Angry cries of America's 'outsourced' middle class

The Arizona Republic ^ | 03.09.04 | E.J. Montini

[Beck_isright]

Among those who apparently didn't listen to the 43-year-old unemployed woman whose recorded message was posted online last week by The Republic were Arizona's Jon Kyl and John McCain, along with 24 of their Senate colleagues, all of them collecting fat government paychecks.

[clamper1797]

My last job was writing verification tests for a large scale multi million dollar chip tester in C++

[FITZ]

There are some FReepers who act like jerks here.

Yes --- making fun of peoples' health problems and mocking people who are desperately looking for jobs is supposed to get them to vote for a particular candidate --- I'm sure Bush could do without certain help.

[Texasforever]

an XRAY technician who loses their job in NY because those X-RAYS are now being read by someone in India, has not lost their job to automation.

No, he has lost it because of the communications network that makes reading that x-ray offshore possible. Gripe to your cousins in the telecomm industry about that one.

[Will_Zurmacht]

That's part of the reason I gave up. It really is all the same junk. I used to try to buy American, but realized there is no such thing anymore.
"American" Cars are made in Canada and Mexico, while "Japaneese" Cars are made in Alabama....Go Figure?hehe

I still try to shop some local stores based on their connection to our community. But honestly, can I go to the Mom & Pop Bookstore? I can go to Amazon and get anything I want for less.

Same goes for almost everything. Oddly, my boycott of walmart led me to the net for shopping, even less local!!!...why? Mom & Pop either don't have it or it costs too dang much. Better to get it from some anomyous transaction online, have some Indonesian in training put it in a box, and have it arrive at my door.

[Texasforever]

Not big on rodents.

Then why bring them up?

[_Jim]

outsourcing their primary IT center

Is this the term that's being used now for customer support centers these days?

Also known as a 'call center'?

[clamper1797]

So ... where's the req ... or a website ... you must have one if you can't find enough S/W engineers

[Jorge]

Of all your scoffing on thread...

Forgive me, but if "scoffing" is what it takes to avoid being sucked into the pessimism, negativity, doom and gloom on this thread then I'll take it.

The test of a man's character is not being upbeat when everything seems to be going great, but in being positive, being thankful and refusing to become discouraged even when things are not so great. That, to me is the true American spirit.
Not the whining, complaining and sense of personal entitlement I see in these threads.

[oceanview]

sure, that makes it possible. but that's not the same as losing a job because a machine can now do it. the end result is that large US companies are expanding their human payrolls, with offshore labor.

[nmh]

If you can't bear to part with your IT job then consider moving to China, India, Romania, Russia etc.. to keep it. Keep in mind the standard of living is lower.

If you can think of other companies that can use your skills, then by all means - go for it while others wring their hands in despair. It's not as though this is an over night phenom. Outsourcing in IT has been going on for ATEAST 1-15 years! Others have prepared for something else ... and doing better than in their IT position.

[_Jim]

once all the IT people haved moved to India

Same question to you -

- is this the new 'glory term' for customer support centers?

[FreeReign]

So ... where's the req ... or a website ... you must have one if you can't find enough S/W engineers

I don't have to produce the website of the company I work for.

[Texasforever]

Yes, a service part if the operation - they don't actually produce anything, but turn out to be necessary when selling to the general public ...

Their big mistake was in training for an overhead function in the first place. If you are not in the revenue stream of a company you are the first to go.

[clamper1797]

I don't have to produce the website of the company I work for.

That's what I thought ....

[KC_Conspirator]

CHICAGO (Reuters) - Bonuses totaling more than $10 million were paid out to five Kraft Foods Inc. executives at the end of 2003, even as the giant food maker made plans to lay off thousands of workers.

I like Larry Kudlow, but I heard him argue that the economy is doing better because the CIO of Hewlett-Patel got a bigger check last year. Thats not very convincing, especially to the thousands of workers that lost their jobs overseas.

[_Jim]

Their big mistake was in training for an overhead function in the first place. If you are not in the revenue stream of a company you are the first to go.

Bingo!

[FITZ]

If any real choice reveals itself (third party get over 5% in polls) I'm there.

Tough decision --- but I don't think I could go for even 4 years of Kerry and what could follow.

[CWOJackson]

I know what you mean. We still have some Mom & Pop stores but this is the Seattle area. So they're Mom & Mom, or Pop & Pop, and sell ridiculously over priced things I have no use for made by other local artists.

I think the thing that I miss most about the corporatization of American stores (and Walmart didn't invent that) is how it's changed the landscape. Used to be towns had personalities, and individual owned stores were part of that.

Now everything looks and tastes the same. You can see the same stores in the same strip malls and the same fast food places from Homer, Alaska to Bugtussle, Florida...the towns all look the same.

[Texasforever]

You still can't accept that the High tech industry sowed the seeds of its own demise can you? Ya'll did it to the blue-collar workforce and now you have done it to yourselves.

[nmh]

It is a "hot issue" however is it up to the government to solve? Should the government be finding jobs for people? Should the government isolate itself from trade through tariffs so people can be over paid for what they do? I don't think so.

It's up to people to regroup and find another way to make a living. Surely Americans are not stupid or helpless like liberals, or are they ? ? ? ?