12 Articles Worth Reading
12 Articles Worth Reading
Date: Sunday, February 27, 2005 3:22 PM
JOB DESTRUCTION NEWSLETTER
by Rob Sanchez
February 27, 2005 No. 1204
NOTE FROM ROB: Be sure to read articles 6,7,8 at the same time because
they are closely related. Same for articles 11 and 12. I'm sad to say
that the voters of Arizona re-elected Jeff Flake because he is an avid
supporter of guest-worker visas, H-1B, NAFTA, and CAFTA.
Article 1:
http://www.federalobserver.com/archive.php?aid=9390
Part 10: The Jobs Americans won't do Scam
"They do the jobs Americans won't do." We'd heard it before, but not
from our President! And right after his re-election, no less. The man
couldn't have expressed his contempt for the voters who elected him any
more thoroughly than the insult of telling them they're lazy and don't
want to work! After all, what American would ever consider being a
truck driver, construction worker, computer operator, cook, or 1000
other jobs including nurses, doctors, lawyers, or entrepreneurs?
Article 2:
http://www.computerworld.com/databasetopics/data/datacenter/story/0,10801,99980,00.html?source=NLT_PM&nid=99980
EDS to shutter 21 global data centers by 2006
As part of an ongoing restructuring, Electronic Data Systems Corp.
plans to close 21 data centers around the world in an effort to cut
costs. EDS will shutter 17 centers in the U.S. and four in Europe,
company officials said yesterday. About 27% of the software workers are
located offshore, Bonet said. That percentage is expected to grow to
about 33% after the consolidations, she added.
Article 3:
http://www.nytimes.com/2005/02/24/business/worldbusiness/24offshore.html
Medical Companies Joining Offshore Trend
The exporting of jobs by ReaMetrix is telling evidence that the
relentless shifting of employment to countries like India and China
that has occurred in manufacturing, back-office work and computer
programming is now spreading to a crown jewel of corporate America: the
medical and drug industries. "What I see in India is the same kind of
opportunity I saw in the Valley in 1979," said Dr. Manian. In the
United States, he said, "a million dollars doesn't go more than three
months." In India, by contrast, "I can run a group of 20 people for a
whole year for half a million dollars."
Article 4:
http://in.news.yahoo.com/050216/43/2jn2w.html
Americans flock to India for treatment
A reversal of medical tourism now has Americans making a beeline for
India, seeking latest and cheaper treatments. Until recently, it was
the other way round, with Indians rushing to the US for better cure
facilities.
Article 5:
http://www.usatoday.com/money/economy/employment/2005-02-10-offshore-usat_x.htm
To start up here, companies hire over there
The 5-year-old business employs 200 in the USA. Yet it employs 2,000
more in southern India, with plans for hundreds more performing
tech-heavy financial services and other tasks. None of those jobs got
there through traditional "offshoring." They were never in the USA to
begin with. The study found that many U.S. start-ups, speeding the pace
of globalization, now bypass the USA for nations where customers and
cheap labor are plentiful.
Article 6:
http://www.dallasnews.com/s/dws/bus/stories/022305dnbuswipro.d72c2.html
Firm is too busy to fret about outsourcing issue
Overseas outsourcing was one of the most popular targets of political
ire last year, but the top executive at one of India's biggest
technology firms said the furor only boosted his company's visibility.
Azim Premji, chairman of Wipro Ltd., said during a Dallas stop that
overseas outsourcing is more important than ever for U.S. corporations.
"I think the process of the U.S. election and all the attention
outsourcing got has really been a positive," Mr. Premji said, "the side
effect of that being an enormous amount of brand building."
Article 7:
http://www.newkerala.com/news-daily/news/features.php?action=fullnews&id=77919
Wipro Chairman Premji rings closing bell at NYSE:
Wipro Chairman Azim Premji got the honour of ringing the closing bell
at the New York Stock Exchange (NYSE) on which his global information
technology company is listed.
Article 8:
http://www.telegraphindia.com/1050227/asp/frontpage/story_4431109.asp
Bell goes off on India fever
Shortly after finance minister P. Chidambaram presents his budget on
Monday, ripples of his proposals will be felt in the worlds
financial capital of New York. On Monday, an Indian American
entrepreneur from Michigan, Raj Vattikuti, has been invited by Nasdaq
stock market to ring the opening bell for the days trading. The
stage for what promises to develop into a mild India fever in the
months ahead has already been set in the US this weekend with Wipros
chairman, Azim Premji, ringing the bell at the New York Stock Exchange
yesterday to mark the close of trading.
Article 9:
http://www.computerworld.com.au/index.php?id=1717998880&eid=-257
How to turn outsourcing into an opportunity
When you first hear that your organisation plans to outsource IT
projects offshore, it's difficult to look on the bright side. If you're
like most people, your initial reaction will probably be to worry about
your job security and start looking into other employment prospects.
However, if you choose to embrace outsourcing rather than resist it,
you will have the chance to benefit from a prime opportunity for career
advancement.
Article 10:
http://magic-city-news.com/article_3000.shtml
There Are No Jobs Americans Dont Want
President George Bush once again blamed Americans for the immigration
crisis in his current State of the Union Message. Apparently, we have
thousands of Mexicans "to fill jobs Americans will not take."
Article 11:
http://www.businessweek.com/premium/content/05_10/b3923130.htm
States' Rights vs. Free Trade
As trade pacts proliferate, states start to howl about lost sovereignty
After decades of dozing on the sidelines as Washington promoted a
free-trade agenda around the globe, governors, state lawmakers, and
judges are waking up to the same startling reality: A growing number of
international trade agreements are usurping state powers. Suddenly
alarmed that Washington is bargaining away their authority over
everything from regulating utilities to controlling land use, states
are all but ready to join the chorus of anti-globalization critics.
Article 12:
http://www.azcentral.com/arizonarepublic/viewpoints/articles/0227flake0227.html#
Trade deal would bolster C. America democracies
Critics of CAFTA have tried to scare people with many of the same
arguments that were made during the debate on NAFTA, despite the fact
that those predictions have not come true. We have not seen a rush of
American companies closing shop in the United States and rushing south
for cheap labor and lax environmental laws.
1. +++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
http://www.federalobserver.com/archive.php?aid=9390
Part 10: The Jobs Americans won't do Scam
Don't be fooled by peddlers of Immigration Reform Scams
By S. J. Miller
{CLICK HERE for Series Overview}
"They do the jobs Americans won't do." We'd heard it before, but not
from our President! And right after his re-election, no less. The man
couldn't have expressed his contempt for the voters who elected him any
more thoroughly than the insult of telling them they're lazy and don't
want to work!
After all, what American would ever consider being a truck driver,
construction worker, computer operator, cook, or 1000 other jobs
including nurses, doctors, lawyers, or entrepreneurs?
Three recent examples of deported illegals explode the myth of "they
only take jobs that Americans won't do." (1)(2)(3) Juan and Patricia
Castillo lived in Clarion, Iowa for 9 years while he worked at a local
agricultural sprayer manufacturing plant and she worked at Electronic
Data Systems. Fabian held a construction job in Licking County, Ohio
for two years before being picked up for driving without a license. And
an illegal family in Missouri lived for 13 years after overstaying
their visa, with the wife working as a school district teacher's aide
and the husband as a driver in the office of the governor of Missouri.
All these are jobs Americans would not only do, but jobs Americans
routinely held until the illegal immigration waves flooded the American
job market, making it more and more difficult for Americans to find a
full-time job.
American workers don't have the privileges that illegals do. Americans
can't accept "under the table" cash wages, because IRS would
investigate why they've apparently disappeared from tax rolls. They
can't accept the low wages illegals do, because they won't be provided
with the "supplemental public assistance" that illegals get from both
public agencies and non-profit "charities." They can't qualify for
welfare and publicly-paid medical care with no questions asked.
Americans are expected to pay their way; illegals are offered all sorts
of assistance.
Need more proof that illegals commonly take jobs that Americans would
do? Illegal alien advocates cite the $7 billion in "contributions" by
illegals to Social Security taxes under counterfeit cards; what they
don't tell you is that payroll withholding taxes are a sign of
mainstream jobs, not picking lettuce or "day labor" jobs.
The Bear Stearns estimate of 20 million illegals makes even more
obvious what we all knew: 20 million illegals are working somewhere,
and we know they're not all picking lettuce! (4)
"The illegals work harder." They don't and we all know that.
"The baby boomers will be retiring and we need illegal aliens to fill
the labor shortage created by retiring baby boomers." We're supposed to
believe that Third-World unskilled illegals with grade-school
educations will fill vacancies left by experienced professional and
technical retirees? If there's such a desperate need for these
unskilled illegals, why are so many on street corners waiting for
pick-up work?
A business world anticipating such a shortage would do all possible to
retain their "baby-boom" employees, not pushing them out the door
prematurely with "retirement packages."
This "labor shortage" is just another myth. Those old enough to
remember liken this to the Great Depression when men waited for work at
assembly areas. And we all know that the Great Depression represented
jobs shortage, not a worker shortage.
IS THIS REALLY TRUE?
Even though the President and his "open borders" crowd think we're too
dumb, we all know Americans routinely earned a living with these jobs,
raised families and lived good lives. Until post-1965 mass third-world
immigration flooded the US labor market, depressed wages, and expanded
the "multicultural" underground economy so common in third-world
countries.
If you've read the series this far, you've learned to identify not only
the "pitch," but the "pitch man." That's handy for the future by
enabling you to ID new scams just by their salesman. For example,
knowing that Senator Ted Kennedy is the key person responsible for the
1965 "Immigration Reform" Act that changed the "key" for immigrating to
the US from "economic responsibility" (the immigrant's ability to be
self-supporting and not be a public charge) to "family ties" (they have
a relative already in the US), that enabled US entry by massive
third-world immigration, would you accept any of his future "reform"
proposals like the Jackpot Amnesty?
I know I wouldn't. Nor would I believe any of Ted Kennedy's allies on
the immigration issue. Like Senator John McCain. Much as it shames me
to admit it, McCain is from my home state of Arizona. During the 108th
Congress, McCain introduced S-1461 for President Bush's "guest-worker
plan." My 3-inch pile of "constituent reply" letters assuring me that
Senator McCain opposes illegal immigration mean nothing when he
consistently introduces and co-sponsors such legislation. The
"open-borders," big-money and big-business crowd couldn't ask for a
better defender of their interests.
So when John McCain claims that ending illegal immigration would "shut
down the homebuilding industry, the resort industry and the restaurants
that we patronize here in our nation's capital," (5) what more official
word could we ask that another industry has been added to the list of
"jobs Americans won't do?"
McCain's interviewer hit the nail on the head with his secondary
comment to the quote, adding that McCain was "referring to jobs
generally held by immigrants, many of them illegal, in industries that
serve moneyed Americans." US immigration has always benefited the
country's employers and wealthy, as it does today.
Those of us who attended American schools before adoption of the UNESCO
curriculum learned that the Republican party historically supported
high immigration levels and the Democratic party opposed them. After
their arrival, immigrants became Democrats because they recognized the
disaster to them by continued mass immigration. That the picture has
changed today reflects both parties have embraced the "global economy"
despite its disastrous effect on Americans and their country.
WHAT'S SAUCE FOR THE GOOSE...
We all realize the advantage given an illegal employee in the
underground economy, but it's easy to overlook the benefits it offers
to the employer. We know from Chapter 4: The "Greedy Employers need
Amnesty, too" Scam, about the costs and taxes the employer evades:
workers' compensation insurance, unemployment taxes, Employers' Social
Security and Medicare taxes (7.65%). But there's even more.
Actually, the Bear Stearns report tells a great deal about the
attraction of employers for illegals, and it's more than just cheap
wages.
Hiring illegals enables the employer to operate in the underground
economy where earnings and profits remain hidden from taxes. We know
that workers' earnings in the underground economy are tax-free, but
company earnings are hidden as well. Lower profits means lower taxes
for the employer/company, and that drops directly to the company's
bottom line.
That $311 billion in "uncollected taxes" cited in the Bear Stearns
report wasn't limited to personal income taxes on individual earnings;
it also includes uncollected corporate taxes as well.
WHAT LEADS TO "IMMIGRANT INDUSTRIES?"
The two most common reasons: Employers who want cheap labor or to
eliminate labor union. Since the 1980s, industry after well-paying
industry has been sent overseas: manufacturing and textiles.
Well-paying jobs that couldn't be sent offshore, such as construction,
landscaping and meatpacking, suddenly were eliminated in labor disputes
or lockouts, and eventually replaced by illegals.
Truck drivers expect their jobs to be the next taken over by illegal
aliens.
The 2002-2003 case of Tyson Chicken revealed clearly that illegal
employees don't just drift northward looking for work. They're
recruited in their home countries by employers or labor brokers, and
arrive in the US complete with forged documents. (6) (7) It's only
recently that newspapers have carried stories of human smuggling rings
that clearly showed what we've all known for years: Illegal immigration
is big business, from top to bottom.
As you can imagine, businesses notorious for hiring illegals didn't get
there by accident; they've made a conscious decision to do so. They
know the need to keep a legal distance, and ensure that employees
always have genuine-looking documents.
That was effective in the past, but the Workplace Verification Program
threw them a curve. The employer uses the phone or the internet to
verify that the applicant's Social Security number and name match
what's on Social Security Administration records. When the employer
receives a "no-match" from SSA, the employer loses excuses of "we're
not document experts" or "we didn't know he was illegal." That's why
legislation to change the program from voluntary to mandatory have been
opposed in Congress by both big-business and illegal alien advocates.
(Chapter 8, The "Food Costs will increase without cheap illegal labor"
Scam ).
But how does an industry or workplace come to be "taken over" by
illegals? Former construction workers as well as young fast-food
restaurant workers know the drill. First, a Spanish-speaking foreman is
hired as a translator, and soon English-speaking employees are excluded
from conversations. Citizens find their parked cars vandalized and
tools stolen.
A friend told me of forcing her 19-year old daughter to quit her
fast-food job upon learning that she was subjected to sexual harassment
by illegal employees. Reports of such harassment to management fall on
deaf ears. The employee can appeal to EEOC, but remember that EEOC is
an federal Executive Cabinet agency, whose head is appointed by the
President. How aggressively will such an agency (under the authority of
an "open-borders" President) pursue such reports?
Knowing the deck is stacked against them, citizen employees quit in
disgust. Predictably, their vacancy is filled by an illegal.
~ Resources ~
(1) Immigrants await deportation rulings,DesMoines Register, December
19 2004.
(2) Mexican Family gives up deportation fight,London Guardian,
September 1 2004.
(3) Deportation on the rise in Central Ohio," Columbus Dispatch, May 5
2003.
(4) Illegals estimated to number 18-20 million, WorldNet Daily, January
3 2005.
(5) Managing Immigration, Baltimore Sun, January 30 2005.
(6) "Prosecutors Call Tyson Smuggling Trial a case of 'corporate
greed'," New York Times, February 6 2003.
(7) Tyson, others cleared in Immigrant case, NewsDay, March 26, 2003.
Friday: Part 11 - How to Recognize an "Immigration Reform" Scam
~ About the author ~
S. J. Miller is a former veteran of the IT industry who sought another
career rather than "follow the jobs" abroad, and a lifelong resident of
border states, California, Texas, Arizona, and Nevada.
2. +++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
http://www.computerworld.com/databasetopics/data/datacenter/story/0,10801,99980,00.html?source=NLT_PM&nid=99980
EDS to shutter 21 global data centers by 2006
The move is part of the company's restructuring efforts
News Story by Todd R. Weiss
FEBRUARY 23, 2005 (COMPUTERWORLD) - As part of an ongoing
restructuring, Electronic Data Systems Corp. plans to close 21 data
centers around the world in an effort to cut costs. EDS will shutter 17
centers in the U.S. and four in Europe, company officials said
yesterday.
The details of the closings emerged at a meeting with analysts. The
news follows the financially-troubled outsourcing vendor's announcement
late last year that it planned to eliminate between 15,000 and 20,000
jobs over the next two years as part of an effort to slash $3 billion
in costs (see story).
Liz Bonet, a spokeswoman for the Plano, Texas-based company, said EDS
currently has 42 U.S. facilities and 12 in Europe. The company had
already announced that consolidations would occur, but no final figures
had been offered until now regarding how many of the facilities would
be closed, she said.
"We have too many sites today," Bonet said.
The company has about 117,000 employees globally today, including about
30,000 who create software applications. About 27% of the software
workers are located offshore, Bonet said. That percentage is expected
to grow to about 33% after the consolidations, she added.
EDS, the world's second-largest IT services company after IBM, has been
struggling for more than two years with a variety of problems,
including disappointing sales and an investigation by the U.S.
Securities and Exchange Commission that was launched in 2002.
3. +++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
http://www.nytimes.com/2005/02/24/business/worldbusiness/24offshore.html
February 24, 2005
Medical Companies Joining Offshore Trend
By ANDREW POLLACK
Bala S. Manian rarely looked back when he left India to attend graduate
school in the United States. Since 1979, he has started one medical
technology company after another in Silicon Valley.
But Dr. Manian is now rediscovering his native country. His newest
medical venture, ReaMetrix, which makes test kits for pharmaceutical
research, is still based in Silicon Valley. But 20 of its 28 employees
are in India, where costs for everything from labor to rent are lower.
The exporting of jobs by ReaMetrix is telling evidence that the
relentless shifting of employment to countries like India and China
that has occurred in manufacturing, back-office work and computer
programming is now spreading to a crown jewel of corporate America: the
medical and drug industries.
It could be a worrisome sign. The life sciences industry, with its
largely white-collar work force and its heavy reliance on scientific
innovation, was long thought to be less vulnerable to the outsourcing
trend. The industry, moreover, is viewed as an economic growth engine
and the source of new jobs, particularly as growth slows in other
sectors like information technology.
"What I see in India is the same kind of opportunity I saw in the
Valley in 1979," said Dr. Manian. In the United States, he said, "a
million dollars doesn't go more than three months." In India, by
contrast, "I can run a group of 20 people for a whole year for half a
million dollars."
While life sciences jobs may be less vulnerable to outsourcing than
jobs in information technology, industry officials say many companies
are looking at that option as pressures mount to control drug prices
and cut development costs.
"First toys, clothes, those kind of things, then electronics and
computers and now, finally, pharmaceuticals and biotech," said Jimmy
Wei, a venture capitalist in San Francisco who helped start Bridge
Pharmaceuticals, a company that is doing drug screening in Asia for
American pharmaceutical companies.
The outsourcing of some life sciences jobs could be seen as evidence
that American biotechnology companies, like their counterparts in other
industries, are doing nothing more than building global connections
that help make them more competitive around the world.
So far, the job movement has been small. According to the most recent
data compiled by the Commerce Department, less than 6 percent of
American companies with biotechnology operations employed contract
workers abroad in 2002, but industry specialists say that percentage
has increased in the last three years.
"It's a trend that's becoming more pronounced as people's budgets get
tight," said Riccardo Pigliucci, chief executive of Discovery Partners
International, a San Diego company that does chemistry work for drug
companies. He said a chemist in India made $20,000 to $40,000 a year,
in contrast to $80,000 to $100,000 in the United States.
Discovery Partners started a small operation in India to offer
lower-cost services. In conjunction with that move it consolidated its
American operations in San Diego and South San Francisco, closing a
facility in Tucson and laying off 28 employees, according to its
regulatory filings.
Clinical trials of new drugs, for instance, are already moving to
countries in Asia, Eastern Europe and Latin America, because the costs
of conducting the trials are lower and human subjects can be recruited
more easily.
Drug manufacturing is another area that can move. India already has a
thriving generic drug manufacturing sector and is moving into
biotechnology. One biotechnology company, Biocon, went public in India
last year. Its founder and chief executive, Kiran Mazumdar-Shaw, has
been described in the news media as the richest woman in India.
With revenues of more than $100 million last year, Biocon is a leading
producer of generic cholesterol-lowering drugs called statins. It has
designs to become a major producer of insulin and monoclonal
antibodies. It also has divisions that do contract research and run
clinical trials for large American and European pharmaceutical
companies.
Fueling the outsourcing trend are Indian and Chinese scientists who
obtained graduate degrees and work experience in the United States and
Europe and are now returning to their native countries.
Ge Li, the founder of WuXi Pharmatech in Shanghai, for example, spent
12 years in the United States, earning a doctorate in organic chemistry
at Columbia University and then co-founding Pharmacopeia, a New Jersey
drug company.
In 2001, Dr. Li moved to Shanghai to start WuXi, which does chemistry
work for American and European companies. The company has grown to 570
employees and had revenues of $21.5 million last year, Dr. Li said.
"Essentially all of the big pharmas are our customers," he said.
PTC Therapeutics, a biotech company in South Plainfield, N.J., hires
WuXi when extra help is needed for a short time.
"We can turn them on and off as needed," said John Babiak, senior vice
president for discovery technologies at PTC. But he said PTC decides
which compounds to make to test as potential drugs, leaving WuXi to
make them. "We're just farming out the bench work," he said.
In that sense, what is going offshore might be called "back laboratory"
work, somewhat equivalent to the back-office information technology
functions that have moved in the past. But there are signs that the
biotech migration will go beyond low-level work.
Roche, the big Swiss drug company, just opened a research center in
Shanghai to make use of Chinese scientists returning from abroad. "U.S.
academia had been run by Chinese post-docs for the last 10 years, if
not 15," said Jonathan Knowles, head of global research for Roche.
China and India are starting to invest heavily in developing
biotechnology expertise. Meanwhile, Singapore has created a cluster of
research centers and has attracted some top scientists.
Another potential advantage for some Asian countries is their more
permissive stance on embryonic stem cell research, a promising new
field that is restricted in the United States.
A group of British stem cell specialists that visited China, Singapore
and South Korea said scientists in those countries were as talented as
in Britain but better equipped and funded. "The challenge to Western
pre-eminence in stem cell science from China, Singapore and South Korea
is real," it concluded in a report.
However, the life sciences industry, even without outsourcing, is not
so big that it can make up for jobs lost in other sectors.
By a broad definition of the industry, including medical devices,
pharmaceuticals and certain parts of agriculture and chemicals,
employment reaches 885,000, according to a study by Battelle Memorial
Institute for the Biotechnology Industry Organization. Some 225,000
jobs, mainly in computers and back-office work, moved offshore in 2004
alone, according to an estimate by Forrester Research.
There are some factors that suggest life science jobs will be slower to
migrate offshore than those in information technology. For one thing,
drug companies face less pressure to cut costs than, say, computer disk
drive manufacturers because pharmaceuticals have relatively high profit
margins.
"We're not trying to eke out another percent of operating margin," said
Kevin Sharer, chief executive of Amgen, the largest biotech company,
which is based outside Los Angeles.
Also, life sciences companies often prefer to be near the best
university research, which, for now, is largely in the United States
because of ample funding from the National Institutes of Health.
Novartis, the Swiss pharmaceutical giant, for example, shifted its
research headquarters from its home country to Cambridge, Mass., in
large measure to be near Harvard, M.I.T. and the numerous biotechnology
companies there.
"The lead the United States has built in biomedical sciences is so
great that I don't think this will be lost anytime soon," said Paul
Herrling, head of research for Novartis.
Moving research and development far from customers in the United States
can also pose problems. Aviva Biosciences of San Diego, which makes
chips for biological research, for example, was started by Chinese
scientists with the idea that much of the technology would be developed
in China.
But now Aviva does most of its work in San Diego because the scientists
in China could not grasp the needs of American researchers, said Jia
Xu, vice president for research and development.
"In terms of the market we're trying to address you really need people
who are from the industry," he said. "And that's something you cannot
find in China."
These barriers to foreign outsourcing, say those in the business, are
not likely to slow the trend. Besides, they argue, cost savings from
outsourcing can free up resources for more drug development in the
United States.
Dr. Manian said ReaMetrix, for instance, can prepare material in
advance so scientists in the United States can do experiments faster.
"I am not interested in replacing jobs here," he said. "I am interested
in taking those opportunities that are compelling, and yet are not
economical to do here and do them in India."
An expert in optics, Dr. Manian first started Digital Optics, which
made equipment to transfer digital medical images, like CT scans, onto
film. (That same technology is used to put computer-generated special
effects onto movie film, earning Dr. Manian an Academy Award
certificate for technical achievement.)
Among the other companies he co-founded were Molecular Dynamics, which
developed a DNA-sequencing machine, Surromed, a drug and diagnostics
company, and Quantum Dot, which has a system for detecting biological
molecules.
These days, he thinks India holds big advantages, including a young
population.
"The exodus of jobs in life sciences will take place," he said.
"There's no avoiding it. There's no way that you can sustain the
inefficient research and development that exists in the U.S."
4. +++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
http://in.news.yahoo.com/050216/43/2jn2w.html
Wednesday February 16, 11:01 AM
Americans flock to India for treatment
By Indo-Asian News Service
Hyderabad, Feb 16 (IANS) A reversal of medical tourism now has
Americans making a beeline for India, seeking latest and cheaper
treatments.
Until recently, it was the other way round, with Indians rushing to the
US for better cure facilities.
However, with the state-of-art medical procedures, equipment and
facilities now available in India, patients from developed countries
like Canada and Britain are flocking to Indian hospitals.
The Indian medical fraternity conquered the "final frontier" when
Americans too started coming here for the latest medical procedures,
which are either not available in their country or are much more
expensive.
Robert Walter Beeney was unable to walk due to a stiff hip when he
landed in India Jan 24. Twenty days later, he not only recovered after
a rare hip replacement surgery at Apollo Hospital here but also visited
the famous Taj Mahal in Agra after that.
The 64-year-old real estate consultant from San Francisco underwent
successful surface replacement surgery using the anatomic surface
replacement (ASR) hip system Jan 27, reportedly becoming the first US
national to come to India for the treatment.
Another patient from Florida will be landing in Chennai for a similar
procedure at the Apollo Hospital there later this week.
A team of doctors, led by orthopaedic surgeon Vijay Bose, carried out
the procedure for Beeney.
Jayaramchander Pingle, a member of the medical team, told a news
conference Tuesday that while in the conventional hip replacement
surgery, the total hip was replaced, in the new system, the patient's
original head and neck of femur were preserved and only their surface
is replaced with metal on metal articulation.
With the use of very advanced metallurgy in this device, the wear and
tear is reduced to a fraction in the artificial joint as opposed to the
conventional total hip replacement.
Another advantage of the latest procedure is that in the event of any
problem that may occur in the long term, the conventional total hip
replacement can be done at a later stage.
Beeney, who came to know about the procedure in India through the
Internet, said that since this was not yet cleared by the US Food and
Drug Administration, he decided to come here.
"This is despite the fact that the device that is fixed in the hip is
made in the US," he said.
He also had other options like going to Britain or Belgium for
treatment. "But I preferred India as the treatment costs there are
huge," he said.
The treatment in India cost him $6,600 (Rs.300,000) while the same as a
part of clinical trial in US would have cost $24,000. Even in Britain,
where this procedure was first developed a few years ago, it would have
cost 12,000 pounds.
Sangita Reddy, executive director of Apollo Hospitals, hoped that doors
of the $1.7 trillion US healthcare industry would now open for Indian
hospitals.
While the patients from Afro-Asian countries, the Middle East, Canada,
Britain and other parts of the world had been coming to India, Beeney's
case was significant as he chose India after a thorough research, she
added.
The Apollo group, one of Asia's largest private healthcare providers,
gets seven percent of its turnover from international patients. The
group's total turnover during 2003-04 was Rs.5 billion.
The Apollo group in India treated 43,000 foreign patients during the
last three and a half years.
5. +++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
http://www.usatoday.com/money/economy/employment/2005-02-10-offshore-usat_x.htm
To start up here, companies hire over there
By Jim Hopkins, USA TODAY
SAN FRANCISCO - OfficeTiger is the sort of young technology company
that once created thousands of high-paying jobs in the USA, fueling
sizzling economic growth.
The 5-year-old business employs 200 in the USA. Yet it employs 2,000
more in southern India, with plans for hundreds more performing
tech-heavy financial services and other tasks. None of those jobs got
there through traditional "offshoring." They were never in the USA to
begin with.
Nearly 40% of start-ups in a new USA TODAY study employ engineers,
marketers, analysts and others in jobs created in India and other
nations. Russell Hancock, CEO of an influential group charting Silicon
Valley's future, called the findings "amazing."
The study found that many U.S. start-ups, speeding the pace of
globalization, now bypass the USA for nations where customers and cheap
labor are plentiful.
The newspaper studied 106 software firms, started since 1999, that got
money last year from influential investors called venture capitalists.
VCs pump more money into software than into any other industry.
The rise of these "micro-multinationals" is worrisome because start-ups
generate most tech jobs. Their role is now more vital as mature tech
firms consolidate and export work, cutting U.S. employment. Indeed,
tech's share of all U.S. jobs fell last year to 4.4% from a record 5%
in 2001. Tech's job share is now near a level last seen in 1992.
And it may not have hit bottom. Hewlett-Packard's ouster Tuesday of CEO
Carly Fiorina raises doubts about its plans. Software giant Oracle just
laid off 5,000 workers after swallowing rival PeopleSoft. Top chipmaker
Intel has said it plans to do most of its future hiring outside the
USA.
Now start-ups are joining the exodus. Micro-multinationals create jobs
that aren't reflected in the Labor Department's influential monthly
jobs survey. The number of these jobs is unknown because most start-ups
are private. But USA TODAY's study, examining a slice of software
start-ups, found nearly 900 jobs created in foreign nations - the tip
of the iceberg.
"It's an irreversible trend," says Nick Sturiale, general partner at
Sevin Rosen Funds, a VC firm that has made up to half of its
investments since early 2003 in micro-multinationals. "You have to be
global."
Private investors like Sevin, dangling scarce start-up financing, now
insist that ventures expand outside the USA from the get-go. Start-ups
say survival hinges on global markets where cell phone software and
other new tech gear spring to life. Young ventures want cheap labor to
keep prices low to better compete.
Speedy Internet access lets entrepreneurs ship software design and
other work anywhere from Day 1. What's more, start-ups are hiring well
beyond India, the nation most closely identified with offshoring.
They're also hiring in Germany, Italy, France and even closer, in
Canada.
6. +++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
http://www.dallasnews.com/s/dws/bus/stories/022305dnbuswipro.d72c2.html
Firm is too busy to fret about outsourcing issue
09:47 PM CST on Tuesday, February 22, 2005
Two color photographs of Chairman Azim Premji and Sanji Joshi are
included with the print article.
By VICTOR GODINEZ / The Dallas Morning News Page 10D, Wednesday,
February 23, 2005
There really is no such thing as bad press.
Overseas outsourcing was one of the most popular targets of political
ire last year, but the top executive at one of India's biggest
technology firms said the furor only boosted his company's visibility.
Azim Premji, chairman of Wipro Ltd., said during a Dallas stop that
overseas outsourcing is more important than ever for U.S. corporations.
"I think the process of the U.S. election and all the attention
outsourcing got has really been a positive," Mr. Premji said, "the side
effect of that being an enormous amount of brand building."
There's no doubt that business is booming right now for Indian
companies like Wipro.
Information technology outsourcing to India is a $12.7 billion-a-year
industry, while business process outsourcing - which covers
non-technical functions like call centers - brings in about $3 billion.
Wipro competes in both arenas.
For the quarter ending Dec. 31, Wipro reported a net profit of $98.7
million on revenue of $483.1 million.
Dallas is one of Wipro's four regional hubs in the United States. The
company has more than 4,000 workers nationwide and about 40,000
worldwide.
Mr. Premji, along with Sanjay Joshi, Dallas-based chief executive of
Wipro Consulting, sat down Monday to talk about expansion into markets
like Western Europe and China, competition from U.S. outsourcing firms
like Plano-based Electronic Data Systems Corp., and political efforts
to restrict overseas outsourcing.
Here are some excerpts from the conversation:
The bulk of your clients are in India and the U.S. Do you have plans to
expand into China, which is often considered the biggest emerging
market?
Mr. Premji: "We have a small base in China. It's very small - they're
doing local implementation for some of our global customers. But we're
not addressing the domestic market for services. But where our
customers require a global rollout of what they're implementing -
that's what we're doing."
Do you plan to do more business with Chinese domestic companies?
Mr. Premji: "No."
Why is that?
Mr. Premji: "Because we see greater opportunities in terms of the
global scene - our price points are better globally."
You've said that Western Europe is your next big target for finding
customers. Why has it taken so long to focus on that market?
Mr. Premji: "It's a tougher market, because I think European companies
have felt the heat of global competition less. They've been more
protected by the political system.
"And there are very strict laws on unions there. They are very
powerful.
"And language. We have to do much more localization, much more language
training. For instance, we are very successful in Japan the last few
years, and hired much more locally. We have about 200 engineers in
Japan working at customer sites. About 150 of them are Japanese."
Do you expect to see a significant challenge from Chinese firms that do
the same things you do and can offer even cheaper prices?
Mr. Joshi: "The notion that you hear that China can offer price
competitiveness, at least in the near term, is not our view. We still
think, given our scale, we can do better out of India than China in the
near term."
Mr. Premji: "China produces as many engineering students as India.
We'll graduate about 320,000 engineers this year, and China will
graduate about 300,000. So where does China lack? Language. Our
engineers speak English, and theirs have to be trained.
"And I think China has an absence of project management and program
management [expertise]. They can build it, but it will take time.
Thirdly, China has much weaker intellectual property [protection]."
Are U.S. outsourcing companies like EDS and IBM Corp. becoming more
competitive in India?
Mr. Premji: "They are becoming better competitors. They have further
endorsed the global delivery market. IBM in India has 9,000 workers.
Accenture has 11,000.
"And they're all getting the benefits of Indian employees and Indian
costs. They are offering not because they want to offer it, but because
their customers are driving them."
Legislation has been proposed in many states that would limit or ban
state contracts going to companies that would outsource the work
overseas. What's your response to that?
Mr. Premji: "Now, I'm not trying to ignore the local sensitivities of
jobs. But the global process of liberalization is a two-way process.
"They cannot have double standards. Because if they have double
standards here, the emerging world will close down their markets, and
where are the growth markets today except in the emerging world?"
Mr. Joshi: "A large percentage of our workforce is based in the markets
in the U.S. So we would have anywhere from 4,000 to 5,000 people in the
markets at client sites who are working on complex, large-scale
projects, and that definitely has an impact on the local economies."
E-mail vgodinez@dallasnews.com
7. +++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
http://www.newkerala.com/news-daily/news/features.php?action=fullnews&id=77919
*Wipro Chairman Premji rings closing bell at NYSE:*
[Business India]: New York, Feb 26 : Wipro Chairman Azim Premji got the
honour of ringing the closing bell at the New York Stock Exchange
(NYSE) on which his global information technology company is listed.
Premji rang the bell at the end of a visit by executives of the company
to the exchange last night.
Wipro, with a revenue of over USD 1.7 billion, provides services in
diverse fields including IT, product development and software design to
technology and telecommunication companies, software application for
development services to corporate enterprises, including Fortune 1000
clients, and Business Processes Outsourcing (BPO) to global
corporations.
The company has about 39,000 employees in 35 countries. PTI
8. +++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
http://www.telegraphindia.com/1050227/asp/frontpage/story_4431109.asp
Issue Date: Sunday, February 27, 2005
Bell goes off on India fever
K.P. NAYAR
Azim Premji
Washington, Feb. 27: Shortly after finance minister P. Chidambaram
presents his budget on Monday, ripples of his proposals will be felt in
the worlds financial capital of New York.
On Monday, an Indian American entrepreneur from Michigan, Raj
Vattikuti, has been invited by Nasdaq stock market to ring the opening
bell for the days trading.
The stage for what promises to develop into a mild India fever in the
months ahead has already been set in the US this weekend with Wipros
chairman, Azim Premji, ringing the bell at the New York Stock Exchange
yesterday to mark the close of trading.
There are high expectations in the US not only from the budget, but
also from the UPA governments economic policies, fuelled by
predictions by several American think tanks and intelligence and
strategic researchers in recent weeks about Indias potential.
Some of these predictions have held out the possibility that India may
overtake China in growth in coming years, becoming one of the major
engines of economic change in the world.
Because of these expectations, Chidambarams visit to Washington in
April for meetings of the World Bank and the International Monetary
Fund will be keenly awaited here and promises to be more than a routine
event.
From available indications, India will continue to be Americas
flavour throughout the year.
In June, the US-India Business Council (USIBC) will celebrate the 30th
anniversary of its founding and is planning a major event to mark the
occasion. Rajat Gupta, senior partner of McKinsey and Company, is the
current chairman of USIBC, an organisation comprising 125 top American
companies investing in India and the brainchild of Henry Kissinger,
when he was secretary of state.
The Indian and US governments are also currently negotiating a possible
bilateral visit by Prime Minister Manmohan Singh to Washington or a
visit by President George W. Bush to New Delhi this year or both.
A Bush visit will be attended by a lot of fanfare and will raise
India's profile here.
Premji was invited to ring the closing bell at NYSE yesterday to
coincide with a visit to the stock exchange by WIPRO executives.
Wipro has attracted attention here because of its $1.7 billion revenue
and its place as the fourth largest information technology services
company in the world based on market capitalisation.
Vattikuti is being honoured by Nasdaq on Monday with an invitation to
ring in the start of trading to mark the 20th anniversary of the global
consulting and technology services company specialising, among other
things, in strategic outsourcing, which he founded in 1985. Nasdaq is
also in the run up to its eight anniversary.
Vattikuti, a graduate of Guindy Engineering College in India, founded
his company, Complete Business Solutions Inc. in Michigan. It has been
listed on Nasdaq since March 1997. The company later changed its name
to Covansys Corporation.
With over 5,500 employees worldwide, Covansys was one of the first
American information technology services companies to establish
offshore facilities in India.
It now runs three wholly owned development centres in India.
The invitation to Vattikuti by Nasdaq is seen here as yet another
indication that outsourcing has come to stay and is gaining political
correctness after an American election year when the idea caused
considerable turbulence.
9. +++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
http://www.computerworld.com.au/index.php?id=1717998880&eid=-257
How to turn outsourcing into an opportunity
Adam Kolawa
07/02/2005 08:22:39
When you first hear that your organisation plans to outsource IT
projects offshore, it's difficult to look on the bright side. If you're
like most people, your initial reaction will probably be to worry about
your job security and start looking into other employment prospects.
However, if you choose to embrace outsourcing rather than resist it,
you will have the chance to benefit from a prime opportunity for career
advancement.
Most organisations use offshore outsourcing to extend -- not replace --
the existing IT team. If you find yourself in this situation,
outsourcing actually affords you the opportunity to redefine your role
and focus on the aspects of your work that you enjoy the most -- but
only if you take a proactive approach.
As soon as you learn that your organisation plans to outsource IT
projects you're involved with, start thinking about what tasks and
responsibilities you would like to offload and determining whether it
would be logistically feasible for an outsourcer to take them on. For
instance, it might be a better use of resources to outsource legacy
code maintenance or other necessary but mundane tasks that don't
require your current level of expertise. It is critical that you take
the initiative to do this yourself; if you wait for management to
decide what to outsource, you may end up with little control over your
future at the organisation.
If you successfully convince the appropriate decision-makers to
redistribute work as you recommend, outsourcing frees your resources so
you can dedicate more efforts to key project tasks or get the ball
rolling on new projects. This additional opportunity for innovation is
a win-win situation for both you and your organisation: It helps you
advance your career and improve your job satisfaction at the same time
it helps your company move (or remain) ahead of its competitors.
To further bolster your job security, make yourself a critical link
between your new focus and the responsibilities you're offloading.
Configure projects so that the code the outsourcer develops or
maintains fits seamlessly into your code. Volunteer to help review and
monitor the code that's being outsourced. And last but certainly not
least, work closely with the outsourcer to foster a mutually beneficial
relationship.
Adam Kolawa is co-founder and CEO of Parasoft, a vendor of automated
error-prevention software and services based in Monrovia, Calif.
Co-author of Bulletproofing Web Applications (Hungry Minds 2001),
Kolawa has contributed to and written more than 200 commentary pieces
and technical articles for numerous publications. He holds a Ph.D. in
theoretical physics from the California Institute of Technology.
10. +++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
http://magic-city-news.com/article_3000.shtml
Paul Streitz
There Are No Jobs Americans Dont Want
By Paul Streitz
Feb 5, 2005, 22:46
President George Bush once again blamed Americans for the immigration
crisis in his current State of the Union Message. Apparently, we have
thousands of Mexicans "to fill jobs Americans will not take."
The President again engaged in his double talk "that rejects amnesty,"
but "permits temporary guest workers. This is an outright lie. The way
you can tell if it is amnesty or not is "Does the illegal have to
return to his home country and come back?" There is no such requirement
for Bushs scheme. Therefore, it is amnesty.
Moreover, this is economic nonsense. In occupation after occupation,
Mexican workers have displaced American workers and caused wages to
collapse below the level at which even the lowest paid American worker
can survive.
Ten years ago the hotel industry in Los Angeles was staffed by
African-American union workers. After the influx of Mexicans, wages
dropped and illegals took the jobs of Americans. African-Americans in
1964 got the Civil Rights Act, but in 1965, they got the Immigration
Act, which started the flood of legals and illegals into the country.
This happened in the construction industry, the meat packing industry,
the home care industry and in day-care centers throughout the nations.
The process of replacing American workers by American corporations is
so blatant that Tyson Foods places billboards in Mexico advertising
jobs available in the Midwest. The immigrants coming into the United
States are not just coming here to wander around looking for jobs. Many
of them already have jobs lined up with the large corporations using
illegal labor.
It is the refusal of the Federal government under George H. W. Bush,
Bill Clinton and now George W. Bush to enforce the laws of the country.
All of these Presidents received massive campaign support from the
large corporate interests. If you remember, Hillary Clinton made a
quick $100,000 by a stock tip from Tyson Foods.
This crisis could be ended in a blink. Enforce the current laws. The
existing IRS laws applied to corporations would end illegal immigration
in a hurry when the shirts and ties started going to jail for tax
corporate tax evasion. Everyone hiring an illegal is guilty of a
Federal crime.
We have the laws. Now we need to elect officials that will enforce
them.
11. +++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
http://www.businessweek.com/premium/content/05_10/b3923130.htm
States' Rights vs. Free Trade
March 07, 2005 - Businessweek
As trade pacts proliferate, states start to howl about lost sovereignty
The good people of Utah decided 110 years ago that gambling was one
vice the state didn't need. So they outlawed it and later added
electronic gaming to the ban. Now, Utah's right to make games of chance
illegal has been shot down by the World Trade Organization.
WTO judges ruled last fall in a case brought by the government of
Antigua and Barbuda that gambling regulations in Utah and most other
states conflict with America's obligation not to discriminate against
foreigners providing "recreational services." In ruling for the tiny
Caribbean nation, which had charged that Utah's wager-phobia infringed
on Internet gambling operations based in the islands, the WTO opened
the door to millions of dollars in potential penalties. "It's not just
gambling," warns Utah state representative Sheryl L. Allen, a
Republican who chairs a multistate committee studying free-trade deals.
"The states are losing their authority in a lot of areas."
After decades of dozing on the sidelines as Washington promoted a
free-trade agenda around the globe, governors, state lawmakers, and
judges are waking up to the same startling reality: A growing number of
international trade agreements are usurping state powers. Suddenly
alarmed that Washington is bargaining away their authority over
everything from regulating utilities to controlling land use, states
are all but ready to join the chorus of anti-globalization critics.
ERODING SUPPORT
The statehouse uprising against trade deals comes at a bad time for
President George W. Bush's trade policy. This summer, Congress will
debate the Central American Free Trade Agreement (CAFTA) between the
U.S., the Dominican Republic, and five Central American nations. It
will also consider whether to end U.S. membership in the WTO and extend
Presidential authority to negotiate future deals.
Business groups worry that an outside-the-Beltway rebellion will
overwhelm Congress's razor-thin support for trade deals. The National
Conference of State Legislatures, for example, may withdraw its
longtime support for so-called fast-track authority.
Such concerns from the heartland are already stiffening the
anti-globalization sentiments of those conservative Republicans who
view the WTO as an attempt to impose a one-world government. Elements
of the Right and the Left increasingly agree that modern trade deals
mostly serve the interests of multinationals intent on moving
investment and jobs offshore.
CAFTA is the most likely victim of this rising resistance. But
Corporate America fears that objections from the states could also
undermine its hopes of reaching the Holy Grail: reducing barriers in
developing nations to trade in services. Talks at the 148-nation WTO
that would center on trade in services are already a year behind
schedule. J. Robert Vastine, president of the Coalition of Service
Industries says fears among the states are "wildly exaggerated by
people who want to make free trade out to be the devil." But, he
concedes, "we are going to need a more carefully thought-out approach
to deal with all these concerns in the state capitals."
That won't be easy. The assault on sovereignty is rooted in a series of
trade agreements stretching back to the mid-1990s. The 1994 North
American Free Trade Agreement and the pact creating the WTO in 1995
both established three-judge panels that can authorize punitive tariffs
or fines against violators. These judges put teeth behind vaguely
worded commitments -- buried in hundreds of pages of arcane detail --
that nations will use the "least trade-restrictive" regulations and
laws "no more burdensome than necessary" to accomplish their social,
economic, and environmental goals. The unintended result: "These
agreements are not just about trade anymore," says Lori Wallach, a
trade-law expert at consumer watchdog Public Citizen. "They're about
every aspect of government."
Just ask California Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger. In December the
governor's advisers warned that proposed tax incentives meant to
encourage road builders to grind up California's annual harvest of 32
million used tires and blend them with asphalt would violate NAFTA by
putting Canadian and Mexican recyclers at a disadvantage.
Schwarzenegger vetoed the bill.
The next front could be a battle over state contracting rules. In 2003,
U.S. Trade Representative Robert B. Zoellick won backing for CAFTA from
22 governors, who pledged to adhere to whatever rules he negotiated for
state government contracting in that and future deals. But a third of
them have since withdrawn their support.
Under CAFTA, states say they wouldn't be able to give preferences to
local contractors. And laws under consideration by 30 state
legislatures to prohibit tax dollars from going to contractors who
offshore their work would be overturned by most trade agreements.
"Procurement rules...would constrain our ability [to favor in-state
business], an outcome that is, in my view, unacceptable," wrote Iowa
Governor Thomas J. Vilsack, a Democrat, in opting out of future trade
deals on procurement.
Trade rules can also come back to bite Washington, even though it led
the way in putting them in place. If Bush successfully engineers the
introduction of private Social Security accounts, WTO rules would
require the feds to let foreign money managers and insurers bid to
manage them, says Robert Stumberg, a trade law expert at Georgetown
University. "Congress has shifted a tremendous amount of power to the
WTO," he says. "But their rules are vague, and until a panel [of WTO
judges] tells you, you don't know what the rules mean."
The Bush Administration says it is trying to negotiate better trade
deals. It's seeking a rule change in NAFTA to head off "frivolous
lawsuits" and is consulting with states about their objections. At
states' insistence, for example, CAFTA specifically allows for minority
contract set-asides and affirmative action programs. But the
Administration continues to point out that the states also have a lot
to gain from free-trade deals -- reciprocal treatment for businesses
within their own borders. "If states want to pass restrictions on
awarding contracts, the costs could be severe for businesses in those
states," including the possibility of legal retaliation, says
Christopher Padilla, an assistant trade representative who deals with
the states.
But heartland capitals are more focused on the cost of free trade than
its benefits. Legislators won't "sit idly by while their constituents'
jobs are lost to competition from overseas," Utah's Allen wrote in a
January letter to Zoellick protesting the USTR's silence on the
offshoring issue.
The anti-globalization fire that has belatedly begun burning in the
states is being stoked by the U.S.'s record $671 billion, job-killing
trade deficit. And America's scorecard as a defendant in WTO courts
isn't helping either: It has won 10 decisions but lost 24, many of
which were among the costliest rulings thus far.
The U.S. hasn't yet lost a NAFTA decision, but states are carefully
watching two cases filed by Canadian companies. Methanex Corp. (MEOH )
is suing the U.S. for $500 million over California's ban on the use of
MTBE, a gasoline additive that has leaked into the soil and
contaminated groundwater. Glamis Gold Ltd. (GLG ) is also suing for $50
million over California's attempt to protect Indian burial sites in the
Imperial Valley from Glamis' open-pit mining practices. Both claim
state regulatory actions amount to expropriation of their assets. Notes
Abner J. Mikva, a former Illinois congressman and U.S. Court of Appeals
judge who served on a NAFTA panel in 1998: "If Congress had any idea
what they were voting on back then, they never would have passed
NAFTA."
Even more troubling for Bush & Co. is the anti-globalization wing of
the Republican Right, which will eagerly welcome state officials into
the fold. "The free traders have lost the moral and intellectual
argument because they can't come out and say CAFTA is good for
America," says Patrick J. Buchanan, the conservative talk-show
commentator who has long railed about America's loss of sovereignty to
world organizations.
No more than a handful or two of House Democrats are enthusiastic about
CAFTA, and the AFL-CIO and most enviro groups are fiercely opposed.
Foes on the Left estimate that as many as 40 House GOP members could
vote against the pact, which would likely doom the deal. If that
happens, some of the loudest sighs of relief will be heard in state
capitals.
By Paul Magnusson in Washington
12. +++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
http://www.azcentral.com/arizonarepublic/viewpoints/articles/0227flake0227.html
Trade deal would bolster C. America democracies
Jeff Flake
Feb. 27, 2005 12:00 AM
Much has been made about President Bush's efforts to promote democracy
and freedom across the world. Free trade agreements, in addition to
promoting the trade of goods and services, also promote the exchange of
ideas and values.
Central America has had a turbulent democratic past. The region was
plagued for decades by democratic repression, economic mismanagement
and civil war. It goes without saying that the six Central American
countries that make up the Central American Free Trade Agreement (Costa
Rica, El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras, Nicaragua and the Dominican
Republic) are strategically important to the United States. Together,
they represent a potentially significant trading bloc with the United
States.
Implementation of CAFTA will strengthen these burgeoning democracies
and further foster democracy and freedom in the region.
While CAFTA is not a perfect trade agreement, it will spur U.S.
economic investment and exports and promote further economic
development in the region. For these primary reasons, Congress should
pass CAFTA, and it should pursue similarly aggressive trade agreements
with our South American trade partners.
As the North American Free Trade Agreement has demonstrated, CAFTA will
begin to spur economic development and investment in both the United
States and in participating countries. Economic competition will reduce
costs for domestic producers and lower prices for consumers.
Critics of the agreement argue that reduced environmental and labor
standards in the participating countries will put pressure on U.S.
companies to cut corners or lower standards to compete.
Don't believe it.
Not only does CAFTA include strong provisions relating to environmental
and labor standards, but the critics' argument is based on an unproven
assumption. Around the world, we have seen that free trade raises
environmental and labor standards in developing countries, rather than
lowering the standards of more developed countries.
Critics of CAFTA have tried to scare people with many of the same
arguments that were made during the debate on NAFTA, despite the fact
that those predictions have not come true. We have not seen a rush of
American companies closing shop in the United States and rushing south
for cheap labor and lax environmental laws.
Instead, NAFTA has benefited Mexico's economy and helped set the stage
for the country's election of its first opposition party presidential
candidate, Vicente Fox.
As mentioned previously, CAFTA is not perfect. Tariffs on sugar and
textiles that may exacerbate problems in those industries in the long
run remain and will surely impede any price reductions for consumers.
However, those examples are the exception rather than the rule.
The agreement does not include provisions on immigration, which needs
to be considered in any discussion on trade. However, stabilizing and
growing the economies of developing countries in Central America should
help curb the influx of illegal immigrants into the United States.
Imperfections aside, CAFTA is a good deal for the United States as well
as American consumers and producers. It also will help foster economic
prosperity in Central America, which is also in the United States' best
interest.
Congress would be wise to take up CAFTA quickly and implement it as
soon as possible.
Jeff Flake represents Arizona's 6th Congressional District, which
includes parts of Mesa and Chandler and all of Gilbert, Queen Creek and
Apache Junction.
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