Forum Moderators: buckworks
The US has the physical and educational infrastructure and financial capital to bring a majority of citizens online and producing intellectual property on a fairly constant basis.
By IP, I refer to:
- content
- product management / product development
- marketing
- ecommerce engines
Basically, large numbers of people in the US would be responsible for writing informative content, determining what people want / need, developing those products, marketing them, and then supporting the infrastructure for purchasing / delivering / and high end or high touch technical or customer support.
Such things as manufacturing, backend, and even first level call center support would be offshored.
I only have one issue with this:
A certain % of the US population simply does not have the IQ to come online and participate. They will be stuck in low-end service oriented jobs. I worry about them a lot because clearly people from developing countries are going to create significant wage pressure on those individuals. Nothing can be done except to take huge economic steps backwards in terms of Free Trade.
However, if for a moment we can carelessly toss those worries aside, I think that the US has an opportunity here if they can reach out and grab it.
Basically, the US needs to focus a significant portion of technical schools and community college education towards eCommerce and content development.
I'll leave it up to the reader to figure out what that education might look like. What I find to be the interesting question is whether or not eCommerce can support the influx of millions of people wanting to compete in this arena.
My guess, rather faith based, is that yes. Especially since the more people working online .. the more people who will be buying things from the people already here.
We'll have more competitors but we'll also have a much larger market to sell into.
I imagine that when the exchange rates with China an India become real then the jobs will stop leaving.
Personally, I wrote my own E-Commerce program, but the only way I can get projects is to outsource my projects to India and act as a router.
I work for one of the major super computer manufacturers and anytime I have a problem with our crap microsoft workstations I have to call tech support instead of just fixing it myself. (Company Policy at work here....) All of our internal tech support is out of Panama or Mexico depending on the time of day. Biggest problem is that your system is broken for days at a time. I can't bloody stand it!
I work for an Investment Bank in the UK as techie. Nowadays when we hire new Java people we source them from India. Half the price for roughly the same skills. Hate to see that way but that's just pure economics.
I have to say honestly that the quality of the Indian staff is no where near as as good as the people from the UK but the bean counters make us do it. They are no bothered about productivity or skills - the more money they save the more bonuses they get. It's a shame but thats the way it's going.
On a wider note - the US has implemented some sort of protection against moving jobs out of the US. This is obviously good but is it sustainable? Why will companies pay 2/3 times the amount for Support and manufacturing roles. In the UK there is no protection for the workforce and there are loads of companies outsourcing thousands of jobs to India and the far east. It's simply inevitable. I hate to see it go this way but I feel that the US and Europe or in for a serious wake up call. The global workforce will become more and more integrated as IT makes it possible.
It's a nightmare for us but it will get more and prolific I think.
Adam
For one, there are a finite number of workers in this country. Granted population increases faster than it decreases, but that increase in population also produces an increase in demand for products and services and thus creates jobs on its own.
In America I don't see e-commerce jobs "replacing" traditional jobs directly, however I think that new jobs will spawn from the growth of e-commerce and THOSE jobs could replace traditional ones.
We're a product-driven country, not a content-driven one. We're consumers ... we buy crap we need and even more crap we DON'T need. Accessibility of information and services are secondary to products because we're cheap, lazy, and don't give a crap :)
Here's a more realistic example ... if a national grocery store chain were to allow online ordering, let's look at probably the most efficient way they could do it:
(1) Hire one person to develop an ECOM site and keep it up to date with prices, products, etc. This would be one full time position.
(2) Purchase a single "delivery van" for each store, or one for every "X" stores within a certain radius.
(3) Hire a person to grab products & deliver them in the van.
When you go online to buy groceries, the ecom site would direct your order to the nearest equipped store based on your zip code. A person there would pull the order, round up all of the products you want, and hop in the van to deliver them. This alone would create a number of jobs if we're basing the example on a national grocery store chain.
If a grocery store were to start offering this service for the exact same price as if you went to the store yourself with no delivery charge, no higher product prices. If they did it that way I think they would find that a LOT of people would start using the service. I personally would love to go online to buy groceries and know they'll be delivered here in a couple of hours or less, and I probably know more people who would do it than those who wouldn't.
Anyway ... my point is that the above scenario would create new jobs, but it would also REPLACE existing jobs. If half of a grocery store's customers were buying online, they would obviously need more than one van and more than one driver to deliver the products - but then they would only need half as many cashiers and stockers.
Jobs will only be "created" without replacing something when there is a higher demand for whatever the product or service is. Intellectual property as described by the original poster isn't something that's going to "sell" enough to justify the creation of jobs.
IMO online growth is going to be more product driven than content. It's going to create new jobs, but its going to destroy other jobs as it does. But I'm OK with that - how freakin cool would it be to go to Walmart.com and buy something, and instead of having to wait a week to have it shipped to you, someone could deliver it to your door in about 30 minutes. Those jobs would stay in our country.
Right now I am trying to launch my own company because when it comes down to it either you are making the decisions or you are replaceable.
steve
