Hey, I feel your pain and am seeing the same things happen all over our industry. Sadly, globalization is not a new trend and it will never end but I think its time WE alter its course. Its time for all American Tech workers to stand up and let our voices be heard. Modern capitalism does create a race to the bottom effect for labor which seems to have no end. Workers world wide need to realize they are at risk for the same slippery slope we now see in the United States. No one is insulated. Unless we all mobilize and make our voices heard the economic landscape will leave us behind as another casualty. This made worse by the multinational corporation who's only desire is to satisfy stockholders needs. 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. Pure free market capitalism has no concept fairness and equity and no room for correcting the drastic changes that can sometimes cause great societal costs. Capitalism is not inherently bad but it is an imperfect system in need of much guidance. Historically the only way this system has been improved is by Labor action, political involvement and transparent government. Getting upset about job losses is useless and futile we need to take action!
Don't Support Outsourcing
Don't buy from companies that outsource US jobs. Be very vocal and call and mail these companies and let them know you will not support them. Let them know you are watching what they are doing and will vote with your Dollars. Check out the site below to look up any company. http://www.workingamerica.org/
Be Politically Active
Be politically aware and active! Remain politically active and tell your state & local politician and the president that they need to be protective of American jobs and leveling the playing field in world wide labor market.
Check out these links
http://www.pbs.org/now/politics/outsourcedebate.html
http://www.workingamerica.org/
Just my 2 cents. =)
I think the IT field as a whole, programmers, network guys, etc... are going
to go the way of the auto workers in the 70's and 80's. I am a CCIE working
and on a second one and it saddens me that all my hard work and advanced
knowledge could be replaced by a chop-shop guy because from a business
standpoint quarter to quarter the chop-shop guy is cheaper on the books.
Never mind the fact that I solve problems on the network in under 30mins and
save the company from downtime but I am too expensive. I used to love
technology and all it had to offer but now I feel cheated, I feel like we
all have been burned by the way the business guys look at the technology, as
a commodity. Thankfully I am still young (mid 20's) I can make a career
switch but I'll still love the technology. Anyway I am going to start the
paper work to be an H1b to China and brush up on my Mandarin.
Jason
-----Original Message-----
From: owner-nanog@merit.edu [mailto:owner-nanog@merit.edu] On Behalf Of Erik
Haagsman
Sent: Thursday, September 23, 2004 7:55 PM
To: Dan Mahoney, System Admin
Cc: Nicole; nanog@nanog.org
Subject: Re: Cisco moves even more to china.
On Fri, 2004-09-24 at 02:29, Dan Mahoney, System Admin wrote:
> I've always personally taken anyone who said "but I'm an MCSE" with a
> grain of salt. I've had equal respect for the A-plus and Net-Plus
> certifications, which are basically bought.
I take most certifications with a grain of salt, including degrees,
unless someone clearly demonstrates he know's what he's talking about,
is able to make intelligent decisions and learns new techniques quickly.
In which case a certification is still just an add-on ;-)
> I used to have more trust in the /CC../ certifications but I find I may be
> laughing those off too quite soon.
The vendor's introductory certs (CCNA, CCNP, JNCIA, JNCIS) don't say
anything about a candidate, except exactly that ("I got the cert"). CCIE
and JNCIE are still at least an indicator someone was at a certain level
at the time of getting the certification, but are still no substitute
for experience and a brain in good working order. It's too bad there
aren't better "general" (non-vendor specific) certs, since what often
lacks is general understanding of network architecture and protocols.
You can teach anyone the right commands for Vendor X and they'll prolly
get a basic config going on a few nodes, but when troubleshooting time
comes it's useless without good knowledge of the underlying technology,
which none of the vendor certs teach very well (IMHO anyway ;-)
Cheers,
Erik
--
---
Erik Haagsman
Network Architect
We Dare BV
tel: +31.10.7507008
fax: +31.10.7507005
http://www.we-dare.nl