More and more American white-collar jobs are being filled or replaced by non-Americans. Where does this leave the American workers? Is this a good thing or a bad thing?.
About 20 years ago many people lost their auto and manufacturing jobs to outsourcing. This was first believed to be bad for the American nation. As we later found out, this resulted in a strong economic growth. Innovation created better and more jobs to replace the ones lost. So does this mean that outsourcing white-collared jobs will in the long term have the same effect as did outsourcing blue-collar jobs? .
There are two ways to look at this. The first says that yes, outsourcing is a good thing. Moving well-educated jobs overseas to have people do the same job for far less will create new higher paying jobs for the American workers. The other opinion is no, outsourcing highly skilled jobs is different and poses a larger risk to the economy. .
As high skilled jobs move overseas, where does that leave the white-collared American workers? Some believe that we have to make the next step in technology to continue creating the next generation of pioneering industries and fresh high-paying jobs. What will be the next innovation growth? No one knows. Back in 1994 when unemployment was above 6%, nobody knew either; the Internet Revolution was a year away. .
People who say that white-collar job outsourcing is good, feel that America will have no problem with the next big innovation and will create new and higher skilled jobs for Americans. They believe that America will be in the forefront of the next big step in technology. The latest figures from the Organization for Economic Cooperation & Development show that 30% of Americans aged 25 to 34 have a college degree, compared with 24% for Japan and 14% for Germany. (Outsourcing Jobs: Is it bad? August 25, 2003.) This data is crucial to America having the next big innovation. Better-educated workers can adjust on the fly, better cope with rapid change, and envision and create new products and strategies.