Pols assignment

Pols 241

Question: What are the advantages and disadvantages of outsourcing jobs to both the sending and receiving countries?

            In the article a few points are brought up about what various politico’s have said regarding the outsourcing of jobs. I want to state right at the forefront that, any politician that tries to take one side of the issue or the other is nothing more than a lying bastard. There is no such thing as a professional politician, such as those in Washington DC, that gives a flying flip about if the people they represent are employed or not, rich or poor, minority or majority. The only thing they care about in those regards is ‘what do I need to say or promise to get reelected’.

            With that out of the way, let us actually address the question at hand. A bit of the response will be from the article and a bit from personal and professional experience. First, let’s talk about the obvious advantages to the outsourcing of jobs. One it cuts costs in the bottom line of the company doing the outsourcing, which in turn means an increase in profits for said company. That in turn means more money for the shareholders. It should be noted that this increase will potentially be a short term increase only, for reasons discussed in a moment.

            The second obvious advantage is the creation of jobs in places such as India that wouldn’t be there otherwise. In sociology, being ‘poor’ or ‘rich’ has everything to do with the societal setting the person is in. So, what we consider poor may look amazing in comparison to someone who lives in Ethiopia, but making such a comparison is considered folly, as the poor person in question doesn’t live in Ethiopia. The next consideration is one of cost of living, or to use an index introduced in class, the Big Mac index. If it is a norm for a poor person to be able to only eat a Big Mac as a once a week ‘treat’, then you have to adjust your expectations about middle class wages appropriately.

            So overall, more money and jobs for those in outsourced countries and more money for shareholders and companies that are doing the outsourcing.

            Now for the downside of outsourcing:

            The first thing to remember about economies and with capitalism specifically, not everyone gets to be a winner. Back when you were in grade school and your teacher said that, fi you tried really, really, really hard you could be president, she lied to you, you will never be president. It simply will not happen. Sure, you can dream, but the likelihood that a person with enough wealth and prestige to actually run for that office is actually ever going to read this is so extremely small that it is effectively non-existent.

            Next, we should look at the society in which the jobs are being subtracted from. Analysts are saying that about 70% of the jobs in America are simply unable to be outsourced because of their nature. With this idea, let’s turn the equation around. That insinuates that 30% of the job market could be shipped out. To give this a better perspective, the ‘unemployment rate’ in America since the housing bubble burst as never really gone much higher than 10-12%. Now understand that I put ‘unemployment rate’ in scare-quotes because there were a number of people who are or were considered ‘displaced workers’ that were unable to obtain unemployment benefits. As such, it is my opinion that the rate of unemployment was higher than reported simply because a number of people without jobs were not counted.

            The present economy, although it is ‘on the mend’ as some analysts insist, is still a far cry from what it was or could be. With that statement, what if the unemployment rate was to double? One can only shudder at the proposition.

            There are current studies showing the disparity between the percentage rate in which the ‘rich’ have increased in salary and the percentage rate of the middle class and the poor’s income rate. This is also shown in the cost of product goods in the economy where packages get smaller, yet somehow become more expensive. Although I believe restricted capitalism is a wonderful idea, I find it curious that CEO’s and decision makers or shareholders seem to be showing the symptoms of a terrible disease, the disease of blatant stupidity. By lowering the percentage of jobs available and dismissing people from job-posts, yet increasing costs of basic goods, exactly how do these people think the economy will sustain itself in the long run? Less jobs = less ‘free money’, less ‘free-money’ = market stagnation.

            In the article provided, it states that economists think that more world trade in this sense will mean more money flow, but that money is locked into the upper levels pockets. Thus my equation, ‘free-money’ or ‘money that is actually circulating in the market’, the less that is present within an economy, the more stagnant the market becomes.

            All of this pondering is moot however, much like the idea that I will never become president, it is absurdly unlikely that any of the people that make major decisions at companies, or any of the people that dictate policy, will ever hear what I say, and if by some crazy happenstance that they do read these words or hear my ideas out, they will never actually ‘listen’.    

            So, with this firmly in mind, I must simply shrug and keep trying to get by, hoping that whatever new career that I may get into won’t be just another target by some over-zealous Harvard grad that has never actually worked a day in their life…

-Tank