Whither Outsourcing?



Few days ago, a colleague sent me a link on how outsourcing has affected Americans, and during our coffee break, lamented that not all is well with outsourcing and many Americans are losing their jobs and suffering. I later went to the site and read through some of those angry outbursts. Before I go into my reaction to this, I want to present some of them.

I am ABC customer (sic). I can't believe I am calling in to India for my financial info. A Third World country people where the law is a joke have my bank account numbers, social security, etc. I can't believe it. Somebody could rip me off there and then I will be powerless to prosecute. Unreal. On top of that, the bank screwed up and I asked for a refund of the bank fee and the Indian customer rep started bargaining with me. This is not a Bombay bazaar, dude.

Another cries hoarse about the jobs going to India:

The trend is that when a position is open-posted, XYZ Management (the VP level) routinely sends the work to India, bypassing qualified individuals in the United States, for cheap overseas labor - which is inferior in ever way to the US workforce.

This is something at the activist level:

Write to Congress, your state Senator, the President and ask them why companies are allowed to import cheap labor on L1/H1 Visa's when there is an American needing that job. Ask Why American workers are being forced to train their cheaper replacement and then laid-off.

And finally, of course, my personal favourite:

I'm beyond the concern for privacy, I'm concerned that my American culture is being diluted into global mush. I don't want my ATM to ask me for a language preference, I live in the freakin' USA!


Now over to me. Five years back, when India signed GAAT, a treaty to accede to World Bank's reform programs, thousands thronged the streets and protested against selling western products in India. They feared that the US products will kill Indian industries. But the pundits of New Economy laughed and said that's the result of globalisation, which leads to consolidation.

When Kentucky Fried Chicken was launched in Bangalore (I was there), many Kannada activists gheroed the outlet and shouted slogans. They said KFCs policy of making genetically modified chickens will not only kill the local poultry industry, it will also lead to health hazards. KFC scoffed at these allegations. A few days later, some angry protesters broke into KFC and destroyed some of their equipment. The media portrayed this as narrow-minded reaction.

Similar protests happened for the launch of Coca Cola too. Those who opposed to Coke coming in, said Coke and McDonalds are an epitome of what we call 'American Culture' and Coke's entry will spoil the 'Indian Culture'. An RSS spokesperson even said, 'Why do you want to drink Coke. What's wrong with nimbu pani'?

Actually you don't have to always drink nimbu pani. Thumbs Up was a very good cola drink available before. But there was another claim. Pepsi opened employment opportunities and over 10,000 people were employed by Pepsi. Perhaps equal number by Coke too.

What many forgot was another fact that Thumbs Up was not the only cola drink available. There were local cola brands like Kali Mark, Bovonto, Campa Cola, and believe me, a brand called Mappillai Vinayaka (Vinayak The Groom). Thumbs Up was brought by Coca Cola. Some of these local operators later turned into becoming bottling units for Pepsi or Coke. But many brands died a slow death, resulting in loss of jobs, especially in the rural areas. A private study estimated that close to five lakh people lost jobs due to Pepsi and Coke's entry into India.

Many people in the US asked why people the middle east hate them. There are many reasons. But surely, one of them could be because Americans enforce their lifestyle and culture onto Arabs they don't like it.

Of many complaints I have read about, this 'cultural erosion' is one of the strongest emanating from the middle east. But the west dismisses it saying they are actually 'helping' the people world-over lead a better peaceful lives.

My contention is not about whether the US culture is rich enough or not. I feel that they do have a great culture and I personally like their focus on freedom and human rights, at least for the American people. But trouble arises when they laugh at the rest of the world and their culture and their people. Outsourcing and the retaliation from this Web site is a classic example that people all over the world regardless of their religion, race and economic status, are just same. When their own survival is in danger, they bring culture, nationalism, race, self-reliance and everything else into the argument.

The people who were part of this site have called Indians as cheap, third-world people, thieves, and inferior. While I can understand their frustration, I raise my eyebrows when they can't understand our frustrations on Coke and Globalisation.

I know that this site is just a small and a very minority voice that is not going to impact much. America has gone too far into the Outsourcing jungle and it's impossible to go back. But this site reminds me that those crying hoarse in the middle east, those Kannada activists and the left, after all, did have a point.

Finally, I told my colleague, that when East Indian Company imported cotton from England and sold it in India. They did this to support the cotton weavers back there. In order to do that, they forced Indian cotton industry to shut shops. This resulted in the infamous Cotton Famine, due to which 10,000 people in Bengal alone died. Now the jobs are coming to east from west.

Perhaps life has come a full circle.