In response to anti-offshoring cries throughout America, the Indian IT outsourcing industry has hired two American lobbyists to make their case to our elected representatives and beureaucrats in Washington, DC. These experienced lobbyists, according the Economic Times of India, are Melanie Carter-Maguire and Robert Hoffman. The article continues,
"Ms Maguire, who was hired by India’s third-largest software exporter Wipro last week, and Mr Hoffman, who joined as first vice-president of global public policy last year at Cognizant, another top IT company, have been entrusted with pushing their companies’ cases in a key market where the public outcry against outsourcing is getting shriller by the day.
India’s $60-billion technology services industry, which has had a largely uninterrupted run in its key market, has recognised that political lobbying is the need of the hour to educate local lawmakers about the economic benefits of outsourcing, after ballooning unemployment has exacerbated the cry against foreign tech companies. The task has been made more difficult by the US jobless rate galloping to double digits. US policymakers are under pressure to tighten immigration norms for protecting local jobs in software programming, call centres and legal paperwork. "
It is clear that outsourcing to India is big business, especially in IT. The nascent Legal Process Outsourcing (LPO) industry is several years behind the growth curve of the IT industry. It is clear that these companies will use whatever tactics necessary to keep the flow of jobs and work from the USA and into India. As the article indicates, there are other such firms using American lobbyists, too.
Who is there in Washington DC to represent us, American Citizen taxpayers? Who is there to defend the American professional class that is being exported offshore? Clearly it is not our elected leaders who would rather write a huge new appropriations bill before actually addressing substantive issues confronting millions of Americans. There won't been any need for healthcare when our tax base is obliterated and we're a third world country, with half the population living in the streets.
In a related article, Indian IT firms have resumed hiring, while US firms are still shedding jobs. This is just more evidence that our "jobless" recovery is due at least partially to increased outsourcing or offshoring of American jobs to India. How much more evidence do we need before we realize that this is destroying (and in no way helpling) our economy and middle class?
While Americans are struggling to make ends meet, on the other side of the world, the Indian outsourcing firms are licking their chops, from the article,
"The downturn will "solidify the benefit" of outsourcing, said Atul Vashistha, the chairman of outsourcing consulting firm New Advisory. Companies and suppliers were "able to ramp down fast" with the downturn, he said.
The US IT work force, which peaked at just over four million in November 2008, has a lot of lost ground to cover as a result of the recession. The TechServe Alliance, an industry group tracks US labour IT-related occupational data month-to-month, counted 3.81 million IT workers at the end of September, with a net gain of about 11,000 jobs to the end of last month.
TPI, which tracks outsourcing spending, said on Wednesday that the total market value of outsourcing contracts (from an index which measures contracts that are greater than $25 million) was this market's best performance in six quarters, reaching $24.7 billion for the most recent quarter, a sequential increase of 47% and 8% percent year-over-year. But despite these numbers, Lang said the outsourcing market is just starting to get back to normal, and still has a way to go. Last year "was a very dismal year," said Lang."
If you want to understand why our recovery is jobless, look no further.
As far as the LPO shills go, this Youtube clip is fairly representative of the quality associated with these firms.
