Jolted workers rethink life's basics 09:54 AM CDT on Saturday, June 26, 2004
By KATHERINE YUNG / The Dallas Morning News
Mark Olesen and Jerry Dugick live 181 miles apart. They're strangers to each other, but they share a common bond. Losing their tech jobs to overseas workers cost each of them more than paychecks and pride.
For Mark, a former software engineer for IBM in Austin, it led to bankruptcy and nearly a year away from his family, driving big rigs to natural gas fields around the country.
Jerry, a former engineer and project manager for Cadence Design Systems, sold the Dallas home he treasured to eliminate debt. He can pay for his daughter's first two years of college. But he doesn't see a way to cover the rest of her tuition with a part-time job.
The upheaval in both their lives illustrates why moving U.S. white-collar jobs overseas has caused so much anxiety and controversy. In many cases, the disruptions go far beyond lost income.
The irony: Offshoring has been a boon to American businesses, consumers and Third World workers – boosting profits, cutting prices and increasing incomes.
"We are kind of a victim of our own success," says Dane Anderson, program director of outsourcing and service providers for META Group, an information technology research and consulting firm.
White-collar workers affected by offshoring usually land other jobs. But for the first time in their lives, many are struggling to adapt to a lower standard of living.
And the emotional toll can be just as burdensome. Most worked hard to get a good education only to discover what plenty of former manufacturing employees already know: Workers overseas can do their jobs for less money."There is no job that is America's God-given right anymore," Carly Fiorina, chief executive of Hewlett-Packard Co., declared earlier this year. "We have to compete for jobs."
Offshoring has come full circle for Mark, a 37-year-old with curly brown hair and a wide grin. Three years ago, his job was moved overseas. Now he spends his nights at his north Austin home collaborating with a group of programmers in Israel.
The group is updating software used to help companies and entrepreneurs figure out whether their products will sell on eBay. The programmers perform the work, and Mark sends them sales data.
The job pays $36,000, about half of what he earned at IBM. He and his family lack health insurance.
And with Israel eight hours ahead, he stays up most of the night. During the day, he talks to his boss in Utah and other folks.
But the software engineer isn't grumbling. He's relieved to be employed in the tech field again, especially since the small firm from Provo, Utah, that hired him is owned by one of his college buddies.
A year ago, Mark rarely saw his wife and the two teenage girls he helped raise. He spent his days at natural gas fields in Colorado, Michigan and other states, setting up and moving pumps and other heavy equipment. His nights were spent sleeping in strange hotels. Most of the men he worked with hadn't gone to college. And the pay: $10 an hour plus overtime.
It was the best he could do. When Mark lost his job in the midst of the tech slump, he couldn't find anything that would allow him to use his computer science degree from Brigham Young University. Employers were interested in hiring only foreign workers on H-1B visas.
The months dragged on. One of his cars was repossessed. On the brink of losing his house and unable to hold off his creditors any longer, he filed for bankruptcy.
The move allowed him to reorganize his finances and clear away enough debt to save his house. But it also frightened him, leading him to sign up for the oil services contracting job.
"It was a humbling experience," says the Star Trek fan who grew up in Long Island, N.Y. "You start to really realize how fragile life is."
It's the last thing Mark expected to happen when he decided to study computer science. "I wanted to go for a career that provided me with some security," he recalls.
One day while out on the road, Mark received a call from one of his college pals, asking whether he'd be interested in a job. In October, he began working from home.
Today, Mark is paying off medical bills for his family and struggling to make his property tax payments. He hasn't bought a pair of shoes for himself in more than a year. And like many other laid-off tech workers, he has lost his respect for corporate America.
"It's really hurting the American people," he says of offshoring. "They are strip-mining society."
But the turmoil in his life has yielded an unexpected benefit: a newfound appreciation for what he does have. His family has learned how to have fun the low-cost way – with barbecues and visits to state parks.
"I don't think I take things for granted anymore," he says. "Life beats you down. You can either stay down or get back up and try to live."
For Jerry, offshoring has been more of a one-way street heading south.
For seven years, he was proud to work for Cadence Design Systems, a company in San Jose, Calif., that sells software used to design microchips, printed circuit boards and other items.
A trim man with alert blue eyes and closely cropped hair, Jerry spent most of his time interacting with Cadence's customers. He taught them how to use the software and listened to their concerns. Most recently, he was in charge of making sure chipmaker Intel Corp., one of Cadence's biggest customers, received top-notch technical support.
The questions he encountered often proved so complex that he needed a team of engineers to find the answers.
The work was rarely dull. He never lacked for something to do. And he earned more than $100,000 a year.
One day last August, after dropping off his daughter at the University of Arizona for her first year of college, Jerry returned to North Dallas to find an e-mail from his manager. Would he be at work the next day?
The next morning he was told his job was moving to Noida, India. Cadence could hire three or four engineers for what they were paying him, Jerry learned.
Until that point, Jerry hadn't thought much about offshoring. He knew Cadence wanted to staff a technical support center in India and had started eliminating jobs in the United States. But the University of Missouri electrical engineering graduate never thought one of those jobs might be his.
"I had never been fired or laid off in my life," said the 43-year-old from St. Louis. "This kind of shocked me."
He felt like he'd been pushed from a train.
Once he got over the initial shock, Jerry started looking for another tech position. He quickly realized just how many people with master's degrees couldn't find work. His wife had just received her MBA and was also searching for a job.
To prepare for the worst, the couple decided to sell their house in North Dallas, where they had lived for the last seven years.
It sold the day they put it up for sale, at the asking price. The couple rented another house nearby so that their 14-year-old son wouldn't have to switch schools. With the money, they paid off debts and made some investments.
Jerry got a few interviews, but nothing came of them. The one offer he got required him to travel more than 80 percent of the time. He turned it down.
"My job is not worth my life," he says.
In the meantime, he took some classes at the University of Texas at Dallas, passed an exam and got certified in project management.
Without a job, Jerry started to take stock of his life. He realized that he had been working for his family and his company but not himself. If he had died the next day, he says, his tombstone would have read, "He was a good employee."
Jerry began volunteering and networking with others who'd lost their jobs. He vows to make the next 20 years of his life more fulfilling.
"I am not going to become a slave to some corporation," he says, still stinging from the memory of how he sang Cadence's praises before it dropped him.
A few months ago, he walked into the office of a small engineering firm in Dallas. It was the first time he'd dared to drop into an office to leave his résumé and cover letter. He knew the owner from his days at Cadence.
What do I have to lose? he asked himself.
Today, Jerry is working part-time as a project manager for Circuitpac Corp. in Dallas, earning about a third of his former salary.
He and his wife, who speaks fluent Spanish, hope to start their own business, selling computers to Hispanics.
"I feel more stress than I used to," he says. "I'm still trying to figure out where Jerry is going to be a year from now."
