Abstract
Outsourcing has become a resource utilized by American companies to remain competitive in today’s global economy. There has been much discussion about the loss of American jobs due to outsourcing and free trade organizations. Many of the articles in this case deal with identifying two remedies: education and training, and flexibility. Experts in the field vary widely on what is the best practice and what these terms mean for the American worker. There is also a range of opinions on who is helped by adopting these practices.
The changing American worker
Outsourcing has become a popular option for many American companies. First, American companies do not have to compensate foreign workers as much as they do in the United States. In addition, American companies do not have to provide benefits such as costly health and retirement benefits to foreign workers. Therefore, outsourcing American work has led to job loss for many Americans. In the book, The World Is Flat, Thomas Freidman, a world-renown author and journalist, concludes that in the future, there will be plenty of jobs in America. He claims that individuals and companies have become globalized and that workers will need to make themselves untouchable or irreplaceable. Friedman sates, “This requires not only a new level of technical skills, but also a certain mental flexibility, self- motivation, and psychological mobility,” (Friedman 2006, p.278). How the American worker survives the results of free trade, globalization, NAFTA and the outsourcing of manufacturing will provide the basis for both individual and national economic sustainability.
Osterman (2004) calls for a change in public policy as far as the public employee and training s ...