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Pradeep A wrote:
<quote>
An interesting article from OP-ED COLUMNIST of NY
Times THOMAS L. FRIEDMAN titled The Great Indian Dream
Don't you agree?
</quote>
Like Al Grist, I've followed this thread and found it interesting. I also
read Thomas Friedman's column.
Several things both the thread and the article miss:
Many of those companies offshoring jobs to XXX (it doesn't matter where) are
receiving tax money from some government entity to promote local economies
here in the US, including jobs. So it becomes an ethical question, is it
right that those companies' offshore jobs that are need here in the US?
Many communities have floated bond issues to raise the money to lure
companies to there area to provide more jobs for the community. The company
comes to the area, then after a period of time offshores the jobs. The
community is back where it began job-wise, but now it has the addition of
the indebtedness for the bond issue. In the economic supply-demand theory
discussions, this government involvement isn't included. It skews the
equation immensely.
Another area, alluded to but not covered, by the Thomas Friedman's article
is "intellectual property rights." Different countries have different laws
about patents, copyrights, and trademarks. I'm not at IP guru, but I have a
concern about the data or code sent to another country. They, as the article
says, can tell me that the data is secure, but who owns that data? What are
the limitations on its use in that country? Friedman's article cites a call
center manager saying that the security is very tight; there is no paper.
But in a call center, hardcopy isn't the real issue. It has electronic
connections. A knowledgeable person could "steal" the data electronically.
That issue isn't addressed. I have spent nearly 10-years trying to get the
credit card companies to remove someone else's information from my report;
that's with the laws we have here in the US. What would it be like if the
data was owned by outside entites?
Another observation I've made: Many managers are very much like sheep. The
current bandwagon is to outsource and/or offshore as a solution to all a
companies problems. They jump on the bandwagon, rather than doing a good
analysis including a risk assessment. A quality risk assessment would
indicate that outsourcing or offshoring would not be the end-all, be-all
solution. I don't have hard data on this and would be interested in any
pointers to some.
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