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I raised this on Ask HN to little fanfare so hoping people could opine on my thoughts here: Does anyone else worry that the natural progression from this mass

I raised this on Ask HN to little fanfare so hoping people could opine on my thoughts here: Does anyone else worry that the natural progression from this mass WFH will simply lead to outsourcing in other countries instead of hiring American? Now that companies are learning the hard way to WFH, and were seeing memes like “now we’ll know which meetings could have been emails,” does it concern you all that the next logical step is to double down on platforms facilitating a WFH culture during the inevitable recession? The last recession in 2007 saw very slow job growth (compared to other recessions) simply because companies opted to adopt technology rather than train+hire expensive labor. I fear that the next leap will be widespread prioritization to set up satellite offices in India and other countries where labor is cheap. If I were a Fortune 500 CEO, my top priority during the coming recession would be to offset the lack of H1Bs in the US and just go straight to the source- because I know every other CEO would be doing the same. I fear for my future prospects a year from now.

sciencewolf 7y ago
This has been a fear for 30+ years now. And it seems like at the end of the day, for most companies, the decrease in cost of labor does not offset the increase in costs resulting from miscommunication, poor training, lack of care in quality of work, and increased times to delivery.
BLKNSLVR 7y ago
One of my takeaways from this situation is that there's been too much dependence outside the country. I actually think this situation will result in bringing some level of previously outsourced work back onshore. This may go hand-in-hand with a (degree of) rolling back the uber-capitalism of sacrificing long-term "anything and everything" for the potential of an immediate bump to the stock value.
xsmasher 7y ago
Yes and no. For work that doesn't require a lot of communication and collaboration, it'll be easy to outsource to other countries, just like now. For work that is intensely collaborative, having the team speaking one language in one (or adjacent) time zones is key.
frankish 7y ago
Depends on many variables, but salaries might be able to lower as people take advantage of moving to places with lower cost of living.

sciencewolf 7y ago

This has been a fear for 30+ years now. And it seems like at the end of the day, for most companies, the decrease in cost of labor does not offset the increase in costs resulting from miscommunication, poor training, lack of care in quality of work, and increased times to delivery.

BLKNSLVR 7y ago

One of my takeaways from this situation is that there's been too much dependence outside the country. I actually think this situation will result in bringing some level of previously outsourced work back onshore. This may go hand-in-hand with a (degree of) rolling back the uber-capitalism of sacrificing long-term "anything and everything" for the potential of an immediate bump to the stock value.

xsmasher 7y ago

Yes and no. For work that doesn't require a lot of communication and collaboration, it'll be easy to outsource to other countries, just like now. For work that is intensely collaborative, having the team speaking one language in one (or adjacent) time zones is key.

frankish 7y ago

Depends on many variables, but salaries might be able to lower as people take advantage of moving to places with lower cost of living.