US Developer Outsourced His Work to China to Surf Reddit

got paid 6 digits a year by VZW, but all he did was surf the internet as he outsourced his work to china for a 1/5 of his salary

 

Now THAT is winning. WTH didn't I think of that?

 

Lol

 

Holy **** lmfao. That is awesome.

 

Epic laziness. Think I'd rather work for a living and have some integrity.

 

Welcome to the 1%?

They should invent a Tech Job where you get to kick these guys in the *** for pulling stupid crap.

Oh wait, I can go down the street @ lunch and do that myself and cut in front of them in line.

Edit: I wonder if "Bob" is related to Milton in any ways?

 

outsourcing is all the rage these days, corporations have been doing it for years/decades now

 

Duh... doesn't mean I support it. I worked for a company that downsized by around 150,000 people and many many of those jobs were outsourced. That means less money being paid to the american work force, less money spent by the american work force and eventually less money to the company that outsourced in the first place. It's short sited and should be stopped. Easy way to do that is to tax the company and people doing it.

 

Wrong, wrong, wrong. Outsourcing is a good thing overall and makes the economy stronger. Yes, there is plenty of potential for pain in the short-term but the reality of life is 'adapt or die'. Read this:

The End of the US Piano Industry - Jeffrey A. Tucker - Mises Daily

 

Really don't think im wrong. If the countries we are sending the jobs to turned around and brought american made goods and spent tourism dollars in america then sure. But that is not the case.

You take a million jobs out if the country that's roughly $40 million dollars out if the economy. Tax dollars. Rent. Mortgage. Food. Fun. Then how many if those end up on unemployment increasing the tax burden?

 

It's macroeconomics 101, comparative advantage. Well, in this case, I believe China has absolute advantage, and that's just how the cookie crumbles for the US economy. But hey, that's how the free market works, viva la capitalism, right?

Sent from my Nexus 4 using i-Club

 

That is how it works. That doesn't mean it's wise int he long term.

All china is doing is industrializing. You know... what we did 100 years ago. They'll ride that for a while and then what'll happen... oh wait...

 

Imagine someone making the following argument: ALL outsourcing is bad. If you buy any goods or services outside the state of California, you are hurting the CA economy. In fact, spending money outside your own town hurts your town. What about spending outside your neighborhood? Why not refuse to do business with anyone outside your immediate household? All the money you would normally spend with businesses, retailers, and restaurants you now give to family members. All of you can cook meals for each other, grow your own food, and build your own furniture. Money that ever leaves your family's possession is gone forever, making your family poorer. Zero outsourcing!

It's an absurd example but it makes my point - we outsource every day. We spend money with people and companies outside our family, neighborhood, city, and state constantly. No one would argue that this hurts us as individuals, or our city, or our state to do business with outsiders but as soon as we get to the nation's borders people believe something magical happens and that the money disappears, never to benefit the US.

I believe that is wrong for two reasons. First of all, in any voluntary transaction, both sides win. If the deal did not benefit one of the two parties involved, they wouldn't do the deal. The more transactions take place, the more people benefit. If we can trade our hard-earned money for new Porsches from Germany, both sides are ahead. I'd rather have a nice new car to get me around than have a bunch of money sitting in my bank account gathering no interest. It took me significantly less effort and time to make the money to buy a Porsche than to try to develop and make one from scratch myself. Porsche benefits because they can trade their time and effort for an amount of cash that is greater than they could get any other (legal) way. In other words, Porsche put $50,000 worth of time, materials, and effort into a car that they can sell for $65,000. They turned a profit. I put $50,000 worth of time and effort into my job and get paid $65,000. I then spend that $65,000 on a car that would otherwise cost me $100,000+ to make myself. I profited too.

So when we do business with foreign companies, so long as we negotiate successfully and there is no coercion or fraud, we profit on the transaction. The other party does too. When we make a profit on a deal, we are ahead. Outsourcing brings tangible benefits to both sides of the transaction.

What about the rest of the US economy though? What about the call center employees who lost their jobs? Again, they will suffer, but no one is guaranteed a job. Sink or swim. They have to provide a value equal to or better than their competition. They can look for the same job elsewhere. They can improve their skill set with education and training to find a better line of work. Read the article I linked to. What happened to all those piano makers in the US? Adapt or die.

Those same outsourced US employees also benefit from outsourcing every day. Goods and services they rely on get less expensive every day. Zenith (as an American TV manufacturer) is long gone but no one thinks about that when they are buying a new 32-inch LCD tv for $250. Could you buy a new TV in the 1950's or '60's with the equivalent of 10-30 hours' worth of labor? I doubt it. Why so inexpensive? Lots of reasons (technical innovation, improvements in mass manufacturing, etc.) but one significant one is outsourcing. Taiwan, Korea, and the Philippines can make a building and fill it with equipment and workers cheaper than the US can. They win by getting the work (and usually significantly higher salaries than they otherwise could). We win by getting better and less expensive products.

And just as we know that dollars spent in San Francisco will make their way back to San Jose and vice versa, dollars spent in India will make their way back to the US, whether directly or indirectly.

 

I didn't say all outsourcing was bad. In fact I don't think it's necessarily bad all together.

Once again you're taking things to the finite point. What you're saying is not only stupid it's impossible and globally irresponsible. The economics of this planet exist on the back of a history of trade started hundreds of years ago. That's not going to change.

What that guy did is sign an agreement with a company to do a job. They hired him, not 20 chinese people. He then farmed said job off for personal gain. What he did was unethical and illegal. It would be the same as you renting a house. They rented that house to YOU. But you don't stay there. Instead you rent it to 2 families with kids and dogs. You're making money because you upped the rent. The person that rented the house now has destruction to their property they would not have had renting to the respectful single man they didn't make pay an extra deposit for pets he didn't have.

Illegal... unethical. That is my point.

As for outsourcing in general. I don't think it's bad to "outsource" for the purchase of goods. I'm not one of those murica! guys. Fact is some things are done better and cheaper elsewhere. But it should not be the end all be all for all things.

Call centers. The job is done better and more efficiently in say Oakland. That's 40,000 jobs for the bay area. But you have to pay those people $12-20 an hour. So you send that call center to Jamaica, the Philippines and India. Now you're paying $3 an hour. But is the service you're providing better? No it's not. You did it because you're trying to save overhead so your profit margins go up and your stock holders are happy.

Now you have 40,000 local people not paying taxes. That's bad for the area. And you have 40,000 local people that can no longer buy those telecom services they were more than likely paying to the company they worked for... that's 40,000 less customers for you. That's bad for you. Now say 30% of those people can't find jobs because the local area had other layoffs and 75,000 people just flooded an area with 50,000 available jobs. Now you have all those people on welfare, food programs, unemployment... etc .

How is that good for the local economy and how is that good for the company in the long run?

Sure your stocks went up and your gains looked good for that quarter. You can get away with doing that for a while but eventually it all catches up. Then you're left with a technology that has not improved and an employee base that can't do the job the old base could. So CEO that made all those moves looks great and makes his couple hundred million over a few years then jumps ship and the company takes a ****.

That is not conjecture. That is fact. I watched it happen.

 

Here's another example...

My buddy works for a machine shop. One of the best around. They are the ones that work on the cat scans and medical equipment you depend on. Well those companies got cheap and started sending stuff out to denmark. You know what happened.... quality went down. So now you have stuff that BARELY makes it through spec if it makes it at all. So those parts are not going to last as long or work as well. And that's the long run.

In the short run what happens is you pay..... says $4000 for a part you were paying $12,000 on. But guess what now you have to ship it. That runs price up. And half of them get damaged... now they have to be fixed.

So guess what... now you just spent $18k on that $12k part.

It's poor business.

Maybe people shouldn't expect to be able to purchase a 47" tv for $400? Maybe consumers shouldn't expect to be able to live rich when they're not rich? It's called living in reality. I don't have a new tv. I have a car with 217k miles on it. I have hand me down couches and I"m wearing a 5 year old pare of converse right now.

That's life. I don't make $100k a year. Why should I pretend I do?