Some of you have seen this picture before. I've just set up an account at flickr, and am testing out its post to blog feature.
Monday, November 29, 2004
Sunday, November 28, 2004
The Outsourcing Demon?
As many of you know, I am a frequent reader of The Economist. I read it for its clear analysis (mostly), witty insight, and excellent prose. It is one of the few publications that has actually convinced me of views which I did not previously hold, and it has done so repeatedly. Broadly speaking, The Economist could be said to espouse a view of capitalism and liberal humanism, and it is one with which I tend to agree. Though I might uphold postmodern views of indeterminacy in a metaphysical debate, when it comes to the material conditions of day-to-day life, I think one must assert something. I assume that no one will find fault with liberal humanism (at least in part because I've left it undefined), but that perhaps many have at least a partial sense of revulsion when the word 'capitalism' is uttered in a positive light. As horrific as the products of capitalism sometimes are, I think it is the best we've got. I'm not supporting completely unregulated markets—indeed, there are many instances in which markets fail—but, on the whole, freer markets produce better outcomes for all involved.
All this is a rather long preamble as to why I was so excited when last week's Economist arrived: inside, I found a survey on 'outsourcing'. However, much to my disappointment, The Economist simply presented the already extant American debate within a slightly more nuanced narrative. I had hoped that more analysis and space would be accorded to both the principal problem, and to one oft ignored benefit.
Before I go any further, let me add that The Economist very rightly points out that 'outsourcing' is not in fact the correct term for the phenomenon that has occupied so much political discourse over the past year. Strictly speaking, a good or service is 'outsourced' when a company stops producing it and instead purchases it. When production is outsourced, it is not necessarily moved overseas. What concerns so many critics of 'outsourcing' then is not actually 'outsourcing', but the movement of jobs overseas, something which does not require outsourcing as a company can—and many do—set up shop overseas. Unfortunately, having made this distinction, The Economist reverts to standard usage, I'll do my best to avoid this.
The problem with moving jobs overseas is that those jobs no longer exist at home. The western world has seen this before with manufacturing. Indeed, some have even referred to America as a post-industrial society because it now manufactures so very little. I think it more correct to see Mexico or China as the home of America's working class, but I digress. What has alarmed white-collar workers and their politicians is that the movement of jobs overseas is no longer limited to manufacturing. Service jobs have joined the pack, and now, when you phone American Airlines, or your credit card company, you may be speaking to someone half a world away in India. Thus, alarmists talk of greedy unpatriotic companies (Lou Dobbs), or Benedict Arnold companies (John Kerry), who are destroying American jobs.
Proponents retort that moving jobs overseas actually creates more jobs at home. The logic goes that the savings companies accrue by moving these jobs will translate into lower prices at home, which will, in turn, stimulate demand for other goods and services, some hitherto unheard of, and thus create new jobs at home. Whether or not we accept this as true, the problem that specific people have lost certain types of jobs remains. Whether or not these people will get new jobs depends on the availability of other jobs, and on their willingness and ability to retrain for those jobs. What needs to be discussed then is how society should deal with these people. Should their jobs be protected? Should they be offered compensation of some sort? Or, should they simply be left to fend for themselves? In the 'outsourcing' debate, the second question is seldom asked. Unfortunately, The Economist, by ignoring the material reality of the workers in question, does no better.
But this is not to say that I think moving jobs overseas is a bad idea. The oft-ignored benefit that I mentioned above is that jobs are created overseas. The Economist does mention this point in passing, but, with the exception of an anecdote about Indian workers' tastes for brand name clothes, offers nothing in the way of facts or figures to support the argument. Unfortunately, I am in no position to do so myself. But I will offer that, surely, all the anti-globalisers of the world can learn to appreciate a phenomenon that creates jobs in many underdeveloped countries around the world. They might retort that it's not really jobs that companies create, but opportunities to exploit underprivileged workers who have no recourse to a system of established rules and regulations. Though this has happened with manufacturing, it has by no means been the rule. As far as service jobs are concerned, the great majority require a fair degree of education, and thus such exploitation seems much less likely. More importantly, when exploitation has been made an issue, companies have often been forced to improve their practices. Unfortunately, this has not usually been a quick process, and many deplorable practices have gone unchecked for many years. Even so, change for the better has occured, and continues to occur—in large part thanks to the efforts of activists who have seized on the association between a corporation and its products. Thus, capitalism has, built in, a mechanism for dealing with such deplorable practices: it is called branding, which allows the exercise of consumer power. For example, since the campaign to eradicate child labour began, Nike has begun to pay a lot more attention to its supply chain, making a concerted effort to ensure that toddlers are not manufacturing its shoes. For a less hackneyed example, look at the rise in non-financial reporting, something that was almost unheard of ten years ago. At present, Britain is considering making such reporting mandatory.
At this point, there is an important digression that I'd like to make. If we don't like a company's practices, we need not support them. There are often many alternatives available, fair trade coffee (Equal Exchange, Fair Trade Federation, TransFair USA, Global Exchange, and others) and Rugmark come to mind. I admit, such alternatives are not always available, but this does not mean that the whole capitalist system ought to be trashed. NGOs and other assorted activists of the world deserve a great deal of credit for raising awareness about issues concerning the environment and social justice. Their work is important in large part for the information that it adds to the table, without which consumers would be unable to make choices that properly express their preferences (I don't mean to advocate market solutions in all cases, but in many, such solutions can work very well). A few years ago, a book by the name of No Logo achieved widespread acclaim. I should first admit that I have not read it and, unless someone convinces me otherwise, I don't plan to. Though I imagine that the author and I share a general distaste for contemporary forms of advertising and the consumer mentality that they engender, I believe that branding is very important. Brands are the mechanism through which consumers can hold companies to account. Without branding, a lot of the work that activists do to raise awareness would be useless. Again, if we don't like a company's product, we need not buy it. How do we know it's their product? Because they've branded it. Similarly, if we don't like a company's practices, we need not buy their products. Without branding, we would have neither fair trade coffee nor Rugmark rugs.
But back to why moving jobs offshore is, at least in part, a good thing: if the western world bogarts all the jobs, there will be none for other countries. Activists often decry the deplorable poverty that plagues much of the majority world, and so, I should think that a phenomenon that creates jobs in these countries would be applauded. What gives?
(comments wholeheartedly appreciated)
All this is a rather long preamble as to why I was so excited when last week's Economist arrived: inside, I found a survey on 'outsourcing'. However, much to my disappointment, The Economist simply presented the already extant American debate within a slightly more nuanced narrative. I had hoped that more analysis and space would be accorded to both the principal problem, and to one oft ignored benefit.
Before I go any further, let me add that The Economist very rightly points out that 'outsourcing' is not in fact the correct term for the phenomenon that has occupied so much political discourse over the past year. Strictly speaking, a good or service is 'outsourced' when a company stops producing it and instead purchases it. When production is outsourced, it is not necessarily moved overseas. What concerns so many critics of 'outsourcing' then is not actually 'outsourcing', but the movement of jobs overseas, something which does not require outsourcing as a company can—and many do—set up shop overseas. Unfortunately, having made this distinction, The Economist reverts to standard usage, I'll do my best to avoid this.
The problem with moving jobs overseas is that those jobs no longer exist at home. The western world has seen this before with manufacturing. Indeed, some have even referred to America as a post-industrial society because it now manufactures so very little. I think it more correct to see Mexico or China as the home of America's working class, but I digress. What has alarmed white-collar workers and their politicians is that the movement of jobs overseas is no longer limited to manufacturing. Service jobs have joined the pack, and now, when you phone American Airlines, or your credit card company, you may be speaking to someone half a world away in India. Thus, alarmists talk of greedy unpatriotic companies (Lou Dobbs), or Benedict Arnold companies (John Kerry), who are destroying American jobs.
Proponents retort that moving jobs overseas actually creates more jobs at home. The logic goes that the savings companies accrue by moving these jobs will translate into lower prices at home, which will, in turn, stimulate demand for other goods and services, some hitherto unheard of, and thus create new jobs at home. Whether or not we accept this as true, the problem that specific people have lost certain types of jobs remains. Whether or not these people will get new jobs depends on the availability of other jobs, and on their willingness and ability to retrain for those jobs. What needs to be discussed then is how society should deal with these people. Should their jobs be protected? Should they be offered compensation of some sort? Or, should they simply be left to fend for themselves? In the 'outsourcing' debate, the second question is seldom asked. Unfortunately, The Economist, by ignoring the material reality of the workers in question, does no better.
But this is not to say that I think moving jobs overseas is a bad idea. The oft-ignored benefit that I mentioned above is that jobs are created overseas. The Economist does mention this point in passing, but, with the exception of an anecdote about Indian workers' tastes for brand name clothes, offers nothing in the way of facts or figures to support the argument. Unfortunately, I am in no position to do so myself. But I will offer that, surely, all the anti-globalisers of the world can learn to appreciate a phenomenon that creates jobs in many underdeveloped countries around the world. They might retort that it's not really jobs that companies create, but opportunities to exploit underprivileged workers who have no recourse to a system of established rules and regulations. Though this has happened with manufacturing, it has by no means been the rule. As far as service jobs are concerned, the great majority require a fair degree of education, and thus such exploitation seems much less likely. More importantly, when exploitation has been made an issue, companies have often been forced to improve their practices. Unfortunately, this has not usually been a quick process, and many deplorable practices have gone unchecked for many years. Even so, change for the better has occured, and continues to occur—in large part thanks to the efforts of activists who have seized on the association between a corporation and its products. Thus, capitalism has, built in, a mechanism for dealing with such deplorable practices: it is called branding, which allows the exercise of consumer power. For example, since the campaign to eradicate child labour began, Nike has begun to pay a lot more attention to its supply chain, making a concerted effort to ensure that toddlers are not manufacturing its shoes. For a less hackneyed example, look at the rise in non-financial reporting, something that was almost unheard of ten years ago. At present, Britain is considering making such reporting mandatory.
At this point, there is an important digression that I'd like to make. If we don't like a company's practices, we need not support them. There are often many alternatives available, fair trade coffee (Equal Exchange, Fair Trade Federation, TransFair USA, Global Exchange, and others) and Rugmark come to mind. I admit, such alternatives are not always available, but this does not mean that the whole capitalist system ought to be trashed. NGOs and other assorted activists of the world deserve a great deal of credit for raising awareness about issues concerning the environment and social justice. Their work is important in large part for the information that it adds to the table, without which consumers would be unable to make choices that properly express their preferences (I don't mean to advocate market solutions in all cases, but in many, such solutions can work very well). A few years ago, a book by the name of No Logo achieved widespread acclaim. I should first admit that I have not read it and, unless someone convinces me otherwise, I don't plan to. Though I imagine that the author and I share a general distaste for contemporary forms of advertising and the consumer mentality that they engender, I believe that branding is very important. Brands are the mechanism through which consumers can hold companies to account. Without branding, a lot of the work that activists do to raise awareness would be useless. Again, if we don't like a company's product, we need not buy it. How do we know it's their product? Because they've branded it. Similarly, if we don't like a company's practices, we need not buy their products. Without branding, we would have neither fair trade coffee nor Rugmark rugs.
But back to why moving jobs offshore is, at least in part, a good thing: if the western world bogarts all the jobs, there will be none for other countries. Activists often decry the deplorable poverty that plagues much of the majority world, and so, I should think that a phenomenon that creates jobs in these countries would be applauded. What gives?
(comments wholeheartedly appreciated)
Wednesday, November 17, 2004
? what's in a name
rather more than you might think, but first an update on earlier events.
Pumpkin wine was a failure. Too much yeast, not enough pumpkin. May have had something to do with my having effectively aged the wine on the lees (dead yeast cells) as I was attempting to rack it. I do, however, now have some real wine yeast. Things can only get better from here.
I'm in the middle of writing a philosophy paper, focusing on a paper by Saul Kripke called 'Identity and Necessity". I'm mostly through the first step, providing a coherent account of the argument, and am now working on my own response. I've not the time to go into it now, nor I am really sure that you've the interest, but I'll just say this:
1. For any objects x and y, if x is identical to y, then if x has a certain property F, so does y (substitutivity of identity).
2. Every object is necessarily self-identical.
3. By substitution, we can conclude that, for every x and y, if x = y, it is necessary that x = y. [I don't know how to type logic thingies on here, but this is an instance of the substitutivity law stated in (1)]
4. Therefore, for any objects x and y, if x is y, then it is necessary that x is y.
This all might seem rather uninteresting until you apply it to identity statements, things like 'water is H2O', statements that many of us generally take to be contingent. Kripke proposes that the way out of the apparent paradox of (4) above, is not to regard such identity statements as contigent, but as necessary (specifically, Kripke argues the necessity of identity for both theoretical identity statements, such as 'water is H2O', and for names). For Kripke, any identity statement that involves two rigiddesignators, is necessarily true, if it is true at all. A 'rigid-designator' is any term that refers to the same thing in all possible worlds in which that things exists. Kripke eventually uses this position to argue that the materialist, specifically the 'identity theory' (Every mental state is identical with a particular brain state) view of the mind-body problem is problematic.
I must get back to the writing of the essay. I'll be up in Vancouver over Christmas. I hope that there are still some of you left back home.
Love Ev
Pumpkin wine was a failure. Too much yeast, not enough pumpkin. May have had something to do with my having effectively aged the wine on the lees (dead yeast cells) as I was attempting to rack it. I do, however, now have some real wine yeast. Things can only get better from here.
I'm in the middle of writing a philosophy paper, focusing on a paper by Saul Kripke called 'Identity and Necessity". I'm mostly through the first step, providing a coherent account of the argument, and am now working on my own response. I've not the time to go into it now, nor I am really sure that you've the interest, but I'll just say this:
1. For any objects x and y, if x is identical to y, then if x has a certain property F, so does y (substitutivity of identity).
2. Every object is necessarily self-identical.
3. By substitution, we can conclude that, for every x and y, if x = y, it is necessary that x = y. [I don't know how to type logic thingies on here, but this is an instance of the substitutivity law stated in (1)]
4. Therefore, for any objects x and y, if x is y, then it is necessary that x is y.
This all might seem rather uninteresting until you apply it to identity statements, things like 'water is H2O', statements that many of us generally take to be contingent. Kripke proposes that the way out of the apparent paradox of (4) above, is not to regard such identity statements as contigent, but as necessary (specifically, Kripke argues the necessity of identity for both theoretical identity statements, such as 'water is H2O', and for names). For Kripke, any identity statement that involves two rigiddesignators, is necessarily true, if it is true at all. A 'rigid-designator' is any term that refers to the same thing in all possible worlds in which that things exists. Kripke eventually uses this position to argue that the materialist, specifically the 'identity theory' (Every mental state is identical with a particular brain state) view of the mind-body problem is problematic.
I must get back to the writing of the essay. I'll be up in Vancouver over Christmas. I hope that there are still some of you left back home.
Love Ev
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