Re: FW: FW: FW: MIDRANGE-JOBS Digest, Vol 5, Issue 187

Joe I hope you are enjoying the debate ..... I am enjoying it, and I have read and looked at every fact sent. I especially enjoy when people like Karl are willing to share real life. You are correct numbers are cold and there is a human aspect to this debate and there are real people being affected by it. Obviously there is a segment out there that is feeling real pain or at least minor discomfort.

I enjoyed the article sjl sent from business week talking about engineering, I read it 3 times. Mr Wadhwa presented some great information and his conclusions are very interesting. He basic conclusion is India and China still have a long way to go to catch up, but they are trying hard. The US is doing better than people give us credit for but we can do better. I love the final part of the article:

"DON'T RELAX. We could also be doing a lot more to encourage U.S.
companies to expand U.S.-based research, to provide ongoing
education and training for their employees, and to work more closely
with universities in commercializing research.

Bottom line: Let's be really worried about looming competition, but
let's focus on the right things—and make more effective of use of
our strengths. Because after all, Friedman is right, in the future
India and China may catch up to where we are today."

Joe rather than the protectionist society you keep advocating for we need the competitive society Wadha talks about. Rather than protectionism we need to encourage expansion, competition, more ongoing training...... and as I obviously believe the more people who participate the more competition there will be (even from china and India) the better off we all will be. As those economies grow so will ours and instead of the collapse your predict the world will see prosperity like it never has before.

My final point is the technology field is very competitive, you can never assume anything about your job or the product you sell. If you employer is not providing ongoing training then you need to provide it for yourself. The numbers tell us that real wages are growing so if your wage is shrinking someone else's is growing and by your own admission the h-1b wages are not the ones causing real wage growth.

Bring on the Insanity.

I'm done, not because it has not been fun but I don't think Joe's blood pressure can take much more.

Shadrach