Outsourcing skilled labor to foreign markets is dangerous for the American economy and does not benefit the domestic worker.  Exporting jobs to foreign countries that offer a skilled workforce at lower compensation benefits the companies doing the hiring and the foreign laborer.

Froma Harrop’s article “New threat to skilled U.S. Workers” first appeared in the Seattle Times on April 17, 2007.  Harrop’s concern is the rapid exodus of skilled workers to foreign countries to the detriment of the American worker and economy.  Harrop quotes two authoritative sources, one having studied the H-1B Visa.  This as a program cited for abuse contributing to the problem.  The contention is the Visa program, while well-intentioned, has opened the door for companies to train workers in the United States, only to export their skills to foreign markets once their training is complete.  This practice relays a cost benefit to the company’s payroll while suppressing the earning potential of domestic skilled labor.  Although Harrop’s article is compelling, it lacks concrete facts to support her ideas.  Her reasoning is sound and the reason should be addressed; however Harrop needs to represent her theories with more than opinions, hearsay, and unsubstantiated statistics.

Harrop quotes two authority figures.  Robert Blinder, a Princeton economist is Harrop’s first authority.  Although he is represented as an expert, economics is a broad based field and there is no way we can know this is in his area of expertise.  Blinder is quoted as saying “40 million” jobs could be lost overseas.  The estimate is certainly alarming but has no basis in evidence.  Where did Blinder get his information?  To quote 40 million jobs will be shipped overseas and the “U.S. worker was not consulted” seems to be an irresponsible and inflammatory assumption.  Blinder was further described as being “taken aback” by a conversation he overheard in Davos, Switzerland by business executives commenting on all of the “professional jobs they could outsource to lower wage paying companies.”  An overheard conversation cannot be utilized as evidence in an article specifying something as defined as skilled labor being exported to foreign markets.  Again, Harrop employs an assumption that lends an emotional value but little evidence to back it up.

Harrop quotes that Congress wants to increase the number of Visas because this would benefit both countries, but this conflicts with her earlier claims.  Harrop mentions Congress would like to increase the number of H-1B Visas to 115,000 per year.  Harrop seems to have forgotten the amount of jobs in danger of exportation was quoted as 40 million.  Citing this Visa as her primary evidence does not seem to support her earlier claims.

Ron Hira, a professor of public policy at the Rochester Institute of Technology, is Harrop’s next quoted expert.  Hira has studied the H-1B Visa and concluded there is abuse by foreign companies who are training their workers in America, then bringing them back to their country of origin to better interact with their American customer while paying them a lower wage.  Hira further claims the practice of “knowledge extraction” is replacing American workers right here at home by having skilled Americans train their own replacements.  While Hira’s first point could represent a contribution to the 40 million jobs lost overseas, his second point seems to open up a new argument not necessarily on topic.