American Job Creation, At Home And Abroad

Published August 1, 2017 at 9:00 AM CDT

The offshoring of American tech jobs is slowing. How do companies decide now which jobs stay here, and which ones go abroad?

Stunning moves at the White House yesterday, with General John Kelly in as chief of staff and Wall Street fast-talker – crude talker — Anthony Scaramucci out as director of communications after just 10 days on the job. What happened in that pressure cooker? Atlantic writer Molly Ball has the story and she’s here to share it. Plus, we’re looking today at outsourced jobs staying inside the USA. This hour On Point: the Scaramucci bounce, and American jobs outsourced in America. — Tom Ashbrook

Guests

Molly Ball, staff writer at The Atlantic, covering U.S. politics. ( @mollyesque)

Steve Lohr, technology, business and economics reporter for the New York Times. ( @SteveLohr)

Ron Hira, professor of public policy at Howard University. Research associate with the Economic Policy Institute.

Monty Hamilton, CEO of Rural Sourcing, an onshore domestic software development firm. ( @mphamilton)

From Tom’s Reading List

New York Times: Hot Spot for Tech Outsourcing: The United States — “Salaries have risen in places like South Asia, making outsourcing there less of a bargain. In addition, as brands pour energy and money into their websites and mobile apps, more of them are deciding that there is value in having developers in the same time zone, or at least on the same continent.”

VentureBeat: Why I outsourced to Michigan instead of India — “For one CTO, offshoring software development seemed like a good idea. Six years ago, the CTO joined a fintech company that had a history of sending coding projects to India, China, Vietnam, and Ukraine. Like so many U.S. corporations, this fintech company sent work overseas to take advantage of low-cost labor. However, after one year on the job, the CTO changed course and began outsourcing to Michigan. ‘We’ve shifted 90 percent of our outsourced work to Michigan over the past five years,’ he said. ‘In my mind, it’s not about dollars and cents, but about value.'”

Washington Post: Foxconn announces new factory in Wisconsin in much-needed win for Trump and Scott Walker — “The move by Foxconn to open its first major factory in the United States is a break with global manufacturing trends over the past 30 years. Foxconn builds electronic gadgets for nearly every major technology company, including Apple, Google and Amazon.com, in massive factories in Asia, South America and Eastern Europe. But until now, it has had a very limited presence in developed countries where labor costs are higher.”