Without getting into the entire conceptual argument about capitalism in general and why some semi-sane economic decisions are made... What is it that makes you think that boycotting a company (particularly one the size or deployment of Cisco and/or Juniper) would make someone say "oh, I'm sorry, it looks like we made a bad decision in saving some money"???

Now, let's also go back and look at the original post. Cisco is putting in what? $32 million. in the grand scheme of things, just what kind of impact do you really believe this is going to have? Committing to training people in another country is not a commitment to abandon jobs elsewhere. Look at the economics of how much the Chinese market is growing. Or should we handle all of that extra work in supporting that country's expanding market with jobs already here in the US (or wherever).

Oh wait, don't many US folks already complain about the down-, right-, left-, some-direction-sizing that's going on and how overworked they may be?

There are SOME areas where the outsourcing may hit a chord, and everyone is always welcome to their soapbox. I just don't think it really applies to the particulars that were announced here, and certainly not to this level. As ANY good job-seeker should realize, it's all about economics. So make yourself a more marketable or valuable person than others. Whether through certifications (not starting this war) or experiences or the ability to demonstrate business prowess along with technical skills...

But where do we draw the line? Almost ANY electronics company uses non-American parts. Many clothing manufacturers use off-shore assembly. Everyone is entitled to desire purchasing locally-produced goods only, but at the same time it's hard to justify complaining about how much more expensive some of those items may be!

It's everywhere.... As long as there are options, it'll never change. We see the shift now because of the ease of travel and shipping and ubiquitous communications (oh damn, that means were in an industry that may have helped this "evil" trend). It's economic destiny, which means to fight it we need to make the overall economic choice one that leans our direction (whever that "our" may be). But simply complaining about it is the easy part. Figuring out the "why" and then working to make the decision better to go a different direction is harder. Business decisions, like routes, have metrics. Figure out what they are and change them if desired. but it's not nearly as simple!

Hello Erik,

Although I agree with you on many points I think its time people stop complaining and take action. My point was not to idly complain about the outsourcing trend and claim that protectionism is the answer but, to ask if there is a better way to deal with the long term trend for ALL of us. Boycotting is just one way to send a message rather than simply complaining.

Your perception of Americans I think is very skewed by the media. You obviously did not read my post and wanted take a cheap shot. Many Americans like myself have always been fighting for equity, fairness and democracy from the beginning in all our activities. Try not to equate a people with what you read and hear in the media and realize they have much more diversity of opinion than is portrayed therein. I argue we BOTH American and international workers (that means you) need to change the system so that we are all treated fairly. I don't think this is an off the wall ideal. But to each his own.

Hmmm. I had no idea there were only 2 networking companies, 1 database and 1 OS. =) With the rich competitive nature of the market I will continue to support companies which conform to a baseline of ethical business practice for all workers worldwide.

With deepest respect,

Erik Haagsman <erik@we-dare.net> wrote:

On Fri, 2004-09-24 at 03:53, Joseph wrote:
> Its time for all American Tech workers to stand up and let our voices
> be heard.

Perhaps it's time instead to make sure you're good at what you do and
try to be on the forefront of tech, rather than whining about how all
those bad people from abroad are stealing your job. It's largely our own
fault labour pricing in large outsourcing countries like India are so
low, and now it's coming back to bite some of us.

> We as world citizens need to come to grips with the fact that we must
> compete with workers internationally but we should be doing so on FAIR
> playing field.

Strangely people only start calling for a level, fair playing field when
they feel something's threatening their own little piece of the cake. If
most companies and governments we're happy to work for wouldn't have
been undermining other people's economies for ages, we wouldn't have
this problem and we would have a more or less fair playing field. But
now practices that we still are making money of is making our companies
stronger, but our workforce weaker, so in the long term probably our
overall economy will be weaker. Anyone else see the irony here..?

> Don't Support Outsourcing, Don't buy from companies that outsource US
> jobs.

Hmm...let me see now, no Juniper, no Cisco, no Oracle, no Microsoft,
basically not a single vendor left...ah yes, we should just stop working
completely and dismantle the Internet, that might just do the trick.

Cheers,

Erik

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Erik Haagsman
Network Architect
We Dare BV
tel: +31(0)10 7507008
fax:+31(0)10 7507005
http://www.we-dare.nl