Programming Jobs Losing Luster in U.S.

[varun]

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20050620/ap_on_hi_te/tech_job_decline

STANFORD, Calif. - As an eager freshman in the fall of 2001, Andrew Mo's career trajectory seemed preordained: He'd learn C++ and Java languages while earning a computer science degree at Stanford University, then land a Silicon Valley technology job. The 22-year-old Shanghai native graduated this month with a major in computer science and a minor in economics. But he no longer plans to write code for a living, or even work at a tech company.

Mo begins work in the fall as a management consultant with The Boston Consulting Group, helping to lead projects at multinational companies. Consulting, he says, will insulate him from the offshore outsourcing that's sending thousands of once-desirable computer programming jobs overseas...

...Career experts say the decline of traditional tech jobs for U.S. workers isn't likely to reverse anytime soon. The U.S. software industry lost 16 percent of its jobs from March 2001 to March 2004, the Washington-based Economic Policy Institute found. The Bureau of Labor Statistics reported that information technology industries laid off more than 7,000 American workers in the first quarter of 2005.

"Obviously the past four or five years have been really rough for tech job seekers, and that's not going to change — there are absolutely no signs that there's a huge boom about to happen where techies will get big salary hikes or there will be lots of new positions opening for them," said Allan Hoffman, the tech job expert at career site Monster.com....

[lovuian]

1. My prediction is Tech Security is going to be the Big Future

How does a company protect itself from hackers ??? and its going to need people and lots of people for that one!!!

[ProudDad]

32. This is computer "grunt" work

No programming involved in these jobs. Most of it's mindless fill-in-the-blanks crap.

Most of it wouldn't be necesary if so many corporations didn't run windoze...

Actually, most programming nowdays is also fill-in-the-blanks work. The real interesting stuff that requires a LARGE dose of creativity is in the Design area.

[okieinpain]

60. well most of the computer work at my company is mindless. the

unix guy's stay pretty damn busy. the windoze crap is from people installing the pretty screen savers or reading the really funny emails. I'm running firefox, and I've noticed that they have updates out to fix holes.

I'll agree that the corps, will continue to experiment with out-sourcing, but I believe the results will always end up being mixed. when a manager has problems on the line with a database, they really aren't interested in waiting to hear back from someone in india, they want it fixed.

right now the hot tech jobs at my company is keeping then network running, and I'm probably sure that's whats going on at other large companies.

[barb162]

2. 400,000 American tech people have been laid off from

their jobs and will never get them back.

[Dogmudgeon]

4. So much for cyber-libertarianism!

Before 2000, every other IT professional displayed copies of Ayn Rand and Murray Rothbard on their bookshelves to show their tribal affiliation. Which may explain why it's so easy to get those same books at used book stores these days.

I'm one of those American tech people. Fortunately, my interest in "Free Enterprise" ended in the early 1990s.

--p!

[barb162]

7. I live near a huge Lucent facility and many of its buildings are empty

Many of the laid off who were making large bucks are still GOP. It's as if they just can't get it through their thick skulls that fair trade and some protectionism and putting the American worker above those in other countries really is for the better of this country.

[katty]

13. Amazing how clueless they are - Ayn Rand...

(her obvious traumatic early adolesence/psychological backlash from the Communist Revolution)was a fascinating, yet deeply disturbed fanatical advocate of 'free enterprise', absolutely no checks and balances (this apparently applied to her personal relationships as well). Jer approach was practically fascistic with her inner circle of adoring groupies and outer ring slavish wannnabes. But her novels were pretty good.

[barb162]

17. I read all her books and bio. She is fascinating but

I think we can look at her writing in her historical and personal context. I wonder what she would write about what is happening now? Capitalism run amuck

[ProudDad]

33. My interest in "capitalism" ended in '68

when I was fired from the Crocker Bank MIS department...

Lucky me!! :bounce: :bounce: :bounce:

[Robert Oak]

3. outsourcing

What they are not saying is this article, upfront is the boom is happening in low cost countries like India and China...it's called outsourcing our jobs overseas.

Now don't say "outsourcing is inevitable" because that is another propaganda statement pounded by the ITAA. The fact is any US job
is now vulnerable due to the current trade laws and many other factors
number one being multinational corporations can just border hop to
another white collar, university educated, slave market.

The U.S. software industry lost 16 percent of its jobs from March 2001 to March 2004. Thousands of U.S. companies have opened branches or hired contractors in India, China and Russia, transforming a cost-saving trick into a long-term business strategy. Offshoring may be a main factor in eroding enthusiasm for engineering careers among American students, creating a vast supply of low-wage labor in eastern Europe and Asia and driving down worldwide wages.

The average computer programmer in India costs roughly $20 per hour in wages and benefits, compared to $65 per hour for an American with a comparable degree and experience, according to the consulting firm Cap Gemini Ernst & Young.

[sidpleasant]

9. re: "any US job is now vulnerable"

Not all jobs can be outsourced. A guy in Bangalore can't replace the transmission in your Civic, nor can he repair a leaky pipe in a house in Michigan. Some jobs just have to be done by a person on - site.

[area51]

14. re: "any US job is now vulnerable"

sidpleasant said:

"Not all jobs can be outsourced."

Actually, any job can be either offshored or inshored. Inshoring is where foreigners are allowed to come into this country to work at American jobs, even though there may be Americans willing to do the jobs.

[undeterred]

20. I used to think that anything dealing with the network infrastructure

was invulnerable, but some of that goes overseas too. They just need a couple of warm bodies to make sure things are plugged in.

[Robert Oak]

22. in-sourced

unfortunately the VISA system is being used to replace Americans
for cheaper foreign counterparts.

Case in point is the H-1B VISA. There is overwhelming documentation
that this VISA is being used to fire American engineers and replace
them with foreigners who are paid ~20-40% less.

The classic "shortage" crisis that doesn't actually exist manages
to get increases in these VISAs.

in GATS (part of the WTO trade in services) they are lobbying for
unlimited Worker VISAs.

Unfortunately when one mentions anything with "VISA" in it,
many react with a knee jerk "Racist" card versus having a grasp on labor
economics and what this means. Unlimited movement of workers
means a fast "Race to the bottom" on wages and workers rights
world wide.

[The_Casual_Observer]

5. Now days your either a manager or a salesman

I don't know if that is sustainable.

[AlphaCentauri]

15. well, coding is a hardwork

[Tandalayo_Scheisskopf]

6. Aha! But!

What they are not mentioning here is the the turd in the oursourcing punchbowl is that companies are discovering that outsourcing is not the bargain panacae that they thought it would be. Cost overruns akimbo, shitty code and a host of other problems is causing a drawback. Yes, it is in its early stages, but there it is.

[davekriss]

10. My understanding...

...is that the results are generally good. The buyer gets (alomost always) exactly what they asked for. The issue is that many U.S. firms aren't very good at asking for what they need. There is thus a middle level of management and business analysis that needs maturation. In other words, there is opportunity. The problem is that the numbers of people laid off and able to fill this middle tier in any "global delivery model" is large, and therefore competition is fierce, and therefore compensation is stagnant or declining, and therefore the capitalist wins again.

The latest rage is, of course, BPO -- don't know what those three words stand for? It's Business Process Outsourcing. Not technical jobs, but mainline business jobs: Everything from accounting to graphic arts to radiology. There are very few segments of the job market that are safe from the threat of outsourcing.

There are economic arguments to say that such "free" competition is good; that it results in an increase in value over all, though comes with dislocative pain (and there is no guarantee that the U.S. will innovate itself out of the Argentina-ization of itself). But I, for one, am not willing to sacrifice the well being of my children at the altar of economic efficiency. To these arguments I say bunk!

Note that globalization means the free flow of capital around the world -- labor, however, is mostly stuck in their nationlistic pens. The net effect: Globalization means pitting populations against eachother, divide and conquer, and the conquered will work for diminished wages.

Note that, during the last 20+ years while the march of globalization has accelerated, the bottom 40% of the U.S. population has seen its wages decline, the middle 20% tread water, and the next 30% make minor gains. This despite more than a doubling of the real value of GDP. Where did that value go? Appropriated by the owning class and its thin sliver of managers and magistrates. The top 10% made subtantial gains. The top 1% made astronomical gains!! Review http:www.inequality.org for more details.

So the choice is ours: Use our democratic institutions to invest in ourselves -- health, education, infrastructure, tax policies, etc. -- so that capital finds our nation attractive to continue to invest in, or reject feudal capitalism as we know it today and invent something else, something that better rewards social justice, equality -- life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.

A third alternative exists: Watch as the Bush regime continues to turn the U.S. into a hollow shell, with a devalued currency, a markedly declined standard of living, increased concentration of wealth in the hands of a few, and war after war after war to protect the interests of those few. The choice is ours to make.

"Get off the internet; I'll meet you in the streets!"

[Robert Oak]

23. here's something interesting

40% of all outsourcing projects fail and most do not show the great
savings originally believed...

I think it's more sales and marketing. We have outsourcing as the new
corporate "herd" behavior, just like investing in bad startups in the 90's.

The fact that cost savings are either negative or slim shows
this doesn't work so hot, yet guess what, CEOs plan on increasing
outsourcing.

Right o...something doesn't work as well as planned...let's do more of it.

Makes me think there is a great conspiracy strategy to repress workers
world wide going on with that kind of logic.

[davekriss]

31. A 60% success rate exceeds the average for tech projects!

There's a running survey by the Standish Group that shows a dismal rate of success for ALL technology projects. Starting on 1994, the success rate -- defined as the project completes on time, on budget, and with the full set of requirements (functions and features) delivered -- was ... 16.2%! Things have improved since then; there has been substantial investment in project and program management so that, by 2000, the success rate has risen to ... 28%!!!

As of 2003, the Standish Group survey shows that 52% of the time required functions and features make it into the delivery, but projects are overbudget and late 82% of the time!

So, if 40% of outsourced projects fail, the outsourced segment seems to be doing better than the total pool of projects surveyed.

(BTW, the reason the failure rate is so high with technology projects is not because the participants are incompetent, althought that is all too often the case -- rather, it's because it is often a complex endeavor and exceedingly difficult to get perfect the first time in absence of an onerous investment in management and quality control. Business can, and does, live with partial results; and the industry can, and does, improve over time. The improvements accrue through economies of experience. It is IMPORTANT to note that, by offshoring, the U.S. will be divesting itself of opportunities to gain and exploit such economies. IOW, there is a long-term social cost that seldom factors into the decision to "do the deal".)

Someone did put in front of me very recently a study done by a major consulting company demonstrating that offshore returns fail to meet high expectations. This is true. The $20 per hour paid to the Bangladore Java coder does not translate into $20 per hour to the American company. Introduction of a global delivery model requires a higher maturity of management and analysis than many American companies exhibit -- and the rate of growth in provider communities exceeds their ability to provide able services -- both contribute to the disappointments. It is not ununsual to see a TCO with only a marginal cost improvement. But management is in great part about exploiting the margins. Thus the march to offshoring.

BTW, I am NOT a fan of indiscriminate offshoring. (And I say this not from self-interest, I'm not in the tech industry.)

[ProudDad]

35. Thanks

Those number reinforce my opinion about the incompetence of business.

The Post Office has better numbers than this ... ha ha...

[davekriss]

38. Post Office

In all my years the U.S. Post Office has failed to deliver just 1 piece of my mail. The Post Office has a phenomenal success rate!

[Robert Oak]

66. I don't think these two statistics are correlated

as to the US definition of failure, say "late" or a canceled project
due to strategy/profit margins, "rev disease" and etc. blunders and so forth. I think this stat is 100% unusable disaster as in absolutely
nothing, no deliverable, complete failure.

I don't have the reference off the top right now but I did read it
and it wasn't the typical "two months = two years" project
delay or "oh that bug is a feature" or "oh that will be fixed
in the next rev" etc. It was total disaster, 100% money sink, zero results.

There is not just a "long term social cost" i.e. the blow off response...
if one examines economics it's a economic cost to the US.

One cannot have a strong economy by destroying the middle class.
This is one of causes of the great depression.

As far as TCO marginal cost improvement, this also is BS. One can
see the same marginal cost improvement state side.

There is also a stat that 60% of all credentials outside the US
are forged, especially India and China where it cannot be checked.

Offshoring "head work" is the same as outsourcing manufacturing in that one loses the economic base which generates economic growth
long term.

You're dreaming if you think people smart enough to engineer
are going to sit around and let US managers "manage" them.
No way, they will use this as a "comparative advantage" if I might
borrow that ill used phrase to jump ship and do their own startups in India and China and eventually ruin those very companies which gave them their start.

Believe me, unlike the "Benedict Arnold" mentality in the US
other peoples are very nationalistic and want to build up the nation
that is their home and which they are loyal too.

[davekriss]

73. You box me into a corner...

...I don't want to defend: I am no fan of indiscriminate offshoring, especially the jump-on-the-bandwagon approach we see today. The reasons I'm no fan, however, are not because of results inferior to what can be procurred internally, or even outsourced to American workers -- the results are generally good though there are anecdotal examples of total failure -- but you touch on some of the macro-economic arguments that fill my own critique.

My experience with studies measuring "project success" show me that it's critical to define "success" as the definition varies widely. If you can find the study you refer to (with a 40% failure rate) and beef up the def it would be helpful.

Depressions are crisis in effective demand. That is indeed what we are setting us up for, with the U.S. being the first domino to fall.

The shortsighted drive to marginally improve the bottom line (by reducing the labor cost component of goods and services) will erode the middle class, and that will erode demand -- in the U.S. -- for these goods and services. Appropriated value will still flow to the coffers of executives and shareholders, and their demand for Bentleys, Van Gogh's, and Bordeaux will remain strong (as they sell to emerging markets in India, China, and Russia instead of us), but Walmart same store sales will decline year-over-year.

Capital will bulge with nowhere to go (over-capacity, a paucity of attractive investment opportunities) and thus the velocity of cashflow will slow, workers will be spun off their jobs, the U.S. federal deficit will bulge still further, and the bubble will burst. Another Great Depression, and it is just ahead.

A question: What are the best things to do now ahead of the coming crisis?

On edit...

"One cannot have a strong economy by destroying the middle class. This is one of causes of the great depression."

One cannot have a strong U.S. ecomomy by destroying the U.S. middle class, but that does not mean the thin sliver of uber-capitalists can't have a field day selling to the emerging markets they're now seeding in India, China, Russia, and elsewhere. They just abandon us, pricey laborers, for labor that demands less yet will make enough to buy washing machines, tv sets, and the occasional automobile.

Further, the middle class as we think of it is truly an historical abberation. It only came into existence after WWII when there was a sense of national purpose and rebuiding, when marginal tax rates hit 90%, and when CEO-to-worker income disparity hovered around 50 as opposed to the 500x factor today. Was this too a bubble about to burst?

Review the last 20+ years. Real GDP has doubled. Yet the bottom 40%-tile has seen its real income decline. The middle 20%-tile's wages have been stagnant. The next 30%-tile has seen some gains. The top 10% has seen significant gains. And the top 1% have seen astronomical gains. Why? Class war -- and our side has been losing battle after battle, globalism, rather neo-liberal imperialism, being the latest onslaught against the workers of the world.

Offshoring in the tech industry, just as manufacturing before it and the coming BPO wave of most back-office functions, is the thrust of the bayonet into the heart of gains made by labor last century. It pits the workers of one nation against another, penned and sold like cattle by political forces they don't control.

Google up some Stiglitz and you will see, after some 20+ years of Globalism, the poor nations are poorer and the rich nations are richer -- part of this is the ability of foreign capital to appropriate an increasing share of the value created by labor at offshore locales. It is not a win-win situation; it's a near zero-sum game with the plusses accruing in the coffers of capital.

[Robert Oak]

76. I think we're agreeing

http://forum.noslaves.com/index.php?showtopic=379&hl=study

http://forum.noslaves.com/index.php?showtopic=358&hl=study

http://www.diamondcluster.com/Press/PressRelease.asp?src=pressreleases331.asp


oops, the stats keep changing, this last one has 51% of contract canceled and now I can't find the one specific to 40%...oh well!

I'm not completely up on my history of the middle class but
it seems to me there are more examples of a strong middle class
than just post WWII, as in the middle ages with the merchants and guilds.

plus it seems to be the "mixed economy" states like Sweden, Norway,
Finland and so forth are doing pretty damn good in terms of building
the middle class still going strong.

This is an interesting topic, wish a researcher would really look at this and see some sort of correlation to policy that promotes
the middle class and economic success, but through the ages so
it's not a spurious conclusion that all of this is just the result
of post WWII.

I've read Stiglitz and know this, our website is devoted to these very topics. and it's not just a "whine" site, we're throwing up
studies, books and reading so someone out there (HELLO? HELLO?) starts formulating a true policy that works. I felt Kerry really was...and to me the solution is quite complex...but the word
didn't get out really during the election what they were doing.

(stupid elections nobody seems to pay any attention to policy!)

I personally like Gomory & Baumol. Their research is actually taken
to support this idea of labor arbitrage as a form of "trade"..
but I read the book and I didn't interpret it that way. I read it
to show that international trade theory is a delicate thing with a hell of a lot of variables and if one wasn't pretty damn savvy and paying attention to the models, they could destroy a nation-state
just with bad trade deals alone.


edit: also it's not bad end "low" IT jobs that are being outsourced,
PhD level research is being outsourced in droves.

A good book on the topic is:
http://www.amanet.org/books/catalog/0814408680.htm

[ProudDad]

34. Middle level management and

business analysts are mainly incompetent. They will never be able to communicate what's needed.

I've been in the business of data processing (which is what it used to be called) as a programmer and system designer for over 40 years. I'd say the about 80-90% of managers and analysts (and programmers and web designers for that matter) are marginally competent at best.

However, I believe that this kind of work moving overseas was inevitable. We've got to face facts here in the belly of the beast of Capitalism. The resources are running out -- oil peak, etc. The metastatic growth rates that corporate capitalism DEMANDS cannot be sustained.

As a people, those of us in the "western industrialized nations" will have to scale down out insatiable thirst for resource heavy toys. Sorry to be the one to tell you but we'll have to scale down our expectations.

[davekriss]

40. Marginally competent at best

Wow. Scathing critique of your own profession. Let me ask, though: Do you include yourself in the 80-90% marginally competent "at best", or amongst the presumable 10-20% who are actually competent?

Having said that, I think you are correct. Software development is not a "profession" in the true sense of the word, not like medicine or engineering or teaching or accounting (although there have been positive moves in that direction). There is no state licensing boards, no mandatory education levels. For most of your 40 years demand always outstripped supply, forcing business to settle for what they could get.

Part of your critique, though, should be directed at business itself. The business stakeholders are themselves notoriously poor at expressing what they "need".

Having said that, wonderful software is everywhere (we're using some right now). To say that "They will never be able to communicate what's needed" is at variance from actuality. Analysts (systems or business) and programmers (developers or web-designers) and managers (project and mid-level) often get it right. Just not 100%, nor within budget and schedule (suggesting software development is an exceedingly difficult thing to estimate and control).

Software today controls the cutting light in Lasik surgery, where a hair-thin layer of tissue is burned away to allow a person to see without glasses. Do THAT with sliderules and pencils!

"However, I believe that this kind of work moving overseas was inevitable. We've got to face facts here in the belly of the beast of Capitalism. The resources are running out -- oil peak, etc. The metastatic growth rates that corporate capitalism DEMANDS cannot be sustained."

We are in the belly of the beast, yes. Offshoring, though, does not support "metastatic growth rates" of the sort you suggest because, in the quest for marginal improvement to the bottom line, it injures demand here in the world's biggest market (the U.S.). Remember, offshoring is NOT just about technology. Our manufacturing base, the former foundation of the blue collar middle-class, is greatly eroded; and there are boardroom plans to offshore just about everything beside dentists and hairstylists. It is true, though, that this will contribute to developing new markets in India and China -- but the growth will be largely offsetting, not additional. And limited by things like Peak Oil.

Abandoning the American market and the opportunities to retain knowledge and skills here is just plain shortsighted and ultimately destructive -- to all except the thinest sliver of the global owning class, a group not beholden to any nation state and with far more in common with eachother than with the rest of us. They have very little interest in the bottom 60%-tile -- the "useless eaters" and "cannon fodder" from their point of view. I say we should abandon the global owning class and eat the rich!

But to your point that we have to scale down our insatiable thirst for resource heavy toys, you are right -- but not by instilling this same thirst in billions of other people on the other side of the globe! And not if the scaling down is unequal, leaving elites here in the U.S. fat and comfortable behind the walls of their bubble communities, themselves sacrificing nothing. Equality is the foundation to Liberty, without a perception of fair play and fair outcomes our society will sink beneath violent strife, a foolish thing to blanket over by telling us you're sorry to be the one to tell us we'll have to scale down our expectations.

[nine30]

44. Equality is NOT the foundation to liberty.

" Equality is the foundation to Liberty, without a perception of fair play and fair outcomes our society will sink beneath violent strife"

It was tried in the ex-communist nations, and people ended up with neither equality (rich communist bosses and destitute citizens), nor liberty.

By its very definition, a capitalist society is NOT an "equal" society. Liberty is granted by the constitution, not the result of equality forced upon the people. And wealth is acquired, not distributed, and in doing so not everyone acquires wealth to the same degree.

Now one may argue about the merits of such a society, but thats what the founding fathers chose for us, and thats how we are today. Is it a fair society ? By no means. But it has worked in making us the richest nation the world has ever known.

[davekriss]

45. Equality is too the foundation of true liberty

I was not giving you a statement of the founding fathers, I am giving you my own reasoned opinion. I am also not asking for us to be true to some ideals we purport to the founding fathers, but be true to our own vision of freedom and fair play, our own present shared interests.

I've said this here before, but "Liberty" is a funny animal. We are all always and absolutely "free" – but "freedom" is illusory. I am free, for example, to stand in the middle of the highway during the height of rush hour. But the freedom of others to drive home will quickly negate my freedom. On the other hand, I am free to drop a giant barricade up the road to secure my freedom to stand in the middle of the road. This "freedom", it turns out, appears to be a Schopenhaurean Will to Power and is the final adjudication of many competing freedoms. Thus one person's "liberty" can be another person's "tyranny". So something else needs to factor into the equation before "liberty" is a good in itself. What can that be?

It is in our mutual self-interest to come together and agree to exercise our freedoms cooperatively. Using the example above, we can agree to take turns. Perhaps tax ourselves to construct and install a traffic light that alternately stops traffic to allow pedestrians to cross the road and then stops pedestrians so traffic can freely flow. Such is the basis for the Liberal State. But as soon as the rights of one party supercede the rights of another, we introduce strife. For example, if drivers are allowed to speed through a red light without consequences if they feel they need to hurry. Pedestrians will plan sit-ins and obstruct traffic! Even throw rocks through windshields of passing cars! Revolution!!! Instead, to secure the highest liberty for all, a sense of justice and fairness must prevail. Otherwise the system will break down and instead open all up to possible dangers of tyranny. Equality, as in reciprocal fairness and justice for all, serves as the foundation of Liberty. Equality is indeed the higher principle.

Think in my example of drivers who, because of some vested interest of their own (they were in a hurry) as an early example of Enronitis, where some because of power and position and priviledge think they don't have to obey the rules. Here is an inequality of justice (justice is not uniformly applied). Why should the man on the street continue to cooperate with other laws if the Enrons of the world are not held to the rules?

Think in my example of green lights that stay lit 23 hours out of a 24 hour day, affording pedestrians 1 hour in the dark to cross the street. This is an inequality of opportunity. What's to keep the poor pedestrian, stuck all day behind a red light, from ditching the rules and flooding the highway?

Both are corrosive of liberty because both lead to a breakdown in the social contract leading to possible imposition of will by force, a very anti-liberal action.

Note that I haven't yet suggested an equality of economic outcome. I would never suggest that a doctor and a day laborer be paid equal wages. But I would use the democratic instruments of a Liberal State to create rules by which we all play and through which we all prosper and which favors no groups above all the others.

The extreme concentration of wealth, for example, that has been enabled by the borrow-and-spend policies of Republican administrations (starting with Reagan, then GHWB, and continued by GWB) has done more harm to the Liberal State than any other action yet. It is the height of foolhardiness, as a wealth-destroying depression has followed each of the other two times these levels of concentration have been achieved. It could've been corrected, as it was corrected during the Clinton years, by raising federal income taxes on upper income individuals. So when CIO income exceeds 500 times the mean wage paid to his workers (unlike the 50 times threshold shown during more broadly prosperous times), I would seek redress. I would, therefore, seek more equal ecomomic outcome.

Poverty is a maker of slaves and rebels, not a breeding ground for a just and fair democracy.

[cap]

74. actually, not always ...

the big banks and investment firms are pulling back projects from overseas.

[Name removed]

8. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[ProudDad]

36. Symantec Outsourcing

The gorilla in the PC Security business outsources.

"Dean Lane might have mastered the art of offshore outsourcing. As senior IT director at Cupertino, Calif.-based Symantec Corp., Lane found a way to please both executives and IT workers alike. He successfully implemented an offshore outsourcing plan that saved the company money and didn't result in any job losses -- to date."

http://searchcio.techtarget.com/qna/0,289202,sid19_gci1002662,00.html

This article crows about how wonderful this guy is but they don't mention that another aspect of this policy is that they haven't been hiring here!!

[endarkenment]

11. what we remain good at is innovation

yes the ordinary can be shipped out to anywhere with a pc and a net connection, but it is the talented/creative/extraordinary - the ability to innovate new high tech products, that will continue to employ software and hardware engineers here - that is until fundamentalist luddite anti-science irrationalism drives all the creative innovative extraordinary types to other countries with saner governments.

[davekriss]

12. Got a link?

The one thing the U.S. has going for it over much of the rest of the First World is the ease in which it can engage/disengage labor. In Europe, for example, there is a huge cost to disengage labor, so there is a tendency to highly engineer processes to ensure maximal productivity and stave off additional hiring as long as possible. In the U.S., we tend to throw bodies on and off the job with ease, so there is less need to be process perfect. This does, however, provide the opportunity to be comparably nimble compared to much of the rest of the world.

On the downside of this nimbleness is the U.S. is eating its own. It is (business) culture-destructive. The last wave of uber-capitalism, brought on by Reagan and GHWB, saw the U.S. exit whole industries in favor of the financial class (Wall Street). The issue here is cost of entry is prohibitively high, so reentry during better times proved not to be. Could the U.S. being doing something similar with the software professional?

Microsoft is building facilities in China (I believe). Cap Gemini was staffing Indian Application Development Centers to the tune of 3,000+ professionals. Do the "creative innovative extraordinary types" have their Visas in order? Do not think that these other nation-states will welcome labor as readily as they welcome capital and sales revenue.

There's a chance many of those "creative innovative extraordinary types" -- at least those less than super-extraordinary (those that fall short of creatively birthing new industries) -- will find themselves working in sandwich shops, lawn-care service firms, or become verythoughtful albeit restless house painters (those McMansions do need servicing, ya' know).

[endarkenment]

16. Link? nope.

it is an unfounded assertion on my part based on the anecdotal evidence of my own experiences in the high tech industry over the last 25 years. What I am saying is that their are two tiers to software jobs, one basically is exportable, and the other isn't. Even though the internet boom went bust, it wasn't the first VC-funded boom and it won't be the last. We've gone through lean times before, and we will go through them again, but currently we, the domestic US high tech innovaters, are still the only ones doing what we do on the planet, and we are going to keep on doing it. Cap Gemini doesn't innovate shit. Micrsoft might outsource some jobs to China, but their key development stays right here where they have access to us creative types who know how to invent new stuff nobody ever thought of before.

The Japanese were going to put us out of business with their 'software factories'. Now its the Indians or the Chinese or whatever. It turns out that teams of low paid coders is not what high tech is all about. Until some other region of the planet starts creating new shit you have never seen before, I am not overly worried.

[barb162]

18. Remember how the Japanese took over TV manufacturing,

innovation and other things. I think the same thing will be happening in other high tech areas.

[endarkenment]

19. they are very good at taking existing products

and working the production efficiency angle to death. They did not invent any of the current tv technologies, as far as I know, but I could be wrong. Something about cultural barriers towards risk taking.

[ieoeja]

21. I have yet to receive an answer to the following.

Name one general purpose Japanese computer.

Not a PC running a US made operating system. But a computer that is truly Japanese in inception.

[NuttyFluffers]

62. name one american tv.

we can play this silly game all day.

japanese had a different view of personal computing than americans. most of them were a strange adaption of consoles doing business work, similar to the early days of our pcs with the atari pc. they did not see the pc being the integrated link where phone/cable, basic processing, games, and business functions -- they saw the console instead being the link. it was a different approach to a similar vision. it was the flexibility and tinkering of americans and their pcs that took the machine to such great advances -- japanese consoles were generally prefab products not meant to be tinkered with, thus channeling creativity from the broad spectrum of amateurs to hired professionals in a few specific companies. japan wanted a polished quality product for consumers first, not wanting to burden them with glitches and disfunction. america just threw it out there and let people play with it and make shit, even if it crashed on them every other day. but i don't see how this example has much to do with anything.

[Robert Oak]

26. I don't think this is so true anymore

they are huge, as in innovation in optics and various visual display
technologies...
these require cutting edge manufacturing techniques.

They are also on the cutting edge in batteries and fuel cells...

Just because they blew off the operating system doesn't mean they are not innovating.

[Name removed]

29. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[sendero]

28. The problem is..

.... that out of the universe of programming jobs to be done, 20% of them require imagination and creativity and the rest are boring crunching of crap akin to doing long division with a pencil and paper all day.

You can easily export the 80%, and that is what is happening.

No, India and China will not take all of our programming jobs. They will take the low tier jobs. But it still hurts because that is a lot of jobs.

[ikri]

68. And a big "Screw you" to new graduates

99% of new IT graduates entering the workforce are going to be moving into the 80% of programming that is grunt work.

That's where they can prove their abilities and move into the 20% of work that involves imagination.

If you remove the lower tier of jobs from the industry it doesn't really hurt those of us who are in the 20% of jobs, but it means that anyone without the experience of managing projects and leading a development team can never get into the workforce.

The real effects of outsourcing probably won't be felt for 15-20 years when companies suddenly find that they can't replace that 20% of the workforce since the normal feed of new workers, the 80% that's outsourced, no longer exists.

[sendero]

70. That's a good point....

... but on the other hand, in my experience, those who are really top notch technically are almost never good managers, but they get promoted to management anyway and then do horribly.

It's a conundrum :)

[davekriss]

30. Fan of Creative Destruction, are we?

"What I am saying is that their are two tiers to software jobs, one basically is exportable, and the other isn't."

It is this very notion of two tiers that I seek to blow away. Much of South and Central America consists of two-tiered societies too, a fat and happy owning class, serviced by a thin sliver of managers and magistrates (you'd add the exceptionally innovative), and then everyone else. This seems to be the vision George Bush has for the United States.

It's all well and good to say that the truly exceptional will survive and thrive (no matter what socio-economic class they come from); my heart and mind does not go out to the exceptional, but to the "everyone else", to the rest of us.

Unless you've personally patented a new approach to M3 or some similar bleeding edge matter, I applaud your cheerleading but lament that won't allow you to provide adequate food and shelter to you and your family.

It's true that the talented will continue to work, but at reduced wage and under the gaze of a new reserve army of the poor, a poor that didn't have to be.

Why should the rest of us agree to policies that allow the free flow of capital outside the U.S. (in the form of the transfer of hard plant and soft intellectual property) that benefits a thin sliver of the U.S. population at the cost of everyone else?

Why can't we sacrifice some economic efficiency and synergy in order to shore up the lives of the non-exceptional?

For example, why not have a "quality of life" tariff on imported goods and services? If a nation pays its labor less than the U.S., affords them a quality of life measurably less than comparable labor here in the states, then impose a tariff that equalizes the labor disparity, forcing the other states to compete on innovative intellectual property?

And on the matter of innovation: Using things like PhD's and patents awarded, and on a per capita basis, I believe the U.S. lost its world lead a few years ago. (I'm at work, so I can't google up a link, but feel free.) I think we still lead, however, in software.

On the matter of "we've gone through lean times before" -- yes, but we've never gone through quite these circumstances before. You appear to be in the tech industry: Recall a book by Yourdon titled something like the Death of the American Programmer? (It's about 10-15 years old.) In it he foresaw a decline in technical employment driven, not by CASE and 5GL (the threats of the day), but in the rising capability of communications technology allowing software to be created and delivered from any place in the world. He was right and that is what we are witnessing now. But it is not right to think of the lost jobs as equivalent to losing horse buggy jobs to a nascent automobile industry.

Outsourcing as a phenomena of globalization is not an even handed deck of cards. It pits labor in one nation against another. We saw it after NAFTA when a poorer nation agreed to pollute its land and waters, injure its workers, and condemn many to lives of misery in order to win commodicized jobs away from American workers. Should those Americans (or their representatives in government) repeal environmental and occupational safety regulations, move to tin shacks, and work for subsistence wages in order to compete with the poor south of their border? For the many, the unfortunately commodicized, it becomes a race to the bottom, a race to see which nation allows its laboring class to starve first.

It's true that we've not exported programming jobs to Matamora; the exported jobs allow many in Bangladore, M'umbai, Moscow, and elsewhere to improve their standard of living substantially. But what do we do as a nation? What do we do with the reserve army of underemployed poor that globalization creates? Until that question can be answered I think it is right and pertinent to demand that our representatives create protections that stay the cold hand of Ayn Rand Capitalism for now.

What do you have to say to the downsized? To the broken dreams? To the disillusioned and hopeless? And in face of conscious policies withdrawing social support (the increasing economic barriers to education, to wealth-rationed healthcare, etc.)? Let them move to India? That's not possible. India won't have them.

[sendero]

49. Hey...

... I'm a "victim" of this - I spent 20 years programming computers, the last 8 or so doing Windows applications using C++. I made a damn good living at it and I'm thankful I had the discipline to save some of it.

Now, I've given up on programming as a career. Between the dot-com bust, outsourcing and the fact that at 50 I would definitely experience age discrimination (the industry prefers young folks who they can work 70 hours a week and who have no life outside of work), I decided to bail.

I'm not saying I *like* what is happening, I'm just saying that it *is* happening and that although there are some grumblings that it is not working as well as some thought it would (which is no surprise because a key element in any software development effort is *communication* and that is often lacking in offshore efforts) it will continue and companies will learn how to make it effective and frankly, I cannot think of any reasonable way to do anything about it.

[davekriss]

53. I was responding to endarkenment

Not you (were you reacting to my previous post?).

Sorry to hear about your current predicament, but glad to hear that you accumulated resources to weather the storm. Have you found what you'll do next?

As to reasonable things to do to stave off offshoring, it is difficult, but I do suggest a few posts above a "quality of life" tariff that equalizes labor.

The funny thing is so many people think we have the best standard of living in the world, when that's not true. Our top 5% have on average exhorbitantly more than most European peers, true, but the situation changes rapidly when you compare further down the socioeconomic strata.

That so many of the bottom 80% lead the cheers for the agents of globalization, "free market" capitalism, and neo-liberal imperialism is just beyond me. Just shows you the sway that our indoctrinating institutions have on people (schools, the media, our political institutions).

Like that experiment of old, where people demonstrated a tendency to follow authority even when asked to inflict pain on other people (electric shocks) -- the only difference is that we follow and inflict pain on ourselves. The more we cede our power to the marketplace, the less we have, especially in an age of increasing limits (think peak oil).

Where the law of the majority ceases to be acknowledged, there
government ends; the law of the strongest takes its place, and
life and property are his who can take them.
--Thomas Jefferson, to Annapolis Citizens, 1809

[sendero]

54. Yes, I was talking to you...

... :)

I've started a small business. It's sucking so far, but I have another year to get it profitable. I think it will be ok.

Believe me, I don't like the direction our country is going vis-a-vis jobs - its just that for things like outsourcing labor I have a hard time figuring out what to do about it.

I suppose there could be tariffs/taxes - and in general I think that doing things to keep Americans employed is a good idea, but the Republicans have done such a stellar job of selling the "free markets" meme I don't think it will ever happen.

In fact, my assessment of where we (as a nation) are going economically is pretty bleak. The minus column is full of entries and the plus column is almost empty.

But have no fear - once the problem is a crushing, undeniable, unspinnable one, then we'll (collectively) do something about it. And not before.

[ckramer]

55. IMHO

"Outsourcing as a phenomena of globalization is not an even handed deck of cards. It pits labor in one nation against another."


You are right. And it has a reason for that in a good way.

All that says is that Americans are living way beyond their means; their compensation is too high, comparing to the same amount of works to be done by others in other part of the globe. The capital sees that, hence the outsourcing.

In other words, outsourcing is telling Americans: you don't deserve a higher wage for that.

I see this trend as a balancing act in a global perspective. Talent has no borders, and is valued at a fair price that the global community accepts. Capital in and of itself is not patriotic. That's what globalization is about.

So, let's get used to it. American programmers don't deserve a higher premium any more than that of their counterparts who are professionally competent as much as they are.

Outsourcing may not be good to Americans, but certainly ecomomically good for the poor countries in the world. All progressive democrats should embrace it.

[davekriss]

58. I see you drank the Koolaid!

Apologies, that was rude of me!

First, in one sense you are correct. The U.S. has about 6% of the world's population yet consumes about 35% of the world's resources. In a fair world, with fair valuation, the percentages should be about 6%/6%. Yes? OK.

But you never consider the fact that labor may be UNDERVALUED in other parts of the world, that in neither the U.S. nor in India, China, Russia, Ireland, or elsewhere is labor given the full value of the work they expend on behalf of capital.

Labor cannot (generally) chase jobs across borders; just about every nation has strict immigration prohibitions. Yet we allow capital to fly where it will. For political reasons many nations have indigent populations that barely rise above subsistence, so what a deal! Capital will pay these laborers a fraction of what they'd pay an American, which is an attractive multiple of what they can make without the arrival of foreign capital. That does not mean that trhe worker receives a fair wage for their labor.

Case in point: Let's say Nike makes a $150 sneaker in California and pays the laborers $20 hour to assemble them. Then China, long under a repressive regime where free bargaining for wages is generally non-existent, offers Nike a population of workers for $1 per day. Does that mean the American worker was paid for more than their fair share of value creation? Or does it mean Nike is complicit in the repression and exploitation of Chinese labor and, thereby, appropriates more of the value labor created for the executives and shareholders of Nike?

If it's the latter, then why should the citizenry allow it? Why can't we use our democratic institutions to ensure that the rules of the game benefit the many rather than the few? I repeat:

Where the law of the majority ceases to be acknowledged, there
government ends; the law of the strongest takes its place, and
life and property are his who can take them.
--Thomas Jefferson, to Annapolis Citizens, 1809

Ideally the pie would grow so that 6%/6% is reached without wrenching decline in the standard of living of the many here in the U.S. But evironmental/resource depletion considerations mean that is not possible. So do you think all classes within the U.S. will willfully allow their standard of living to decline? Or do you think it's possible that some will sow memes of Smithian "free markets" and Horatio Alger stories, of "small government", the L-word and attacks that this or that is "socialism" (as if that's a bad thing!), and instead, while the masses are distracted, steel their financial fortresses for generations while the rest of us sink into oblivion? Do you think the word "deserve" figures into this?

But you do raise a real ethical point. However, I just don't share the same faith you seem to have in the benevolence of the agents behind globalism. Keep in mind these points, which have governed the our foreign policy since WWII in places where we are now so loved such as Nicaragua, Honduras, El Salvador, Chile, East Timor, Afganistan, and Iraq (to name just a few from a very long list!):

The US has about 50% of the world’s wealth but only 6.3% of its population. In this situation we cannot fail to be the object of envy and resentment. Our real task in the coming period is to devise a pattern of relationships which will permit us to maintain this position of disparity without positive detriment to our national security. To do so, we will have to dispense with all sentimentality and day-dreaming, and our attention will have to be concentrated everywhere on our immediate national objectives.

We need not deceive ourselves that we can afford the luxury of altruism and world benefaction. We should cease talks about such vague and unreal objectives as human rights and raising of living standards and democratization. The day is not far off when we are going to have to deal in straight power concepts. The less we are then hampered by idealistic slogans, the better.
---George Kennan, PPS 23, 1948

I think the intention is to keep the imbalance for the few while abandoning the "useless eaters" to their dismal circumstances.

[Voltaire99]

63. Excellent post.

As lucid a statement of the case as is likely to be found on this or any other message board. Well done.

When I see a self-proclaimed "progressive Democrat" declare him or (as in the case of Hillary Clinton) herself in favor of outsourcing, I despair of hope for this party.

Your post should be taped to their foreheads.

[ckramer]

77. There are always arguments against globalism

but I don't believe it's 100% true that the poor nations are poorer and the rich nations are richer in an absolute sense. Globalism does good things and gives opportunity to poor countries that they may not have in their life time and that sometimes can not be measured with dallor and cents.

Exploitation by the capital is a given fact. Even here in US, it happens everyday. That's what you should keep an eye on. But one dallor earned by the folks in a poor country on a pair of Nikie sneaker has a very different meaning than that of 100 dollars earned by the Nike corporation. One can't even buy a load of bread in America with one dollar today, but $1 helps a poor family of a third world country in such a big way that you probably could not imagine.

Blaming the foreigner for the decrease of Americans' living standard is short-sighted politically. The focus of democratic institutions should be placed on the checking of the unchecked capitalism, which is the real cause of decline of Americans living standard. Unchecked capitalism causes inflation, energy shortage, unemployment and social unrest.

Through taxation, through regulation, through new ecomomic policy, that's the only way to resolve the problem of wealth concentration in America.

If anything, the rampant outsourcing movement signals the failure of our domestic economic policy.

[davekriss]

79. Straw man fallacy

ckramer says: "Blaming the foreigner for the decrease of Americans' living standard is short-sighted politically."

Yes it is. But of course that's not what I've done here. I blame the global uber-capitalist that sees the workers in our nation and in third-world nations not as precious human beings but as numerical inputs into ROI calculations.

Recall the ferris wheel scene in Carol Reed's The Third Man: The wheel is stopped with Orson Welles and Joseph Cotton at the top. They look down hundreds of feet at people bustling about and Welles' Harry Lime says:

"Look down there...Would you feel any pity if one of those dots stopped moving forever? If I offered you £20,000 for every dot that stopped - would you really, old man, tell me to keep my money? Or would you calculate how many dots you could afford to spare? ... free of Income Tax, old man... (CLOSE SHOT - MARTINS) ...free of Income Tax."

(For the non-film buffs out there, Harry Lime was stealing and selling scarce penicillin for personal profit while kids were dying of horrible untreated infections in post-war Vienna.)

It is the Harry Limes of the world that I blame, ckramer, and not just those clearly on the other side of the law, but in the boardrooms and the White House and Congress when they can calculate suffering and death as profit.

"The focus of democratic institutions should be placed on the checking of the unchecked capitalism, which is the real cause of decline of Americans living standard. Unchecked capitalism causes inflation, energy shortage, unemployment and social unrest."

On this we absolutely agree! I leave it there... :)

[stickdog]

61. Bullshit. Why then have Mexican wages gone down after NAFTA?

I guess unions were a really bad idea too, right?

You know, because they only improved the lot of the unionized at the "expense" of the nonunionized and all. Right?

I guess we'll just have to learn to live on $6,000 a year like they can in India, right? Because it's only "just" for capitalists to be allowed to exploit most whoever is the most exploitable, right?

[ckramer]

78. You know what?

6,000 dollars can go a long way if the rent is 200 dallors a month, the transportation is 5 cents each way, the foods cost 50 dollars for family of four. That's why the third world country people are much happier earning $1 on that pair of Nikie sneaker they produced.

Let's focus on and blame the unchecked capitalism.

[Greyhound]

50. The problem with this line of thought is where the...

next generation of "creative types" is going to come from. As an OG techie I'm sure you understand that great programmers (developers, architects, solution providers, whatever they're being called this year) are made and not born. It takes years and years of coding to learn the limits and possibilities of programming. If all of 'junior' programming jobs are being done in China/India/Russia, we're not creating the next generation of software gurus.

[NuttyFluffers]

64. which speaks to education and job experience problem.

i'm glad you brought it up. how can we pass on a successful america when we discard the necessary rungs in the ladder to gain such proficiency? when education and starting job experience is being short changed and given outside the nation we are creating a next generation abjectly dependent on the now skilled professionals of other countries. that's a bad position to be in.

you point out something that deeply troubles me and wished was talked about more, especially being part of the 'next generation.' how can we take the reins of power if we haven't been taught or given a chance to make beginning level mistakes? we are being ill served by certain people in power who will deny the next generation from gaining the skills to manage the power we are to inherit.

i honestly believe all this is a game of fascism, for as long as it will last, which will then collapse into neo-feudalism. i hate this. so frustrating.

[Robert Oak]

25. GI bill and so on

fostering innovation truly was an American area...but no more.

University level education used to be cheaper and due to the overall
high standard of living it was easier to be that "garage inventor"
in the past.

Now other nations are investing heavily in their people while the US
makes it impossible to get a university degree.

Venture capitalists currently DEMAND and I mean REQUIRE startups
to offshore outsource at least part of their engineering team,
which is psycho.

You cannot move fast, innovate and do the "next big thing" with
half of your team half way around the world. It makes no sense...
and we can see the results...there has been a dramatic decrease
in US patents awards and applications after 2001.

[Ambrose]

24. Yup, my company is going gung-ho with offshoring

Anyone have any suggestions for a career change for a 17+ year programmer with no future?

Thank you President Dumbass for continuing to say the economy is doing great.

[Robert Oak]

27. become a political activist

Seriously, they cannot take away the brains of people who have
studied a difficult subject. Apply those brains to new areas,
especially political activism!

[ProudDad]

37. I feel your pain, too

Seriously. I've got over 40 years of programming experience and have just been laid off again for the 2nd time since '02. Both jobs were outsourced, one to India and the other to Redmond, WA (home of the evil borg - micro$oft).

I'm looking into a system sales job (which I HATE) 'cause they just ain't many design/development jobs for folks nowdays. Even the brightest and most "innovative" are finding it very hard in *'s amerika.

I'm also getting more involved in political activism. I'm going to the 100th Plenary of the IWW this weekend. How's that for jumping in at the deep end? :-)

www.iww.org

[Greyhound]

51. God I'm so sorry

I've heard this so many times in the last 6 years. Maybe we should get jackets?

[nine30]

56. Programming is blue collar work. Sorry

Yes, I have been there myself and fallen victim to it too. I am surprised it wasn't outsourced back in the 70s/80s along with manufacturing.Oh thats right-- India is used to be a socialist/semi-communist country back then. Unless you are designing complex operating systems or optimizing application server code, there is nothing that a newbie graduate from a third world country cannot do.
And he will do it with more enthusiasm and less grumpiness.

To all folks who are in this profession-- as of now it still ain't all that bad, but it WILL be. Use the few years that you have between now and then to chalk up alternate career plans. It will be too late to start once the job is gone, believe me , I KNOW that.

[Ambrose]

71. Not if you want it work beyond the 60 day warranty

I've never seen a newbie or a non-english speaking programmer develop any code that was maintainable or even readable.

Anyway, I don't know what to do because I spent my life from high-school on programming. So far, I think the best alternative career for me is welfare recipient.

[sadiesworld]

75. Apparently you were unenthusiastic and grumpy.

It had nothing to do with cheaper labor. :eyes:
BTW, welcome to DU!

[LiberallyInclined]

39. a 22 year-old MANAGEMENT CONSULTANT???

i assume he'll be drawing on his vast experience in management when consulting clients.

[NawlinsNed]

81. What they mean is...

... he'll take the first plane trip out to Oracle, Peoplesoft, or SAP and sit through a few classes then get shipped out to a project to get billed out at 150 bucks an hour as he learns the ropes on another company's time.

[Nihil]

82. ... or EDS or Accenture or ...

... any of the other "consultancy" companies.
(Oracle & PeopleSoft are one and the same now)

[Media_Lies_Daily]

41. "Losing luster" = outsourcing.

[aresef]

42. *sigh*

I was considering going into programming until I had my epiphany. I plan to become a tech journalist.

[rndmprsn]

43. i'm one of those stats!

laid off from my job @ an e-learning company in cleveland OH in mid 2003, been doing some freelance and consulting since then, but never got full time work after that, even moved out of state too...f#ck all that, i'm going into my family's business and become a small business owner...tech industry used to be a good living, but no job security now and pay is about 1/3 off too from the 2000-2001 heyday.

[lovuian]

46. I'm waiting for the Foreign Programmers to Sabotage US!!!

There are ways of screwing your US American Company and it not have any ramifications on you and help fight Tryanny of Bush!!!


Just waiting for it to happenn!!! You get what you pay for!!!

[DS1]

47. But just YESTERDAY someone posted an article saying that

ANYTHING IN COMPUTERS was hot for college grads :eyes:

Make your fucking minds up.

[Greyhound]

52. well whoever posted that knows nothing

about the industry

[NuttyFluffers]

65. i read that too.

and my parents took the bait again, hook line and sinker. they pointed at it and said, "you could be making money in computers! or in bio-tech, nursing or medicine!"

yeah right! computers is already a lost cause in america, and bio-tech and medicine is already slipping through our fingers. it'll be another boom/bust cycle again. not fallin' for that shit. i'm getting something diverse so that i can escape while the getting is good and go to a nation that actually realizes the value of some protectionism. screw this. brain drain, baby. ain't just for "3rd world countries" anymore!

[darkism]

48. Makes me glad I dropped out of computer science

and changed to something I really want to do...journalism!

Maybe, just maybe, if there are more journalists like me in training, we can make the media liberal again.

I can dream, can't I?

[Deja Q]

57. Duh. Should ANYBODY be surprised by this? Apart from idiot 'reporters'?

I'm leaving IT myself.

[high density]

59. Got a computer science degree in '03 and it's gathering cobwebs

Not sure what to do with it and I'm not sure what to do, period. I don't think I'll ever be able to do what I wanted to do (software development.) The job market is full of lame 3 month contracts and I can't even find an entry-level position so I can gain the experience that most employers want.

[FLBlueFaced]

67. I also have a dilemma

I dont know if I should continue my education in networking(mcsa, cisco, etc.)because even system administrator positions are being shipped to india, china, etc. They dont have to be on site, they just need an internet connection and they are able to oversee the network infrastructure, like one DUer said before me, they just need a couple of people to maintain the systems physically connected.

It seems to me that the only safe fields are teaching and fast food.

[Ambrose]

72. Get out now

There is no future in information technology in America.

[Endangered Specie]

69. I predict that very few base level programming jobs will be around

in, say 10 or 20 years...

mainly because the companies can find people all over the world who will do it 2x faster, just as good, and 1/10th the labor cost.

The math doesn't lie, neither does economics.

[leesa]

80. But....new grads face GREAT job market!

Right.