Talk:Lecture 9

Diwaker: Why are these discussions on outsourcing here? Shouln't they be moved to Lecture 8?

Quality of Life during transition

Jack Richins: Something I kept thinking about during the lecture is that from the history I've read of Europe and America the transition from a rural, agricultural society to urban, industrial society was at least initially painful and probably lowered the quality of life. What can we do to help prevent a lose in quality of life? Is it practical to move to an IT based economy without destroying the villages? Or introducing massive pollution?

Graphs in the Lecture

Looking back at the second part of lecture on outsourcing, there is a series of graphs showing how rates of employment in the IT industry have gone up and down over the past few years. In the most recent years, there has been a lot of jobs lost in the IT industry folloing a period in the late 90's and early 2000's where there was a really high degree of growth in the industry. Looking at the breakdown of how specific job functions changed over time, it appears as if outsourcing could have had a strong impact because those fuunctions are easily outsourced. So it seems like all those programers could have lost their jobs to outsourcing, but i wonder how big of an impact the high degree of enthusiasm and fast growth in tech industry had on that. Does anyone have any idea?

Diwaker: Some analysts are of the opinion that this high speed growth is only temporary, and that bulk of the outsourcing process (that we're yet to see) is going to take place slowly over time, allowing the industry and nations to adapt to the changing environment. There is also data to show that the number of jobs "lost" to outsourcing is not really a significant chunk of the total IT work force.

pmhalupt: The challenge of getting ICT access into the poor and rural areas is tough - but a couple of things are working in its favor. The productivity levels / real incomes / GDP of nations continues to rise (extremely fast in many of the so called third world countries), but the ICT costs continue to fall - so the reach of technology into a broader range of society/world will improve just from the improving economics. The efficiency gains for government services through technology will help motivate the government to spend on the technology infrastructure too - but right now the labor wages in rural India are so low that labor efficiency isn't a big motivator. I think access to ICT is similar to access to books in public libraries - and the funding for both should be supported by the government.

Is Outsourcing the Fleecing of America?

(User: John) As a Boeing engineer, I have had many opportunities to observe the econimcs of outsourcing, first hand. In the vast majority of cases, outsourcing occurs for reasons unrelated to reduced labor costs, which of course, is the most frequently touted rationale for outsourcing. The argument that American business cannot compete in the international arena because of high labor costs has always been ludicrous. No, there is something else in the outsourcing equation that compels big business to outsource - especially offshore outsourcing. We live in a time when the robber barron is again king. We have gone through this cycle, most recently during the 1890-1930 time frame. The cavalier attitude of big business towards American workers caused the rise of the AFL and the CIO. It caused the Depression and the intervention of the federal government into the business arena. Today, business has forgotten that it is well-paid American workers who buy those goods they make. It appears to me that we are in the midst of converting from a national economy to an international economy. Such a change is good for non-Americans and some companies that cannot compete without extremely cheap labor. It is not good for Americans generally, however. The U.S. economic boom started during WWII continued through to the 1980's as a national economy. Our real wages and spending ability was unparalled. Worker's political power was at its zenith. America had highly trained workers, economic stability, safe working environments, and what appeared to be a bright future. Enter the over inflationary policies of the Federal Reserve Banks in the late 1970's and the advent of Reaganomics, and we have seen a continuous decline in the national economy ever since. Deregulation has not helped the aircraft industry, nor the airline industry. Systematic destruction of labor unions has not helped the workforce of America. I wonder what will happen to America if we have to produce our own goods during wartime? Hmmmm.

Diwaker: You raise an interesting point, but you didn't really clarify what it was, if now lowering costs, that led to outsourcing (for Boeing in this case). The transition from national to international economy has to be driven by corporate goals like profit, don't you think? Indian giants like Wipro and Infosys also claim that Indian workers are not only cost efficient, but infact just *as* (if not more) productive than say U.S. workers. So in the IT industry atleast, the incentive to lower costs while maintaining same or higher quality levels seem quite lucrative to me.

Cybersecurity

David Dorwin: For those of you interested in Cybersecurity, there is a UW CSE Colloquium on Critical Infrastructure Protection. This may be of particular interest to UW PMP students enrolled in the Colloquia.