I feel like everywhere I work, we have this term, and it’s become increasingly more common over the past decade as the USA becomes more and more hateful and aggressive towards the working class people… The offshore team. I really, really hate hearing about the offshore team. It’s from a certain country in Asia that starts with I But I have nothing against those people that come from that country, it’s simply out of concern for my well-being and my survival that it bothers me…
You look at a country like Germany, and how they have a workers council, and a country like France that has proper retirement, then you see the USA and how We have millions of computer science grads who struggle to find work, can’t get a job, universities churning out new students in the tens of thousands per year… We shouldn’t have an offshore team, at a company that makes billions of dollars, led by people that have so much money amassed up that they could survive for a thousand years spending millions.
It’s just embarrassing, that as a society, we are so horrible to each other.
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Since it isn’t happening to you personally I guess it would be hard to back up with evidence but is there not somewhere you could anonymously report these abuses and concerns to? Any government department? At the very least the misrepresented conditions seem like they must be a violation of something . If it’s anonymous hopefully you’d be shielded and you don’t personal face the same risks to your well being. If there’s anything that is actionable it could result in better conditions all round.
Your tip might be a piece of information that they can add to any other such information to trigger an investigation maybe. Here in Australia at least, the government does at least sometimes act on abusive labour practices, they’ve swooped in on farmers employing fruit pickers who are almost entirely foreign and who suffered absolutely blatant wage theft and abuse and other high profile instances such as foreign embassy staff being treated as slaves.
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I feel like everywhere I work, we have this term, and it’s become increasingly more common over the past decade as the USA becomes more and more hateful and aggressive towards the working class people… The offshore team. I really, really hate hearing about the offshore team
…and…
then you see the USA and how We have millions of computer science grads who struggle to find work, can’t get a job
There’s a couple factors in play and depending on how old you are (or how long you’ve been in this industry) some things may not be apparent.
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IT spending/staffing is cyclical. Boom and bust. This happens every 5-8 years. There is massive spending by organizations in IT for various reasons. This drives up the need for IT staff and as the talent pool is exhausted, salaries rise sharply as companies try to poach from one another. IT workers win in this case. However, when the pendulum swings expensive IT staff are on the chopping block. For the cycle we’re in right now, that started about a year ago and the cuts are still ongoing, but to me, it feels like it will start swinging back in the other direction in the next 8-12 months with hiring picking up again.
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In-source vs Outsource/ onshoring vs offshoring cycle - Many businesses have short memories and “the grass is always greener” mentality. If they are heavily In-sourced and onshore they look at their budgets and see this MASSIVE number next to the “payroll” line item. They start asking how they can lower this number and save money. Consultants come in and convince them that the company can save money by cutting out a segment of the company’s operations and outsourcing that to another firm that quotes them an attractive rate. The company chooses this option, fires their own staff, contracts out the work. The bottom line is appropriately attractive, and executives get a bonus for making cost cuts. Inertia from the previous staff keeps the org going much as before for awhile. However, the service begins suffers because the contract company is attempting to provide the least amount of resources and money to fulfill the contract. Many times this means using offshore staffing themselves. After a few expensive outages for outright rebellions from the company business departments, the company fires the contracting company hires their own staff again and brings the service back in house. This pendulum swings again for another 8-10 years.
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International pay disparity - IT workers in the USA are crazy expensive compared to nearly anywhere else in the work. I’m not just talking about a little more, but by a factor of 10 or 15 times more expensive than other nations that provide similar skilled staff. A $150k USD IT worker in the USA can be replaced (mostly) with a $15k USD worker in India with the same level of skill. That same IT worker skill level would earn $75k-$100k CAD in Canada. In Germany that same worker would earn €60-$90. During boom times that USA worker might be able to earn $175k-$300k USD.
As a worker, you can see that working in the USA will earn you the most money when you can get a job. So the trick is to save during the boom times knowing the bust is coming. If you earn $300k for one year, and are unemployed for two years afterward you’ve effectively earned $100k per year for 3 years straight. Being unemployed in IT for over a year is unusual. You can usually find a lower paying job in IT to cover your living expenses and then some until the boom occurs again.
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What really annoys me is when this becomes a racist thing. You get managers who love all ethnic Indians because they “are cheap and work hard” and then you get everyone else who now hate all ethnic Indians everywhere.
I work with plenty of people from India. They’re pretty good at their jobs. They should be paid the same as us in the USA.
I don’t mind that they work on the other side of the world. I don’t mind them at all. I mind that the main reason why they’re hired is that my employer can pay them peanuts. They deserve better.
I’ve met and worked with Indians who either were born in the US or migrated more than 5 years prior.
As it turns out they are just like the rest of us. There is definitely some racial stereotypes at play.
You had to work with Indians to realize they’re just like us? 💀
We are biased even if we don’t realize it. Its not that I had some sort of hate or something like that. I just found working with them to be eye opening to me. I conscious level I could care less about race. The thing is everyone is biased because that’s how our brains work. You will subconsciously make assumptions which may or may not be truth. It feels better to work with people that look like you because that is a survival trait.
To answer you question I didn’t believe Indians were or were not hard workers. However, I have met people who hate the Indians because they are all the same. I myself was simply unconsciously biased. If I were given the choice between a Indian and a white guy I would likely choose the White guy for some non racial reason. Bias is very had to avoid and you may be completely unaware you are being racist. What also bothers me is when companies go out of there way to hire someone because they are a minority instead of hiring because they are the best. If someone hired me based on race or disability I would be put down to say the least.
It sounds like one of the items you’re getting at may be separating nationality/ethnicity stereotypes from race stereotypes. Immigrants or children born in another country will have varying degrees of that cultural as part of their personality. Bartering comes to mind with Indians.
One I experienced recently was Hispanic drivers. We have a fairly large Mexican population here but I obviously can’t tell by appearance. There’s a certain combo of vehicle, modifications, and asshole driving style that would indicate to me the driver was probably hispanic. I took a trip a manufacturing Mexican city (read:non-Resort) and was shocked by the drivers. I saw the wildest maneuvers to get 2 cars ahead, every peice of pavement was valid for driving, and speeding is only avoided at checkpoints. Yet, I didn’t see any accidents, I didn’t hear any horns, I didn’t see any road rage. It was aggressive driving, but everyone just existed and cooperated. Obviously, if you’re the only one doing it, it makes you unpredictable and therefore it’s reckless, but damn, that adjusted my opinion so fast
You are being racist
What are you seeing that I’m not seeing to the same degree? We’re talking about subconscious biases here. I am aware the one city I visited does not represent a whole country, but being a large city, likely has significant representation in extranational communities. I do not assume a particular vehicle has a particular driver. All I assume is when someone drives unpredictably in sight (in comparison to the rest of the driving culture present), they’ll be just as unpredictable when I’m near them. Like, I’m trying to keep growing here and try to talk about why racial stereotypes often “feel” correct. I don’t see it as any different than judging your own race from a different region - for me, that’d be rude NYC people vs slow southerners or optimistic coastal Californians. I’m only talking about mannerisms that unintentionally get construed as racial.
I’m about to be one of those grads, career changing in my early thirties. Whoops. Got into Berkeley CS so hopefully that carries my foot into a door somewhere
You missed the best part: it’s return to office to boost communication and collaboration… …by being in a call with the offshore team.
The people responsible for your anxiety are not offshore, they’re upstairs.
Germany has nearshoring. Anything that doesn’t require native level spoken German or isn’t physical or under some weird regulation that it has to be in-country, it will be outsourced to a country with a significant amount of German speakers like Slovakia, Hungary, Romania or Brazil (Blumenau).
Oh I feel this in my soul. Recently my company was going to buy some very important welded structures, and instead of working with the American company that we promised the business to, one executive went over everyone’s heads to buy these from the offshore team, despite protests from literally everyone.
They came in today each one is $100k worth of scrap metal. Absolutely unsalvageable pieces of shit. Truly a colossal level of fuckup.
Will the execs learn? Probably not.
The intern fucked it up no doubt. The guy who signs a contract would never make such a mistake.
Oh no I assure you, this was an executive decision. The VP of manufacturing, specifically.
We don’t let Interns make purchase orders at all, let alone call shots like that. Especially not for big ticket items like these weldments.
It was sarcasm.
Corporate Culture is always to blame some guy with no authority
