Point 1. France is the worst western country as far as morality. Selling weapons to, providing training, then protecting the Hutu Murders during the Rwandan genocide is the most glaring point, next is the atrocious and nefarious means it is willing to take to sell a few Aerobus planes makes me want to vomit.

Point 2. The recent elections have shown one thing. Europe is fucked. Hello??? McFly... Socialism is fucking dead, and if Europeans want to hang onto 35 hour work weeks, bloated benefit packages and unemployment benefits that are almost as good as being employed, in the next 10 years India and China is going to mop the fucking floor with you...
Sooner or later Great Britian, or someone, will see the writing on the wall and recognize the ingrained socialism of Western Europe is an albatross that will sink Europe to a 3rd rate power in the next 3 years.
http://cia.gov/nic/PDF_GIF_2020_Support/NIC%202020%20Final%20Paper/2020%20Project_files/China_India_GDP.gif

You stupid fuckers.. you worry that you dont want to work a 35 hour WEEK? haha.. Say hello to 3 Billion people willing to work a 35 Hour DAY. Its obvious that Europe doesnt get it. They have lost the edge and really are totally unprepared to deal with the next century.


but Poland? nothing but uncultured zealously religious peasants, Europe's rednecks.

Ya? Well guess what buddy, its those Eastern countries that hold your only prayer to survive the massive changes coming up. You need a population that is hungry and energized and anxious to take advantage of the new opportunties of the new global reality, instead of short sighted and hopeless attempts to isolate and hold onto a system that can no longer exist.
Voters in "old Europe" - France, Germany, the Netherlands and Italy - seem to be saying to their leaders: stop the world, we want to get off; while voters in India have been telling their leaders: stop the world and build us a stepstool, we want to get on. I feel sorry for Western European blue collar workers. A world of benefits they have known for 50 years is coming apart, and their governments don't seem to have a strategy for coping.

One reason French voters turned down the E.U. constitution was rampant fears of "Polish plumbers." Rumors that low-cost immigrant plumbers from Poland were taking over the French plumbing trade became a rallying symbol for anti-E.U. constitution forces. A few weeks ago Franz Müntefering, chairman of Germany's Social Democratic Party, compared private equity firms - which buy up failing businesses, downsize them and then sell them - to a "swarm of locusts."

The fact that a top German politician has resorted to attacking capitalism to win votes tells you just how explosive the next decade in Western Europe could be, as some of these aging, inflexible economies - which have grown used to six-week vacations and unemployment insurance that is almost as good as having a job - become more intimately integrated with Eastern Europe, India and China in a flattening world.
-Tom Friedman


The problem is that Western Europeans dont seem to view the EU an opportunity to become a cohesive economic powerhouse, it has seemed to morph into a socialistic quagmire where the only goal is to preserve the bloated social welfare nets you have created for yourselves.

Europe is going to be the first to crash hard, this is obvious, my only hope is that we in US see the example of the inevitible tailspin of the European Economy and transformation of that continent into a "also ran" region in the next 10-15 years and get our shit together in time to make the changes to be able to compete more vigorously with the rising powers of the East.

Yes, this is a bad time for France and friends to lose their appetite for hard work - just when India, China and Poland are rediscovering theirs.

The whole root of there even being socialism in Europe and also other places such as Canada is that there was this desire to have the wealth of the nation be partially distributed in a manner where it benifits everyone. Not just a few fat cats. Great in priniciple in some ways, such as education and healthcare, but it can be stiffling in areas such as amibtion and creativity in others.

China and India having a larger GDP than Europe, Japan and the United States may mean alot for the wealthy few in both nations, but for the average Chinese and Indian peasant, it means dick. . The question is, what is the trade off and how long can their nations maintain the courses they are taking? Both countries are enjoying wealth, but for the majority of the billions that live there, life isn't too much different from 200 years ago. Also there are enviromental issues and issues of human rights. China's air is almost unbreathable in many of the large cities. Who knows if you want to drink the water. Also the issue of wanting to have children? They are in such a hurry to grow their economies that everything else got thrown out the window. So, is that the method the world needs in order to compete? China and India may have a tiny Middle class now and some fancy new buildings in their finacial districts of their largest cities (some of which are the world's tallest built by American and European engineers. In China's case, one has to wonder if they are compensating for something), but the bottom line is that those nations are still vastly overpopulated backwards shitholes whose people are doing whatever it takes just to get a slight chance of a better existance. The situation is not enviable at all, as it is mostly American, Japanese and European companies making the bank off these two nations, and NOT the vast majority of their population.

The US economy will always be strong, even if its not the big cock on the block anymore. Heck, that might even be a good thing since the majority of the world's scorn might get shifted to Asia if it turns out to be them that devours all the world's resources for a change. They have to take the bad with the good and if they want to manufacture everything on the earth than they get all the pollution and other undesirable side effects as well. The majority of US citizens live a pretty decent life. The same can be said of Europeans. Granted, we have had it so good for so long that we have become arrogant and complacent. That doesn't mean we have forgotten how to work hard. /shrug. Heck, throw a war at Europe and the US and we will work our asses off. Perhaps I only say that because I work 80 hour weeks for peanuts :p

Lummusl.

There is major, major factor you are forgetting.
http://www.j-bradford-delong.net/movable_type/archives/000900.html
Remember the "Dot Com Boom"? One of the primary reasons it went bust was foolish over investment in fiber optic cables. Companies used capital to lay these lines all over the globe. There has never been anything like this since the Railroad boom of 1800s. While this over investment helped end one phenonemon, it created another..

Suddenly, Bangalore, India became THE R&D hub of world. In the next 5 years Bangalore will be mentioned in the same breath as New York, Tokyo, London and Paris. And it happened almost overnight. Thats the speed of the world economy today.
Look. 5 years ago if you had the choice to be a C - B student anywhere in America, or a genius in India in China, you would choose being a C to B student in America, why? because even mediocre, you had more opportunity than anyone over there.
Thats gone.
With the entire world now wired fiber optically we are all connected and virtually next door neighbors in real time.So Lummus it doesnt matter if most of India and China is a shithole.. it really doesnt. Opportunity lives in the casing of a high speed data wire. 3 Billion people have been shown the way out of that surrounding.

They are hungry, they want what we have and are willing to work harder than us to get it. Is it a small percentage of the populations? Yes.. but its getting bigger and bigger every day. English is taught mandatory in Indian schools. Schools with dirt floors that teach English in backwater towns in Asia are crammed full, because parents know that speaking the language creates opportunity.

The world is changing very very fast...

All of those doom-n-gloom predictions hold everyone but India and China standing still while only India and China experience growth and innovation. While, they may be developing more rapidly than anyone else, that's just because they're still at the bottom of the curve. Their expansion will not continue this boom linearly for 10+ years. The global economy would never support that.

The same argument about the dominance of these emerging nations in the tech sector could easily be applied to similar situations in the past. The same people making the India argument now were probably predicting that we'd all be living in poverty by the year 2000 due to manufacturing jobs being moved overseas during the 80's and 90's.

Instead, we effectively turn off-shore resources into leverage for our domestic industries. Some of the payroll might go to India, but the wealth stays here. That capital is what allows us to continue dictating the next rung on the economic ladder, and thus creating opportunities for everyone.

Progress is never easy and change can be frightening, but that doesn't mean we're doomed just because some guys in China learn English and start doing menial jobs for us.

Some of the payroll might go to India, but the wealth stays here.

Why will this continue? As connectitivity gets better and better, and more and more of the area of the world gets internet access, why will capital investment continue to remain in the west almost exclusively. At what point does this cease to make sense.

Craig Barrett, chief executive officer of Intel told New York Times columnist has said that his company can be totally successful without ever employing another American.
Hello?
"America’s high schools are obsolete,” Bill Gates has said. “By obsolete, I don’t just mean that they’re broken, flawed or underfunded, though a case could be made for every one of those points. By obsolete, I mean our high schools — even when they’re working as designed — cannot teach all our students what they need to know today for me to want to hire them tomarrow.”
Ring?

IIT in India is producing BETTER engineers than MIT. Thats just a fact.

Lets say just 10% of India and China are let into this big party. 300 Million.. They still massively outnumber us. Where is the bulk of the talent most likely to be?
What do you think the PURPOSE of Bangalore is?
http://www.outsource2india.com/
Sun wants to help build 100 dotcoms

Over the next three to four years, we want to help create up to 100 dotcom companies in India, each with a market cap of around $10 billion,” said Lionel Lim, Sun's VP and MD (Asia South). “That is, perhaps, the biggest investment we can make in this country,” he added.

Sun, he said, planned to push the Net economy in India much the same way it had done in Singapore a few years ago. Primarily, it would be through offering its technical expertise and incubation funds. It has already started an incubation program with ICICI. Besides, it is working with DoE (department of electronics), LG (for developing appliances) and PricewaterhouseCoopers.

The company has other plans for greater presence in India. It has evolved a three-pronged strategy- -to increase the number of people working at its engineering center in Bangalore to 500 in 12 months from around 100 at present; to open new offices; and to expand its Java pool program to help engineers develop network-centric program and devices.

Cisco to invest $150 million in India

Networking giant Cisco Systems Inc said that it would invest $150 million to expand its technology development center in India over the next two years.
Cisco's largest R&D center outside the US

This will be Cisco's second-largest research and development (R&D) facility globally and the largest outside the U.S.,” Jayshree Ullal, Cisco's vice president and general manager, Enterprise Line of Business, told a news conference in the southern Indian city of Bangalore.

Cisco officials said the company had already invested $75 million in India since January 1996. The current announcement relates to fresh investments, they said.

Ullal said the R&D facility would be based in Bangalore and increase its workforce to 1,500 tech professionals over the next two years from the current 500.
Tapping business potential in the Asia-Pacific

This center will play a strategic role in Cisco's ability to rapidly develop technologies...and quickly deploy solutions and products that customers are demanding,” she said. Cisco officials said the investment was part of the firm's strategy to tap the rapid business growth in the Asia Pacific region.
Ford will make India its IT hub for global operations

Close on the heels of making India its accounting headquarters, the US-based auto giant Ford Motor Company (FMC) in now working towards making India the IT hub for its global operations.

"Ford will set up a software development center in India by January next year for its future e-business solutions," said the company's director (IT) Asia Pacific and South Africa John Larson.
Software development

FMC has decided to infuse $3 to $5 million over the next six-18 months into the IT venture, said Larson. This can go up to $30-$50 million per annum. “We have already started getting the IT work from other manufacturing bases to India”, said Larson. The company is in the process of finalizing the modalities of the venture, which is likely to be floated as a separate company.

“India would play a major role in Ford's global strategies and it would be the pilot for our new e-business solutions,” said Larson, adding that the company had tested some new IT solutions in the country before their global launch.
B2B automotive portal

Ford is also planning to set up an India chapter of its Web initiative, Covisint.

“Covisint has been floated as a joint initiative between Ford, General Motors and Daimler-Chrysler for common purchases on the Net. Since all the three partners already have manufacturing bases in India, we are looking at setting up an exclusive exchange for us. At a later stage, we will also look at including other automobile manufacturers into the system,” Larson said.

The three partners are merging their respective current exchanges under Covisint. The exchange will help in online purchasing, price comparison and configuration.
Remote processing and call centers

Larson said Ford was also planning to set up call centers in the country to do back-office processing work on the lines of General Electric (GE).

“The company is opening an office in India to explore possibilities of establishing call centers in the near future,” he said.

Oracle Invests in Indian Brainpower

Oracle has drawn up huge plans for India. On the drawing board are plans to set up an off-site consulting center for providing a virtual consulting resource for Oracle worldwide. Oracle has also started an initiative in India to focus on incubation for evaluating start-ups
Incubation for start-ups

According to Gary Bloom, Oracle's executive vice-president who also looks after the company's venture capital operations, India has a lot of small technology companies that have good ideas. He says, “There is a lot of incubation happening in India and we want to focus on that. The board has authorized us $500 million for global investments and we haven't allocated any sum to any location. If we find $200 million of great investments in India, we'll invest $200 million. But there are no allocations by geographical regions.”

Virtual consulting center at Hyderabad

Oracle Consulting has plans to set up an extension of its e-business studio at Hyderabad, which will provide virtual consulting capability and knowledge to all Oracle clients worldwide. "At this point of time, we might start off with just 100 people. But, over time, I see that growing to over 1,000 people," said Oracle executive vice-president Edward Sanderson. Oracle already has global software development centers in Bangalore and Hyderabad.

GE Opens Indian R&D Center: the 2nd largest in the GE family

Leading U.S. multinational General Electric (GE), is investing approximately $130 million (over a three year period) in the multi-disciplinary John F. Welch Technology Center in Bangalore, the largest R&D center of its kind in the GE family outside of the U.S.

The Center, which was built in a record 10 months, was inaugurated by John F. Welch Jr., chairman and chief executive officer, GE. It incorporates the latest technology and e-engineering tools that facilitate real-time global interaction with GE's customers, suppliers, businesses and technology centers, including its U.S. lab in Schenectady, New York.

...
Some of the payroll might go to India, but the wealth stays here. That capital is what allows us to continue dictating the next rung on the economic ladder, and thus creating opportunities for everyone.

Sorry, try again! The above is just the news from this month


They arent taking menial jobs Sanchek. India and China are racing us to the top.

There is a real sense of urgency in India and China about ‘‘catching up’’ in talent-building. America, by contrast, has become rather complacent.

‘‘People go to Shanghai or Bangalore and they look around and say, ‘They’re still way behind us’,’’ John Hagel (http://www.johnhagel.com/) said. ‘‘But it’s not just about current capabilities. It’s about the relative pace and trajectories of capability-building. ‘‘You have to look at where Shanghai was just three years ago, see where it is today and then extrapolate forward. Compare the pace and trajectory of talent-building within their population and businesses and the pace and trajectory here.’’

India and China know they can’t just depend on low wages, so they are racing us to the top, not the bottom.

Oh, forgot to add this
http://www.google.com/jobs/sw-bangalore.html

And for people who invest in the stock market... what has been one of the, if the not THE, biggest moneymakers over the last 5 years? Chinese Cell Phone companies.
http://www.billingsgazette.com/index.php?id=1&display=rednews/2005/06/02/build/business/40-cell-phones.inc

So stfu about capital investment, you have no clue what you are talking about.

Why will this continue? As connectitivity gets better and better, and more and more of the area of the world gets internet access, why will capital investment continue to remain in the west almost exclusively. At what point does this cease to make sense.

When american citizens don't control their own wealth anymore. The capital investment is being made by foreign companies in the east. So as soon as our wealthy citizens move to those areas, the US won't control anymore of the wealth. As you say, its so interconnected now, they don't need to live over there. Therefore the majority of the Wealth will stay here. It's going to hurt the middle and lower classes for sure.

"America’s high schools are obsolete,” Bill Gates has said. “By obsolete, I don’t just mean that they’re broken, flawed or underfunded, though a case could be made for every one of those points. By obsolete, I mean our high schools — even when they’re working as designed — cannot teach all our students what they need to know today for me to want to hire them tomarrow.”

People from the tech sector have to go to college, I don't see the issue here. We've known for a LONG time that a high school graduate wasn't going to get a high paying job /shrug, old news. Why do we see so many foreingers in our colleges? because they are still produce the best education available in the world. My wife and I are Purdue graduates, she's an engineer. She has ABSOLUTELY ZERO problem finding a good job. She works for Rolls Royce, A British company, in the United States. They aren't moving her jobs out of the US. In fact Chinese, Thailand, and many other asian oil companies come to her company for work. My wife has been to Korea, Samsung has outsourced work to rolls royce to develop engines to pump their oil. Her next business trip will be to Kuala Limpur Malaysia. As the east grows, areas they don't have expertise will continue to bring jobs here as well. Now I'm in IT, i see the opposite of this, i see jobs I want outsourced, but with my wife I see both sides of the equation.

/emote steals Lleauric's copy of The World is Flat (http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/0374292884/qid=1117909540/sr=8-1/ref=pd_csp_1/002-4159189-8824816?v=glance&s=books&n=507846) and bins it to stop him from sounding like a med student who keeps diagnosing the disease he learnt on his last lecture.

Back on topic, Click me (http://www.guardian.co.uk/comment/story/0,3604,1498989,00.html)

When american citizens don't control their own wealth anymore. The capital investment is being made by foreign companies in the east. So as soon as our wealthy citizens move to those areas, the US won't control anymore of the wealth. As you say, its so interconnected now, they don't need to live over there. Therefore the majority of the Wealth will stay here. It's going to hurt the middle and lower classes for sure.

But thats the POINT of capital investment, it creates jobs, it sustains the middle class. The new rampant globalization will have 0 effect on the richest 1% of Westerners, because they are going to invest capital in the areas that show the greatest potential to bring back the maximum return. The laws of Capitalism are very clear on this. Just like many Americans dont buy American cars, despite all the "Buy American" campaigns a few years ago. It would be FANTASTIC for our economy if we all did, but we dont. Why? Because Hondas and Toyotas are vastly superior to Fords and Chevys. They last longer and are more dependable. Thats just the facts.
These new Asian PROFESSIONALS (not cheap labor) are willing to work harder, longer and for less money, and do better work. Thats why all these companies investing billions to build labs and facilities in India and China. Its making them money.
Can you see now why the European holding onto thier cumbersome social welfare system is damning? Why on earth will anyone want to invest in Europe? Its a tough enough sell investing in the US, Europe has no shot for future growth if they are going to be so protectionist and demanding of unrealistic benefits.





At the same time, its not just about existing industry Tal.

Why wont the next Bill Gates be Asian? Why wont the next wave of technological breakthroughs happen in Bangalore?
As the east grows, areas they don't have expertise will continue to bring jobs here as well.
Why is this anything other than a temporary condition? We teach them, they learn, they no longer need us.

are you shitting me Linlaweniel?

To put it bluntly, do we want to live in a world in which the only choice is between the American civilisation and the emerging Chinese authoritarian-capitalist one? If the answer is no then the only alternative is Europe. The third world cannot generate a strong enough resistance to the ideology of the American dream. In the present world constellation, it is only Europe that can do it. The true opposition today is not between the first world and the third world. Instead it is between the first and third world (ie the American global empire and its colonies), and the second world (ie Europe).

/e rolls eyes.

Wow.. Europeans really are living in denial.

The population of the region that served as the locus for most 20th-century history—Europe and Russia—will decline dramatically in relative terms; almost all population growth will occur in developing nations that until recently have occupied places on the fringes of the global economy

Aging populations and shrinking work forces in most countries will have an important impact on the continent, creating a serious but not insurmountable economic and political challenge. Europe’s total fertility rate is about 1.4—well below the 2.1 replacement level. Over the next 15 years, West European economies will need to find several million workers to fill positions vacated by retiring workers. Either European countries adapt their work forces, reform their social welfare, education, and tax systems, and accommodate growing immigrant populations (chiefly from Muslim countries) or they face a period of protracted economic stasis that could threaten the huge successes made in creating a more United Europe.
http://cia.gov/nic/PDF_GIF_2020_Support/NIC%202020%20Final%20Paper/2020%20Project_files/population.gif


Could Europe Become A Superpower?

According to the regional experts we consulted, Europe’s future international role depends greatly on whether it undertakes major structural economic and social reforms to deal with its aging work-force problem. The demographic picture will require a concerted, multidimensional approach including:



More legal immigration and better integration of workers likely to be coming mainly from North Africa and the Middle East. Even if more guest workers are not allowed in, Western Europe will have to integrate a growing Muslim population. Barring increased legal entry may only lead to more illegal migrants who will be harder to integrate, posing a long-term problem. It is possible to imagine European nations successfully adapting their work forces and social welfare systems to these new realities; it is harder to see a country—Germany, for example—successfully assimilating millions of new Muslim migrant workers in a short period of time.


Increased flexibility in the workplace, such as encouraging young women to take a few years off to start families in return for guarantees of reentry. Encouraging the “younger elderly” (50-65 year olds) to work longer or return to the work force also would help ease labor shortages.
The experts felt that the current welfare state is unsustainable and the lack of any economic revitalization could lead to the splintering or, at worst, disintegration of the European Union, undermining its ambitions to play a heavyweight international role.

The experts believe that the EU’s economic growth rate is dragged down by Germany and its restrictive labor laws. Structural reforms there—and in France and Italy to lesser extents—remain key to whether the EU as a whole can break out of its slow-growth pattern. A total break from the post-World War II welfare state model may not be necessary, as shown in Sweden’s successful example of providing more flexibility for businesses while conserving many worker rights. Experts are dubious that the present political leadership is prepared to make even this partial break, believing a looming budgetary crisis in the next five years would be the more likely trigger for reform.

If no changes were implemented Europe could experience a further overall slowdown, and individual countries might go their own way, particularly on foreign policy, even if they remained nominal members. In such a scenario, enlargement is likely to stop with current members, making accession unlikely for Turkey and the Balkan countries, not to mention long-term possibilities such as Russia or Ukraine. Doing just enough to keep growth rates at one or two percent may result in some expansion, but Europe probably would not be able to play a major international role commensurate with its size.

In addition to the need for increased economic growth and social and welfare reform, many experts believe the EU has to continue streamlining the complicated decision-making process that hinders collective action. A federal Europe—unlikely in the 2020 timeframe—is not necessary to enable it to play a weightier international role so long as it can begin to mobilize resources and fuse divergent views into collective policy goals. Experts believe an economic “leap forward”—stirring renewed confidence and enthusiasm in the European project—could trigger such enhanced international action.

Lleauric has good points and the reason why I agree with him is the well documented relationship between foreign direct investment (FDI) and technology transfer.

See, pure outsourcing is not the driving force behind the rise of the east, it is foreign direct investment (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Foreign_direct_investment).

For the readers who aren't holding economics/business degrees a quick rundown why investment causes technology and knowledge transfer:

1. when a multinational enterprise creates a subsidiary to tap into the cheaper labour conditions or new sale possibilities of another country it will bring its knowledge based assets (patents, know-hows, practices) along with them and train the local workers and coach the local suppliers.

It is not the local education establishments which are creating the bulk of the highly trained workforce, it is the multinationals.

2. It goes both ways, the new trend in India for tech startups is to reinvest the capital that flowed into the country and create subsidiaries in western countries' technology hot spots (like the silicon valley) in order to be able to tap into the knowledge base of those areas and turn their experiences into profit back home.

It is how it works, India has the untapped talent and the west supplies both the capital and the knowledge needed to become globally competitive.

Also, what do you think those foreign students will do with their degrees earned in the US? Most of them take the knowledge back home. It is only a matter of time before the critical mass of brain is reached and they will have just as good educational establishments as well.



-------------------------------------------------------------------



As for Linlaweniel's link...the big difference between US and Europe is that US is all about having a common vision and Europe is all about having a common sarcasm, regarding the future. No amount of change in the economy will level that.

That's the problem with the rabid anti EU, anti capitalist crowd, they think that if the economy becomes too liberal then the EU will suddenly become the US. Well no chance buddy, the difference is in the mind and not the pocket.



PS: We can make another topic on outsourcing and FDI if you guys want, the weekly economy debates topic is loooong overdue. :p

Jobs

First, you're talking to a guy whose job has been in danger of outsourcing for years. In the past months, I took the initiative to restructure our technology efforts so that instead of being a developer I'm managing a team of Indians and Indonesians to do that work. Maybe I replaced my job with some $20/hour bargain guy, but in the end most of our higher profits are staying here. My partners and I are making bank off a bunch of guys that retain no intellectual rights and work 12 hours a day for a fraction of what I was costing.

Telling me I don’t know what I’m talking about when it comes to Indian outsourcing is laughable.

Now, we take those higher profits and we hire more salesmen, and purchase all sorts of equipment, office space, and other materials locally. While Kumar might have taken my $70/hour job and turned it into three $20/hour jobs on their end, we've created more jobs than we outsourced, are spending much more money locally in our physical area than we were able to before, and the job that we outsourced (mine) has turned into a more profitable position anyway. It’s win-win all around.

Like I said before, jobs that are easy enough that anyone can do them will leave. That doesn't mean things are as bad as people would manipulate you to believe. It just goes to show Capitalism works. The best jobs in history have always ended up either being dumbed down to the point where nearly anyone can do them, replaced by machinery, or so popular that many people train for them and inflate the supply of workers compared to the job demand. That isn't limited to the outsourcing phenomenon we're seeing now. It's been a constant for hundreds of years, if not thousands.

Education

As for education, working arm deep in the situation will change your mind about that. Yes, there are some brilliant Indians (many of them are here, not there), but the majority of them are mediocre at best. The top three outsourcing firms over there are pretty sharp, but it falls off dramatically after that. I've personally dealt with more than a couple CS PhDs over there that would be lucky to pass the first year CS classes I took. Most of them are more skilled tradesmen than the geniuses all these alarmist bloggers like to portray them as. Give them a PHP script to write that they've written 100 times that month, and they'll churn it out. Give them an actual task that requires application of even fundamental CS principles and you'll both get frustrated fast.

Of course, talking about education, you can’t gloss over the fact that the standards are completely different between here and there. There, I know of at least one “university” that trades degrees for work. You work for free on outsourced projects for five years and you get your bachelor degree. Another three years for a master’s. Another four for a PhD. It just goes back to the skilled tradesman holding a PhD certificate. That is more prevalent than they’ll ever let be publicized widely.

Even certifications are easier. Here, if you want to become a Microsoft MVP, you have to be nominated by a board of your peers (who also have to be MVPs) and then selected from that list by Microsoft. On their India MSDN site, they have a plain old form where anyone can nominate an Indian Microsoft developer. It even suggests that you use the form to nominate yourself!

I could go on forever. This is a topic that I’m entrenched in and see the realities of every day. The bottom line though, is that it’s no where near as bad as it’s being played up. Years ago, people made a pretty big deal about the fact that the television manufacturing industry moved off shore. In retrospect, I’m sure we’re all happy that we moved on to better things than building TVs, and that color televisions aren’t still a luxury due to manufacturing cost. This situation is no different. We just have to keep our eye on the ball instead of wasting time crying over the jobs of the past.

Capital

You're missing the boat here, but I'm out of time. Will get to it later.

Sanchek you are talking about the present and Lleauric and me are talking about the future.

Even if everything in your post is true on the greater scale as well and not just your sector, can you be sure that they won't catch up within 10-15 years?

I agree with you, outsourcing is not an issue really as long as the society can adjust and do something else instead of making TVs (to use your example).

However, just as Japan and South Korea could become influential players in high tech in a few decades after WWII the same could happen with India as well and this time it might be a lot quicker due to FDI, outsourcing and digital economy (insert a few more buzzwords here).

He is also talking about Micro (his own personal and individual experience) while the rest of us are talking about Macro (the big picture and global trending).
Im assuming he does some sort of tech contracting, wherein he designs systems for companies. He has saved 10$/hr by outsourcing his job to 3 Indians for 60$/hr. Because they are doing so much better than he was, the extra profits are now being reinvested locally. So all the heavy lifting is being done it seems from India. At what point do your clients and the Indians realize they no longer need you? Thats the point Bangalore is striving toward, and they are getting closer every day.
The funny thing is, you have partners, so that makes the assumption you own the business, and they were going to outsource your job. Hint?

As far as education, you dont get it here either.
Look how far their systems have come in the last few years. Is it all around as good as western education? No, of course not, but it is rapidly getting there. But even if it stays a notch or two below, its a simple numbers game. With 5x more of them than us, the law of averages states the best and brightest will make a significant portion of people of eastern origin, competing on a level playing field with the rest of us.

Capital

You're missing the boat here, but I'm out of time. Will get to it later.
Id be interested in this.. you said capital investment stays in the west, I showed you several billions invested in the east just this last month. Seems pretty cut and dry

Ya'll might be thinking economically macro, but you're not allowing/recalling tensions over there.

Soon as India starts to truly ascend and gain wealth/power there will be trouble with their eons old neighbor Pakistan. They've come close to all out war in recent memory and by all reports the hatred is still there.

China is a huge internal revolt waiting to happen. Pressures are growing with the Chinese gaining more of a taste for all things Western and the govt wanting to remain in the 19th Century.

True economic/cultural growth comes out of balance, not the other way around...

Fandros

India and Pakistan have rattled sabers regularly over the last couple decades, moreso since they developed nukes, but lately the overtures between the two nations have been far more peaceful. Kashmir is still a sticking point, but for the moment both countires are playing nice with one another. And for the time being, I expect that to remain the case for one particular reason: the US. We're playing far more nicely with Pakistan than we should be, given the country's leadership. I expect the current administration to dull potential conflicts with India if the two neighbors return to hostility.

The current Chinese premier has startled his predecessors with his reactionary ways. I'm not sure China's bubbling cauldron is ready to overflow just yet, and I'm not sure that any kind of revolt can take place outside the system, but current leadership seems willing to put such aspirations to the test (in between watching pirated copies of Revenge of the Sith and Fantastic Four).

Haha.
I love when you lose a debate you throw a hissy fit and split the thread.
Exhibit A as to why you suck.

It wasnt ME who derailed the thread Sanchek, it was you. I was speaking of why the western portion of the EU needed the hungry and ready to work Eastern European, and how the Polish Plumbers were part of the reason why France rejected the constitution, thusly slitting their own wrists.
Then you decided to chime on with your half truth personal story of ubermenschood as if it had any relevance to the conversation, which it didnt.

You have brought me great joy today Sanchek, I love when peoples owns actions prove me right.

Now shuffle off, you have a guild to provide sub-mediocre leadership to, and a imaginary business to run that needs plans for the new rollercoaster you are going build with that 10$/hr you saved outsourcing your difficult job to 3 people in India.

I don't really mind that the thread was split in two, just that without any note indicating that there was a thread split now both topics look a tad weird. :o

I M H O (with capital letters) :cool:

Ranting and raving.
Miss your meds, man? This half of the thread took an interesting turn, but has very little to do with the EU constitution debate anymore. There's never a perfect place to split threads, but with the few active threads in this section, it's not exactly hard to figure out what's going on. Now both discussions can keep going without interfering with each other. Oh, the horror.

I don't expect to have time to write a decent reply till after work tomorrow. Try to hold yourself together and stop replying to your own posts for a whole day, unless you're just more interested in slinging worn out personal attacks instead of actually discussing the subject. If that's the case, use the right forum and stop wasting our time.

********, quick question:


While Kumar might have taken my $70/hour job and turned it into three $20/hour jobs on their end

How are you doing all that stuff with $10/hour?

I know those were off-the-cuff numbers, but it sounds like your company has re-allocated capital from elsewhere to do this stuff, and added that to your cost savings.

One of the reasons that job growth is seriously lagging economic growth in the US is that companies are NOT doing what your company appears to be doing. They looked at the late 90s and said "we're not gonna do that again."

Our company, an outsourcer of IT, has actually outsourced some of its low level positions. Level-1 support (account and share creation, etc) has moved overseas. In fact, we're going to stop answering the phone "<My Company> at <Your Company>, this is Palimax" and move to "<Your Company> IT Support, this is Palimax" so our out-out-sourced people can (fail to) identify themselves correctly.

Also, there's some bullshit about us blending in better, but it's a ruse.

...so our out-out-sourced people can (fail to) identify themselves correctly.
My favorite is when clearly Indian customer service folks call and introduce themselves as Joe, John or other common US names. Kinda cute, really.

[Mod aside: Please focus on the topic, not on the thread split or each other. Danke]

Ok so you took one job and made it three but actually you made another position for yourself? now are you just paying these people an hourly wage or are you also giving them other compensation? insurance, medical, PTO, etc...I see your point I'm just wondering if in the long run you are going to gain much.

I do agree on the points that assuming China and India are going to take over is assuming that other countries are just going to give up and let them do it. The L2 paranoia would be vaild if that were the case but it's not. There are too many factors. Too much can happen between now and then. Investing too much in these pretty charts and graphs is like believing a mad man preaching the end of the world.

But...in order for the world to keep pace with the trends and changes that India and China are helping to influence they need to recognize and follow suit. Anyone who invests in continuing to have a 35hr work week is living in Wonderland. I havn't worked less than 50hrs week ever. And hell no I don't get OT but I know if I don't then some young gun will come do my job for less!

Oh its not the end of the world.. just the end of the world as we know it, and thats just fine.

India had 1 million more college graduates than the US last year. China had 3 million more. Both of them have 6x the number of graduates with degrees in Engineering.

Its not matter of countries "letting" anything happen. Its the simple fact that Geography no longer is the excluding factor it once was for the rest of the world. 300 Million new people (thats the 10% of 3 Billion) now have all the resources, information and opportunity that were once only availible in the west.
Its a numbers game.

Capitalism won. It is the dominate force in the world. In reality all thats happening is we are entering a golden age for Capitalism. The entire world spinning under the power of free market enterprise.
In capitalism the best always rise to the top. It is very Darwinian like that. All that has changed is that the benefits and disadvantages of where you were born are being stripped away and removed. Americans and Europeans cant expect to fall out of bed and land into Middle Class lives. The entitlement is gone. This generation coming up is going to have to work twice as hard as their parents because there is quite simply going to be twice the competition. Its not even that scary once people start not living in denial about how the world is changing...

Considering India's population, the relative graduation numbers aren't that interesting.

I agree to a certain extent L2. But I also think India, as a country, will have to undergo alot of solid intra/infrastructure growth before those college degree's transform it into anything resembling a economic superpower.

I billion folks live in India aprox. Even given the numbers you shelled out that still is a overwhelming minority of it's populace able to perform at that level.

Fandros

Why? Its the law of averages. In China.. A one in a million talent means there are 1,300 people just like you.

Simple Brute force.
Broken down in a very simple and understand form. On average, can a high school with a graduating class of 70 hope to realistically compete with one that has a graduating class of 1,200 in sports or any competition? Only on rare, rare occasions and in movies like Hoosiers. Sure, once in a blue moon the small school will pull off an upset or two, but in the long run itll be utter domination.
Its about a larger talent pool to draw from. And a talent pool that no longer has to relocate (brain drain) in order to succeed. New York/Paris/LA/London = Bangalore.

Fandros.
It may seem like that. But the reality is, India now has all the infrastructure it needs. About 5 years ago there was a MASSIVE over investment of fiber optic cables. The Internet Super Highway = The ultimate infrastructure.
And the Indian Government is making massive improvements and upgrades to what they have.
Two things just this week. India and Iran are discussing building an oil pipeline directly connecting the two, and India is also in late stage negotiations with the US to buy Nuclear power technology. Additonally it was announced that the state run power company of India is investing 7 Billion dollars (American) into improving and expanding the power grid.
Everything they do is about making themselves more attractive to capital investment.

bah, hit submit midthought due to a twitch. /chuckle

To continue the thought. Unless you are suggesting that it's not India itself that will benefit. But that the educated and hardworking folks of all cultures will rise above the limits of the countries of their births and truly ascend financially inspite of it.

Really that's not so bad and will only entice our own folks to lower their noses to the grindstones more. No culture on earth works as many hours as we do in America, as long, and with relatively low work related suicides ( ruling out Japan and most of the orient with that stipulation.

Give us a challenge and we will arise. I even submit that a good percentage of the India up and coming will transplant to our greater good no?

Random thoughts, you deserve to have someone better informed than this old Indiana hick reply to ya. /chuckle

Fandros

Thats pretty close to what Im saying Fanny.

Thats good and bad.


Read Jerrod Diamonds "Guns, Germs and Steel". In it he explains how the West and Europeans were able to dominate civilization. (Impose colonialism/imperialism, ect ect) These factors have defined world affairs for the last few hundred years.
This old order is being thrown out.

Now, what happens next is up for a great debate. This debate has been hashed out in a sense in fantastic dialogue between John Mearsheimer and Zbigniew Brzezinski in an article called "Clash of the Titans" (cool title)
http://www.foreignpolicy.com/story/cms.php?story_id=2740

Mearsheimer is the leading Realist thinker in the world so his vision is much gloomier than Brzezinski's

How are you doing all that stuff with $10/hour?

I know those were off-the-cuff numbers, but it sounds like your company has re-allocated capital from elsewhere to do this stuff, and added that to your cost savings.

One of the reasons that job growth is seriously lagging economic growth in the US is that companies are NOT doing what your company appears to be doing. They looked at the late 90s and said "we're not gonna do that again."
I way over-simplified the situation.

What's really happening is we draw from a pool of about 500 Indians and Indonesians who work as a loose team and have diverse skill sets. We buy roughly 500 man hours per month of their time, spread over whoever's specialties we can use the most for each given portion of a task.

Now I'm freed up to spend 90% of my time designing the high level architecture and planning, without having to waste time with the nitty gritty of the implementation.

Between those two changes, our productivity is way up. In our business, productivity is pretty directly related to how much business we can handle, and thus how much revenue we can generate. So, the net change on the staffing reorg is small, but the effect on the bottom line is relatively large.

edit: Ll, you got the wrong idea about my personal situation. No one had actually mentioned outsourcing our software development until I brought it up myself. When I said my job was in danger, I meant it was exactly the kind of job that could easily be outsourced, if someone were to have wanted to. I was just a contractor with the company before, but became a partner of the company as part of setting up this new model. So, it's not as if I was a partner in the company before and they were trying to squeeze me with the Indians. Those guys I work with probably wouldn't even be able to figure out what to ask the Indians to do, much less keep the project on track.

All of the education argument based on volume/population is completely an apples and oranges comparison.

They simply do not offer the same level of education there. They are so focused on quantity (in nearly every regard, not just education) that quality takes a back seat.

Take my example of the schools that give out diplomas based on work experience. The head guy in the organization we use for outsourcing runs one of those schools. They are required exactly no formal training whatsoever, in order to get a bachelor's, master's, or doctorate. I don't know how many "graduates" he produces, but I know it's a wildly popular program over there.

They may have a larger pool of potential warm bodies, but it's a huge mistake to assume that the same percentage is educated as well or as capable, based on skewed comparisons. I think anyone that's called Dell tech support lately can attest to that...

So, as has been said, the best come here and attend our schools. Well, guess what. Most of them don't go back. I'm sure some people are too attached to family or their home to stay, but I can't think of a single Indian or Chinese student I knew at Tech that didn't take a domestic job offer on graduation. Why would they, when they're able to get better jobs here, with much better living conditions?

One of the things that make the Western cultures, and more specifically America, so attractive is not only our college trained. But our general population is at such a higher level educationally speaking than the rest of the world. Yes our general schooling has taken it's knocks through the years and needs vast improvement. But by in large the free education that's required is worlds better than India and such have at hand.

I don't doubt India will become a power in it's own right. What I doubt is the rapidity that many discuss. I'm not too afraid of India ascending to be honest. Despite it's neighbors, despite it's overwhelming population problems coupled with large cultural hurdles they are still the largest democracy in the world. Couple that with a love of all things Western and perhaps they will be the child of vision that the Western countries strive for.

Who knows...;)

I've long thought that there wasn't enough drive to succeed in todays youth. Perhaps this will inspire them, lord knows my own son needs a kick in the pants. ;P

Fandros

Those predictions of the future are great, if you take them as what they really are: guesses in the dark. Oh sure, they're based on some compelling information, but they also require that you hold too many factors static to be anything more than pretty graphs of someone's guesses.

For example, to tie in with my other post about the lack of truly qualified people in India, check out this article (http://www.spacedaily.com/2004/040423013119.tbrm6v9t.html). If they're already running into a shortage of people for the jobs, it's going to be awfully hard for them to continue that growth rate. Even if they do manage to scrounge up people, the quality level is just going to drop off even worse.

Those predictions also assume that the increased supply of work is there. While companies are outsourcing menial tasks, there's no reason to believe that they will start to outsource jobs that require more skill or creativity. Especially given the dubious quality of the work a lot of those firms put out. I could write for days about the freelance work I've done fixing broken code dropped in the laps of companies here who outsourced important projects and then found themselves with nothing to show for it except a missed deadline.

Another important consideration is that the basic laws of economics would say India won't continue working for so much less than the industry averages. In fact, we're already seeing that. Over the past two years, their wages have increased around 30%. As their economy and ours come into equilibrium pricewise, there will be much less of a financial case for outsourcing. They will have to compete on the merits of their work instead. They currently don't fare well in that category.

You also assume that the general backlash against outsourcing will magically vanish. Did you know that Dell's corporate tech support has already been un-outsourced, due to complaints about the quality of service?

There is no doubt that they will remain a legitimate factor in the industry, but the idea of them overtaking us without major fundamental changes in how they educate and do business is very unlikely.

Finally, the capital bit. That's a lovely list of investments you posted.

Cisco - It says that they've invested $75 million in India since 96 and are spending $150 million to expand its development center there this year (not spending $150 million purely on development, but infrastructure). Well gosh, their financial report for 2004 say they spent over 3 billion on research and development. Makes even the $150 seem pretty trivial to me.

Oracle - So they're going to spend $500 for all global investments. Even if they spent 100% of that on Indian, which they of course won't, their total R&D investment in 2004 was around 1.5 billion dollars according to their financial report. 1/3 for the whole world combined, and 2/3 domestically. I couldn't find historical info on the breakdown of global vs domestic R&D spending, but I doubt that the $500 million signifies any real growth. These companies have been operating globally for some time now.

GE - $130 over three years? Their total R&D in 2004 was $3.091 billion. $130 million's almost an insult.

SEC 10k's make my eyes bleed, so I'm not going to keep looking these up, but I think you get the idea. India, while being taken seriously, is a drop in the bucket. The amount budgeted to growth in India by non-Indian companies is nothing compared to what they're spending for growth in other areas. There is absolutely no reason to expect India to continue explosive growth when it isn't even receiving a large share of growth investment.

As for the capital remaining in the US, what I was saying is that while a few dollars might get sent over to India, India is not the ultimate beneficiary. When GE builds a new R&D center in Bangalore, the ideas and profits from that research still come back home in the end. When Sun incubates startup companies in India, they certainly aren't doing it to strengthen their overseas competition. They're doing it so that they control the ideas and products that emerge. The GE/Sun form of investment over there is nothing more than a larger scale version of me outsourcing programming. A few dollars are spent, but if it weren't more profitable domestically than its cost, they wouldn't be doing it.

And the middle ground (water?) is? http://www.newsmax.com/archives/articles/2005/4/28/170632.shtml?j=1048517&e=alblong@earthlink.net&l=143149_HTML&u=19496917

Here's their website (http://www.sea-code.com/)

Wonder what their shore excursion package is like.