Contact Rep. Inslee about IT offshoring

Representative Jay Inslee of Washington state says he does not think that offshore outsourcing of U.S. tech jobs is a problem. On a recent tour in India, he told Indian reporters and business leaders that he believes any U.S. state or federal legislation that aims to limit the transfer of U.S. jobs overseas will not go anywhere. He also discounted concerns about such offshoring among U.S. tech workers, saying, "People are worried about job security in the U.S. and therefore it is not terribly surprising to find a few people who will oppose outsourcing to other countries."

We think there are more than a few of us who oppose the wholesale shipment of tens of thousands of good IT jobs abroad, especially jobs that are paid for by U.S. taxpayer-funded projects. Please send a message to Rep. Inslee and help us to let him know that this is an issue of concern to consituents in his district, hundreds of thousands of IT workers throughout the United States, and millions of U.S. citizens.

Your message will be emailed to Rep. Inslee. While we have provided a sample letter, we encourage you to modify and customize this message, or swap it out with one of your own. Details about your own experiences in the tech industry will make your letter more powerful.

Sample Letter for Campaign

Subject: Please reconsider your position on offshoring...

Dear [ Decision Maker ] ,

I am writing because I am increasingly concerned about the escalating practice of moving U.S.-based information technology (IT) and other computer service jobs abroad. I am aware that you have supported offshoring of IT jobs, particularly to India, and I'm strongly suggesting that you reconsider your position.

I understand from the Washington Alliance of Technology Workers and Forrester Research report that over the next 15 years 3.3 million U.S. service industry jobs and $136 billion in wages will likely move offshore to countries such as India, Russia, China, and the Philippines. The IT industry is already leading the initial exodus, with legal, accounting, and other sectors to follow.

Whether in highly visible corporations like Microsoft, or as part of other businesses such as an insurance company, IT work has fueled the aspirations of many local communities as well. It is in large part responsible for wealth creation in our country. While economic globalization may prove beneficial to multinational corporations, it is not at all clear that it will benefit most workers here or abroad. It is one thing to have access to cheaper goods, as globalization promises; it is another to have the jobs to pay for them. What we need for our future and security is for our jobs at all skill levels to stay here.

What is the future of our country if so many of our jobs, including government IT jobs, are moving offshore? It looks to me like a race to the bottom, with few social safety nets for the many workers who will be displaced.

My issue is not with IT workers in other countries, but with the practice of moving these jobs abroad with no apparent concern for U.S. workers, many of whom are highly trained and are now out of work.

Because this emerging issue is so important to our future, I urge you to support calls for an immediate congressional investigation into IT offshoring. We need to look much more closely at the ramifications of this disturbing trend -- on U.S. workers, the communities in which they live, and the future economic and technological security of this country.

For your research, I've included the following links:

Perilous Currents in the Offshore Shift http://www.businessweek.com/magazine/content/03_05/b3818051.htm

A new report projects federal spending on information technology outsourcing services will increase from $6.6 billion to nearly $15 billion by fiscal 2007. http://www.washingtontechnology.com/news/1_1/outsourcing/19754-1.html

The New HP Way: World's Cheapest Consultants http://www.forbes.com/2002/12/05/cz_qh_1205hp.html

Forrester Research reference http://itmanagement.earthweb.com/career/article.php/1503461

Sincerely,

Campaign Launched:
May 30, 2003


Background Information

Some Facts Behind IT Offshoring

 

What Microsoft Says:

 

  • “Two heads are cheaper than one.”
  • “Pick a project and outsource today.”


What Hewlett Packard Says:

 

  • “We’re trying to move everything we can offshore,” Forbes quoted Hewlett Packard Services chief Ann Livermore as saying.
  • “We’re aggressively realigning our resources.” HP already has a presence in India and is also looking to China, which company officials expect to soon rival India for outsourcing services.


What Forrester’s Research Says:

 

  • 3.3 Million service jobs will move overseas with the technology sector leading the way.
  • $136 billion in wages will move to countries like India, Russia and China.  Up from $4 billion in 2000.


What the Economic Policy Institute Says:

  • “Research shows that the 15 to 25 percent decline in wages can be traced to the effects of globalization,” says Jared Bernstein, a Washington D.C-based economist for the Economic Policy Institute. “This used to be true of lower wage workers, but now we see it occurring with IT [workers].”
  • “My best advice is for IT workers to organize,” Bernstein says. “What tech workers lack is bargaining power that protects them from overseas competition.”


What WashTech/CWA Says:

 

  • We must raise our collective voice around this issue.
  • If we organize, both at the legislative level and in the workplace, we can have a say in our economic futures.
  • If we do nothing, if too many of us are paralyzed out of fear of losing our jobs, it is increasingly likely we will lose them anyways.
  • The U.S. Congress should move immediately to study the impacts of widespread IT offshoring.

At WashTech, we are alarmed as we watch more and more of our co-workers -- many of them highly skilled professionals in the IT sector -- become unemployed. Or when we have been tossed aside as disposable workers ourselves.

We first thought the economic downturn was to blame and that it would correct itself eventually; thus we focused on actions that would help workers through the hard times, such as extension of unemployment benefits. We now realize that many of our IT jobs are simply gone, perhaps gone forever. We do not see the fuel for a reversal of a downturn—not when so many family-wage jobs are going offshore as part of the globalization process. Indeed, the process of “harmonization,” as described in World Trade Organization terms, calls for open borders for many jobs—from nursing, to accounting, to our own computer-related work.

 

We note that many companies receive both local and federal tax breaks, yet they plan to take the jobs these tax breaks help create elsewhere. Incredibly, we also see government IT jobs going offshore, including some designated by the Homeland Security Act. Also involved in the globalization process is the use of H1B and other visas, and the practice of setting up companies in the United States to take work elsewhere, so employers can claim to be using US workers.

 

Globalization around a corporate agenda may very well be good for business, but we are unconvinced that it is good for people pulling in a paycheck, or for the communities in which we live. The path to addressing this complex issue is not yet clear, which is why we are asking for a study by the United States Congress. We hope both the request (in the form of your letter to your representatives) and the study itself will raise the understanding among elected officials and IT workers and will result in legislation that recognizes the needs of U.S. workers.

 

We will continue to focus on this issue, as our members cite job security as their top priority.

 

Links:

A new report projects federal spending on information technology

outsourcing services will increase from $6.6 billion to nearly $15

billion by fiscal 2007.

http://www.washingtontechnology.com/news/1_1/outsourcing/19754-1.html

 

The New HP Way: World's Cheapest Consultants

Quentin Hardy

http://www.forbes.com/2002/12/05/cz_qh_1205hp.html?partner=yahoo&referrer=

  

Forrester Research reference

http://itmanagement.earthweb.com/career/article.php/1503461