Outsourcing is a slippery-slope; the logic is, by moving
jobs overseas, we increase the demand for American goods
in these regions, and thus America sees a rise in prosperity
here at home. It's hard to get that point across to
the 8 million Americans without jobs, though.
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They view the trend of outsourcing labor to countries
where the cost of living is lower, and workers are therefore
payed less, as detrimental to an American way of life.
The unemployment rate has held steady at 5.6 percent for
much of 2004, and there are still 300,000 Americans every
week applying for unemployment benefits for the first
time. The prosperity and enrichment outsourcing provides
that the Bush administration continually posits isn't
being seen by the American people in the short-term, where
it matters for most, as they struggle to keep themselves,
and their families, afloat.
Forrester Research, the Massachusetts-based technology
research company, announced in November 2003 that 830,000
US service-sector jobs will move outside the borders
by the end of 2004, with a projected total of 3.3 million
leaving by 2015. That amounts to 15,000 jobs leaving
the US every week this year. Even the most
fundamentally "American" tasks that could
be handled here in the U.S. are finding their way overseas.
In early 2002, the Republican National Committee contracted
the Capital Communications Group, a Washington-based
consulting firm, to solicit campaign contributions for
Bush's 2004 presidential run. CCG in turn outsourced
this work to HCL America, a division of HCL Technologies,
an India-based technology firm headed by billionaire
Shiv Nadar.
Two offices located in Noida and Gurgaon, India, under
the direction of HCL BPO Services in Delhi, handled
solicitation of campaign contributions for President
Bush from May 16, 2002 until July 22, 2003. Seven teams,
totaling roughly 125 employees, worked for $9.75/hour
calling individuals in America from a voters' database
provided by the RNC, and secured an estimated $10 million
dollars in contributions, close to 6 percent of the
total amount Bush has collected thus far. They did not
directly handle any money; their task was to obtain
pledges to donate this money, and the RNC followed-through
with them and received their contribution.
With the abundance of RNC-volunteers in America, coupled
with the $9.75/hour pay rate, I find it hard to believe
that a task such as this couldn't have been handled
by Americans. True, it is an almost insignificant number
of jobs created compared to the total job losses seen
in the US every week, but I fail to see how the responsibility
of raising support for an American president can be
in any way outsourced.
What this says to me is that it is not a strong-base
of Americans working towards a common goal of seeing
their candidate in office that wins an election, but
the amount of money their parties can accumulate that
will propel them to the top, regardless of how that
money is collected. Providing 125 Americans a job for
14 weeks is a more worthy goal, in my mind, than cutting
costs and shipping those jobs overseas, and would instill
a notion of being politically involved I feel is lacking
from most in America today.
Call me a purist, but I find it ridiculous that 125
unemployed, qualified Republicans couldn't be found
in the U.S. and given $9.75/hour to help elect their
candidate. Something as intrinsically "American"
as working to elect an official in the U.S., getting
involved in the political process in your own town,
state, and country, and helping to raise support and
awareness for a candidate which best represents your
ideals and vision should be left to Americans, and those
without jobs in the U.S. should be provided the opportunity
to do just that.
George Bush himself has stated that "a job is
more than a source of income — it is also a source
of dignity." It would have been a bold statement
for the RNC to have taken 125 unemployed Americans and
provided them with income, with the dignity the President
has declared comes along with it, in order to show that
their party has a direct interest in any and all Americans
without jobs who have the desire to work, and gotten
more Americans involved in the political process along
the way.
Instead, they choose to hand out contracts that were
outsourced, leaving 125 Americans still without jobs,
without dignity, and themselves disconnected as ever
from the actual needs and suffering of the American
people
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