Substitute Nortel Networks (and others). For years Nortel has been outsourcing its software to India and hiring H1 workers from India (and other countries). Now, with the downturn a couple of years ago, Nortel fired 2/3 of its staff (90,000+ --> 30,000-), and increased by thousands the number of positions filled by Indian contractors. It has also left millions of square feet of office space available for others. This trend will only get worse (for Americans).
But, we should not be so surprised, as automakers, shoemakers, electronics manufacturers, etc., have been shipping jobs overseas for decades. Its just the telecommunication industry's turn. The Indians are hungry for work, and bid the price down. Even without shipping jobs overseas, the aftermath of the dot-com bust is the emergence of a new age.
One might say the Information Age has come and gone. Just as we still have vestages of the Industrial Age, we have ongoing benefits of the Information Age. It has left us with a mature industry that has given us, for example, wireless phones for the same price as our wireline phones. Wireline phone companies are competing directly against the wireless phone companies for our business (witness the heartofore-unheardof offers for unlimited flat-rate local and long distance service). But, hey, I can buy a brand-new computer for under $800, that runs twice as fast and has twice the hard-drive space as a computer that only a couple of years ago would cost $2000.
This is the age of "Do more with less". In telecommunications, the (not-so-distant) future holds total voice over IP, putting all the huge telephone switches on the junk pile. It holds wireless data hubs in every neighborhood, putting all the cable and DSL POPs out to pasture. These are examples of "do more with less". This trend will affect jobs just as much as outsourcing.
Yes, age does play a part. This will hurt even more as the Boomers (of which I am one) mature. But, it is just the way jobs are flowing. As a consequence of this new trend, we may have to "do more with less" in our personal lives, too.
Wouldn't it be great if suddenly there was a market for energy efficient appliances and homes, and clean energy generation? There's an industry we could start here in America, benefit from its growth, and then ship the jobs overseas.
I hope the suit against Sun, if it is discriminatory, is successful. It won't stem the tide of jobs, but it will make it a bit more expensive for the companies that are not mindful of the negative impact of cutting corners.
