They Were Expendable

All the people working from home because of the Democrats’ Covid-19 response think they are essential. No, their jobs were declared essential to prevent widespread unrest, but the individuals performing the function are not essential. They are largely  interchangeable personnel units.

If a job can be done from my basement in Como Park, it could be done from a warehouse in Bombay, India. Think about this Summer as a giant dry run for outsourcing your job.
 The Luddites were right, in the end.

Joe Doakes

That’s true in all too many cases – although there are quite a few jobs where that has historically worked out very badly, mine (fingers crossed) among ’em.

But is this something that’s being harnessed to pave the way for “Universal Basic Income”? Which is another term for “Universal Dependence on Government”?

9 thoughts on “They Were Expendable

  1. I can’t speak for those doing legal work in a basement of Como Park, but in my experience, those employees working in warehouses in India leave much to be desired in the quality of their work. They’re very nice, industrious, eager to learn, and utterly hopeless. This knowledge is widespread and well-known, especially in the certain fields in which I worked.

    On the other hand, as a figurative cat’s paw to “Universal Basic Income” et al, sure why not?

  2. jdm, you’re right, India is an extreme example and maybe a poor one. How about something closer to home?

    Imagine two 29-year-old women, both graduates of St. Cloud State, both Education majors, both B+ students, both with Minnesota teaching licenses and eight years teaching experience.

    One lives in Wisconsin and commutes to Stillwater where she teaches in the local charter school. The other lives in Alabama where she teaches in the local school.

    Counting pay and benefits, who costs more? Without a doubt, the Wisconsin teacher.

    If we’re not having in-class teachers, if distance learning is being done over the internet, why not hire the Alabama resident instead of the Wisconsin resident and thereby save a bundle?

  3. Apologies, JD. My response about Indian workers was not meant as a criticism of your comment which I found utterly plausible. I was merely commenting on the generally disappointing results (in the field from which I retired).

    I can’t comment on the quality of teachers nor teaching in AL vs WI, but I will say, with pretty good authority, that SCSU’s Education major program is not set up to make good teachers, but well-indoctrinated ones.

  4. Universal Basic Income Economics 101:

    “Oh boy, Oh boy, a check for $1,000 every month!! I’m thinking a new Harley.”

    “WTF!! Why did my rent go up $400 a month?”

    “WTF!!, and my utilities went up too!!”

    “Holy SH*T!! Now Verizon is getting in on the act!!”

    “Jumping Jesus, County Child Support just clipped me for an additional $330 and with the rent, utilities, phone, insurance and bus fare all going up, now I’m underwater…..

    No….

    Of course I am still voting for Ilham Omar. Not sure I see your connection.”

  5. Another way to look at it – Globalism. Soros must be doing a jig every morning this calamity is perpetuated by his acolytes and public continues to buy it hook line and sinker.

  6. Wait for it…

    Wait for it…

    There is another shoe whistling through the air, aimed at the floor.

    “Those who resist outsourcing to the third world are white supremacist racists.”

  7. jdm, I know where you’re coming from. In the early 00’s our company decided to open a design bureau in Shanghai with engineers costing 75% less than us.

    The decision of management was to take an internal linear voltage regulator from my block and give it to them to “save me time”. The first one they delivered after 3 months was unstable at some process corners and used all minimum width metal everywhere, which was laughable since it was supposed to deliver a lot of current. When I looked at the design after my manager had some questions, I was apoplectic when I came back with my detailed criticism.

    The second one they delivered after another 6 months was incredibly huge and inefficient. I howled, spent one week redesigning it and came in at 25% of the size they’d designed, and was stable over all corners and met all the specs — theirs hadn’t. I walked into my manager, showed him what I’d done and explained that the 3 engineers in Shanghai had cost us more than 6 times what it would have cost to just give me the time to work on that. And I pointed out that I had just earned the company over $10M from just the area savings (the price of the chip was pretty much fixed, so area savings translated directly into profit).

    Strangely enough, they never asked me to work with Shanghai again.

    The Chinese have learned a lot, but their salaries have increased even faster than their productivity. Right now it’s over 75% the cost of US engineers, but their productivity is maybe 40%.

    One thing I don’t like is the rigid social and hierarchical design environment over there. When you do custom analog design like I do they assign a technician who specializes in changing my schematic into the polygons that form the masks to make the chips. These guys usually have tech college degrees, while the folks who do what I do never have less than a Master’s. In China, the designers are in the upper hierarchy and it’s unseemly for them to take feedback from the “lower class” mask designers. To say to that that alone leads to lots of bad results is understating things. I tell my mask guy, “Look, challenge me on anything and ask me anything, and if something seems strange, ask me. If you see something I did that isn’t optimal in terms of layout TELL ME. I don’t know all the ins and out of your job or the deep technology details so I’m willing to do anything I can to make what you do better. After all, we tape out polygons, not schematics.” They give me feedback that’s absolutely essential to making good chips, and I appreciate it. We’re a team enabling each other, rather than a knight ruling over a page as it is in China.

    And our Singapore design center is a thing of the past.

  8. nerdbert, yes to everything you wrote. I can’t speak to having had any experience with Chinese or Singaporean engineers, but I’m not surprised by yours. Thanks for the info.

  9. I’ve had very good and very bad experiences with Asian engineers, but I can also concur with others regarding their capabilities. I would dare suggest that their wages are indeed rising with their capabilities, and that as a result, U.S. engineers have less to fear except from management which is unaware of the relative capabilities.

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