But for immediate politics, it is unreasonable to ask the rest of the world to be open to US products if all of them are 'Made In America'.
I would dispute that "the best companies with the best products survive". Microsoft's systems were mostly not the best, and nor were Intel's chips. But they used their existing power to persuade most US companies to standardise on their producets, which in turn put pressure on foreign companies to use systems that allow easy trading with the USA. It's based on POWER, the biggest block of English-speakers in the world, the biggest and richest of numerous European settler colonies created during Europe's period of ascnedancy.
I would dispute that "the best companies with the best products survive". Microsoft's systems were mostly not the best, and nor were Intel's chips. But they used their existing power to persuade most US companies to standardise on their producets, which in turn put pressure on foreign companies to use systems that allow easy trading with the USA. It's based on POWER, the biggest block of English-speakers in the world, the biggest and richest of numerous European settler colonies created during Europe's period of ascnedancy.
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