>In that case why don't we buy our pharmacuticals from
>overseas?
We already are! Surely you've read stories of Americans
buying cheap
medicine from Canada. Heck, certain states are trying to
legalize this
practice so that their state Medicare systems can order
pharmaceuticals from
Canada and other states.
The only thing preventing this from happening on a more
widespread basis is
the law. But just think of the inequity of the system. You
can get the
cholesterol medication Lipitor (the #1 selling medication in
the world) for
about 30-50% cheaper in Canada than you can in the US. It
is the EXACT SAME
drug, produced by the EXACT SAME pharmaceutical company
(Pfizer).
Similarly, many European and Asian coutnries enjoy cheaper
prices for
pharmaceuticals for the EXACT SAME pharmaceuticals that we
use here. It's
just a matter of pricing strategies of the pharmaceutical
firms - that
foreign governments demand, through their single-payer
health care systems -
that drug companies charge them less. So they turn around
and stick American
consumers with high prices. And then those American
consumers respond by
getting cheap medication from Canada or other countries.
This is a running
problem that I hope will eventually be solved in a more
equitable manner.
>Why don't we outsource our legal system - anyone can
>learn our system...
To some extent, we already are! For example, many US law
firms are already
outsourcing much of the grunt legal work offshore. Let's
face it. A lot of
the currently billable hours that law firms charge, frankly,
can be done
anywhere, especially the legal research work, the drawing up
of contracts,
and basically all of the paperwork can be done overseas.
You need a
licensed attorney to oversee the process, but the grunt work
can and is
being done anywhere in the world.
http://www.legalaffairs.org/issues/May-
June-2005/scene_brook_mayjun05.msp
>Hell we might even outsource our military...
Aren't we basically doing that already, at least partially?
There are
thousands of private military contractors in Iraq. Without
them, the US
would either need to inject even more US troops into Iraq,
or Iraq would be
even less secure than it current is.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Private_military_contractor
http://www.cnn.com/2006/WORLD/meast/06/12/i
raq.contractors/index.html
>Exactly why should the rest of the world pay any sort
>of tribute to U.S.?
>We can outsource any professional job overseas - why
>start/stop with I.T.?
>Do you think we should pick our congressmen from
>overseas too? and the President?
>I mean they are "remotely" serving their
states...
>Think about it... It really is quite expensive to get
>an American to do most any job...
>I mean alot of I.T. guys work in sweatshops for
>$20-50k here in the U.S. and push 50-70 hours.
>Why not hire someonw with "5" master's degrees
and a
>tons of certs to manage your business, ALL ASPECTS OF
>YOUR BUSINESS = for say $20,000.00 per year.
>Who needs a CEO/CFO for say $1,000,000.00 -
>$35,000,000.00 any?
>Wait till the stockholders here this one.
>If they knew they could get a guy with more
"quals"
>than John Chambers who has 5 master's degrees and is
>only like 25-30 years old...
>What a bargain?
Here, I can tell that you are speaking facetiously. But it
all gets down to
a very simple point. If a particular business option really
can save you
money, why wouldn't you do it?
Let me give you a story. I remember being in a meeting not
that long ago
when a Cisco sales rep was pushing Callmanager, and one of
his main sellinng
points was that it would be cheaper than a traditional PBX.
Cheaper to buy,
cheaper to maintain, cheaper to integrate with the current
Cisco network,
just cheaper all the way around.
Nor is this story atypical. The tech industry has always
exhibited a
general trend of cheaper technologies replacing expensive
ones. Mainframes
were supplanted by cheaper minicomputers, which were
themselves supplanted
by cheaper workstations, which were were supplanted by
cheaper PC's. Linux
is winning market share because it is cheaper than UNIX or
Windows (and now
UNIX vendors like Solaris are trying to fight back by
cutting prices).
Microsoft won market share in the database market by selling
SQlServer for
less than Oracle. Part of the strategy by which Cisco
pushes MPLS to
service providers is that Cisco claims that doing so is
cheaper than running
an ATM core. Rarely in the tech industry does a popular
cheap technology
get supplanted by a more expensive version - it is almost
always that an
expensive technology gets supplanted by something cheap.
And the reason
for that is simple - everybody likes to save money.
So that begs the question - why is it OK to save money by
moving to cheaper
technology, but not OK to save money by outsourcing?
Ultimately, isn't it
the same thing? If Cisco VoIP takes share away from PBX
manufacturers, that
means that PBX techs will lose their jobs. But you as a
customer don't care
about that - you just want the cheaper product.
Would you call that a trojan horse too?
I'll give you another perspective. Companies perennially
use technology to
replace people. How many secretaries have lost their jobs
because of the
advent of word processing software? How many bookkeepers
became unemployed
because of the advent of spreadsheet software? How many
bank tellers have
lost their jobs because of the rise of online banking
websites and ATM
machines? How many travel agents have lost their jobs
because of the rise
of Internet travel sites? How many encyclopedia salesmen
have lost their
jobs because of wikipedia? How many flea markets and
specialty collectors'
stores have been bankrupted by Ebay? How many regional
bookstores have been
bankrupted by Amazon?
So that just begs the question - why is it OK to replace
jobs with
technology, but not OK to move jobs overseas? At the end of
the day, isn't
it really the same thing? Either way, you're replacing
labor with
something cheaper. The only different is what that
'something' is - whether
it's a foreigner or a piece of software. But at the end of
the day, the job
is still eliminated. So what's the difference?
Is that also a trojan horse?
Message Posted at:
http://www.groupstudy.com/form/read.php?f=7
&i=118285&t=118243
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