India's Software Industry Predicts Outsourcing to Expand

Indian software interest groups are predicting a boom in outsourcing as the United States begins to understand the concept more and more. Notwithstanding the backlash experienced by India as U.S. news reports have portrayed the transfer of U.S. jobs to foreign companies, the reality of globalism and global competition in a new generation of technology is leading more and more American companies to come to terms with the simple fact that to remain globally competitive, they must use all of the tools and resources that they can, including outsourcing. Sunil Mehta, the Vice-President of Indian software lobby group Nasscom, said that certain U.S. law firms (which were not identified) are drawing up an industry-approach paper intended to create a "professional services visa" to be submitted to the U.S. government. [For the record, we are not a part of that group, nor do I think that the concept of a professional services visa has an ice cube's chance in hell under this Administration and with this Congress.] Mehta further noted that bringing down the number of visas to 65,000 would not have very much impact as the country annually needed about 25,000 visas every year. Get this:

"Offshore work is going up, which means that you need lesser numbers of visas."

The same day that I received this e-mail from my buddy Sanjeev, another intrepid volunteer reporter, I received a very sad and distraught e-mail from a lady who's experiencing a terrible situation as a result of her IT unemployment in the United States, as an H-1B professional. I have e-mailed her and asked permission to share her letter, and I didn't get a response in time for the preparation of this week's column. It seems that those who are suffering in the United States are across the board: U.S. employees displaced by foreign workers as well as foreign workers who are suddenly being treated like disposable gloves. All in all, these are symptoms of an uncaring system which calls these folks "temporary workers," when in reality there is a great big "wink wink," fully understanding that what we intend to do when we bring them over here is create a mechanism for permanent residency. It stinks and it plays with people's lives, whatever color your passport.

So what to do about outsourcing? Prohibit it? Make IT companies rely exclusively on U.S. employees, in a nation where kids are simply disinterested in programming and where the path to success is more often seen through the eyes of a TV personal injury lawyer assuring you that you have rights the minute somebody dings your fender? Please. As Tancredo and other Fools on the Hill continue to "protect the American worker," we are sinking into a navel-gazing isolationist economy in total disregard of the world going on around us. By creating inaccessibility for U.S. corporations, we will not diminish the greed or profit expectations of their shareholders, who will simply move operations abroad. It is a simple formula, but apparently too complex for our elected leaders.

The end result is clear, whatever your politics. The jobs will move abroad, to wit...

Silicon India Career Factory: Opportunities in India

As if to further emphasize the trend I am discussing, the information technology's leading information magazine, Silicon India, recently hosted a sold-out event (on June 24) at the Hilton in Iselin, NJ. The Career Factory event was notable not in that it was seeking to hire IT professionals during a time of colossal unemployment in the United States...that in and of itself would have been notable and reportable. What truly made the Silicon India Career Factory event staggering was that it featured jobs seeking to fill job opportunities in India, recruiting in the United States. That's right, folks, the proverbial "brain drain" has not only stopped, but the vacuum is flowing in the other direction. I spoke to a few folks who were planning on attending, and the comments were pretty consistent. The United States has made them feel like absolute pieces of garbage as far as their immigration treatment. They've been here as H-1Bs, working long hours, and the minute that the employment situation changed, hostility from American coworkers, bad press, and everything has left them feeling like outcasts. They all feel as if changes in the global economy have suddenly made criminals out of them... as if they had personally caused the economic situation in this country. One of them told me that he was absolutely perplexed at living in a nation which could fully support a President who has just "pissed away" the national pocketbook on an unneeded war and sent the economy into turmoil, and yet the worker is held accountable when just a few years ago he was recruited quite aggressively and offered a six-figure salary to take a job for which no Americans were available... he was just disgusted.

They're heading home, to live like very wealthy individuals, and to eat their food and live with their people. They're heading home to be big shots in the country from whence they came, and no doubt they'll be heading home to a small murmur, or even at times loud choruses, of "good riddens." As they leave to take their new positions in Bombay, in Delhi, and in other places in a booming new India, what they will leave behind them in the United States are executive, managerial, and complex programing jobs that are currently filled by a cadre of American individuals who are pretty much not doing what they prefer to be doing. In their wake also are children, friends, mortgages, half-finished college degrees, high school girlfriends left behind... and ballots perforated by Americans who voted for the elimination of visa categories to "save American jobs" and corporations who will have no choice but to move more and more divisions abroad.

What was that line about the forest and the trees?

One More on India

U.S. Trade Representative to India, Robert Zoellick, assured visiting Indian Commerce and Industry Minister Arun Jaitley that Social Security benefits will be assured for Indian professionals who have worked in the United States. Meeting with Zoellick and Commerce Secretary Bob Evans (not clear if he is related to the restaurant chain), Jaitley pressed for the signing of a "Totalization Agreement" which would help thousands of IT professionals who continue to pay Social Security taxes while living and working in the United States but who are ultimately unable to derive any Social Security benefits once they leave the country. Under current U.S. law, a foreign professional who pays Social Security in the United States can only be entitled to benefits once they complete 10 years of employment in the U.S. Unfortunately, as you guys know, the H-1B's limitation is 6 years... Stinks, doesn't it? So that $500 you cough up every year to the Social Security Administration is basically a tax on nothing. Under the terms of the Totalization Agreement, India would receive the same type of treatment that about 15 other countries have with the U.S., where the moneys are credited to retirement funds in various formats. Apparently, India has been raising this "for a very long period," but it has yet to be resolved. We'll have to wait and see what is decided...

La Reina is Dead, Long Live La Reina

I received several sympathetic e-mails last week from our readers who know me well regarding the deaths of two of my favorite Cuban performers, Compay Segundo and her majesty Celia Cruz. Compay Segundo was 95 years old when the good Lord called him to the big "Chan Chan" in the sky, and I am sure that he and my father are swinging to a nice, slow Cuban son at this very moment. Jose Manuel Palli, Mayda Prego, and I stood, transfixed, in front of his gate last January in Havana as the driver casually told us that we were at his home, but that he happened to be out of town recording in another village. I almost got to see Compay, but that will have to wait for now.

The death of Celia was less of a surprise to me - I guess one should never be surprised when a 95-year-old passes away, right? (: Especially since she had been suffering from cancer and had been fighting it for a considerable amount of time. Most of you probably saw Celia at some point with her giant heels, big old nails, and crazy hair... but not many of you knew the sweetness of her voice, and the love for her "Cabezita de Algodon" or "cotton head," as she called her beloved husband of 41 years, trumpet player Pedro Knight. Another thing that many of you don't know is that my very first recorded CD, "Navegue con Amor," was released on Polygram Records as a compilation of classic Cuban songs, including one from Celia. Although the album bore my name, I only sang the title song and it was the very prestigious inclusion of Celia's prior recording and the Polygram Label which ever led Orfeon/Sony to even consider doing a full Jose Latour album... without even knowing me, Celia Cruz was helping with my music. But the clencher for me is that I have just finished writing "Yo De Aqui Soy" ("I Am From Here"), a duet where a Cuban-American who has returned to his Island (me) is talking about how great it is to be back home while being gently corrected and rebuked by the real Cuban who has remained there through all of the Castro years and can see it as it really is. I had written this song in the hopes that I could persuade a great, classic Latin singer such as Celia Cruz or Tito Puente to record it with me for inclusion in my next Spanish album. The great Tito Puente died a few years ago, and now Celia... Alas, this will have to wait for now, as well.

Please take the time to surf the web and read about these two amazing performers who contributed so much to the lives of so many. They will be greatly missed.

Have a great weekend, folks. Relax, listen to some great music, and enjoy the summer sun and breeze.

- Jose